Almost to scale.

Another fun project to sneak in at the end of a slow day in the office: Pizza Papercraft

Print these pizza-based papercraft templates out (use the color laser printer to really make them sparkle), cut as indicated (an exacto knife and the metal ruler borrowed from the art department work well), fold in the right spots (I like to crease the straight lines with the back of the exacto blade to get a nice sharp corner) and ta-da! everyone at work will know that you love pizza when they see your adorable paper pizza toys on your desk.

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The first project is from a Tokyo-based Italian restaurant called Napule. The papercraft is an anime-esque pizza guy holding a pizza with a knowing wink. What does he know? That you love pizza. And that you just got paid for an hour of your time folding him together.

Click to download the PDF

I found this on maurusso.com

(Interesting info: the pizzaiolo at Napule used to be Hisanori Yamamoto – winner of the 2007 World Cup Pizza Championships in Naples, Italy. He now runs Pizzeria Da Isa.)

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The second  project is a funny one: Papercraft McDonald’s Pizza in a pizza box.

This one folds together similar to the boxes that tormented any of us that worked their way through high school and college making pizzas. And if you’re halfway decent with Photoshop or Illustrator, you can tweak the image on the pizza box to be anything you want, instead of the disgusting failed attempt to make pizza by one of the worst food corporations ever.

I brought some vinyl records home from Italy once in a box I kept from a place in Naples – it had a great design on it, and if I can find the box I’ll scan it and post the image here for you to use.

Click to download the PDF

I found this on Tektonten who also have a similar Pizza Hut Darth Maul papercraft project.

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Nothing overly complex about these projects – I’d like to see more pizza focused paper projects though. I’ve got a prize for whomever comes up with the best papercraft wood-fired pizza oven by the end of April.

Click the image to open in another window, print the coupon, stop by your local Harbor Freight and enjoy a six-piece screwdriver set for free.

From the pixelated image on the coupon, these screwdrivers look pretty cheap (of course), but sometimes a cheap screwdriver is just the tool you need. Like when you get mad and you need to throw something – don’t waste a nice Craftsman on your short temper.

And if you can get there in the next couple days, bring this coupon for a free LED flashlight for an added bonus. It expires March 24.

If you’re looking for a good deals on name-brand tools, check out Amazon’s Tools & Home Improvement Value Center. A grab bag of discounts on quality goods. One example: Milwaukee 18v cordless circular saw w/o battery: List $312, discounted price $41.55.

Gas powered go karts are awesome fun – fast and noisy will put a smile on the face of any driver. But the undeniable torque available from an electric motor gives two advantages: insane acceleration and kick-ass hill climbing ability.

A quick instructables from a couple years back has info on retrofitting your gas-powered go-kart to run with a motor, battery and electronics. Turn it into a silent speed machine!

Motor:
Type: Series Wound DC Motor
Max Current: 300A
Cont. Current: 100A
Voltage: 36
Max HP: 15
Cont. HP: 5
Length: 14″
Diameter: 7″
Weight: 30Lbs

Controller:
Alltrax Series Wound Brushed DC Motor Controller
Max Current: 300A
Cont. Current: 100A
Max Voltage: 50V
Min Voltage: 20V
Throttle Type: 0-5k

Batteries:
Lithium Phosphate 42V/33AH system
Capacity (WH): 1.3KWH
Voltage: 42V
Capacity (AH): 32AH
Max Current: 800A
Cont. Current: 400A
Weight: 28Lbs

How does electric stack up to gas? The Mythbusters built and raced an electric go-kart against a gas powered one. The electric components (motor, batteries) doubled the weight of the cart, but even with that, the acceleration easily beat that of the gas version. With some tweaks, they felt they’d be able to have gotten the top speed up to that of the gas engine, too.

A user video of a converted racing go-kart shows the speed capabilities: