Resources

Tools and Resources

The Worklab is a collection of equipment and tools for prototyping and testing ideas. Here you can learn new technologies like digital fabrication through workshops and demonstrations, and apply them as part of a business team, as a researcher, or a community member with an idea to make a better widget. The Worklab is a makerspace, and houses the equipment below with a goal to provide access to anyone who wants to learn safe and economic use of advanced tooling, anyone who can become a steward for the space, and anyone who is willing to volunteer time in IF in a capacity that suits their strengths.

You are provided materials during workshops and courses in the Worklab, but when using the space for research, private prototyping, personal projects, IFternship teams, and Innovation Certificate capstone teams, you will be expected to BRING your own material for the processes you are utilizing. Some of our equipment bears a per-minute cost to pay for associated maintenance and consumables.

Much of our equipment is part of new campus loan and donation program, where areas that have equipment which no longer gets used, or can’t be maintained, is loaned or given to the IF so that access can be provided to the entire community with the goal of regular maintenance or improvements. 

  • 3D printers, large, small, new materials, faster prototypes to scale
  • Laser cutter, 100w, Co2 Boss Laser for cutting acrylic, 1/4 plywood, foam, paper, fabric, etc.
  • Vinyl Cutter, 32” width for large decals and stickers, and adaptable for cnc drawings
  • Acrylic forming station, vacuum formers, benders.
  • Industrial sewing machine with large array of stitch patterns
  • Hand tools, power tools, and bins of fasteners and scraps.
IF Worklab

The Garage

To encourage serious play and invention, independent from prescribed outcomes, IF also includes a Tinkerspace for walk-in self-guided exploration. This includes carts or stations for all sorts of modeling: 3-D modeling software, 3-D scanners, a sewing station, Lego robotics, Arduino and sensor tech kits, 3-D pens, modeling clay, electronics, RC cars and drones, robotic arms, blocks, foil, string, and rolls and rolls of free paper!

In the Tinkerspace you can:

  • fix a button on your jacket
  • trace complex patterns from an x-ray lightbox
  • hack an RC car with an HD camera
  • sketch a visualization in yarn on the wall
  • draw abstract designs with a vinyl cutter

The Tinkerspace explores how systems, forms, or information can be arranged in empowering ways. The physical sketching that unfurls in the Tinkerspace partners iterative development with wonder and provides an opportunity for students to develop a workflow with their own creative touch.