Hey Fatman, wanna build a pipe stand??

As some of you might know, I have knocked up a couple or three electronic pipes in the past. Being the cheapskate I am, I never got around to buying or building stands for them.

I have been holding off until I could come up with a charging station where you just place the pipe in, and the thing charges, without plugging it in.

Writers call it mental block? I call it apathy!! Given up on that idea out of necessity. The good lady has made it plain that she is fed up with these pipes just lying around, and they need a home.

The pipes in question have a touch circuit. Now the idea of this (For the uninitiated) is that when you touch two points on the pipe, the thing fires and you can get your nicotine hit.

The two points are the top cap on the bowl, and a contact at the bottom of the bowl. The bottom contact is a small rare earth magnet. For no other reason than I had them lying around when building these things.

The remedy (in the short term) was to take the first mod stand I built and set another couple of magnets into the ends of the stand. Eureka, two pipes standing up on their own, and a happy wife (in the short term)

There are commercial magnetic pipe stands on the market, but these involve dropping a magnetic ball into the pipe. Not ideal for my situation.

I will eventually build the charging station, but Fatman keeps throwing obstacles in my way!!!

If anybody wants to go this route, make sure the magnet “Polarity” is correct before gluing into place. Take it from me, they are realy, realy realy difficult to remove!!!!

 

Love that skull pipe!

 

Look really great and an excellent idea and workmanship.

 

Just a thought Rob but rather than using another magnet, why not use a steel washer (plated for rust resistance) in the stand. That would remove the issue of polarity & make it easier to remove the pipe from the stand, for those without your superhuman strength

 

Brilliant solution to a finicky problem Rob ... as always , its often the simplest things that work the best !
Its not just your head I do in with this charger base issue , I do mine in too LOL

I am thinking it might be easier to take a leaf from your book , have them magnetically dock with a single magnet in the pipe , and have that magnet locate them on a mini charge jack ? Like a male 2.5mm sticking up that mates into a female jack socket in the pipe body .... no chance of accidental discharge from the pipe that way ?
I dunno , too much thinking , not enough doing lately LOL

 

Like the bottom of a Kambrook kettle?
Very nice work I must say.

 

Thats the one LOL

 

I would have had the job done months ago, but you were being very finicky, worrying about safety!!!

Using the charge jack idea, you could do away with the magnet as the jack would support the pipe. I'll think about it, but not telling you till its done. Dont need brains intruding on this type of project!!

 

Nice idea? The problem is the magnet size required would be too big for the pipe. The ones I have used were really only intended as a touch contact, so didn't need to be very big. They are well glued in, so removing them is not an option. Much of the magnetism is lost anyway due to the heat when soldering the contact wires inside the bowl.

 

The Mac laptop uses a magnetic three pin to dock with its power cord.

check one out, or I can post some pics later......not in a good condition to take pics Atm

 

Thanks for that. I have seen those types of magnetic docks. My whole philosophy playing around like this is Cheap!!! I dont like buying stuff unless its shiny!!

 

You could make it shiny, and it has a tiny led to let you know its charging status.

As for cheap maybe possible to get 2nd hand on ebay or a chinese copy.