Not all upgrades are a good idea

Sure, it seems harmless and innocuous at first.  A little upgrade here, a little upgrade there.  A super strong metalic arm, a sweet head’s up display, maybe an embedded MP3 player.  People, don’t you understand – no good can come of mashing up evil cyborgs and dispensers of delicious candy?!  The next thing you know we have replicas of talk show hosts and disruptive CEO’s.  I urge, no – I implore you, please stop the madness.  And, whatever you do, do not create an evil cyborg action figure that can walk on it’s own.

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P.S. A special thanks to TeamTeamUSA, 7777773, Tony Buser, jbakutis, skimbal, I-Bioloid, Luis, and InnovationByLayers for bringing us just a little closer to Judgment Day and the robopocalypse.

P.P. S.  Okay.  You got me.  I’m not really that worried about the coming robopocalypse.  I really just wanted a post highlighting awesome Doctor Who-themed things on Thingiverse so I could post THIS:

Thanks for the head’s up Sasha!!!

I wanted to use a metal spring for a new design.  However, the problem with metal springs is trying to find something that is useful, ubiquitous, and cheap.  However, I was shocked that I simply could not find any pictures anywhere on the internet of the inside of a Pez dispenser!  After a little help from Chris Connors, I decided that the metal spring from inside a Pez dispenser would be absolutely perfect for my application.  After locating a Pez dispenser of my own, I disassembled it and found it was, indeed, just what I needed.

If you’re interested in taking apart a Pez dispenser in a minimally destructive way, here’s how you do it:

The reason you need to tilt the Pez candy platform down is because it has two small prongs on the front and back, making it slightly too long to come out of the colored plastic Pez case easily.

Notice the bumps along the side of the white plastic slide.  The bumps at the bottom prevent the slide from coming out of the colored case easily.  The bumps at the top prevent the white plastic slide from coming out of the bottom.

In case you’re curious, I was using my Pez dispenser for a Pez Powered Disc Shooter.

Dalek Edition - Candy Dispenser Topper by TeamTeamUSA

Having known a few Pez dispenser collectors in my time, I have always figured it was just a matter of time before the addiction showed up on Thingiverse. Even better than a model of a Pez dispenser, here’s a thing-post that instructs you how to create “toppers” for existing Pez dispensers using any item on Thingiverse:

The Dalek is just one topper that can be printed using the attached dispenser_insert.stl; virtually any thing on Thingiverse can be turned into a topper with the correct transformations and support material (so sharpen your support-fu)!

As I have been researching support for a week or so, I’m particularly excited about this challenge, and am hunting through Thingiverse for potential candidates.

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