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Welcome to Fat Cat Fab Lab!

Fat Cat Fab Lab is a volunteer-run makerspace in the West Village neighborhood of New York City. This wiki contains information about the space, the FCFL community, and the equipment and tools that the lab provides. Become a Fat Cat Fab Lab member today!

This wiki is public but only members may edit. If you'd like to edit please see 'Wiki Edit Access' at bottom of page.

New Member? New members should go through some of our onboarding in New Member Orientation.

Member Portal

Membership Levels and Benefits
For creating accounts, registering for classes, machine reservations, or making payments, please use our member portal.

CiviCRM is self-hosted in the cloud. We are looking for volunteers to help maintain it or even migrate it to another CRM.

Fat Cat Fab Lab Member Portal
civicrm.fatcatfablab.org

Membership Help

Please contact the Board by emailing info@fatcatfablab.org for anything listed below.

Changing membership levels (ex: adding storage and switching from 'Standard Membership + Standard Storage')
Updating your Credit Card on file
Canceling membership
Restarting membership after a leave
Lost/broken RFID card

New Member Help and Links

Private or anonymous questions & concerns can be sent here.

Caring for the Space

All members are responsible for taking care of Fat Cat Fab Lab's physical space. Everyone must chip in to keep the place clean and organized for others. This includes putting tools and materials back where they belong, making sure power tool batteries get recharged, emptying waste baskets, cutting down scrap material for garbage, sweeping, cleaning off tables, making sure AC's, lights, and equipment are turned off when not in use, taking care of the fridge and kitchenette, etc.

Lab Areas

Explore these to learn about the tools and equipment available:

Floor Plans:

Labeled: google diagram
Unlabeled: 2d pdf, 3d 3dm, 3d dwg

Fab Lab Maker Residency Program

Please see Fab Lab Maker Residency to learn about this opportunity!

Basic Use & Safety Classes (BUS)

BUS classes introduce you to safely and properly operating our equipment. Even if you have previous experience, there are many specifics to our machines you should know before using. Members may be held responsible for damage caused by improper usage. Laser and CNC Router classes are required for certification.

3D Printing 101 Class - Highly recommended.
CNC Class (Router) - Required for certification.
Laser Class - Required for certification.
Metalshop Orientation - Orientation required for stationary tools.
Woodshop Orientation

Teach a BUS Class or Workshop!

Part of FCFL's mission is to share knowledge and promote growth. A big part of that means teaching classes! Members, please add your workshop ideas and/or sign up to teach on our Trello board.

For BUS Class Teachers

BUS classes are taught by volunteer instructors and teachers receive no income from the class.
BUS teachers receive a free storage 70qt bin for the whole year on commitment to teach a minimum of 8 classes & cover 3 Open Hours per year.
The classes must take in a minimum of $240 per year to qualify for a free storage bin for the year.

For Workshop Teachers

Your workshop can be free for everyone! Up to you.
Workshops can be set to any date, pace, or frequency you wish.
For paid workshops, FCFL collects 20% minimum and the rest is yours!
We encourage scheduling the classes at regular intervals (ex: 12 classes, once a month, every third Friday).

Want to Teach? How to Setup a Class/Workshop

Decide whether it's a recurring class, a single standalone workshop, or multi-day bootcamp.
Come up with a lesson plan, broken into sessions if applicable.
Determine how long each class session is likely to take. Please add plenty of buffer and/or beta test!
Schedule a date/time for all sessions.
Decide the maximum number of students.
Determine what you want to charge per person, if necessary.
Provide descriptions to be added to Meetup for your class and a photo for Meetup (at least 1200 x 675 pixels)
Reach out to the people managing (Meetup & CiviCRM... it's the Board atm) with your class/workshop & schedule and they'll help you setup the class and onboarding (Meetup scheduling, class registrations, etc).
Pay 20% event space fee (of event profits) with Zelle to info@fatcatfablab.org

Web Presence Areas

Website

Our main website fatcatfablab.org is on Squarespace, if you wish to contribute/edit anything, we can provide access as needed.

GitHub

We have a Github if you want to share or update code.

Socials

Rules and Policies

Rules & Policies
Orientation and Responsibilities
Membership Terms
Waiver and Liability
Member-Loaned Tools agreement & policy : for larger tools brought in by members to share
Operations
Member Shipping to FCFL

(TO BE UPDATED) Member-Led Improvement Projects : Propose and lead a lab improvement project

Organization

Organizational Structure
FCFL is a Not-For-Profit and how that differs from a Non-Profit in New York State
Board Member Notes
Operational Notes

Wiki Edit Access

We strongly encourage all members to help out with keeping the wiki up-to-date, comprehensive, and easy-to-read. To get edit access:

Click "Create account" in the upper right
Go into the #wiki channel on Slack and ping the Wiki Admins and let them know your username

See Wiki Configuration and Onboarding/Offboarding Wiki Admins for more information.