The Fix Its: DIY Magnetic Flower Vases
By bruno
Alicia found these great magnetic flower vases that amaze your dinner guests by balancing implausibly on the table-top. Unfortunately, the price tag was also implausible ($42 dollars!).
So, in true Curbly fashion, we decided to do it ourselves. Here's the video, details and links are below.
For those of you who want to try this at home, here's what we ended up buying, and some tips to get you started:
Ingredients:
3 - 3/8"x12" Sink water line extenders ($1.70 each)
1 - Kwik-Fix Super Glue (3 pack for $0.99)
1 - All purpose silicone rubber kitchen and bath caulk ($2.59)
3 - 5 lb Neodymium magnets (super-strong!) ($2.95 at Ax-man Surplus)
Sheet metal for base plates (cheap)
Steps:
1. Trim pipes to desired length using a hack saw. Make sure not to cut your girlfriend's fingers off.
2. Fill one end of each pipe with the silicone caulk to create a water-tight seal. Be patient while they dry (add some pictures to your Curbly account!)
3. Glue a magnet to the base of each pipe using super glue. Super glue + fingers = bad, be careful.
4. More patience while drying (do yoga or something).
5. The metal plates go on the table under a table cloth, the pipes secure (magically!) to the vase-bases via magnetism. Flowers and water go inside.
6. Your friends think you are magic.
Watch the first Fix-Its video!
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Hey, my name is Bruno and I'm the founder of Curbly.com. I started this site...
shazzbazz
That's awesome, I'm sure there are many variations that stem from this video which could be exciting to see!
VEGAN4EVER
Great Ideas except isnt there another alternative to the hack saw step. Maybe a pipe that is inclosed already? But very cool display.
dwarrenku
Chrisjob
jellzey
i just made a few myself. the only small tubing i could find at lowes was copper tubing, which looks really great! thanks for the idea.
oldbay
I keep waiting for your finger to get cut off...definitely get a pipe cutter.
Any chance this would work with magnetic paint? How well do the supermagnets attach to the magpaint. Could I paint my coffee table with mag/chalkboard paint instead of using the sheet metal.
Neiman
maybeface
gregoryjohnson
gregoryjohnson
gregoryjohnson
celee
DIY Maven
Your vases are unbelievably cool! I'm making some!!
And Bruno, don't believe a word Gregory says. I'm not going to demean myself by getting involved in some petty competition with a plagiarist.
By the way, have you seen my fabulous new post on How to Flip A House in 90 Days: Getting Started to Demolition??!!
gregoryjohnson
Bruno and Alicia! That video was totally cool! I think maybe DIY Maven and I have an unspoken competition going on to see who can create the most impressive DIY posts on curbly. You've just set the gold standard! Fortunately I have two Apple PowerMac computers available that both have dual liquid-cooled 2.5 GHz G5 processors in them and they are fully loaded for video production with 23 inch Apple cinema displays! So, one computer can be rendering and exporting to streaming video format while the other is used as a high-end video production system. Let the games begin! ~ Gregory
creede
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