Tag: make yourself

DIY Dental Light with Elastic Headband

Cre­at­ed and updat­ed 2/26/2023

What: Den­tal light worn like a head­lamp with no loupes or safe­ty glass­es or face shield. Den­tal light mount­ed to elas­tic head­band.

Why: For those who don’t have or don’t want to use their loupes plus light. Suit­able for those who wear glass­es. When oper­a­to­ry lights fail. Pow­er out­age. I per­son­al­ly have trou­ble with loupes when I suf­fer from sinus issues (makes me nau­seous), but find I want the light, so this is a workaround to that. Plus, it costs 4x less than my loupes + light.

Sup­plies: Den­tal Light sys­tem (with bat­tery pack), elas­tic head­lamp strap, mount­ing kit (came with sys­tem), drill, drill bit, ruler, clamps, safe­ty glass­es, mark­er, cord ties (opt)

Cost: Light sys­tem ($595) + head­lamp strap and brack­et ($11.70) = $606.70

Time: 30 min­utes

*Note: Not intend­ed for dogs!*
*But they do look cute wear­ing it!!*

Process

  • Acquire sup­plies
And safe­ty glass­es!
Mount­ing kit/hardware
Elas­tic, adjustable head­lamp band with plas­tic brack­et
Back­side. It’s decent­ly thin
Used a 5⁄64″ bit

  • Mea­sure and mark drill holes. Be aware that if there are nuts to secure the screws, then to leave enough room on the oppo­site side for them
Marked mid­point and holes
Dry test. Looks good

  • Clamp, wear safe­ty glass­es, and then drill (be care­ful, I man­aged to make mine lop­sided)
Don’t clamp too tight that it breaks
Twist­ed the bit in to help the drill find foot­ing and not wan­der
It’s drilling time!
One down!
Uhhhh…how’d it get lop­sided…
Oh well. Tight­en­ing the screws
Nice
Oops…didn’t take into account the nuts. Would drill low­er next time.
Sol­id in there, even with­out the nuts
Ready
Set
Boom!

  • Option­al: Use cord orga­niz­ing ties to secure the cord to the side of the elas­tic head­band
Although the light comes with a clip for your clothes, a sec­ond one in the back works well to keep the cord out of the way

  • Done! Test it out!
Unwill­ing demo patient
My loupes with light is bet­ter, but also costs 4x as much.
It’s pret­ty com­fort­able. Made sure that the fuzzy side of the cable ties faced my skin

DIY Simple Dog Urine Collection Stick (No Bending Down!)

Writ­ten June 2022, updat­ed 7/2024

What

Pole for col­lect­ing dog urine for sam­pling

Sup­plies

Any stick or pole, hose clamps, col­lec­tion con­tain­er, screw­driv­er

Time

10 Min­utes

Mate­ri­als Used

  • 25–38mm Hose Clamp (x2)
  • 10–16mm Hose Clamp (x1)
  • 48 in x ⁷⁄₁₆ in (L x W) Gar­den Stake (x1)
  • Ster­ile Col­lec­tion Cup (x1)

Cost

ItemAmount
48in Pow­der Coat­ed Met­al Gar­den Stake$2.33 (1 qty)
60 pc Assort­ed Hose Clamp Kit$12.99 (1 kit)
Ster­ile Col­lec­tion Cup$7.99 (5 qty)
Total$23.31
Total per Col­lec­tion Stick$4.59

Process

  • Make a ring to place the col­lec­tion cup in with­out it falling through all the way
  • Use a small­er clamp to con­nect the pole to the large ring
  • Place col­lec­tion con­tain­er of your choice into ring
  • Make sure your pet isn’t afraid of it before using to col­lect
    2 clamps togeth­er
    small­er clamp
    pole con­nect­ed

    Notes

    • Used a plas­tic gar­den stake because: it’s rigid, has ridges on there to pre­vent the clamp from shift­ing, easy to clean, resist rust with plas­tic coat­ing
    • Any width gar­den stake or pole can be used. I just hap­pened to have the ⁷⁄₁₆ inch one
    • The largest hose clamp avail­able was the 25–38mm, but the nice thing about them is that you can just con­nect small­er ones togeth­er (by feed­ing the ends into the neigh­bor­ing tight­en­er) to make a larg­er one
    • Adding a non-slip han­dle is as easy as wrap­ping vet wrap which can there­fore be changed out when you want to. Or what­ev­er you want to wrap it with