[something98]

Having done that, I can answer. I'll be a little vague on the topic to keep some anonymity.

Without a plan, per se, I nurtured a burgeoning personal research interest that was well outside my field. The initial hobby was very rudimentary but it gave me enough feedback and fuel that over a number of years I built more advanced software and hardware to investigate it more scientifically. Eventually, having reached the limits of the data I had access to, I reached out to a local university to start a collaboration.

If you already have an idea, I think, as long as you're sufficiently interested in actually doing research, you'll be able to find some professor that is as well. On the flip side, I know for a fact that most professors have more research ideas than students, so they can certainly provide you with things to investigate.

As a bonus, for the professor, since this is a side gig for you, there isn't an cost for them (or much less of one). Access to facilities and resources depend on the university. But I was certainly surprised by what I was given access to in the service of doing the research.

[zaptheimpaler]

Wow ive been hoping to do something very similar! If you're open to chatting a little more, i would love to learn a bit about how you do this - my email is in my profile or i will contact you if you drop an email here.