HVW Sale, Useless Machine, Pitsco

Fun fact: As I type this out, I'm doing so not while sitting at my desk, but sitting on it. I highly recommend you try it. Probably not very ergonomic, but hey. When the boss temporarily commandeers your chair, you gotta make do with what you got.

So this week we have a few small tidbits. To kick things off, our sister site HVWtech.com is throwin' a bit of a mid-summer shindig. A handful of items will be on sale  each week from a different brand, but quantities are limited so you better check it out quick. There has also been a decent fistful of new items added, including some SparkFun and Gravitron stock. Head on over to check it out.

Have you heard of the Most Useless Machine? Well, apparently Stephen Colbert has (hey look, a link for Canadians, too! Dear Comedy Central, making your websites region-specific is stupid). And if you want to make your own such device, we suggest checking out this fantastic tutorial over at MakeProjects. As it turns out, we carry almost all of the items you'll need, such as:

• GM2 Gearmotor
• GMW Gearmotor Wheel
• GMB28 Motor Bracket
• BHoldAAx4 Battery Holder
• SPDT Snap Lever Switch

You'll still need to get a hold of the box, wire, and DPDT switch, but we should have enough for you to assemble most of the electronic guts for building something... Useless, apparently.

You know who we like? Our distributors. They're like our top secret super agents that infiltrate foreign lands with their cool business to publicly sell our kits and components. So we'd like to introduce and brand new feature for our news posts - Meet a Distributor!First up are our pals at Pitsco, who focus on Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math. They handle all sorts of neat stuff, mainly geared towards schools and education. The best part is that their online store is totally open to everyone. Here's how they describe their company:

In 1971, three teachers started a company with two simple goals. The first was to provide their colleagues much-needed innovative products for teaching technology education concepts. The second was to deliver on the promise of great customer service.

For almost 40 years, their once part-time endeavor has expanded beyond technology education to also cover science, math, and engineering and now serves millions of teachers and students with thousands of innovative, hands-on products and industry-leading customer service. Thousands of activities and projects covering CO2 dragsters, aerospace, sustainable energy, structures, engineering, and more are available. Each activity provides students a motivating, hands-on experience and helps teachers ensure student success in today’s standards-based classrooms.

They've certainly been around for a long time and have an impressive track record. These guys operate right out of Pittsburg, so if you live in the area and need some Solarbotics goods (or any of the other great stuff they carry), give Pitsco a call or check out their site.

Well folks, that about wraps things up. Remember, if you want to review a BeetleBot you better get an email in to chris [at] solarbotics [dot] com really soon. We'll be selecting and emailing the lucky participants at the end of next week.I'm on a horse.Er, desk.