The Charging Crate upcycles a milk crate into a charging station. When I was looking for something to make for a four-hour rapid prototyping class, I looked to the community. The Youth Center that I work at has piles of these milk crates just lying around and I had a mess of cords and Kindles so I put together the things I needed. In order to get this get in four hours, I had the help of another Creative Technologies Major (Paul van Wingerden) making the process faster. Overall, it turned out well and the crate will be put to good use.

Step 1: Tools and Supplies

Supplies

2 2x2' Quarter Inch Sheets of Plywood
10 Port Charger (http://a.co/d/0qb0HpA)
Cord Clips (http://a.co/d/3ZxfCdu)
Ereaders with Chargers
Stain (optional)

Tools

Nail gun
Wood glue
High-Temp Hot Glue Gun
Table Saw
Sanding tools
Brushes/safety masks for staining

Step 2: The Bottom

In the bottom, we put two equal sized pieces of wood that are as tall as the charger and as wide as the inside of the crate. Next, we glued the wood to the sides of the crate and then the charger to the middle of one of those sides.

Step 3: The Core

The core of this project has a base that is the length and width of the crate. On two opposing sides of this crate, we sanded some notches for the cords to feed through. Next, we nailed a piece of wood that was not much taller than a Kindle. Lastly, we nailed those two pieces together at a 90-degree angle (photo for reference).

Step 4: The Cubby Walls

At this point, we made the walls that separate the Kindles. The walls are the height of the center piece and the width of one side of the base. We had extra time at this point so we stained the wood to give it a cleaner look. These were wood glued and then stapled so that there were ten evenly spaced cubbies.

Step 5: Finishing

That's it! Now you just need to place the cords in the charger and feed the wires up into the cubbies.

Overall, this was a fun project that required a bit of freehanding but it was great to give the Youth Center a way to transport, organize, and charge these Kindles. If I were to improve this in the future I would make the tops of the walls rounded to make the crate a little more friendly to hands.