Alternatives to the Vancouver Hackspace.

12 Jul 2016

Vancouver Hackspace (VHS) use to be a place where people could ask questions and get help with their projects, while helping out others. Now new people asking questions, at best, get ignored, and worst ridiculed for asking a questions. I use to have pride in being a VHS member but now I am ashamed to have been apart of that group.

Between the years of 2015-2016 the Vancouver Hackspace the board of directors ( names removed ) as well as a few other members ( names removed ) destroyed the existing community that took years to create.

Good, energetic, people will succeed anywhere. VHS is a handicap that prevent even good people from achieving success. Your projects will wither and die at VHS.

This is a list of the alternatives to The Vancouver Hackspace (VHS). This list was last updated on 2016-Oct-13. Pull requests greatly appreciated.

Vancouver

Physical spaces

• Maker Labs - A 26,000sf maker space that provides better, sharper, tools. 3D printers, CNC, multiple laser cutters, plasma cutter, shopbot, Sewing Machine, etc…
• VIVO media Arts - VIVO has been in Vancouver since 1973. Public programming includes events, workshops, exhibitions, residencies, co-productions, critical forums.
• Van Community Lab - Vancouver Community Laboratory (1907 Triumph Street), a 7,000-square-foot huge wood, and metal shop. They run Workshops every so often.
• WePress - A Vancouver Downtown Eastside Community Makerspace. 3D printers, Workshops, Sewing Machine, etc…
• Fraser Valley Makerspace - Fraser Valley Makerspace (4612 216 Street, 2nd floor) 1200 sq ft with all the DIY tools that you would ever want. 3D printers, Workshops, etc…
• Zen Makerlab - Zen Maker space (272 East 1st Street)- 3D printers, CNC, multiple laser cutters, and lots of workshops.
• Maker Cube - Arduino, Robots, VEX, 3d printers, PCB printing, and a meeting space for a lot of different groups.
• The Egg Arts Foundation - The Egg Arts Foundation. TheEgg art incubator is a year-round interactive art workshop and gathering place for the Vancouver Burning Man community. 5,000 sq ft studio has a wide variety of tools, technology, and fun distractions - a great place to build your art project, host a fundraiser, or have a meeting. TheEgg is volunteer-driven and free for everyone.
• The Beaumont studio - Art and gallery space with a social emphasizes.
• Decentral Vancouver - Decentral Vancouver is a collaborative community incubator inspired by the ideas behind bitcoin.

Events

• Vancouver Mini Maker Faire - One Giant show and tell for the Maker and Hacker comunity. One of my favorite events of the year.
• Open Hardware Summit - Not techinically in vancouver but close by in Portland. Annual event.

Meetups

• The Open Science Network - YVR DIYbio is is a community in which burgeoning biological engineers can come together to learn and share ideas, bringing back that enthusiasm for science we experienced as kids. DIYbio
• HackerNest Vancouver Tech Socials - HackerNest Tech Socials are a fun, relaxed way to connect with your local tech community. Atmosphere: chill, friendly, unpretentious, agenda-free (no sales pitch, yo), and brimming with UltraSmart(TM) people.
• OpenDataBC-Vancouver - OpenDataBC is a collaborative effort by a group of B.C. residents to explore, promote and create value with open data and related technologies. promotes the responsible and safe practice of scientific techniques.
• Vancouver Robotics Club - For people who like building robots. Meetup page
• Polyglot Vancouver - Polyglot Vancouver’s mission is to bring together software engineers, computer scientists, system administrators, or whatever title you choose. We strive to be inclusive, diverse and bullshit-free.
• VanDev - Vancouver’s Software Developers Network
• Startup Drinks Van - Startup Drinks is a casual gathering at the end of each month for anyone who’s interested in startups. We meet at a bar in downtown Vancouver and we chat about all things #startups…projects, funding, challenges, and people in the scene. Meetup page.

Accelerators/co-working spaces

• The Hive - Community hub for social impact. Coworking, Events, Support Services, hotdesk, etc..
• Launch Academy - Education and mentorship in a collaborative environment
• The Profile - Co working space.
• The Network Hub - Co working space, hot desk.
• Light House Labs - Code bootcamp. Full-Stack, iOS devlopment, etc…
• Code Core - Code bootcamp. Full-Stack, Rails, Javascript, etc…
• Red Academy - Code bootcamp.

Suppliers

These suppliers are local to vancouver area.

Eletronics conponents

• Lees Electronic - Supports maker faire and the local maker comunity. 4131 Fraser St (King Ed and Fraser)
• Main Electronics - Not too friendly with newbies but has the best selection of knobs and buttons. 4554 Main Street (29th and Main)
• RP Electronics - Also has some consumer eletronics. 4181 Dawson Street, Burnaby

Metals

• Metal Supermarket - Good source for metal rods, beams, angled, etc. in stainless steel, aluminum and more.
• North Star Metal: Metal recycling, They allow you to wander around but be safe or they will kick you out.

Wood

• Windsor Plywood - Great selection, lots of helpful staff. On the expensive side.

Platics

• Industrial Plastics & Paints - Has most of everything. 12571 Bridgeport Rd #150, Richmond,
• Associated Plastics - Great for Acrylic. 1104 Franklin Street, Vancouver, BC

Craft supplies

• Urban Source - All kinds of recycled craft materials - everything is cheap!. Main Street between 15th and 16th Ave.
• Dressew - Sewing/fabric/knitting/etc. Huge selection, dirt cheap! 337 W Hastings St, near Cambie
• Yoko YaYa - Japanese dollar store with all kinds of neat stuff. Tinseltown Mall, 1st floor
• Daiso - Same as Yoko Yaya, but about 5 times more stuff. Aberdeen Mall in Richmond

Screws, Fasteners

• Pacific Fasteners - They stock a huge range of fasteners (nuts, bolts, screws, nails etc.). 3934 East 1st Ave
• Fastenal - Huge selection. SE Marine Dr and Knight St, and many other locations.

Tools

• Princess Auto - All kinds of tools.
• Acklands GGrainger - Tools, equipment and consumables.
• KMS tools - Every tool that you could ever want.
• Busy Bee Tools - I have never been but I am told that its great.
• Lee Valley - Mostly wood working tools.
• Summit Tools - Even more tools. (1st Ave at Boundary)

Online

Communities

• Hackaday – Daily hacks and projects
• Instructables – Best of instructions. DIY projects.
• Make Magazine – Magazine for hackers and Makerspace
• Dangerous Prototypes – Blog of electronics projects
• Electronics-Lab – Blog with daily projects and electronic products reviews
• Embedded-Lab – Blog with several projects, tutorials, PIC microcontroller stuff, etc.;
• Robot Kingdom – Website with lots of robot projects;
• Lets Make Robots - Largest and coolest DIY robotics community
• The MagPi - The official raspberry PI magazine. Lots of tutorials and projects.
• EEWeb - Electrical Engineering news, resources, and community.

YouTube channels

• EEVblog - An off-the-cuff video blog for electronic engineers, hobbyists, and hackers.

Retailers

Online retailers of compoents and dev boards.

Devlopment boards and kits

• Adafruit - One of the best. Great community partner, lots of tutorials. Order your stuff from here when you are getting started.
• SparkFun - Awesome site with tutorials and lots of breakout boards and rad parts.
• Seeed Studio - Strait from Shenzhen.
• ITead Studio - Similar to Seeed Studio, and also located in China.
• Solarbotics - Robotics related parts (motors, electronics, gears, sensors, etc).
• RobotShop - Robots and related parts.

Eletronic components

• Digikey - They’ve got pretty much anything, and they ship overnight from Canada.
• Mouser - Similar to Digikey, but ship from the US (taking an extra day usually).
• Newark element14 - Similar to Digikey and Mouser, but slower and more expensive shipping.

Materials

• Inventables - Acrylic sheets, woods and vaneers, moulding materials, etc.
• McMaster Carr - Massive catalog of engineering components. Not the cheapest, but the only source for many things. Used to be US-only, but ships (fast) to Canada now.

Miscellaneous

• Ali Express - Sort of Amazon meets eBay in China - and almost everything that is manufactured in or for China is available here (i.e. almost everything).