Today marks 1 year since the initial release of the Foxie Clock. I want to thank all my customers for supporting me!
I decided in the 3rd quarter of 2020 to do Foxie Products full time for several months and while I'm really glad I did, it has not yet become able to fully replace my normal income, so I've taken a full time job again.
Because of that, I'm not going to be making very many exotic wood Foxie Clock cases any more, because they are somewhat labor intensive. But, I'm not done! Future Foxie Clock plans are probably easy to guess: WiFi, NTP, light sensor, RTC time backup, and... more. All of those things are in the works, but it's going to be awhile before I have more news.
Thanks again to everyone following this project and making 2020 a bit easier to get through!
In closing: Black lives matter, science is real, and systemic racism is real and needs to be dealt with. Trans rights are human rights (I have a gender fluid teen child, so this is especially important to me!), and... last but certainly not least, we must separate church and state. Everywhere. Religion has dragged humanity down for long enough. We don't need to devote time and resources to things that have literally _never been proven_ to be real or tangibly beneficial.
Over the last few weeks, I've done a lot of work on the firmware and digit design. I spent time refactoring the codebase and fixing minor bugs and adding features.
I've also just launched beautiful, brand new digit blocks. These solve every problem with the old digit slides -- they are more clear, stand completely vertically, and more importantly, don't wobble around at all.
I also have taken the sad step to remove BLE support from the firmware for a couple of reasons: First, the app has never worked correctly on Android, and second, I am not going to be using the Redboard Nano for much longer.
In the progress of working on the wood cases a few months ago, I quickly realized that I would need to either befriend a photographer or learn how to do it myself, otherwise it would be too slow and expensive to do anything. So, time well spent, I think.
So, I've finally (sort of) launched the wood cases. I made several red oak cases, and I'm trying to clear those out before I start making more cases out of more exotic wood... so if anyone wants a 1-of-8 red oak wood case, now's the time.
Finally, I've really tried to give the PXL mode the love it deserves. It's taken quite a bit of work and testing to get to the point where I'm ready to start shipping these. I love the PXL mode with the fading transitions between numbers.
(Sorry, no video of this just yet... learning one thing at a time!)
I'm posting photos on FB and Instagram now, but here are a couple to look at before you head to www.foxieclock.com :)
One of the coolest things about the Foxie Clock is the versatility to be both an edge-lit display and a RGB pixel display. I haven't been able to put as much time into this project as I've wanted until now -- I'm full time Foxie Products!
I've committed several improvements/fixes/features in the last 24 hours, and in addition to that, I've been working on making the "pixel mode" as good as the edge-lit mode... which needed some mechanical design work to get there.
I designed a new "stand" that wraps around the existing 3d-printed case, and then use a "dark smoke" special acrylic for the cover, and I think it looks pretty fantastic! It does require a right-angle USB-C cable, which I will be providing with Foxie Clock orders that include this "stand"
In addition, I also added an option that can "flip" the display, which works for both edge-lit and pixel display modes (see below picture)
This new stand and the acrylic lid will start shipping with all Foxie Clocks soon, with a minor price increase (don't worry, you can still remove the stand/pixel lid if you don't care for it).
P.S. I haven't forgotten about the wood cases or the app. It's been an absolutely ridiculous several months (outside of COVID-19), but I'm back on track now. More soon!
Like everyone, I'm at home adjusting to this new normal.
I have had a list of things I wanted to improve some things for the Foxie Clock for some time now.
1. Digit assembly sucks. I'm sorry. It just does. Peeling paper off 60 pieces of plastic is the worst.
2. Digit thickness variance in the raw material has made the clocks less than perfect for some people. I'm sorry about this too. I tried to "fix" this as much as I could with the 3d-printed digit positioners, but they aren't the best fix possible.
3. Even though 3D printed cases are awesome, I also really enjoy woodworking and I wanted to see how I can combine woodworking, 3d printing, and laser cutting.
Let's tackle these one at a time. I've come up with a better design for cutting the digits that vastly improves assembly time by keeping them all attached as long as possible. It is possible to peel nearly all the plastic off the back of these in one shot, and due to improvements in the 0, 4, 6, 8, and 9, it is much easier to continue to peel up the plastic for these. In my experience, this reduces total digit peeling time by about 40 minutes, or more than 50%. One final change I will be making to this is to change the number order slightly to streamline assembly.
Second, digit thickness variance and rigidity of the assembled digits. One of the things I tried was a narrow strip across the top of the digits:
However, I really didn't like this for several reasons:
- It makes it much more difficult to read the digits off-axis (that is, not directly from the front), which is one of my favorite parts of the clock. It is also prone to clouding up the digits, which is completely unacceptable. - It is a terrible idea to suggest super gluing at the top of the digits to people for assembly, due to badly clouding up the digits.
So, I tried the "digit positioner" idea between 2 sets of digits again, but with clear acrylic and gluing them at the base (FAR less prone to clouding up the digits), and it was MUCH better. Unfortunately my first attempt made the "teeth" between the digits far too long.
This made little bright rectangles at the bottom of every other digit when they're lit up! Not great. After further iteration and making the "teeth" much shorter, I came up with a design that holds the digits rigidly and doesn't add distracting rectangles.
So, all future clocks will ship with new clear acrylic digit positioners that are meant to be glued in place with a drop of superglue at the base of each digit. This also has the affect of permanently placing the digits in the lid after assembly.
I also have decided to provide the option of pre-assembled sets of digits for the clocks for people that want to open the Foxing box and get Foxie as quickly as possible. That will be available in the near future.
Finally, let's look at some exotic wood! (snicker) In the previous picture, I'm sure it was noticed that this was a different case design...
Here is a close-up from the side:
This is leopardwood, and looks incredible in person. It has various reflective bits, imperfections, and a ton of character, even after careful sanding. Also, this was the very first one I assembled and glued, and it isn't perfect either :) I've improved my assembly skills and 3d-printed (of course!) jigs since this case was created.
I will be launching a new Wood Foxie Clock product line, using Solid Oak as the standard (but beautiful!) wood option. Cases made from exotic woods such as Leopardwood, Purpleheart, Padouk, and Wenge will also be available. These cases are for those that want to really want their clock to stand out. I'll also be offering custom laser engraving for your own message on the back of the case.
Lastly, as indicated in the log a few weeks ago, the mobile app. It runs on both iOS and Android (8+) and is close to being ready to launch. I'm holding off on it for a bit for some further polish, but intend to launch it around the time I start shipping again.
Thank you for reading and following this project!
P.S. Further down the road, how about a Mini Foxie Clock? Extra Large? Or a totally new Analog design, mixing edge lighting with traditional analog display?
I'm getting pretty close to the launch of the app. I've uploaded a couple of pictures of it running on iOS and am doing further testing/development with Android this week, hoping to launch within the next 2 weeks.
In other news, I'm also working on a new wood case design that should be quite a nice option for people not enthusiastic about the 3D printed cases.
What else would you like to see from this project?
Will Fox
