RUG/California/Bay Area

Forum/Mailing List

Alternative Mailing List

http://groups.google.com/group/bay-area-reprap

Meeting times and location

Generally Wednesdays from 7pm to 11pm.

Refer to the Calendar and Google Group for more information.

Local Related Communities and Resources

Places

• https://www.noisebridge.net/wiki/Noisebridge
• http://thecrucible.org/
• http://www.buildcoolstuff.com/
• http://hackerdojo.pbworks.com/
• http://www.betalab01.org/

Nearby Robot Hobby Clubs

• Home Brew Robotics Club
• San Francisco Robotics Society of America
• http://www.robogames.net/
• http://www.meetup.com/makesf/
• http://www.betalab01.org/

Model Engineering

• Area Engine Modelers
• http://www.ggls.org/default.aspx

Model Making

• http://www.ipmsmtdiablo.org/home.htm
• http://www.ipmssantarosa.org/
• http://www.ipmssantarosa.org/links.htm

Community Machine/Fabrication Shops

• TechShop San Francisco
• TechShop San Jose and TechShop Menlo Park
• http://www.sawdustshop.com/location.asp

Hobby Shops

• http://billabbott.wordpress.com/2008/01/16/6/

Official RepRap Suppliers

• The For Sale Forum (anyone with a RepRap is an official supplier).]
• Suppliers

Local Suppliers

Local Shops may be better or worse than buying from online retailers. This depends on your local shops and what you're getting. Stepper motors you'll want to get online, steel rod - perhaps not. Fasteners, it depends. You may want to check your yellow pages to look these up, as opposed to online. If you find any place good, tack it up here.

Hardware

• Mr. Metric - Mr. Metric does online and phone orders but also has a physical location in San Jose to pick up in person. They don't stock rod, but they have reasonable prices on various metric fasteners.
• Olander - Another source for metric fasteners, in Sunnyvale.
• Orchard Supply Hardware - They have fairly expensive small packs of metric hardware. One can also get print bed sized pieces of glass cut extremely cheaply. A 8" by 8" sheet costs around $1.

Electronics

• Halted - Halted has a location in Santa Clara with an enormous selection of connectors, resistors, capacitors, wire, and so on for much cheaper than can be found online. They also have used computer components and random finds like 1.5mm aluminum sheets roughly the right size to use as a print bed.

(Example) Local Construction Steel Suppliers

http://www.yellowpages.com/san-francisco-california/construction-steel?g=san+francisco+california&q=construction+steel