I was just thinking about a mechanatrix Artificer, for gestalt I would probably use a warblade / aritficer, focusing on the white raven school (I like warblade a lot better than crusader, plus int synergy, and it will shore up your weak reflex save.) Not sure what PrC's to use, I like renegade master maker for flavor/looks, but it's not very optimal. Possibly trapsmith 1 followed by swiftblade for some more casting and gishness, it's too bad I don't really see a way to shoehorn 3 levels of factotum into the build.
Mechanatrix is nice because of the skill bonuses that fit an artificer to a T, especially the +4 to Craft, and Knowledge (architecture), and +8 to Profession (engineer).
Remember that craft can be used untrained, and with being int focused it's relativly easy to get a +30 or better modifier on all craft checks, even without ranks (renegade master maker gives +1 per level to craft checks, so +10 rmm + 4 race + 8 int, and I don't remember what other bonuses I used +36 at 15'th level without ranks tough.).