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https://hackaday.com/2022/06/03/a-rotocasting-machine-sized-for-the-home-shop/ | A Rotocasting Machine Sized For The Home Shop | Dan Maloney | [
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"casting",
"mold",
"polyurethane",
"rotational",
"silicone"
] | If you’ve ever wondered how large, hollow plastic structures like tanks and drums are formed, you’re in luck: [Andy] not only fills us in on the details of rotational casting and molding, but he also built
this sweet little rotational casting machine
to help him with his DIY projects.
Granted, [Andy]’s build won’t be making anything too large, like a car fuel tank or a kayak. Not only is it sized more for smallish parts, but those structures are generally made with the related process of rotational molding. Both processes use an enclosed multipart mold that’s partially filled with plastic resin, and then rotate the mold around two axes to distribute a thin layer of resin around the inside of the mold. The difference is that roto-molding uses a thermoplastic resin, whereas roto-casting uses resins like polyurethane and silicone that set at room temperature.
The machine looks simple, but only because he took great pains to optimize it. The videos below cover the build in detail — feel free to skip to the 11:38 mark of the second video if you just want to see it in action. Though you’ll be missing some juicy tidbits, like welding a perfect 90° joint in square tubing. There’s also the custom tool [Andy] built to splice the beaded chain he used to drive the spinning of the mold, which was pure genius.
Using the machine and a complex nine-piece mold, [Andy] was able to create remarkably detailed tires for RC cars from polyurethane resin. We’d love to see what else this rig is good for — almost as much as we want to see details on how the mold was made. We’ve seen
other rotational casting machines
before, but this one takes the cake for fit and finish. | 5 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6480669",
"author": "rasz_pl",
"timestamp": "2022-06-03T13:16:44",
"content": "Rotational casting is so weird. It almost looks like it shouldn’t work, for example this:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PxhgC5iG7I",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
... | 1,760,372,676.459092 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/31/saving-birds-with-3d-printed-boats/ | Saving Birds With 3D Printed Boats | Bryan Cockfield | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"3d printing",
"birds",
"boat",
"bodyboard",
"conservation",
"lake",
"remote control",
"sensor",
"water",
"wildlife"
] | Montana, rightfully nicknamed the big sky country, is a beautiful state with abundant wide open landscapes, mountains, and wildlife. It’s a fantastic place to visit or live, but if you happen to reside in the city of Butte, that amazing Montana landscape is marred by the remnants of an enormous open pit mine. Not only is it an eyesore, but the water that has filled the pit is deadly to any bird that lands there. As a result,
a group of people have taken to some ingenious methods to deter birds from landing in the man-made toxic lake for too long
.
When they first started, the only tool they had available was a rifle. Scaring birds this way is not the most effective way for all species, though, so lately they have been turning to other tools. One of which is a custom boat built on a foam bodyboard which uses a plethora of 3D printed parts and sensors to allow the operator to remotely pilot the boat on the toxic lake. The team also has a drone to scare birds away, plus an array of other tools like high-powered lasers, propane cannons, and various scopes in order to put together the most effective response to help save wildlife.
While this strategy runs the gamut of the tools most commonly featured here, from 3D printers to drones to lasers, the only thing that’s missing is some automation like we have seen
with other drone boat builds
we’ve featured in the past. It takes quite a bit of time to continually scare birds off this lake, even through the winter, so every bit of help the team can get could go even further.
Thanks to [floz] for the tip! | 22 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479949",
"author": "Josiah Gould",
"timestamp": "2022-06-01T05:06:54",
"content": "I have to wonder, can the water be cleaned or removed? Seems like a big old strip pit would be a good place for a landfill. The site is already toxic.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"re... | 1,760,372,676.516846 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/31/retrotechtacular-clay-pipe-the-hard-way/ | Retrotechtacular: Clay Pipe The Hard Way | Dan Maloney | [
"Retrotechtacular"
] | [
"clay",
"manufacturing",
"pipe",
"retrotechtacular",
"stoneware"
] | Troll YouTube long enough and chances are good that you’ll come across all kinds of videos of the “How It’s Made” genre. And buried in with the frying pans and treadmills and dental floss manufacturers, there no doubt will be deep dives on how pipe is made. Methods will vary by material, but copper, PVC, cast iron, or even concrete, what the pipe factories will all have in common is the high degree of automation they employ. With a commodity item like pipe, it’s hard to differentiate yourself from another manufacturer on features, so price is about the only way to compete. That means cutting costs to the bone, and that means getting rid of as many employees as possible.
Such was not always the case, of course, as
this look at how I
rish Stoneware & Fireclays Ltd. made clay pipe, drain tiles, and chimney flues back in the 1980s
shows. The amount of handwork involved in making a single, simple piece of clay pipe is astonishing, as is the number of hands employed at the various tasks. The factory was located in Carrickmacross, County Monaghan, Ireland, near an outcropping of shale that forms the raw material for its products. Quarrying the shale and milling it into clay were among the few mechanized steps in the process; although the extrusion of the pipe itself was also mechanized, the machines required teams of workers to load and unload them.
The amount of handwork that went into the pipes once they came out of the extruder was remarkable, especially the sewer pipes. The creation of the “Armstrong junction,” a complex fitting that serves as a cleanout and inspection port for sewer lines, was fascinating to watch, especially since almost no jigs were used and no measurements were taken. It was strictly Mark I eyeball stuff, along with skill and decades of experience.
We love these documentaries that capture what are now some of the long-lost methods of making stuff. The “Hands” series was made in the 1980s by RTÉ, Ireland’s public service broadcaster, and one gets the sense that even then, long before the current wave of off-shoring and globalization had begun, they knew they were capturing the last days of dying industries. We’re glad they did. | 28 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479926",
"author": "Man",
"timestamp": "2022-06-01T02:33:05",
"content": "Casual work attire means no tie.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6479933",
"author": "Dale Kaup",
"timestamp": "2022-06-01T03:07:44",
"conten... | 1,760,372,676.421606 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/31/remote-screen-viewer-is-text-only/ | Remote Screen Viewer Is Text-Only | Bryan Cockfield | [
"computer hacks"
] | [
"administration",
"client",
"command line",
"console",
"gui",
"minecraft",
"python",
"remote desktop",
"server",
"text"
] | Have you been slowly falling down a rabbit hole of Stallman-like paranoia of computers ever since installing Ubuntu for the first time in 2007? Do you now abhor anything with a GUI, including browsers? Do you check your mail with the command line even though you’re behind seven proxies? But, do you still want to play Minecraft? If so,
this command-line-only screen viewer might just be the tool to use a GUI without technically using one
.
This remote screen viewer is built in Python by [louis-e] and, once installed, allows the client to view the screen of the server even if the client is a text-only console. [louis-e] demonstrates this from within a Windows command prompt. The script polls the server screen and then displays it in the console using the various colors and textures available. As a result, the resolution and refresh rate are both quite low, but it is still functional enough to play Minecraft and do other GUI-based tasks as long as there’s no fine text to read anywhere.
The video below only shows a demonstration of the remote screen viewer, and we can imagine plenty of uses beyond this proof-of concept game demonstration. Installing a desktop environment and window manager is not something strictly necessary for all computers, so this is a functional workaround if you don’t want to waste time and resources installing either of those components. If you’re looking for remote desktop software for a more specific machine, though, take a look at
this software which enables remote desktop on antique Macs
. | 5 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479905",
"author": "CRJEEA",
"timestamp": "2022-06-01T00:07:35",
"content": "I find the irony of text mde not displaying text amusing.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6479906",
"author": "CRJEEA",
"timestamp": "2022-06-... | 1,760,372,676.555199 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/31/how-to-move-a-full-sized-church-organ-from-a-house-to-a-museum/ | How To Move A Full-Sized Church Organ From A House To A Museum | Robin Kearey | [
"Musical Hacks"
] | [
"church organ",
"MIDI controlled",
"museum piece",
"pipe organ"
] | As electronics hobbyists we are grateful to our spouses and flatmates who gracefully tolerate all of our weird equipment and chaotic projects in their homes. But it takes a different level of dedication to share one’s home with a pipe organ enthusiast: back in the 1970s, one organist in Bristol went to the effort of installing a full-sized church organ into their house, effectively turning the modest dwelling into one giant musical instrument. Recently however, the house passed on to new owners who, understandably anxious to reclaim some space, listed the whole system on eBay.
No cash in this attic; just lots of zinc pipes and pneumatic tubing.
Thankfully, the auction was won not by some scrap metal dealer but by [Look Mum No Computer], our favourite expert on odd musical instruments. He drove out all the way from Kent to help disassemble the organ and stuff the dozens of pipes, miles of cable and numerous valves, tubes, latches and switches into his van. Once back home, he faced the daunting task of reassembling the whole lot into something capable of playing music,
which he’s currently documenting in a video series
.
The organ’s new home is
This Museum Is (Not) Obsolete
, where it has its own room decorated in a style similar to the house it spent much of its life in. The first step to getting it working was to fire up the blower, which is effectively a powerful electric air pump together with a pressure-regulating mechanism. Once this was working, one row of pipes was added to test the actuation system. This consists of a set of solenoids that simply open or close the air supply to each pipe. [LMNC] still had an Arduino-based organ driver system from an earlier project, which allowed him to connect a MIDI keyboard to the partially-complete instrument and play a few notes on it.
There’s still a lot to be done, but we’re definitely impressed by what [LMNC] has achieved so far and can’t wait to see the organ restored to its former glory. We already knew that you could
control pipe organs through MIDI
, and we’ve seen
much smaller organs built from scratch
. Thanks for the tip, [hackbyte]! | 11 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479829",
"author": "mrehorst",
"timestamp": "2022-05-31T20:15:59",
"content": "I live in Milwaukee where a lot of old houses had pipe organs. You still see them, or pieces of them, coming up for sale once in a while.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{... | 1,760,372,676.957859 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/31/at-last-a-cyberdeck-you-might-want-to-use/ | At Last! A Cyberdeck You Might Want To Use | Jenny List | [
"Cyberdecks"
] | [
"cyberdeck",
"raspberry pi",
"waveshare"
] | Cyberdecks make for interesting projects, some are a bit rough while others are beautiful, but it’s maybe something that even the most ardent enthusiast might agree — these home-made portable computers aren’t always the most convenient to use. Thus we’re very pleased to see
this machine from [TRL],
as it takes the cyberdeck aesthetic and renders it in a form that looks as though it might be quite practical to use.
It takes a Raspberry Pi and a Waveshare 1280×400 capacitive touch screen, and mounts this combo with a keyboard in an uncommonly well-designed 3D printed chassis. With the screen flat it resembles the venerable TRS-80 Model 100 “slab” computer of the early 1980s, but flip it up, and a surprisingly usable laptop appears. Power comes from an external battery pack with a lead, but this is due more to thermal management issues with PSU boards than it is to necessity. The finishing touch is a stylish custom laptop bag, making for a combo we’d take on the train to bang out Hackaday articles any day.
Looking around, we think perhaps it might give
the Clockwork DevTerm
a run for its money. Alternatively, you might take a look at
this upgraded TRS-80 model 100
.
Thanks to [The Kilted Swede] for the tip. | 14 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479802",
"author": "RW ver 0.0.1",
"timestamp": "2022-05-31T18:47:50",
"content": "Tempting, I have lusted after the HX-20, Z88, NC200 etc for many a year, like the idea of a keyboard large enough to use on the hoof, with screen compact enough not to get in the way while doing so."... | 1,760,372,676.64445 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/31/junk-i-bought-my-psu-just-wont-do/ | Junk I Bought: My PSU Just Won’t Do | Jenny List | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Slider"
] | [
"fake",
"power supply",
"psu"
] | I have an Acer monitor that I’ve owned for around 15 years, and thanks to my having paid extra at the time for the model sporting a DVI socket for HDMI compatibility it still finds a place as one of my desktop monitors. It has a power brick that supplies it with 1 2V at 4.5 A, and over the years this has developed an annoying whine. Something’s loose in the magnetics, and I really should replace it. So off to AliExpress I went, and dropped in an order for a 12 V, 5 A power brick.
It’s No Heavyweight
So far so good…
These units are pretty standard, a box about 130 mm by 60 mm with an IEC socket at one end and a trailing cable at the other for the low voltage. I’ve had enough of them pass through my hands over the years to know what to expect, so I was dismayed to find when I received my PSU that it was suspiciously light. 86 g compared to the around 250 g I’d expect, so I began to smell a rat. Time for a teardown, and a descent into the world of small switch-mode mains power supplies.
Normally it should be easier to break into Fort Knox than to crack open a mains power supply, because for safety they are ultrasonic welded together. The few times I’ve done it have required some Dremel time and a bit of swearing, so when this case turned out to open fairly easily by levering with a screwdriver it was evident this wasn’t a high-quality item. Sure enough my suspicions were confirmed, for there inside was a much smaller board. It’s clear this isn’t a 5 A power supply, so just what
have
I received?
For A Fake, It Could Be Worse
… but not so good inside.
On the board were the components I’d expect for a small switch-mode mains PSU. Rectifier, electrolytic capacitor, control chip, opto-isolator, ferrite transformer. It’s a through-hole board, and unlike with some plug-top chargers the designer has given them plenty of space. Flipping it over and there’s a reasonably healthy 6.25 mm of physical isolation between the two sides, with an additional milled slot beneath the opto-isolator. I can’t comment on the quality of the transformer without prising it apart, but maybe it could be a little more chunky.
The board itself could even be reasonable, even if it’s in a flimsy box wired with dubious hair-thin conductors and secured only by a sticky tab. Zooming in on the chip I found a
CSC7224
, a little 18 W 8-pin DIP. It’s a generic chip that’s available from more than one Chinese manufacturer, and it implements a pretty straightforward switch-mode PSU. It seems to follow the circuit in the data sheet pretty closely except for the mains filter, meaning that it’s probably a working and not scarily unsafe 12 V supply module. If I needed one good for 1.5 A I’d be happy.
So I’ve been taken for a ride by a supplier on the other side of the world, and for your entertainment and edification I’ve turned it into a Hackaday article. Props to AliExpress for this, when I raised a dispute with photo and description of the hardware they did a no-questions refund. What can I take away from this, other than a warning not to play random PSU roulette again? The first thing is that, from the point of view of the manufacturer, it’s too cheap even to be a successful fake product. If I can tell by its weight that it’s fake the minute I pick it up then they’ve failed, so I’m curious as to why they didn’t make it a bit more convincing
by putting a bit more weight in it
. At least the chip has overcurrent protection built in, so it will simply refuse to serve 5 A rather than burst into flames.
Thus I’ve opened myself up for ridicule in the comments, and evidently I should have shelled out a little bit more. Have any of you ever been ambushed by a fake PSU? | 98 | 34 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479771",
"author": "Andrew",
"timestamp": "2022-05-31T17:12:16",
"content": "I never thought my VR-monitor failing could have something to do with a fake PSU but that explains a lot. I feel both relieved and dumb… thanks.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
... | 1,760,372,676.906857 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/31/panelize-pcbs-graphically-with-hm-panelizer/ | Panelize PCBs Graphically With Hm-panelizer | Dave Rowntree | [
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"Gerber Panelizer",
"gerbers",
"mouse bites",
"panelisation",
"pcb"
] | When you’re working with PCBs and making single units to knock out in those Chinese fabs, going from layout to manufacturable Gerber files is just a few button presses, no matter what PCB layout tool you prefer. But, once you get into producing sets of PCBs that form a larger system, or are making multiple copies for efficient manufacturing, then you’re not going to get far without delving into the art of PCB panelization. We’ve seen a few options over the years, and here’s yet another one that’s looking quite promising —
hm-panelizer by [halfmarble]
is a cross platform Python GUI application, which leverages
Kivy
, so it should run on pretty well on most major platforms without too much hassle. The tool is early in development, so is restricted to handling only straight PCB edges, with horizontal mouse-bites for now, but we’re sure it will quickly grow more general purpose capabilities given time and support.
In an ideal world, open source tools like KiCAD would have a built-in panelizer, but for now we can dream and hm-panelizer might just be good enough for some people. For more choices on panelizing, checkout
our guide to making it easy
, and just to muddy the waters here’s
another way to do it
. | 14 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479764",
"author": "morgan",
"timestamp": "2022-05-31T16:49:54",
"content": "> In an ideal world, open source tools like KiCAD would have a built-in panelizerHopefully the improved scripting in future releases will allow building more complex UIs like this possible.",
"parent_i... | 1,760,372,676.68967 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/31/making-the-case-for-cobol/ | Making The Case For COBOL | Maya Posch | [
"Interest",
"Original Art",
"Slider",
"Software Development"
] | [
"cobol",
"gcc",
"gcc-cobol",
"gnucobol"
] | Perhaps rather unexpectedly, on the 14th of March this year the GCC mailing list received an
announcement
regarding the release of the first ever
COBOL
front-end for the GCC compiler. For the uninitiated, COBOL saw its first release in 1959, making it with 63 years one of the oldest programming language that is still in regular use. The reason for its persistence is mostly due to its focus from the beginning as a transaction-oriented, domain specific language (
DSL
).
Its acronym stands for Common Business-Oriented Language, which clearly references the domain it targets. Even with the current COBOL 2014 standard, it is still essentially the same primarily transaction-oriented language, while adding support for structured, procedural and object-oriented programming styles. Deriving most of its core from
Admiral Grace Hopper
‘s
FLOW-MATIC
language, it allows for efficiently describing business logic as one would encounter at financial institutions or businesses, in clear English.
Unlike the older
GnuCOBOL
project – which translates COBOL to C – the new
GCC-COBOL
front-end project does away with that intermediate step, and directly compiles COBOL source code into binary code. All of which may raise the question of why an entire man-year was invested in this effort for a language which has been declared ‘dead’ for probably at least half its 63-year existence.
Does it make sense to learn or even use COBOL today? Do we need a new COBOL compiler?
Getting The Punch Line
An IBM 704 mainframe in use at NACA in 1957. (Credit: NASA)
To fully grasp where COBOL comes from, we have to travel back all the way to the 1950s. This was a time still many years before minicomputers like the PDP-8, never mind home computers like the Apple I and kin became a thing. In these days dinosaurs stalked the depths of universities and businesses, with increasingly transistorized mainframes and highly disparate system architectures.
Even within a single manufacturer series of mainframes such differences existed, for example IBM’s
700 and 7000 series
. Since each mainframe had to be programmed for its intended purpose, usually scientific or commercial tasks, and this often meant that software for a business’ or university’s older mainframes would not run on the newer hardware without modifications or a rewrite, adding significantly to the cost.
Even before COBOL came onto the scene, this problem was recognized by people such as John W. Backus of
BNF
fame, who proposed the development of a practical alternative to assembly language to his superiors at IBM in late 1953. This resulted in the development of the
FORTRAN
scientific programming language, along with the
LISP
mathematical programming language, both targeting initially the
IBM 704
scientific mainframe.
FORTRAN and other high-level programming languages offer two benefits over writing programs in the mainframe’s assembly language: portability and efficient development. The latter is primarily due to being able to use singular statements in the high-level language that translate to an optimized set of assembly instructions for the hardware, providing a modular system that allowed scientists and others to create their own programs as part of their research, studies or other applications rather than learn a specific mainframe’s architecture.
The portability feature of a high-level language also allowed for scientists to share FORTRAN programs with others, who could then run it on the mainframes at their institute, regardless of the mainframe’s system architecture and other hardware details. All it required was an available FORTRAN compiler.
A UNIVAC I operator’s console at the Museum of Science in Boston, USA.
Whereas FORTRAN and LISP focused on easing programming in the scientific domains, businesses had very different needs. Businesses operate on strict sets of rules, of procedures that must be followed to transform inputs like transactions and revenue flows into payrolls and quarterly statements, following rules set by the tax office and other official instances. Transforming those written business rules into something that worked exactly the same way on a mainframe was an important challenge. This is where Grace Hopper’s
FLOW-MATIC
language, formerly Business Language 0, or B-0, provided a solution that targeted the
UNIVAC I
, the world’s first dedicated business computer.
Hopper’s experiences indicated that the use of plain English words was very much preferred by businesses, rather than symbols and mathematical notation. Admiral Hopper’s role as a technical advisor to the
CODASYL
committee that created the first COBOL standard was a recognition of both FLOW-MATIC’s success and Hopper’s expertise on the subject. As she would later say in a 1980 interview, COBOL 60 is 95% FLOW-MATIC. The other 5% coming from competing languages – such as IBM’s COMTRAN language – which had similar ideas, but a very different implementation.
Interestingly, one characteristic of COBOL before the 2002 standard was its column-based coding style, that derives from the use of 80-column punch cards. This brings us to the many feature updates to the COBOL standard over the decades.
Standards Of Their Time
An IBM COBOL coding form from the 1960s.
An interesting aspect of especially domain-specific languages is that they reflect the state of both said domain as well as that of the technology at that time. When COBOL was put into use in the 1960s, programming wasn’t done directly on the computer system, but usually with the code provided to the mainframe in the form of punch cards, or if you were lucky, magnetic tape. During the 1960s this meant that ‘running a program’ involved handing over a stack of
punched cards
or special coding form to the folk wrangling the mainframe, who would run the program for you and hand you back the results.
These intermediate steps meant additional complexity when developing new COBOL programs, and the column-based style was the only option with the COBOL-85 update as well. However, with the next standard update in 2002, a lot of changes were made, including the dropping of the column-based alignment, adopting free-form code. This update also added object-oriented programming and other features, including more data types to the previously somewhat limited string and numeric data representations.
What did remain unchanged was COBOL’s lack of code blocks. Instead COBOL source is divided into four divisions:
Identification division
Environment division
Data division
Procedure division
The identification division specifies the name and meta information about the program, in addition to class and interface specifications. The environment division specifies any program features that depend on the system running it, such as files and character sets. The data division is used to declare variables and parameters. The procedure division contains the program’s statements. Finally, each division is sub-divided into sections, each of which are made up out of paragraphs.
An IBM z14 mainframe from 2017, based around the IBM z/Architecture CISC ISA.
With the latest COBOL update of 2014, the floating point type format was changed to
IEEE 754
, to further improve its interoperability with data formats. Yet as Charles R. Martin
pointed out
in The Overflow in his solid COBOL introduction, the right comparison of COBOL would be to another domain-specific language like
SQL
(introduced 1974). One could add like
PostScript
, Fortran, or Lisp to that comparison as well.
While it’s technically possible to use SQL and PostScript for regular programming and emulate the DSL’s features in a generic (system) programming language, doing so is neither fast nor an efficient use of one’s time. All of which rather illustrates the raison
d’être
for these DSLs: to make programming within a specific domain as efficient and direct as possible.
This point is rather succinctly illustrated by IBM’s Program Language One (
PL/I
) – introduced in 1964 – which is a generic programming language that was intended to compete with everything, from FORTRAN to COBOL, but in the end failed to outperform any of those, with neither FORTRAN nor COBOL programmers convinced of the merits of PL/I to switch to it.
It’s important to realize that you don’t write operating systems and word processors in any of these DSLs. This lack of genericity both reduces their complexity, and is also why we should judge them solely on their merits as a DSL for their intended domain.
The Right Tool
An interesting aspect of COBOL was that the committee that produced it was not made up out of computer scientists, but rather by people within the business community, driven strongly by the needs of manufacturers like IBM, RCA, Sylvania, General Electric, Philco, and National Cash Register, for whom a good experience by the business owners and government agencies with whom they did business was paramount.
As a result, much like how SQL is shaped by the need to efficiently define database queries and related, so too was COBOL shaped over decades by the need to make business transactions and management work smoothly. Even today much of the world’s banking and stock trading is handled by mainframes running code written in COBOL, largely because of decades of refinement to the language to remove ambiguities and other issues that could lead to very costly bugs.
As attempts to port business applications written in COBOL have shown, the problem with moving statements from a DSL to a generic language is that the latter has none of the assumptions, protections and features that is the very reason why DSLs were made in the first place. The more generic a language is, the more unintended consequences of a statement may occur, which means that rather than the verbatim porting of a COBOL or FORTRAN (or SQL) statement, you also have to keep in mind all the checks, limitations and safeties of the original language and replicate those.
Ultimately, any attempt to port such code to a generic language will inevitably result in the DSL being replicated in the target language, albeit with a much higher likelihood of bugs for a variety of reasons. Which is to say that while a generic programming language can implement the same functionality as those DSLs, the real question is whether this is at all desirable. Particularly when the cost of downtime and mistakes tend to be measured in millions of dollars per second, as in a nation’s financial system.
The attractiveness of a DSL here is thus that it avoids many potential corner cases and issues by simply not implementing those features that would enable those issues.
Where GCC-COBOL Fits In
There’s currently still a severe
lack of COBOL developers
, even though demand is strong. Although GCC-COBOL is – like GnuCOBOL – not an officially validated compiler that’d be accepted anywhere near an IBM z/OS-running mainframe at a financial institute, it does however provide the invaluable role of enabling easy access to a COBOL toolchain. This then enables hobbyists and students to develop in COBOL, whether for fun or for a potential career.
A business could also use such an open-source toolchain for replacing legacy Java or similar payroll processing applications with COBOL, without having to invest in any proprietary toolchains and associated ecosystems. According to the developer behind GCC-COBOL in the mailing list announcement, this is one of the goals: to enable mainframe COBOL applications to run on Linux systems.
Although financial institutions are still highly likely to jump for an IBM Z system mainframe (the ‘Z’ stands for ‘Zero Downtime’) and associated bulletproof service contract, it feels good to see such an important DSL become more readily available to everyone, with no strings attached. | 76 | 28 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479716",
"author": "johnkabat",
"timestamp": "2022-05-31T14:24:18",
"content": "In 1974 while in the Air Force, I used COBOL to write an 8080 assembler for my Altair 8080. One of the things it included was free form input instead of the fixed fields normally used. It ran on a Burr... | 1,760,372,677.077431 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/31/macbook-gets-nvme-ssd-with-help-of-a-bga-imitating-pcb/ | Macbook Gets NVMe SSD With Help Of A BGA-Imitating PCB | Arya Voronova | [
"computer hacks",
"Mac Hacks"
] | [
"M.2",
"macbook",
"NVMe",
"pci express",
"PCI-E",
"PCIe"
] | Recently, we stumbled upon
a video by [iBoff],
adding an M.2 NVMe port to a 2011-2013 MacBook. Apple laptops never came with proper M.2 ports, especially the A1278 – so what’s up? The trick is – desoldering a PCIe-connected Thunderbolt controller, then soldering a BGA-like interposer PCB in place of where the chip was, and pulling a cable assembly from there to the drive bay, where a custom adapter PCB awaits. That adapter even lets you expose the PCIe link as a full-sized PCIe 4x slot, in case you want to connect an external GPU instead of the NVMe SSD!
The process is well-documented in the video, serving as an instruction manual for anyone attempting to install this specific mod, but also a collection of insights and ideas for anyone interested in imitating it. The interposer board ships with solder balls reballed onto it, so that it can be installed in the same way that a BGA chip would be – but the cable assembly connector isn’t installed onto the interposer, since it has to be soldered onto the mainboard with hot air, which would then melt the connector. The PCB that replaces the optical drive makes no compromises, either, tapping into the SATA connector pins and letting you add an extra 2.5mm SATA SSD.
Adding an NVMe drive is an underappreciated way to speed up your old laptop, and since they’re all PCIe under the hood, you can really get creative with the specific way you add it. You aren’t even limited to substituting obscure parts like Thunderbolt controllers – given a laptop with a discrete GPU and a CPU-integrated one, you could get rid of the discrete GPU and replace it with an adapter for one, or maybe even two NVMe drives, and all you need is a PCB that has the same footprint as your GPU. Sadly, the PCB files for this adapter don’t seem to be open-source, but developing a replacement for your own needs would be best started from scratch, either way.
We’ve seen such
an adapter made for a Raspberry Pi 4
before, solderable in place of a QFN USB 3.0 controller chip and exposing the PCIe signals onto the USB 3 connector pins. However, this one takes it up a notch! Typically, without such an adapter, we have to
carefully solder a properly shielded cable
if we want to get a PCIe link from a board that never intended to expose one. What’s up with PCIe and why is it cool? We’ve
talked about that
in depth! | 12 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479718",
"author": "philosiraptor117",
"timestamp": "2022-05-31T14:39:36",
"content": "NOW THATS A HACK!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6479724",
"author": "Mark",
"timestamp": "2022-05-31T14:51:56",
"content": "If... | 1,760,372,676.598147 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/31/ultra-light-voron-x-beam-milled-from-aluminium-tube-stock/ | Ultra Light VORON X-Beam Milled From Aluminium Tube Stock | Maya Posch | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"CoreXY"
] | Voron X/Y carriage overview.
When it comes to 3D printing using fused deposition modeling (FDM) technology, there are two main groups of printers: Cartesian and CoreXY, with the latter being the domain of those who wish to get the fastest prints possible, courtesy of the much more nimble tool head configuration. Having less mass in the X/Y carriage assembly means that it can also move faster, which leads to CoreXY FDM enthusiasts to experiment with carbon fiber and a
recent video
by [PrimeSenator] in which an X-beam milled out of aluminium tube stock that weighs even less than a comparable carbon fiber tube is demonstrated.
As the CoreXY FDM printer
only moves
in the Z-direction relative to the printing surface, the X/Y axes are directly controlled by belts and actuators. This means that the faster and more precise you can move the extruder head along the linear rails, the faster you can (theoretically) print. Ditching the heavier carbon fiber for these milled aluminium structures on a
Voron Design
CoreXY printer should mean less kinetic inertia, with the initial demonstrations showing positive results.
The interesting thing about this ‘speed printing’ community is that not only the raw printing speeds, but also that in theory CoreXY FDM printers are superior in terms of precision (resolution) and efficiency (e.g. build volume). All of which makes these printers worthy of a look next time one is shopping for an FDM-style printer. | 49 | 17 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479639",
"author": "Jon H",
"timestamp": "2022-05-31T08:35:55",
"content": "Is that rigid enough?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6479642",
"author": "Rumble_in_the_Jungle",
"timestamp": "2022-05-31T08:47:08",... | 1,760,372,677.173938 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/30/expired-certificate-causes-german-payment-meltdown/ | Expired Certificate Causes German Payment Meltdown | Jenny List | [
"Security Hacks"
] | [
"germany",
"payment terminal",
"verifone"
] | For most Hackaday readers the process of buying groceries this weekend has been a relatively painless one, however we’re guessing some of our German friends will have found their cards unexpectedly declined. The reason? A popular model of payment card terminal, the Verifone H5000, has suffered what has been described as
a “software malfunction”.
So exactly what has happened? The answer is as simple as it is unfortunate:
a security certificate for German transaction processing stored on the device has expired
.
The full story exposes the flaws in assuming that a payment terminal is an appliance rather than a computer and its associated software that needs updating like any other. The H5000 is an old terminal that ceased production back in the last decade and has reached end-of-life, however it has remained in use and perhaps more seriously, remained in the supply chain to merchants buying a terminal. With updates requiring a site visit rather than an over-the-air upgrade, it’s likely that the effects of this mess could last a while.
In case the hardware for this type of equipment interests you,
we’ve had a teardown on another Verifone terminal in the past
. | 83 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479604",
"author": "Andrew",
"timestamp": "2022-05-31T06:13:38",
"content": "Verdammt!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6479610",
"author": "Deine Mutter",
"timestamp": "2022-05-31T06:35:25",
"content":... | 1,760,372,677.285069 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/30/domino-row-goes-with-the-flow/ | Domino Row Goes With The Flow | Michael Shaub | [
"hardware",
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"dominoes",
"ieee",
"linear actuator",
"research",
"servo",
"soliton",
"U Penn",
"university of pennsylvania"
] | Around here, we’re always excited about a new actuator design. Linear actuators are particularly hard to make cheap, fast, and good, so it’s even better when something new that we can build ourselves slides onto the scene.
Researchers at U Penn’s
Pikul Research Group
took inspiration from the cascade of falling dominoes for an innovative take on linear motion.
This article on IEEE Spectrum
describes the similarity of the sequential tipping-over with the peristaltic motion of biological systems, including you, swallowing right now.
The motion propagation in falling dominoes, called a
Soliton Wave
, can be harnessed to push an object at the front of the wave, just like a surfer. See the videos after the break for examples of simple setups that any of us could recreate with laser-cut or 3D printed parts. Maybe you won’t be using them to help a robot swallow (a terrifying idea that the article suggests), but you might need a conveyor or a novel way to help a device crawl like a shrimp. The paper is behind a paywall on IEEE, though you readers likely see enough in the videos to get started, and we can’t wait to see where your dominoes will lead us next. | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479730",
"author": "RW ver 0.0.3",
"timestamp": "2022-05-31T15:04:15",
"content": "Fascinating and innovative, but I wonder how it wears… got the friction between the “dominos” to take into account and should they scuff up a bit, it might jam things up eventually. Determining the m... | 1,760,372,677.366425 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/30/can-you-build-an-industrial-grade-cnc-with-only-diy-resources/ | Can You Build An Industrial Grade CNC With Only DIY Resources? | Dave Rowntree | [
"cnc hacks"
] | [
"CNC flatbed",
"concrete",
"I-beam",
"metal"
] | [FloweringElbow] aka [Bongo] on YouTube is certainly having a go at this, and we reckon he’s onto a winner! This
epic flatbed CNC build
(video, embedded below) starts with some second hand structural I-beam, with welded-on I-beam legs, DIY cast aluminium side plates and plenty of concrete to give a strong and importantly, heavy structure.
The ideal machine is as rigid as possible, and heavy, to dampen out vibrations caused by high-feed speed cutting, or the forces due to cutting harder materials, so bigger really is better. For construction of the frame, steel is pretty strong, and the mass of the structure gives it additional damping, but triangulation was needed to counteract additional twisting. He stitch-welded the pre-heated frame in inch-long sections to limit the heat transferred into the metal, minimizing the subsequent warpage. [Bongo] used hacky
Vibratory stress relief (VSR)
constructed from a washing machine motor and eccentric weight, clamped to the frame, with feedback from a mobile phone app to find the resonant frequencies. There are other videos on the channel devoted to that topic of such stress relief techniques.
Precise enough to cut sticky-backed vinyl at half thickness!
When it came time for adding even more mass, a priming coat was made from a mixture of bonding epoxy and sharp grit, intended for non-slip flooring. The concrete mix used Portland cement,
pozzolan
(Silica fume) polycarboxylate superplasticiser and 1/2″ glass fiber threads. A second mix added crushed stone for additional mass. A neat trick was to make a handheld vibratory compactor from a plate welded onto the end of old drill bit, mounted in an SDS hammer drill.
Once the frame was flipped the right way up (collapsing the overloaded hoist in the process) it was necessary to level the top surface to accept the linear rails. This was done using a super runny, self-leveling epoxy, and checked by flowing water over it. Once the epoxy surfaces were adequately flat and coplanar (and much scraping later) the linear rails were attached, after creating some epoxy shoulders for them to butt up against. End plates to attach the Y axis lead screws, were added by bolting into the frame with a grit-loaded epoxy bond in between.
The gantry design was skipped for this video (but you can
see that here
) and once mounted a quick test showed the machine was viable. One curious task was making their own cable-chain from ply, on the machine itself, rather than buying something expensive off-the-peg. Why not? Once the machine was working well enough to mill a flat sheet of steel to nice reflective surface, it was used to mount a DIY drag-knife to cut out shapes in some vinyl, so it has the precision. We did like seeing an XBox controller used to manually jog the machine around! So much to see in this build and other related videos, we reckon this channel is one to watch!
We’ve featured CNC builds many a time, there’s a build whatever your needs and budget, but here’s a good starting point to
build a machine, just good enough
to build the tools you need. If you don’t happen to have a source of structural I-beam to hand, you
can do something quite capable with wood
, and if you fancy a go at 3D printing a knee mill,
we’ve got that covered
as well. | 14 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479552",
"author": "metalman",
"timestamp": "2022-05-30T23:41:00",
"content": "this is epic,kudos for bringing ancient skills forward and meldingthem with latest bits and bobs,phones and vinyl.surface plates made 400 years ago have been checked forflatness and are +- less than a mi... | 1,760,372,677.421608 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/30/3d-printing-a-water-cooled-jet-engine/ | 3D Printing A Water-Cooled Jet Engine? | Dave Rowntree | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"3d printed",
"jet engine",
"resin printing",
"water cooled"
] | Everybody knows the trick to holding a candle flame to a balloon without it bursting — that of adding a little water before the air to absorb the heat from the relatively cool flame. So [Integza], in his quest to 3D print a jet engine wondered if the same principle could applied to a
3D printed combustion chamber
. First things first, the little puddle of water was replaced with a pumped flow, from an external reservoir, giving the thin plastic inner surface at least a vague chance of survival. Whilst this whole plan might seem pretty bonkers (although we admit, not so much if you’ve seen any of other videos in the channel lately) the idea has some merit. Liquid cooling the combustion jacket is used in a great many rocket engine designs, we note, the German WWII V2 rocket used this idea with great success, along with many others. After all, some materials will only soften and become structurally weak if they get hot enough in any spot, so if it is sufficiently conductive, then the excess heat can be removed from the outer surface and keep the surface temperature within sensible bounds. Since resin is a thermoset plastic, and will burn, rather than melt, this behaviour will be different, but not necessarily better for this application.
The combustion chamber itself didn’t burn
The issue we can see, is balancing the thermal conductivity of the resin wall, with the rate of cooling from the water flow, whilst making it thick enough to withstand the pressure of combustion, and any shock components. Quite a complicated task if you ask us. Is resin the right material for the job? Probably not, but it’s fun finding out anyway! In the end [Integza] managed to come up with a design, that with the help of a metal injector separator plate, survived long enough to maintain some sort of combustion, until the plate overheated and burned the resin around its support. Better luck next time!
This isn’t the first time attempting to use 3D printed resin for such an application, here’s an attempt to use the
air-multiplier type setup with a combustion chamber
. Of course making
a combustion chamber from a toilet roll holder
is far more sensible, just as [colinfurze] will attest, don’t try this at home folks! | 14 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479504",
"author": "Alex99a",
"timestamp": "2022-05-30T20:19:31",
"content": "Rocket engines usually duct the fuel or oxidizer through the jacket surrounding the combustion chamber to keep it cool. Not water… carrying water for that purpose would be rather inefficient, no?",
"p... | 1,760,372,677.47702 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/06/01/alternative-display-technologies-and-where-to-find-them/ | Alternative Display Technologies And Where To Find Them | Arya Voronova | [
"Art",
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"3d",
"art",
"database",
"display",
"illusion",
"screen"
] | [Blair Neal] has been working on
an information database
for artists and hackers – a collection of non-conventional display technologies available to us. We’ve
covered this repository before,
six years ago – since then, it’s moved to a more suitable platform, almost doubled in size, and currently covers over 40+ display technology types and related tricks. This database is something you should check out even if you’re not looking for a new way to display things right now, however, for its sheer educational and entertainment value alone.
[Blair] doesn’t just provide a list of links, like the “awesome-X” directories we see a lot of. Each entry is a small story that goes into detail on what makes the technology tick, its benefits and fundamental limitations, linking to illustrative videos where appropriate. It’s as if this guide is meant to give you an extensive learning course on all the ways you can visualize things on your creative journey. All of these categories have quite a few examples to draw from, highlighting individual artworks that have made use of any technology or trick in a particular way.
If you’re ever wondered about the current state of technology when it comes to
flexible
or
transparent
displays, or looked for good examples of
volumetric projection
done in a variety of ways, this is the place to go. It also talks about interesting experimental technologies, like
drone displays
,
plasma combustion
or
scanning fiber optics.
Overall, if you’re looking to spend about half an hour learning about all the ways there are to visualize something, this database is worth a read. And, if there’s a display technology the author might’ve missed and you know something about,
contributions are welcome!
Someone setting out to compile information about an extensive topic is always appreciated, and helps many hackers on their path. We’ve seen that done with
3D printer resin settings
and
SMD part codes,
to name just a few. What’s your favourite hacker-maintained database? | 13 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6480279",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Known As Ren",
"timestamp": "2022-06-02T02:10:00",
"content": "Interesting, but I thought it was going to take me to a web site with info on how to hook up to various displays, such as those found in the surplus market.",
"parent_id": ... | 1,760,372,677.333306 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/06/01/hackaday-prize-2022-house-ventilation-reverse-engineered-and-automated/ | Hackaday Prize 2022: House Ventilation Reverse-Engineered And Automated | Arya Voronova | [
"home hacks",
"Reverse Engineering",
"The Hackaday Prize"
] | [
"2022 Hackaday Prize",
"atmega32u4",
"CC1101",
"environment control",
"smart home"
] | [Marcel] thought – what if he had more control over his house ventilation system? You could add some nifty features, such as automatically ventilating your house in the mornings when everyone’s away, only creating noise when nobody’s around to hear it. Sadly, most ventilation systems are not automation-friendly at all – he was lucky, however, as his system came with a wireless remote. [Marcel] reverse-engineered this remote,
created a USB dongle
speaking the same protocol, and tied it into his Home Assistant setup!
The remote in question is Orcon R15, with an Atmel MCU talking to a CC1101 chip through SPI. He sniffed the SPI communications when pressing different buttons, figured out the protocol by comparing the recordings, and built a test setup with a spare Arduino and CC1101 module. It worked, and he set out to design a separate dongle, using an ATMega32U4. The dongle looks pretty neat, and fits a Hammond enclosure – what’s not to like?
Then he set out to develop the firmware, and didn’t disappoint on that front either. His code doesn’t just imitate the original remote perfectly in terms of control, it also has user-friendly pairing flow, keeps track of the system’s current state, and still lets the original remote be used in parallel. Eagle files for the PCB are available
on the project page,
with the code and a PDF schematic available
in the GitHub repo.
This entire journey is described in the Hackaday.io page, and we would recommend you check it out for all the insights it provides!
Ventilation systems don’t tend to be designed for automation, and it’s endearing to see hackers working on conquering this frontier. Last time we’ve seen a ventilation system hack, it had the additional challenge of being landlord-friendly, and we think
the hacker nailed it!
The
Hackaday
Prize2022
is Sponsored by: | 5 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6480351",
"author": "Javier",
"timestamp": "2022-06-02T09:59:26",
"content": "Congraulations to Marcel for taming that AC!!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6480481",
"author": "marcelh1",
"timestamp": "2022-06-... | 1,760,372,677.514137 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/06/01/bulk-material-what-is-this-stuff-anyway/ | Bulk Material — What IS This Stuff, Anyway? | Anne Ogborn | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"hardware",
"Slider"
] | [
"bulk material",
"gummy bear"
] | I hope last week’s
introduction to bulk material handling
got you all thinking up amazing hacks, and we’ll soon be reporting on DIY Cap’n Crunch Robots galore. This week we’ll look at how to measure particle sizes, separate particles, and even grind them up when you need to.
Measuring Material Properties
Last week we talked about cohesive strength. Bulk material behaves somewhere between a solid and a liquid — if you’ve done your homework, it flows down the funnel just fine. But if you haven’t, it sticks together and holds up the rest of the material. Cohesive strength is the measure of how much weight the material at the bottom of the funnel can hold up.
You can get a rough measurement by packing material in a box with a square hole at the bottom. One side of the hole should have a retractable slide. Slowly withdraw the slide, making the hole rectangular. Material will bridge over, and then at some point a larger chunk will fall out. This is about the size of the minimum opening that will not arch, and a practical measure of the material’s cohesive strength.
Image capture from
The Million Dollar Rathole
(video).
Many materials cohere better when wet. Dry a sample in a microwave to determine the
percent moisture
by weighing it before and after
.
Cohesive strength is closely allied to
shear strength
. If you want to measure shear strength, cut two 1 cm wide rings of 5 cm diameter PVC pipe, stack them, pack with material, put a disk atop the material and load it, then drag the top ring off the bottom with a spring scale. The force per unit area is the shear strength at that pressure. If it starts packing you’ll see it in the curve.
Packing factor
is another useful measurement. Gently shake material to fill a rigid container and weigh it. Now empty the container and refill, packing the material as hard as you can with a length of 1” dowel. Reweigh, and the ratio of the two weights tells you how well the material packs.
Real bulk material is almost always made up of particles of varying sizes, shapes, and compositions. Dirt is particles of different kinds of mineral and organic matter varying from outright rocks to sub micron clay particles. If you’re having problems, getting a
graph of material size distribution
can be helpful.
For particles above about 75 μM, you can measure the sizes with sieves. If you want to be fancy, they sell nice sets of metal sieves with wire mesh in the bottom. Screen assortments are cheaper. Below 75 μM, you have to use a hydrometer. This is messy and takes a while, but does work.
The idea is to mix the material with soapy water and then use a hydrometer from the auto parts store to measure the density. The particles fall out by Stokes law, big ones first. Stokes law is just that the drag force on a sphere is proportional to the square of the radius. Mass will go up as cube of the radius, so large particles fall faster than small ones. As they fall out, the density of the fluid decreases.
This page describes how to do it,
and
this page has a handy calculator
for interpreting the results.
Grinding
You can also change the size of particles in your mix. If particles are too large, they can be crushed or ground. You can separate by size and only grind some of the sizes or discard some of the material. There’s a whole science to grinding. The finer you grind, the harder it gets to grind. Cosmetics and pharmaceutical companies are full of grinding experts.
In general, there are three ways to make something smaller – crush it, cut it, or hit it.
Crushing is straightforward. Use rollers or jaws, a rolling pin or a rock crusher. Don’t overlook the vise. A jaw crusher only crushes particles larger than the jaw space, useful to make a certain size.
Rock crushers have a complex motion
(video) that should nonetheless be easily imitated by a hacker project. Amateur/hobby gold prospectors have an accessible community.
Crushing action in rollers only works until the particle is small enough that the surface of the roller deforms instead of the particle. Stones have been used to crush grain into flour for most of history.
Oldies Marketplace – Meat Grinder
by amiefedora. CC BY-ND 2.0
Cutting is best for soft things, like gummy worms, and
tough
thing
s
(video.). Make sure the cut material has an easy path out. Think of an old fashioned kitchen meat grinder. .
If you want small particles, you need an impact grinder. A coffee mill or blender works by striking the particle with a fast moving impactor. This can be a blade – useful if the material first needs to be cut up, as in a coffee mill – or blunt. Many industrial mills use two pivoting weights on a shaft, and
this unit just uses chains
(video).
Another impact mill is the ball mill. Rotate a drum on it’s side with steel balls and the material. The balls travel up the side, then fall back down, striking the material.
All these work by fracturing the material. What if you’re trying to powder something that doesn’t fracture, say rubber O rings? For that, there’s
cryogenic grinding
.
Many rubbery materials are really glasses — materials that are a gloppy liquid at a higher temperature, often brittle at a cool temperature, and soft in-between. The glass you’re probably thinking of is a brittle, breakable material at room temperature, but at high temperature is a liquid. The transition point is the ‘glass transition temperature’.
So what about our O rings? If they’re natural rubber their transition point is about -70° C. Below that temperature they’re brittle and can be ground up. Unfortunately, grinding is going to put heat back in. So consider grinding slowly – some
labs grind biological material
s like skin samples with a special mortar and pestle cooled beforehand with liquid nitrogen. Just be sure everything in contact with the material has been cooled, and use a thick walled container with lots of thermal mass.
Separating
Wheat From Chaff
Sometimes you have a mix and need to separate it. Your roommate dumped all the gummy bears and all those weird ginger candies into a bowl or whatever. Last week we introduced particle segregation as a bad thing. But when you want to un-mix a mixture, it can be a good thing. Any of the techniques from last week can be an aid.
Sieves and screens work to separate by size. They clog unless the material keeps moving over them. One simple way to do this is to flow the material over sieves on a slanted board, finest sieve first. Another is to mechanically shake the screen. Paper filters are just fine screens, and do clog.
A
trommel
is a slowly turning cylinder with walls of different sized screens along it’s length. Material is fed into the fine screen end and slowly moves towards the other.
Stokes law provides another way to separate materials as we saw above. Make an upward air draft in a vertical pipe. Deliver the material into the pipe part way up. Materials with more drag than weight will go up, larger materials will go down. You can use the air speed to control the size of particle. An industrial machine called an air classifier does this with higher velocity air blowing material into the rim of a spinning set of blades.
It could be the air (or another gas) you want to remove. There are a couple ways to do it. The first is
the cyclone familiar to wood shops
. The second is even simpler – inject the air/material mix into the top of a tall, slender container with a tube that extends about halfway into the container. Let the air out from an outlet pipe in the roof. The air flow expands, slows down, and the material falls out.
You can just blow the material sideways – the age old system of threshing wheat works this way. Wheat comes from the plant with a husk, you beat it with a flail to loosen the husk, giving you wheat grains and chaff mixed. Put the mix on a blanket and have four peasants toss it repeatedly. The chaff blows away in the wind.
Inertial Separation
A very sensitive separation technique is inertial separation. Here’s a mix of gummy colas and jelly beans. We separated them by tilting and gently shaking the sheet. A material moves on a sheet by staying in place until the acceleration is more than some critical value. Then it rolls or slides.
If your material is dirt or such, run a magnet through it. There’s iron ore and bits of human generated iron in a lot of soil. It can get into motors and such. If you need it out run the material past magnets. An eddy current separator uses AC magnetic effects to do the same with nonferrous metals.
You can also segregate materials by dissolving them. A mixture of table salt and white sand would seem impossible, but if you stir it into water, then decant and boil off the water, the salt and sand can be recovered separately. But we think we’re veering into chemistry now, and we should stop.
Next time we’ll finish up by looking at controlling movement: building gates and contraptions that move your bulk material without clogging up. | 13 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6480173",
"author": "Barry+Carter",
"timestamp": "2022-06-01T18:26:21",
"content": "Interesting stuff, thanks!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6480181",
"author": "RW ver 0.0.3",
"timestamp": "2022-06-01T19:06:04",
"... | 1,760,372,677.568464 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/06/01/new-resin-printing-method-creates-objects-in-seconds/ | New Resin Printing Method Creates Objects In Seconds | Bryan Cockfield | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"3d printer",
"centrifugal",
"fast",
"light",
"research",
"resin",
"sla",
"small",
"spin"
] | For anyone looking to buy a 3D printer at home, the first major decision that needs to be made is whether to get a resin printer or a filament printer. Resin has the benefits of finer detail, but filament printers are typically able to produce stronger prints. Within those two main camps are various different types and sizes to choose from, but thanks to some researchers at Switzerland’s École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
there’s a new type of resin printer on the horizon that can produce prints nearly instantaneously
.
The method works similarly to existing resin printers by shining a specific light pattern on the resin in order to harden it. The main difference is that the resin is initially placed in a cylinder and spun at a high speed, and the light is shined on the resin at different angles with very precise intensities and timings in order to harden the resin in specific areas. This high-speed method allows the printer to produce prints in record-breaking time. The only current downside, besides the high price for the prototype printer, is that it’s currently limited to small prints.
With the ability to scale in the future and the trend of most new technologies to come down in price after they have been on the market for some amount of time, it would be groundbreaking to be able to produce prints with this type of speed if printers like these can be scalable. Especially if they end up
matching the size and scale of homemade printers like this resin printer
.
Thanks to [suicidal.banana] for the tip! | 20 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6480136",
"author": "scott_tx",
"timestamp": "2022-06-01T15:56:03",
"content": "shame the objects are indescribable lumps",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6480146",
"author": "Jon H",
"timestamp": "2022-06-01T16... | 1,760,372,677.620558 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/06/01/rogue-waves-are-mysterious-and-big/ | Rogue Waves Are Mysterious And Big | Lewin Day | [
"Featured",
"Interest",
"Original Art",
"Science",
"Slider"
] | [
"ocean",
"oceanography",
"rogue wave",
"rogue waves",
"waves"
] | Stand by the shore and watch the waves roll in, and you’ll notice that most come in at roughly the same size. There’s a little variation, but the overwhelming majority don’t stand out from the crowd. On all but the stormiest of days, they have an almost soothing regularity about them.
Every so often though, out on the high seas, a rogue wave comes along. These abnormally large waves can strike with surprise, and are dangerous to even the largest of ships. Research is ongoing as to what creates these waves, and how they might be identified and tracked ahead of time.
Myth Becomes Reality
The MS Riverdance was run aground after being struck by a rogue wave off the coast of Blackpool in 2008. The ship was eventually dismantled on site as attempts to refloat the vessel failed. Credit:
Susan Noble, CC-BY-SA 2.0
Stories of rogue waves have long been part of maritime folklore and legend. For centuries, sailors told tales of “walls of water” that would appear out on the open seas, dashing ships to pieces as the towering waves crashed over the vessel.
They’re not to be confused with tsunamis, either. Those are generally caused by the displacement of water from a volcano or earthquake or similar large disturbance. Tsunamis barely show up as more than a ripple in the ocean, only towering once they get close to breaking on the shore. Rogue waves are quite the opposite, standing at great height in open seas and posing a major danger to any ships or platforms caught in the path.
Despite many anecdotes of such phenomena, however, mainstream science was slow to accept the existence of rogue waves. Established models for wave creation and propagation simply couldn’t account for such behaviour. Thus, rogue waves remained largely ignored by the scientific literature. A handful of papers and texts looked into the idea of freakishly large waves, but the concept was seen as little more than a curious myth.
The accurate recording of the rogue wave that hit the Draupner platform in 1995 sparked a change in the broader scientific community, leading to a flurry of research to better understand rogue waves. Credit:
Paolosan, CC-BY-SA-4.0
That all changed in 1995. The Draupner gas pipeline platform in the North Sea was struck by a rogue wave with a maximum wave height of a full 25.6 meters. It was a huge wave, well above the typical significant wave height of just 12 meters in the locality during typical conditions. The big break was that the Draupner platform was fitted with an accurate laser rangefinder wave recorder, which recorded the height of the wave accurately as it passed by. Thankfully, the platform only took minor damage, but the data captured went on to shake up oceanography for years to come.
The measurement of the Draupner wave completely changed the scientific consensus; there was now unarguable proof that rogue waves really existed. Research took off in earnest, with scientists quickly realizing that rogue waves fell outside of the typical Gaussian models used to predict wave height and activity.
By the early 2000s, scientists had determined that rogue waves weren’t obscure, 1-in-10,000 year events, either. By 2004, satellites of the European Space Agency were being used to spot rogue waves out in the ocean. Researchers found ten rogue waves over 25 meters in height after surveying a section of the South Atlantic for just three weeks.
In a relatively short time, science had gone from disbelieving in rogue waves to now finding them regularly showing up all over the world. It raised serious concerns, particularly in the world of ship design. Modern merchant vessels had traditionally been designed to withstand wave heights in the realm of 11 meters. Now, there’s a better understanding that waves in excess of 20 meters are not unexpected, and waves up to 30 meters are possible. It’s led calls to increase the minimum wave height
that ships are intended to withstand
, to give merchant vessels a greater chance at surviving an encounter with a rogue wave.
Hunting for an Answer
The modern definition of a rogue wave is a wave that is more than twice as high as the significant wave height. The significant wave height is determined by taking the mean of the top third of waves in a given sea state. Thus, a rogue wave stands out by being over twice as high as other tall waves in a given area.
Scientists hope to better understand what causes rogue waves to form. Rather than a single cause, current research suggests that a variety of different factors can come into play to generate a rogue wave.
A simulation of the Draupner wave performed in 2019. In the first row, waves meet at an angle of 0 degrees, while meeting at 60 degrees and 120 degrees respectively in rows 2 and 3. Note the significant rise in height in the third row, where researchers found a vertical jet of water rapidly increased the wave height. Credit:
McAllister et al 2019, CC-BY-4.0
Constructive interference is one of the simplest ways that a rogue wave can form. This is where separate waves travelling through the water come together and meet, wherein their peaks and troughs happen to line up, and the waves constructively interfere to become larger than before. Simulations have suggested that the angles at which these wave trains meet could play a significant role. One simulation showed that waves meeting at a 120 degree angle led to steep rogue waves being generated.
Interactions between wave swells and ocean currents are also suspected to be a way for rogue waves to form. This mechanism is thought to be at play
off the coast of South Africa
, where large rogue waves form in the region of the powerful Agulhas current. Where a swell travels in the opposite direction of an ocean current, the current is thought to have a focusing effect on the waves. The current slows the wave front, pushing subsequent waves closer together and raising the overall wave height.
Other explanations include non-linear phenomena, where one wave in a series of waves may suck energy from those around it, becoming larger in itself. This phenomena has been demonstrated in the lab successfully in water tank tests.
Research is ongoing into better predicting and understanding these wave events. A recent
research paper
has been published on trying to observe rogue waves in the field
aiming to explore these causative effects
. A wave buoy outfitted with inertial measurement systems and differential GPS for high accuracy was used to measure a rogue wave off the coast of Canada in 2020 through to 2021.
The study managed to capture data on a rogue wave of 17.6 m trough-to-crest height, in a sea state where the significant wave height was just 6.05 m by comparison. With a height ratio of 2.9 relative to the significant wave height, and a crest height 1.98 times higher, the study’s authors believe this to be the largest normalized rogue wave height thus far recorded. Notably the team did not discover evidence for non-linear effects in the generation of the rogue wave.
It’s likely it will take many years of further research and modelling before the rogue wave phenomena is truly understood. The efforts will only be hoped by better understanding, with more seafarers and researchers aware of rogue waves and thus better able to capture data on them when and where they occur. | 34 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6480077",
"author": "Reality Bites",
"timestamp": "2022-06-01T14:06:58",
"content": "Since the ships are insured and the owners almost never travel on them…. no changes will be made.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6480097",
... | 1,760,372,677.701998 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/06/01/english-words-in-french-gaming-non-merci/ | English Words In French Gaming? Non Merci! | Jenny List | [
"Games"
] | [
"France",
"french",
"gaming",
"language"
] | Are you a gamer? If you’re French, it seems that
you shouldn’t be using so much English
in pursuit of your goals.
It’s a feature of an active language, that it will readily assimilate words from others. Pizza, karaoke, vuvuzela, parka, gateau, schadenfreude, they have all played their part in bringing a little
je ne sais quoi
into our everyday speech. This happens as a natural process as whatever the word is describing becomes popular, and sometimes these new words cause a backlash from those who see themselves as the language’s defenders.
Often this is a fringe activity such as the British politician who made a fool of himself in a radio interview by insisting on the now-archaic Wade-Giles “Peking” rather than the vastly more common Pinyin “Beijing”, but for some tongues it’s no laughing matter. Nowhere is this more the case than in the Francophone world, in which the Academie Francaise and the French and Quebecquois governments see themselves as very much the official guardians of French. And now it seems that the French ministry of culture have turned their eyes upon gamers.
It’s nothing new for words associated with technology to fall under this scrutiny, a quarter century ago
in the CD-ROM business
it was
de rigeur
for localized discs to talk about
le logicel
,
l’ordinateur
, and
telecharger
instead of program, computer, and download. The talk of the industry was that Sony refused to do this for PlayStation consoles sold in Quebec during the 1990s, and thus all their sales in the province had to be under-the-counter. But there’s a sense from reading the reports that this intervention is a little clumsy; while it’s easy to say
logicel
we’re not so sure that
jeu video de competition
or video game competition for e-sports and
joueur-animateur en direct
or live player-animator for streamer aren’t just too much of a mouthful for easy adoption. For the first one, we can’t help remembering that sport is also an everyday French word, so couldn’t they have come up with something less clumsy such as
reseau-sports
or network-sports?
Here at Hackaday more than one of us are unrepentant Francophiles, so the evolution of French words in our field is of interest to us. Habitez-vous en France ou Quebec? Donnez-nous votres idees dans les commentaires! (mais en Anglais s’il vous plait pour les Americains, excusez-nous)
Header image: Christopher Macsurak,
CC BY-SA 4.0
. | 111 | 33 | [
{
"comment_id": "6480011",
"author": "Viktor",
"timestamp": "2022-06-01T11:02:26",
"content": "No schematics?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6480012",
"author": "wolf+arthur",
"timestamp": "2022-06-01T11:07:25",
"content": "Remember... | 1,760,372,678.274854 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/06/01/automatic-water-turret-keeps-grass-watered/ | Automatic Water Turret Keeps Grass Watered | Bryan Cockfield | [
"home hacks",
"Machine Learning"
] | [
"computer vision",
"khadas",
"machine learning",
"neural processing",
"SBC",
"sprinkler",
"turret",
"vim3",
"water"
] | Summer is rapidly approaching (at least for those of us living in the Northern Hemisphere) and if you are having to maintain a lawn at your home, now is the time to be thinking about irrigation. Plenty of people have built-in sprinkler systems to care for their turf, but this is little (if any) fun for any children that might like to play in those sprinklers.
This sprinkler solves that problem
, functioning as an automatic water gun turret for anyone passing by.
This project was less a specific sprinkler build and more of a way to reuse some Khadas VIM3 single-board computers that the project’s creator, [Neil], wanted to use for something other than mining crypto. The boards have a neural processing unit (NPU) in them which makes them ideal for computer vision projects like this. The camera input is fed into the NPU which then directs the turret to the correct position using yaw and pitch drivers. It’s built out of mostly aluminum extrusion and 3D printed parts, and the project’s page goes into great details about all of the parts needed if you are interested in replicating the build.
[Neil] is also actively working on improving the project, especially around the turret’s ability to identify and track objects using OpenCV. We certainly look forward to more versions of this build in the future, and in the meantime be sure to check out some
other automated sprinkler builds we’ve seen which solve different problems
. | 11 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479983",
"author": "Colton",
"timestamp": "2022-06-01T08:21:41",
"content": ">grassThat’s anything but grass.Thats a garden full of green weed.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6480048",
"author": "Adren",
"tim... | 1,760,372,677.980995 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/30/an-mp3-player-that-gives-off-nintendo-vibez/ | An MP3 Player That Gives Off Nintendo Vibez | Orlando Hoilett | [
"digital audio hacks"
] | [
"audio",
"codec",
"mp3",
"nintendo",
"synthesizer",
"vs1053"
] | We’re definitely pretty fond of the DIY MP3 players here at Hackaday, but we don’t think we’ve seen one like
CartridgeMP3
from [jpet26] before.
All the electrical components are what we’ve come to expect. [jpet26] uses the popular VS1053 decoder to read MP3 files stored on an SD card. He also includes a potentiometer for adjusting volume, a USB C port for power and programming, a headphone jack for the audio output, a general-purpose status LED, and an on/off switch.
But what really caught our attention is the form factor [jpet26] selected for his MP3 player. Though the MP3 files are stored on an SD card, he uses a cartridge interface, similar to that of a Nintendo 64 or Game Boy of yesteryear, to choose which MP3 to play from the SD card. The cartridge interface is tied to a few GPIO pins and by reading the status of each pin, the device determines which MP3 to select.
You could say that the cartridge is a little unnecessary, and we wouldn’t argue with you. The cartridge doesn’t actually store the MP3 files, the SD card does. It might make a bit more sense if the cartridge housed the SD card itself with a few select MP3s stored on the card. That would be a quirky way of sharing your favorite playlists with your friends. So, yeah some clumsy handshaking there, but
who isn’t guilty of that from time to time
? We like it and thought you might appreciate it as well.
Cool MP3 player, [jpet26]! May we suggest a
speaker for V2
? And maybe some
flex cables
. | 3 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479487",
"author": "Dude",
"timestamp": "2022-05-30T18:41:24",
"content": "Not at all. Having just few pre-selected songs available is more in line with a cartridge system; you wouldn’t or couldn’t download just any game onto a cartridge either. You had Tetris, Super Mario 3, and t... | 1,760,372,678.040989 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/30/practical-wireless-tele-tennis-build-after-only-34-years/ | Practical Wireless “Tele-Tennis” Build After Only 34 Years | Dave Rowntree | [
"Games",
"Retrocomputing"
] | [] | Home-etched PCBs ready for drilling
Back in November 1974 the publication “Practical Wireless” produced a five-part article series showing the reader how to construct a version of the popular “pong” game that could be played on the television screen available in the typical British home. [Grant Searle] had wanted to build this project for years,
but it took him until 2008 to find the opportunity to do so
. The magazine article printed PCB layouts to 1:1 scale, with a bill of materials and assembly instructions. After each month, the reader would have an assembled the project a little more, with the final month dedicated to point-to-point wiring and final setup. Subsequent months contained some enhancements such as a scoring system and sound effects, but these are not yet part of the main build. In order to understand the build, you will need to
download the PDF copy
of the magazines prints. (And if you’re an electronics nerd like this scribe, you’ve already done that right?)
A tidy assembly job with an authentic retro style
The electronics are based upon pure discrete 7400-series logic, 741 opamp-based ramp generators and, you guessed it, 555 timers. The way the various boards have discrete functions is particularly interesting. For example, in part 3, the PCB described (board A) not only is the master field/line sync generator, but also generates the video signals for the ball, with its position and size determined in an analogue fashion. Signals coming into the board from Board C (top/bottom base) cause a discrete flip-flop to toggle, changing the ball’s direction as it ‘bounces’ off the edge of the screen. Each board generates its own video signal, which are then all combined in the final video mixer (board E) that simply wire-OR’s them all with the composite sync to generate the composite video needed. This would have been tapped off and fed to a UHF video modulator, but [Grant] chose not to install that for the build. The whole thing was wrapped up inside an MDF case, coated in that dubious fake-wood plastic wrap, for that very 70’s aesthetic some of us remember fondly.
Pong is such a popular classic game, that we’ve covered many, many variants over the years. Here’s
one that’s purely mechanical
, another that uses the original PCB
with a visually appealing twist
, and finally, a
completely virtual simulation of the original arcade circuit, courtesy of Falstad
. We’re sure there will be many more to come.
Thanks [JohnU] for the tip! | 8 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479443",
"author": "Michael Black",
"timestamp": "2022-05-30T14:26:17",
"content": "In the US, a project wouldn’t have lasted five months. Either it would be crammed into one or two issues, or there’d be more an introductory article and yiu coukd send a dollar or so for plans. O... | 1,760,372,678.134072 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/30/check-your-mailbox-using-the-airtag-infrastructure/ | Check Your Mailbox Using The AirTag Infrastructure | Arya Voronova | [
"Mac Hacks",
"Wireless Hacks"
] | [
"AirTag",
"apple",
"Apple AirTag",
"bluetooth",
"bluetooth low energy",
"Find My",
"nRF51",
"nRF51822",
"OpenHaystack",
"tracker"
] | When a company creates an infrastructure of devices, we sometimes subvert this infrastructure and use it to solve tricky problems. For example, here’s a question that many a hacker has pondered – how do you detect when someone puts mail into your mailbox? Depending on the availability of power and wireless/wired connectivity options, this problem can range from “very easy” to “impractical to solve”. [dakhnod] just made this problem trivial for the vast majority of hackers, with
the FakeTag project
– piggybacking off the Apple’s AirTag infrastructure.
This project uses a cheap generic CR2032-powered NRF51822 board, sending the mailbox status over the FindMy system Apple has built for the AirTag devices. For the incoming mail detection, he uses a simple vibration sensor, glued to the flap lid – we imagine that, for flap-less mailboxes, an optical sensor or a different kind of mechanical sensor could be used instead. Every time someone with a FindMy-friendly iPhone passes by [dakhnod]’s mailbox, he gets an update on its status, with a counter of times the sensor has been triggered. [dakhnod] estimates that the device could run for up to a year on a single battery.
The specific NRF51822 board shown in the title picture seems to be sold for about $7 online, but there are many different NRF51822 boards available, and you should be able to use any one of them. As an example, [dakhnod] sends us a photo of a different sensor he designed, held in a 3D printed case and connecting to a CR2032 battery using copper tape. By now, it’s not unlikely that a friendly hackerspace has a few suitable boards in a drawer somewhere!
This project builds on top of the OpenHaystack project, a research effort that
we’ve previously told you about.
We’ve even seen
the ESP32 microcontrollers being used
for building clones before, but the NRF51822 low-power features are unbeatable for practical applications. | 32 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479427",
"author": "111111z",
"timestamp": "2022-05-30T12:54:05",
"content": "That is really cool. I assumed the system that airtag uses could only be used by apple.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6479607",
"author":... | 1,760,372,678.385981 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/30/using-a-laser-cutter-to-replicate-an-optical-comparator-screen/ | Using A Laser Cutter To Replicate An Optical Comparator Screen | Robin Kearey | [
"Laser Hacks",
"Repair Hacks",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"angle measurement",
"laser etching",
"optical comparator"
] | Precision instruments often contain specialized components that are essential to their function, but nearly impossible to replace if they fail. [Andre] had just such a problem with an optical comparator, which is an instrument typically used in machine shops to help check the tolerances of a finished part. It does this by projecting a magnified picture of an object onto a glass screen with markings showing angles and distances.
In the old comparator [Andre] bought on eBay, the markings on the glass had faded to such a degree that the instrument was almost unusable. So he contacted [James] over at Clough42, who was able to
create a near-perfect replacement screen by using a laser cutter
, as shown in the video embedded below.
The first step was to replicate the screen’s markings in a CAD program. [James] explains the process in Fusion 360, demonstrating how you can generate all the different scales nearly automatically through the proper use of constraints, variables and patterns. He then transferred the drawing to Lightburn, which drives the laser cutter and etches the markings into a sheet of glass covered with CerMark, a marking solution that turns a deep black when heated by a laser.
After etching, the final step was to apply frosting to the glass to turn it into a projection screen. While there are several ways to achieve this, [James] went for a simple spray-based method that gave surprisingly good results. It took a few experiments to find out that etching the markings on the back of the glass and applying the frosting on that side as well gave the best combination of sharpness and durability.
[James]’s project shows that even delicate instruments with custom glass components can be repaired, if you just have the right tools. A similar strategy might also work for creating custom scales for analog meters, or even old radio dials. If you’re not familiar with laser cutters, have a look at
our experiments with an Ortur model
. Thanks for the tip, [poiuyt]! | 13 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479429",
"author": "cncFriend",
"timestamp": "2022-05-30T13:33:58",
"content": "This and other videos by James are well worth watching. He is very detail oriented and states his reasoning very clearly.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment... | 1,760,372,678.08599 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/29/laser-engraving-hairlines-when-a-line-isnt-a-line/ | Laser-Engraving Hairlines: When A Line Isn’t A Line | Donald Papp | [
"Laser Hacks",
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"hairline",
"laser engrave",
"slide rule",
"tektronix"
] | When is a line not a line? When it’s a series of tiny dots, of course!
The line is actually tiny, laser-etched craters, 0.25 mm center-to-center.
That’s the technique [Ed Nisley] used to create a
super-fine, colored hairline in a piece of clear plastic
— all part of his project to re-create a classic Tektronix analog calculator from the 1960s, but more on that in a moment.
[Ed] tried a variety of methods and techniques, including laser engraving a solid line, and milling a line with an extremely tiny v-tool. Results were serviceable, but what
really
did the trick was a series of tiny laser-etched craters filled in with a red marker. That resulted in what appears — to the naked eye — as an extremely fine hairline. But when magnified, as shown here, one can see it is really a series of small craters. The color comes from coloring in the line with a red marker, then wiping the excess off with some alcohol. The remaining pigment sitting in the craters gives just the right amount of color.
This is all part of [Ed]’s efforts to re-create the
Tektronix Circuit Computer
, a circular slide rule capable of calculating all kinds of useful electrical engineering-related things. And if you find yourself looking to design and build your own circular slide rule from scratch?
We have you covered
. | 8 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479312",
"author": "Rumble_in_the_Jungle",
"timestamp": "2022-05-30T05:27:14",
"content": "Photoresist, point source light, colimating lens – Bob’s your auntie.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6479424",
"author": "psu... | 1,760,372,678.48195 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/29/inflatable-canoe-gets-remote-control-upgrade/ | Autonomous Inflatable Canoe | Tom Nardi | [
"Robots Hacks",
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"ardupilot",
"remote controlled",
"trolling motor",
"watercraft"
] | With the summer months nearly upon us, many are dreaming of warm afternoons spent floating on a quiet lake. Unless you’re [Kolins] anyway. Apparently his idea of a good time is controlling a full-sized inflatable canoe not from onboard with a pair of oars,
but from the shore with a RC transmitter
.
The linkage design allows the motor to be adjusted vertically.
Of course, as the video after the break shows, just because the canoe is powered by a remotely operated electric trolling motor doesn’t mean it can’t still carry human occupants. In fact, with the addition of a Matek F405-Wing flight controller running the rover variant of ArduPilot, the boat can even take you on a little tour of the lake while you kick back and relax.
We like that this project took the path of least resistance wherever possible. Rather than trying to spin up his own custom propulsion unit, and inevitably dealing with the challenge of waterproofing it, [Kolins] built his system around a commercial trolling motor. A clever servo mechanism physically turns the motor in much the same way a human operator would, while the speed is controlled with a suitably beefy ESC from Traxxas placed between the motor and its lead-acid battery.
It doesn’t look like there’s been any permanent mechanical or electrical changes made to the motor, which makes the whole thing a lot easier to replicate. We’ve talked in the past about the
relative rarity of low-cost robotic watercraft
, so a “bolt-on” propulsion module like this that can turn a cheap inflatable boat into an autonomous platform for research and experimentation is very interesting.
Thanks to [Neolker] for the tip. | 6 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479289",
"author": "RW ver 0.0.1",
"timestamp": "2022-05-30T03:34:11",
"content": "“Autonomous” …https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DkAA_u6X0AEO-d9?format=jpg&name=largeIt’s a radio controlled boat, Tesla’s first mother of all demos a hundred years ago.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth... | 1,760,372,678.318259 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/29/hackaday-links-may-29-2022/ | Hackaday Links: May 29, 2022 | Dan Maloney | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Hackaday links",
"Slider"
] | [
"007",
"adhesive tape",
"chip shortage",
"crime",
"delivery bot",
"food science",
"hackaday links",
"James Bond",
"license plate",
"starship",
"theft"
] | It looks like the ongoing semiconductor shortage isn’t getting any better, and if
the recent spate of computer thefts from semi trucks
is any indication, it’s only going to get worse. Thieves seem to be targeting the Freightliner Cascadia, probably the most popular heavy freight truck on the road in North America today, with “smash and grab” thefts targeting the CPC4, or Common Powertrain Control module. These modules are sitting ducks — they’re easy to locate and remove, the chip shortage has made legit modules nearly unobtanium from dealers, and the truck won’t run without them. That’s driven the black market price for a CPC up to $8,000 or more, making them a tempting target. And it’s not only individual trucks parked in truck stop lots that are being hit; gangs are breaking into trucking company lots and bricking dozens of trucks in short order. So the supply chain problem which started the semiconductor shortage caused the module shortage, which drives the thieves to steal modules and take trucks off the road, which only worsens the supply chain shortage that started the whole thing. Nice positive feedback loop.
Speaking of crime, among the gadgets 007 had available on his Aston-Martin DB5 courtesy of the Q Branch boffins, probably the least-prosecutable one to actually equip your car with would be the license plate flipper. But least-prosecutable doesn’t mean legal, as two people in California learned when they were nabbed for allegedly having
a plate-flipper on their Mercedes
. The pair allegedly used the flipper, which just turned the plate over so it couldn’t be seen, to help dodge the notice of security cameras while committing burglaries from vehicles in parking garages. The plate flipper shown in the video below is pretty clever — it poses as a somewhat stocky-looking license plate frame that obviously hides a small motor. It looks like something that’s commercially available, although it would be pretty easy to 3D print something like that. Nah, forget we even said that.
Are you tired of the heartbreak of self-unwrapping burritos? God knows we are, but thankfully we’re living in the future, where
edible adhesive tape is a thing
. Or soon will be, if the “Tastee Tape” invented by some engineering students at Johns Hopkins goes anywhere. The ingredients of the edible tape are being kept under tight wraps (lol) due to a pending patent application, but they will say that the tape is completely edible and uses ingredients and additives common to the food industry. A casual inspection of the ingredients list on any pre-packaged food item suggests that this means they had a huge cupboard to work from, so we’d be curious to see what’s in there. From the picture in the article it almost looks like nori, but they say that version was dyed for presentation, and the production recipe yields a clear tape. Which is good, because that blue stuff doesn’t look too “Tastee.”
And finally,
last week
we featured the last painful seconds of a Starship delivery robot, whose guidance system betrayed it by telling it to cross railroad tracks at a most inopportune moment. Knowing that nobody got hurt — aside from the college students who didn’t get their pizza, of course — made it easy to laugh at the snuff film, especially when the bot’s lithium batteries did the thing that lithium batteries tend to do when smooshed by a train. But
this photo of a seemingly lost Starship wandering around in the woods
is somehow a little less funny. It was taken in England, where the delivery bot was spotted trundling down a trail in a nature preserve. It turns out that rather than being lost, the bot was exactly where it wanted to be — the paved trail was actually the shortest route to its delivery destination, so everyone who thought the bot had gone feral turned out to be wrong. After all, not all who wander are lost. | 15 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479197",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2022-05-29T23:10:30",
"content": "“Nice positive feedback loop.”I have a suspicion guns will soon be involved, on both sides.” It turns out that rather than being lost, the bot was exactly where it wanted to be — the paved trail was actu... | 1,760,372,678.434832 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/27/3d-print-a-colour-tv/ | 3D Print A Colour TV | Jenny List | [
"Arduino Hacks"
] | [
"arduino mega",
"Color TV",
"mechanical TV",
"nipkow disk"
] | The oldest form of television used a spinning disk with a progression of holes — a Nipkow disk — to slice the image into lines for display. They’re surprisingly simple machines and capable of unexpectedly high-quality images despite their relatively low resolution. Even better, in an age of microcontrollers and bright LEDs, making one that works is not the chore it might once have been. [Markus Mierse]
has created one that uses an Arduino Mega and a set of 3D printed parts
, so there’s no excuse for not having a spinning disk TV on your shelf.
The Arduino Mega is chosen because it has enough lines to drive three six-bit DACs for each of red, green, and blue. The disk is driven by a PWM motor controller, and synchronization is taken care of by a piece of reflective tape and an IR proximity sensor. Images and video are read from an SD card and displayed on the screen in glorious 32-line colour. The full build process can be seen in the video below the break.
A surprise when viewing mechanical TV is that its quality is much better than the meager resolution would have you believe, and this one with its colour display is much better than the usual monochrome devices. It’s hardly HDTV, but it acquits itself well and would provide an excellent talking point.
If you’re curious about Nipkow disks,
they’re a subject we’ve examined in the past
. | 36 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478707",
"author": "N2",
"timestamp": "2022-05-28T02:50:21",
"content": "I wonder if an addressable RGB LED could have been used for this project, some of them will refresh at 800KHz or faster.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": ... | 1,760,372,678.561006 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/27/cityscape-multi-level-keyboard-really-stacks-up/ | Cityscape Multi-Level Keyboard Really Stacks Up | Kristina Panos | [
"Peripherals Hacks"
] | [
"key wells",
"keyboard",
"pcb",
"PCB architecture",
"TTC KS32"
] | Keyboards with wells like the Maltron, the Kinesis Advantage family, and everything dactyl-esque out there are great. Trust us, we know this firsthand. But if you want to build your own curvy girl, how the heck can you implement that shape without 3D printing, clever woodworking, or access to tooling and plastic molding equipment? Well, there is another way. Over on
twitter
(
translated
) (Threadreader:
Japanese
,
English
), [tsukasa_metam] has achieved the key well effect by stacking up PCBs to create a skyline of vertically-staggered keys.
The boards of Cityscape are all screwed together for mechanical integrity, but those screws are working overtime, providing electrical connections between the layers as well. We particularly like that there is an impetus for this build other than ‘I thought of it, so let’s do it’ — [tsukasa_metam] tends to typo in the double key press sense, hitting Q for instance at the same time when A was the intended target. Between the 3.2 mm of key travel, the 2.8 mm step height, and those flat F10 keycaps, that is no longer an issue.
Instead of the popular low-profile Kailh choc switches, [tsukasa_metam] went with TTC KS32s, a new switch introduced in 2020. Unlike chocs, they’ll take Cherry MX-style keycaps, as long as they’re wearing short skirts. Cityscape isn’t totally open source, but the idea is now out there nonetheless, and we happen to have an
Odd Inputs and Peculiar Peripherals contest
running now through July 4th.
Do stacked PCBs seem kinda familiar? Hey,
it’s easier than winding transformer coils
.
Via
KBD #79 | 0 | 0 | [] | 1,760,372,678.606414 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/27/electronic-catan-game-board-is-modular/ | Electronic Catan Game Board Is Modular | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Games"
] | [
"board",
"catan",
"communications",
"games",
"mesh",
"modular",
"pcb",
"pogo",
"rgb",
"rp2040",
"TILE"
] | Plenty of gamers around these parts require an expensive PC to play games, often spending thousands of dollars for a gaming machine. Believe it or not, though, there are entire classes of games that don’t require any electronics at all, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t benefit from the addition of some neat gadgets. This Settlers of Catan game
uses custom LCD tiles with a built-in custom mesh network
.
The tiles for the game board themselves are hexagonal and snap together using magnetic pogo pins in order to form a board of any size or shape. The pogo pins also allow communication for a pseudo-mesh network to operate with each tile’s built-in PCB to allow the game board to know exactly which tiles are placed where and to display the correct image on each one. Each tile contains it own RP2040 microcontroller, keeping the overall cost of each tile to a minimum.
For those regularly hosting game night, a project like this could really change the traditionally analog game’s dynamic for the better. It was mostly a project that [Colin Iuliano] built just for fun, and if he ever builds a second one he does plan on some improvements, but we’d say that it looks like a success already. For other Catan-based electronic design inspiration,
take a look at this complete and non-modular electronic game board
. | 6 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478662",
"author": "paulvdh",
"timestamp": "2022-05-27T21:50:50",
"content": "Ever tried Widelands?It’s got a map called “settlers of wlatan” which also has strangely famiilar hexagonal shapes.https://www.widelands.org/maps/settlers-of-wlatan/",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": ... | 1,760,372,678.655031 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/27/hackaday-prize-2022-pewpew-lcd-plays-with-python/ | Hackaday Prize 2022: PewPew LCD Plays With Python | Arya Voronova | [
"handhelds hacks",
"The Hackaday Prize"
] | [
"2022 Hackaday Prize",
"CircuitPython",
"handheld game",
"Nokia LCD"
] | [deshipu] aka [Radomir Dopieralski] has been building educational handhelds for a good part of a decade now, and knows how to design hardware that makes for effective teaching. Today, we are graced with
the PewPew LCD project,
latest in the PewPew student-friendly handheld series, powered by CircuitPython.
The goal for all of these devices has been consistent — making game programming accessible and fun. This time, as an entry in the Reuse, Recycle, Revamp round of Hackaday Prize, the new PewPew receives an upgrade – from an 8×8 LED matrix to an LCD display. This might not sound like much, but the change of display technology itself isn’t the main point. [deshipu] is working on ways to bring down the price and assembly complexity of PewPew handhelds, and he’s
found there’s plenty of old stock
RH-112 displays, previously used on cellphones like Nokia 1202, which these days go for as little as $1.30 a piece.
It’s
exceptionally simple
to get into writing games for the PewPew – one of the reasons why it’s a strong platform for workshops and individual learning. There’s already
a slew of games and tutorials,
and we can’t wait to see all the cool games people can build when given all the extra pixels! And, of course, we appreciate setting an example for giving new life to old displays – displays that’d otherwise inevitably end up in a trash container behind a warehouse in China.
The
Reuse, Recycle, Revamp
Hackaday Prize 2022 round is going on for two more weeks. If you’re making good use of something that would otherwise be discarded, please do
share it with us,
so that we can all learn and draw inspiration from your projects!
The
Hackaday
Prize2022
is Sponsored by: | 4 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478733",
"author": "Drone",
"timestamp": "2022-05-28T06:13:59",
"content": "What is up with the hackaday.io page for this post? There’s a clickable image, I need to see a bigger version so I click it. A new tab automatically opens and nothing is displayed. The new tab says “(GIF Im... | 1,760,372,678.705899 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/27/vintage-pro-audio-hack-chat-gets-in-the-groove/ | Vintage Pro Audio Hack Chat Gets In The Groove | Tom Nardi | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Slider"
] | [
"audio",
"Hack Chat",
"microphone",
"sound"
] | Despite the fact that we’ve been doing them for years now, it’s still hard to predict how a Hack Chat will go. There’s no question it will be an hour of interesting discussion of course, that much is a given. But the dynamics of the conversation can range from a rigid Q&A, which isn’t exactly unexpected when you’ve only got a limited amount of time with a subject matter expert, to a freewheeling hangout with a group of people who all happen to be interested in the same thing.
This week’s
Vintage Pro Audio Hack Chat
with Frank Olson
definitely took the latter approach. The allotted hour flew by in a blink, with so many anecdotes and ideas flying back and forth that at times it was tricky to follow. But no worries, with the Chat transcript to pore over, we can make sure none of that accrued first-hand knowledge goes to waste.
So what did we learn during this Chat? Well, it probably won’t come as much of a surprise to find that those who have an opinion on audio gear tend to have a
strong
opinion on it. Folks were painting with some fairly broad brushes, with particular manufacturers and even whole fields of technology receiving a bit of good-natured ribbing. If your favorite brand or piece of gear gets a specific shout-out, try not to take it too personally — at the end of the day, most in the Chat seemed to agree that sound is so subjective that the right choice is more often than not whatever sounds best to you at the moment.
Which leads directly into Frank’s work with custom microphones. As a musician he knew the sound he was looking for better than anyone, so rather than spend the money on big-name gear, he prefers to build it himself. But the real hook here is their unique construction, with pieces that
reimagine design concepts from mid-century commercial equipment using unexpected materials
such as thin pieces of walnut cut with a vinyl cutter. Frank explains that the structure of the microphone isn’t as critical these days thanks to the availability of powerful neodymium magnets, which gives the builder more freedom in terms of materials and tools. He says the goal is to inspire others to try building gear from what’s available to them rather than assuming it won’t work because it’s unconventional.
We appreciate Frank, and everyone else, stopping by this week for such a lively and friendly discussion. Let’s be honest, a Chat specifically for folks who want to discuss concepts as personal and nebulous as how they perceive the
warmth
of sound could have gotten a little heated. But the fact that everyone was able to express their opinions or ask for advice constructively is a real credit to the community.
The Hack Chat is a weekly online chat session hosted by leading experts from all corners of the hardware hacking universe. It’s a great way for hackers connect in a fun and informal way, but if you can’t make it live, these overview posts as well as the
transcripts posted to Hackaday.io
make sure you don’t miss out. | 3 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478636",
"author": "Frank O.",
"timestamp": "2022-05-27T19:24:14",
"content": "Thanks all! It was fun, and great to share it with a community of like minded makers and hackers!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6478794",
... | 1,760,372,678.907573 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/27/hackaday-podcast-170-poop-shooting-laser-positron-is-a-3d-printer-on-its-head-diy-pulsar-capture-gpss-achilles-heel/ | Hackaday Podcast 170: Poop Shooting Laser, Positron Is A 3D Printer On Its Head, DIY Pulsar Capture, GPS’s Achilles Heel | Tom Nardi | [
"Artificial Intelligence",
"Hackaday Columns",
"Podcasts",
"Slider"
] | [
"Hackaday Podcast"
] | Join Hackaday Editor-in-Chief Elliot Williams and Managing Editor Tom Nardi for a recap of all the best tips, hacks, and stories of the past week. We start things off with an update on Hackaday’s current slate of contests, followed by an exploration of the cutting edge in 3D printing and printables. Next up we’ll look at two achievements in detection, as commercial off-the-shelf hardware is pushed into service by unusually dedicated hackers to identify both dog poop and deep space pulsars (but not at the same time). We’ll also talk about fancy Samsung cables, homebrew soundcards, the surprising vulnerability of GPS, and the development of ratholes in your cat food.
Direct Download link
Check out the links below if you want to follow along, and as always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!
Where to Follow Hackaday Podcast
Places to follow Hackaday podcasts:
iTunes
Spotify
Stitcher
RSS
YouTube
Check
out our Libsyn landing page
Episode 170 Show Notes:
News This Week:
2022 Hackaday Prize: Congratulations To The Planet-Friendly Power Finalists!
Show Us Your Odd Inputs And Peculiar Peripherals!
What’s that Sound?
Think you know this week’s sound?
Enter for a chance to win
a coveted Hackaday Podcast t-shirt!
Interesting Hacks of the Week:
3D Printing Fabrics Is Easier Than You Think
Remoticon Video: How To 3D Print Onto Fabric With Billie Ruben
The Latest 3D Printed Fad: Flexible Armor And Pangolin Cosplay
Portable 3D Printer Gets Even Smaller, Faster, Better
Point Out Pup’s Packages With This Poop-Shooting Laser
Homebrew Radio Telescope Bags Pulsar
TurtleAuth DIY Security Token Gets (Re)designed For Durable, Everyday Use
Fighting Back Against Dodgy Dyson Batteries
Quick Hacks:
Elliot’s Picks:
The STM32 Makes For A Cheap DIY USB Soundcard
Receive Virtual Postcards On This Beautiful E-Ink Photo Frame
Bi-Color Filament Kicks 3D Printed Optical Illusions Up A Notch
Tom’s Picks:
PSP Turned Robot Remote With Custom Software
Using A Fusion Splicer To Repair A Samsung TV’s Cable
Long-Distance Text Communication With LoRa
Can’t-Miss Articles:
Handling Bulk Material: Why Does My Cat Food Get Stuck?
Knowing Your Place: The Implications Of GPS Spoofing And Jamming
Teardown: Mini GPS Jammer | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478803",
"author": "Caleb",
"timestamp": "2022-05-28T15:25:12",
"content": "Poop laser Caleb here. Fun to hear others excited about the project. And good podcast, didn’t know you guys ran it. I’ll have to tune in once and awhile",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies... | 1,760,372,678.8181 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/27/toothbrush-goes-from-mouth-whitening-to-room-brightening/ | Toothbrush Goes From Mouth-Whitening To Room-Brightening | Kristina Panos | [
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"dollar store",
"electric toothbrush",
"flashlight",
"led flashlight",
"rechargeable"
] | Some of the hacks we see make us wonder why they aren’t already a commercial product, and
this electric toothbrush turned rechargeable flashlight
is one of them. Sure, these things exist, but we haven’t seen one with a dedicated charging stand. They usually just take micro USB or whatever, so it’s on you to remember to plug it in. How great would it be to have a fully-charged flashlight always at the ready, especially one in a position to illuminate the room? Although [wannabemadsci] makes it look easy, this conversion took quite a bit of doing.
Perhaps the most amazing part is that [wannabemadsci] found a halfway decent flashlight at the dollar store. Better than average, this thing has a main light, a side light, and takes 3xAAs instead of a couple of AAAs. The only issue is that the toothbrush batteries don’t quite put out enough voltage for the flashlight’s LED, so [wannabemadsci] used a booster board.
Of course, there’s a lot more to this hack than sawing off the USB connector from the boost converter so it fits. The toothbrush handle had to be modified to accept the flashlight guts, and the threads relocated from the flashlight. Since the battery charge indicator shines through the momentary button on the toothbrush, [wannabemadsci] wanted to reuse it, but it required a small board that converts it to a latching push button. Finally, the flashlight bezel had to be painted white. Paint is such an easy thing to do, and this detail makes all the difference in how professional this looks.
There’s a lot you can do with a functioning electric toothbrush as your base, like
brute-forcing the pins of a lock with vibration
. | 18 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478577",
"author": "Catalin Voinescu",
"timestamp": "2022-05-27T16:00:34",
"content": "These exist as rechargeable emergency torches (flashlights). Some double as night lights (with PIR sensors) and/or emergency lights (on when power is off) while in the cradle. Most have charging ... | 1,760,372,679.094286 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/28/ai-attempts-converting-python-code-to-c/ | AI Attempts Converting Python Code To C++ | Donald Papp | [
"Artificial Intelligence",
"Software Development"
] | [
"ai",
"c++",
"code conversion",
"Codex",
"machine learning",
"openai",
"python"
] | [Alexander] created
codex_py2cpp
as a way of experimenting with
Codex
, an AI intended to translate natural language into code. [Alexander] had slightly different ideas, however, and created
codex_py2cpp
as a way to play with the idea of automagically converting Python into C++. It’s not really intended to create robust code conversions, but as far as experiments go, it’s pretty neat.
The program works by reading a Python script as an input file, setting up a few parameters, then making a request to OpenAI’s Codex API for the conversion. It then attempts to compile the result. If compilation is successful, then
hopefully
the resulting executable actually works the same way the input file did. If not? Well, learning is fun, too. If you give it a shot, maybe start simple and don’t throw it too many curveballs.
Codex is an interesting idea, and this isn’t the first experiment we’ve seen that plays with the concept of using machine learning in this way. We’ve seen
a project that generates Linux commands based on a verbal description
, and
our own [Maya Posch] took a close look at
GitHub Copilot
, a project high on promise and concept, but — at least at the time — considerably less so when it came to actual practicality or usefulness. | 31 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478910",
"author": "Andrew",
"timestamp": "2022-05-29T00:35:42",
"content": "Next step: teach the AI to copy and paste from StackExchange.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6478918",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Kn... | 1,760,372,679.16381 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/28/hackaday-prize-2022-reuse-those-dip-chips-to-make-a-1980s-style-single-board-computer/ | Hackaday Prize 2022: Reuse Those DIP Chips To Make A 1980s-Style Single-Board Computer | Robin Kearey | [
"classic hacks",
"computer hacks"
] | [
"6502",
"74xx",
"dip chip",
"single board computer"
] | With the Great Chip Shortage still delaying deliveries of new components, now might be a good time to look around your lab and inspect those piles of chips that you thought “might come in handy one day”. Chances are you’ll find a good stack of 74xx series logic, once ubiquitous but today mostly obsolete thanks to powerful microcontrollers and FPGAs. It would be a shame to let them go to waste, so why not use them to make a neat 1980s-style computer?
With this idea in mind, [Anders Nielsen] designed the
ABN6502: a single-board computer based on the venerable 6502 processor
, but with relatively modern interfaces like a VGA monitor output, a PS/2 keyboard connector and even a wireless module to simplify firmware uploads from a PC. One design requirement was to minimize the number of new components needed; the average hacker interested in building the ABN6502 will probably have many of the chips lying around somewhere in their workshop.
The component list reads like a typical bill of materials for a 6502-based computer, but comes with a lot of flexibility to allow for part subsititution. For the CPU, both the classic NMOS 6502 as well as the modern CMOS-based 65C02 are supported, along with their 6522 companion chip that provides I/O ports and timers. A ROM socket can hold either modern, fast flash chips or traditional but slow UV-erasable EPROMs.
Instead of using DRAM chips with their complicated refresh requirements, [Anders] went for 32 KB of SRAM to implement the main memory; unaffordable in the ’80s but easily available today. Standard 74xx series logic chips glue all the components together, again with several options to add or remove features as the user prefers. Pin headers bring out the I/O ports for easy connection to external peripherals.
The ABN6502’s software library is currently limited to a bootloader, but a complete development toolchain based on the CC65 compiler should make it easy to develop all kinds of programs on this platform. We’ve already featured the
clever wireless ROM flashing system
, as well as
a demonstration of the 6502 driving RGB LEDs
.
The
Hackaday
Prize2022
is Sponsored by: | 30 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478862",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Known As Ren",
"timestamp": "2022-05-28T20:06:07",
"content": "Every now and then, I look into my IC stash (i.e. spreadsheet), and think,Hey! I have enough to build me an Olde Tyme Comfutre!I’ve looked at OSHPark for those type of boards p... | 1,760,372,679.224479 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/28/3d-print-glass-with-a-laser-cutter/ | 3D Print Glass With A Laser Cutter | Jenny List | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"laser cutter",
"powdered glass",
"sintering",
"sls"
] | We’re all familiar with FDM 3D printing, and some of the more well-heeled or adventurous among us may even have taken a faltering step into the world of SLA printers. But for most of us there’s a step further in 3D printing that remains beyond our reach. SLS, or Selective Laser Sintering, creates prints from powder by melting it layer by layer using a laser, and has the advantage of opening up more useful materials than the polymer stock of the other methods. It’s not entirely unreachable though, as [Kenneth Hawthorn] shows us by using a laser cutter
to produce SLS prints from powdered glass.
He evolved the technique of repeated fast passes with the laser to gradually melt more glass together as opposed to slower passes. He achieved a resolution as low as 0.1 mm, though he found a better glass color when the laser was less tightly focused. It raises the concern that glass powder is abrasive and thus a threat to any mechanism, thus he’s being extremely careful with the fan settings.
This may not be quite in the league of an SLS printer costing thousands of dollars, but it’s a technique that bears more investigation and could no doubt be refined for more custom fused glass creations. He tells us he was inspired by
a previous Hackaday post about sintering sand
, and of course we’d like to remind readers of a 3D printer
that did the same job with the power of the sun. | 15 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478854",
"author": "sam13to",
"timestamp": "2022-05-28T19:36:34",
"content": "If there’s a fixed Z-height can this be called 3D printing?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6478913",
"author": "Gokce Yildirim",
"... | 1,760,372,679.339276 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/28/the-box-think-outside-of-it/ | The Box: Think Outside Of It | Elliot Williams | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Rants"
] | [
"art",
"creativity",
"engineering"
] | There’s no single recipe for creativity, as far as I know. But this week on the Podcast, Tom Nardi and I were talking about a number of hacks that were particularly inventive, out-of-the-box, or just simply “how did they think of that?”. One possible route to something new is learning from other disciplines.
We were talking about an
inspiring video about 3D printing fabrics
. At the moment, the design world is going crazy for all things 3DP, so it’s no surprise to see someone with a design background asking herself how to make stuff that comes off the 3D printer more flexible, and fit her needs a little bit better. But what if those of us on the building-purely-functional side of things took what the fabric folks learned and applied it to our work? You’d get something like
this hybrid approach to folding mechanisms
, or
this approach to remove supports from your prints
.
I’m continually surprised by how much the home-gamer can learn from industry, and this week was also no exception. [Anne Ogborn]’s piece on
handling bulk material
draws mostly on the hard work of engineers who are worried about properly emptying gigantic grain silos or feeding tons of screws into small boxes to ship out to customers. But the same physics are at work when you’re designing an automatic dry cat food dispenser for your next vacation, just on a smaller scale.
How about you? What things have you learned from other disciplines, possibly entirely unrelated ones, that have helped you with your hacking?
This article is part of the Hackaday.com newsletter, delivered every seven days for each of the last 200+ weeks. It also includes our favorite articles from the last seven days that you can see on
the web version of the newsletter
.
Want this type of article to hit your inbox every Friday morning?
You should sign up
! | 19 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478793",
"author": "Nick",
"timestamp": "2022-05-28T14:41:12",
"content": "Ancient texts are the mother of all invention if you can decipher them.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6478795",
"author": "PWalsh",
"timestamp... | 1,760,372,679.288778 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/28/track-down-ghosts-in-your-wifi-with-the-pwnton-pack/ | Track Down Ghosts In Your WiFi With The Pwnton Pack | Robin Kearey | [
"Security Hacks",
"Wireless Hacks"
] | [
"ghostbusters",
"penetration testing",
"proton pack",
"wireless security"
] | If there’s something weird in your Network Neighborhood, who you gonna call? If you want your WiFi troubles diagnosed in style, try calling [Travis Kaun] — he might just show up wearing
the amazing Pwnton Pack
. Built from a replica Proton Pack similar to those used in the 1984 classic
Ghostbusters
, it’s a portable wireless security diagnostics kit that should be able to pinpoint any weaknesses in your wireless network.
Inside, it’s got a Mark VII WiFi Pineapple, which is a portable device designed for security testing purposes, as well as a Raspberry Pi running
Pwnagotchi
: a deep learning-based WiFi sniffer that aims to capture those network packets that help maximize your chances of brute-forcing the WPA key. These two devices are connected to an array of antennas, including a cool rotating 5 GHz panel antenna to scan the surrounding area.
Naturally, the Pwnton Pack also includes a Neutrona Wand, which in this case contains a 2.4 GHz Yagi antenna hooked up to an ESP32 programmed to perform deauthentication attacks. An Arduino Nano drives an LED matrix that shows scrolling
Pac-Man
ghosts, while a dedicated sound board provides movie sound effects. The whole system is powered by three LiPo battery packs, and can even be remotely operated if desired.
Sadly, it doesn’t come with one of those ghost traps to suck up wayward WiFi networks, but the range of tools available should help to catch any kind of weird phantoms hiding in your system.
We’ve spotted a
few
Proton Packs before
, but never one with such advanced functionality. Security testing systems tend to be
a bit
less
conspicuous
, after all. | 6 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478774",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2022-05-28T12:01:02",
"content": "“Inside, it’s got a Mark VII WiFi Pineapple, which is a portable device designed for security testing purposes, as well as a Raspberry Pi running Pwnagotchi: a deep learning-based WiFi sniffer that aims ... | 1,760,372,679.377218 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/28/linux-and-c-in-the-browser/ | Linux And C In The Browser | Al Williams | [
"Linux Hacks",
"Software Development",
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"browser",
"emulator",
"linux"
] | There was a time when trying to learn to write low-level driver or kernel code was hard. You really needed two machines: one to work with, and one to screw up over and over again until you got it right. These days you can just spin up a virtual machine and roll it back every time you totally screw up. Much easier! We don’t think it is all that practical, but [nsommer] has an interesting post about loading up a C compiler and compiling Linux for a virtual machine. What’s different? Oh, the
virtual machine is in your browser
.
The v86 CPU emulator runs in the browser and looks like a Pentium III computer with the usual hardware. You might think it is slow and it certainly isn’t going to be fast as a rocket, but it does translate machine code into WebAssembly, so performance isn’t as bad as you might think.
The post goes into detail about how to build and create a simple machine web page that hosts v86. Once you cross-compile the kernel you can boot the machine up virtually. The other interesting part is the addition of
tcc
which is a pretty capable C compiler and much smaller and faster than the very traditional
gcc
.
The
tcc
build is tricky because the normal build process compiles the compiler and then uses the same compiler to build the default libraries. When cross-compiling, this doesn’t work well because the library you want for the host compile is different from the library you want to target for the second pass. You’ll see how to work around that in the post. The post continues to show how to do remote debugging and even gets QEMU into the mix. Debugging inside v86 doesn’t seem to work so far. There are more posts on this topic promised.
Honestly, this is one of those things like teaching a chicken to play checkers. It can be done, there’s little practical value, but it is still something to see. On the other hand, if you spend the weekend working through this, your next Linux porting project ought to seem easy by comparison.
Amazing what you can pull off with
WebAssembly
. If you need a
quick introduction
, check this one out from [Ben James]. | 45 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478752",
"author": "BrightBlueJim",
"timestamp": "2022-05-28T09:25:30",
"content": "Oh, HELL no. This is like Linux From Scratch, only the target machine is an interpreter. So you get all the convenience of building a complete operating system from source packages, PLUS all of th... | 1,760,372,679.456047 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/27/electronic-dice-is-introduction-to-microcontroller-programming/ | Electronic Dice Is Introduction To Microcontroller Programming | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"beginner",
"dice",
"die",
"how-to",
"microcontroller",
"pic",
"random number",
"seven segment",
"timer"
] | By now most of us are familiar with the Arduino platform. It’s an inexpensive and fairly easy way into the world of microcontrollers. For plenty of projects, there’s no need to go beyond that unless you have a desire to learn more of the inner workings of microcontrollers in general. [Cristiano] was interested in expanding some of his knowledge, so he decided to build t
his electronic dice using a PIC microcontroller
instead of the Arduino platform he was more familiar with.
As a result, this project is set up as a how-to for others looking to dive further into the world of microcontrollers that don’t have the same hand-holding setup as the Arduino. To take care of the need for a random number for the dice, the PIC’s random number generator is used but with the added randomness of a seed from an internal timer. The timer is started when a mercury tilt switch signals the device that it has been rolled over, and after some computation a single digit number is displayed on a seven-segment display.
While it might seem simple on the surface, the project comes with an in-depth guide on programming the PIC family of microcontrollers, and has a polish not normally seen on beginner projects, including the use of the mercury tilt switch which gives it a retro vibe. For some other tips on how to build projects like this,
take a look at this guide
on how to build power supplies for your projects as well. | 10 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478743",
"author": "J_B",
"timestamp": "2022-05-28T07:59:30",
"content": "Nice project. It explains the need for a seed to get better randomness. Very important!But is it a fair dice roll?Making it fair to ensure each value has equal chances of showing up instead of only making it ... | 1,760,372,679.502582 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/27/this-week-in-security-good-faith-easy-forgery-and-i18n/ | This Week In Security: Good Faith, Easy Forgery, And I18N | Jonathan Bennett | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"News",
"Security Hacks",
"Slider"
] | [
"Digital ID",
"This Week in Security",
"zoom"
] | There’s a danger in security research that we’ve discussed a few times before. If you discover a security vulnerability on a production system, and there’s no bug bounty, you’ve likely broken a handful of computer laws. Turn over the flaw you’ve found, and you’re most likely to get a “thank you”, but there’s a tiny chance that you’ll get charged for a computer crime instead. Security research in the US is just a little safer now, as the
US Department of Justice has issued a new policy
stating that “good-faith security research should not be charged.”
While this is a welcome infection of good sense, it would be even better for such a protection to be codified into law. The other caveat is that this policy only applies to federal cases in the US. Other nations, or even individual states, are free to bring charges. So while this is good news, continue to be careful. There are also some caveats about what counts as good-faith — If a researcher uses a flaw discovery to extort, it’s not good-faith.
Digital ID
In New South Wales, Australia,
citizens can use digital driver’s licenses
. This is done via the Service NSW app, available on Android and iOS. What could possibly go wrong? There is a glaring problem with this,
it’s a terrible idea to voluntarily hand your phone to a law enforcement officer
. That aside, the app generates the ID image on-the-fly from data stored on the device. On a jailboken phone, this is trivial to modify, but on any other iPhone, one can manipulate the app’s data using a backup and restore. ServiceNSW encrypts this data… using a 4 digit numeric code. It’s trivial to manipulate the data stored on the phone, and therefore the ID presented. Bizarrely, after the initial pull, the app never verifies its data store against the official database. The app even includes a pull-to-refresh function that claims to update the ID data. This function updates the date, time, and QR code, but not the potentially spoofed data.
The ability to modify an ID, as well as spoof someone else’s, means that the app makes identity theft painfully easy. The QR code does pull up-to-date information when scanned, but only the name and under-18 status. The picture isn’t part of that data. Steal an ID, slap your picture on it, and the QR code will check out. Service NSW has responded, issuing a statement that clearly indicates they don’t understand the problem:
This issue is known and does not pose a risk to customer information. The blogger has manipulated their own Digital Driver Licence (DDL) information on their local device. No other customer data or data source has been compromised. It also does not pose any risk in regard to unauthorised access or changes to backend systems such as Drives. Importantly, if the tampered licence was scanned by police, the real time check used by NSW Police (scanning mobipol) would show the correct personal information as it calls on DRIVES. Upon scanning the licence it would be clear to law enforcement that it has been tampered with. Altering the DDL is against the law. The DDL has been independently assessed by cyber specialists and is more secure than the plastic card.
Just Here For the i18ntranslation
Bonita is a business automation platform, mainly designed to let businesses put together workflows with minimal code. It’s a Java application, typically running on Tomcat, and distributed as a docker image among other channels. That Docker image, with it’s over five million downloads,
had a big problem
. The
web.xml
file contains filter stanzas used for controlling how requests are handled. A pair of those filters were intended to match i18n (internationalization) files, and deliver those endpoints without any authorization checks. This makes sense, as it allows a user to change the interface language on the login page. It’s a naive filter, literally matching any url containing
i18ntranslation
. So, any endpoint can be appended with
;i18ntranslation
, and an unauthorized user has access. Whoops! The Docker image and other releases have been updated to fix the issue.
Zoom Fixed, Update!
First, if you have zoom installed, go check the version. If you’re older than 5.10.4, go trigger an update. And if you run Zoom on Linux, you’ll probably have to go download the installer again manually to update, though that makes things a bit safer in this case.
With that out of the way, let’s talk about
the series of issues that could have allowed Remote Code Execution (RCE)
. Zoom does XMPP messaging, which is
massages
messages over XML. Zoom also sends control messages over this XML stream. The trick is that the server uses one library to validate those XML messages, and the client uses a different one, with different quirks. Sound familiar? Classic request smuggling material. One of the fun tricks is to send a
clusterswitch
message, pointing a client to a different server, potentially controlled by an attacker.
If a MitM attack wasn’t bad enough, an attacker can then send an “update” on Windows, consisting of a
.exe
installer, and a
.cab
file to install. The running Zoom client checks the exe to confirm that it’s signed, then executes. A modern Zoom installer also confirms the
cab
file signature, but a downgrade attack is possible. Send an older version, like 4.4, and a malicious
.cab
file. The exe is signed, so Zoom runs it, and this one doesn’t check the
.cab
, leading to easy RCE. The request smuggling was fixed server-side in February, but the client fixes didn’t land til April in 5.10.4.
Quick Tip
This week, I was helping a friend think through how to configure a Google account for some unorthodox utility usage. He was forced to turn on two factor authentication, but found that to be quite the pain, as he re-installs Android often for development and testing. If only, we mused, you could install Google Authenticator on a Linux machine, and back up the key yourself. And thus this tip, as you can indeed do this. Google Authenticator is just a TOTP, Time-based One Time Password. It takes a secret key and current time, and runs them though an algorithm to produce a (in this case) 6-digit code.
So how do you get that secret key out of your device? On a rooted phone it’s easy enough to extract from the
sqlite
database. Thankfully, the authenticator app can export a saved key as a QR code. Capture the data contained in the QR code, and then
use this handy Python script
to convert it back to the raw secret. (In many cases, you can even get the secret key directly by saying that the QR code didn’t work.) From there
it’s an easy command
:
oathtool --totp -b secret_key
If you want to see how TOTP works under the hood,
we wrote about that a while back
. | 26 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478561",
"author": "pelrun",
"timestamp": "2022-05-27T15:32:14",
"content": "So 16 year old learner drivers can now easily generate perfect ID’s with changed birthdates to enter licensed premises and buy all the alcohol and tobacco they want. So much better than a physical card!",... | 1,760,372,679.568322 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/27/the-huge-apple-toolkit-for-fixing-your-iphone/ | The Huge Apple Toolkit For Fixing Your IPhone | Jenny List | [
"iphone hacks"
] | [
"apple",
"iphone",
"right to repair"
] | It’s been a frequent criticism of Apple, that their products are difficult to repair. They’ve hit back with a self-repair program for iPhones, and should you wish to take advantage of it they will hire you a tool kit. Not the iFixit box you might expect, instead
they give you two hefty suitcases that contain 36 Kg of tools and equipment
. Yes, you can repair an iPhone, but they ensure that it’s not for the faint-hearted.
In the kit is an impressive array of everything you might need for your iDevice, including the proper heat plate and press for the job. None of that messing about with a hot air gun for your $49 rental cost and $1200 if you don’t return the tools, but it remains an impossibly difficult and expensive process for all but the most dedicated of Apple fanboy technicians.
The sense from the
Verge
article is that Apple have had their arm twisted to the extent that they must provide a repair option, but they’ve gone to extravagant lengths to make it something nobody in their right mind would pursue. There’s an attraction in the idea of playing with a fully-equipped Apple repair kit for a few days, but maybe it’s not worth the cost.
Even without the Apple toolkit,
it’s still possible to upgrade your iPhone
.
Thanks [Nikolai Ivanov] for the tip. | 71 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478463",
"author": "Andrew",
"timestamp": "2022-05-27T11:13:24",
"content": "This feels an awful lot like malicious compliance.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6478465",
"author": "DropTableAdventures",
"times... | 1,760,372,679.667147 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/27/wireless-power-here-now/ | Wireless Power: Here? Now? | Al Williams | [
"News",
"Science"
] | [
"laser",
"power transmission",
"tesla"
] | Outside of very small applications, Nikola Tesla’s ideas about transmitting serious power without wires have not been very practical. Sure, we can draw microwatts from radio signals in the air, and if you’re willing to get your phone in just the right spot, you can charge it. But having power sent to your laptop anywhere in your home is still a pipe dream. Sending power from a generating station to a dozen homes without wire is even more fantastic. Or is it? [Paul Jaffe] of the Naval Research Laboratory thinks it isn’t fantastic at all and he
explains why in a post on IEEE Spectrum
.
Historically, there have been attempts to move lots of power around wirelessly. In 1975, researchers sent power across a lab using microwaves at 50% efficiency. They were actually making the case for beaming energy down from solar power satellites. According to [Jaffe], the secret is to go beyond even microwaves. A 2019 demonstration by the Navy conveyed 400 watts over 300 meters using a laser. Using a tightly confined beam on a single coherent wavelength allows for very efficient photovoltaic cells that can far outstrip the kind we are used to that accept a mix of solar lighting.
Wait. The Navy. High-powered laser beams. Uh oh, right? According to [Jaffe], it is all a factor of how dense the energy in the beam is, along with the actual wavelengths involved. The 400-watt beam, for example, was in a virtual enclosure that could sense any object approaching the main beam and cut power.
Keep in mind that 400 watts isn’t enough to power a hair dryer. Besides, point-to-point transmission with a laser is fine for sending power to a far-flung community but not great for keeping your laptop charged no matter where you leave it.
Still, this sounds like exciting work. While it might not be Tesla’s exact vision, laser transmission might be closer than it seemed just a few years ago. We’ve seen similar systems that employ safety sensors, but they are all relatively low-power. We still want to know what’s going on in
Milford, Texas
, though. | 34 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478427",
"author": "Andrew",
"timestamp": "2022-05-27T08:05:23",
"content": "The Navy! Because, sharks.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6478438",
"author": "Yoplait",
"timestamp": "2022-05-27T08:26:59",
... | 1,760,372,679.731969 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/26/console-macropad-uses-sd-cards-for-stylin-and-profilin/ | Console Macropad Uses SD Cards For Stylin’ And Profilin’ | Kristina Panos | [
"Peripherals Hacks",
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"macro pad",
"macropad",
"microsd card",
"oled",
"rp2040",
"sd card"
] | Macropads are great to have around for hotkey input, but things can get out of hand pretty quickly when you realize just how many shortcuts are in your life. To avoid ending up with another keyboard-sized keyboard, some hackers will use a handful of switches and a lot of layers to turn a few keys into many. And instead of worrying about legends, they use blank keys and leave the labels to be displayed on some kind of screen.
Among them is [QCJ3], who built
this nifty little console-style macropad
. Uninterested in managing microcontroller memory, [QCJ3] went the tangible route and loaded various profiles onto a micro SD card. Each text file on a given card holds a label, a color for the keyswitch LED, and of course, the keystrokes that make up the macro itself.
There are myriad ways to build a macro pad, from designing with bare chips (if you can get them) to programming a pre-built key matrix.
Grab the files
if you like the console look and call it a day, or build a completely new enclosure that fits your hand exactly. Whatever you build, consider entering it in
our brand spankin’ new Odd Inputs and Peculiar Peripherals Contest
, which runs now through July 4th. If you need more inspiration, just peep
the projects under macropad tag
, or peruse the much heftier
keyboard tag
.
Via
KBD | 7 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478404",
"author": "Gregg Eshelman",
"timestamp": "2022-05-27T05:52:25",
"content": "Saitek had a couple of programmable keypads for games or anything you wanted to set them up for. The first model connected to a PS/2 port inline between the keyboard and PC. To program it, the setu... | 1,760,372,679.772837 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/26/color-vector-display-controller-brings-arcade-classics-back-to-life/ | Color Vector Display Controller Brings Arcade Classics Back To Life | Robin Kearey | [
"classic hacks"
] | [
"arcade monitor",
"mame",
"vector display"
] | If you’ve been reading Hackaday long enough, you’ve probably come across a few hacks where someone made simple animations or even video games on an analog oscilloscope screen. Those hacks generally use vector graphics, where the cathode ray tube’s electron beam directly draws geometric shapes onto the screen. This gives the image a unique look that’s quite distinct from the pixel-based raster displays used on TVs and most computer monitors.
Vector displays were also used in several arcade machines of the early 1980s, including classics like
Tempest
,
Gravitar
and
Star Wars
. In order to emulate these games more faithfully than would be possible on a raster monitor, [Robin Champion]
designed the vstcm: a color vector monitor controller
to easily drive RGB vector monitors.
The design is based on [Trammell Hudson] and [Adelle Lin]’s
v.st system
, and therefore features a Teensy microcontroller as well as a couple of digital-to-analog converters. While the v.st can only connect to monochrome X/Y systems like oscilloscopes, the vstcm can work with RGB monitors to allow near-perfect emulation of color vector-based games. A custom software interface connects the vstcm to AdvanceMAME, a special version of the well-known arcade emulator that facilitates the connection of unusual display systems.
The end result definitely looks the part, although [Robin] notes that performance is not at the level it could be and requests those familiar with the Teensy platform to help optimize the code. If you’d like to build the vstcm but can’t find a vector monitor, you can always
modify the yoke of a conventional CRT
. Want to learn more about vector displays? Check out
this thorough introduction
. | 12 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478387",
"author": "Bruce Perens",
"timestamp": "2022-05-27T04:25:19",
"content": "One would think that 4K monitors might render rasterized vectors pretty well.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6478390",
"author": "Spr... | 1,760,372,679.819459 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/26/bottoms-up-soda-can-help-with-almost-any-project/ | Bottoms Up: Soda Can Help With Almost Any Project | Kristina Panos | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"f'n magnets",
"parts",
"small parts",
"soda can"
] | If there’s any one thing that the average hacker is short on at a given moment (besides chips), it’s transient small part storage. Just as new projects are built from small parts, diagnostics and teardowns of commercial equipment invariably result in small parts. We think [amenjet] may have the answer —
small parts holders made from the bottoms of soda cans
.
You start by cutting the bottom off of an empty can however you like. In the first video after the break, [amenjet] scores the can on what could be a purpose-built jig before cutting along the line with tin snips, but you could use regular scissors if that’s all you have. Then it’s just a matter of shoving it into the circle around the perimeter of the print to secure the sharp edge.
The underside of the print is graduated and ends with a small hole fit for a disc magnet. To keep the prints from scratching the table, [amenjet] covered the bottoms with crushed velvet. After making about a dozen of these things, they CNC’d a tray to hold three of them, which you can see in the second video. Each cavity in the tray is lined with more crushed velvet for elegance and stability.
Between the concavity of the can bottom and that little lip, it should be particularly easy to actually retrieve a tiny part from the pile and grab on to it. Between the utility and the recycled aspect, this could easily be an entry into
the second Challenge of the 2022 Hackaday Prize
, which runs now until Sunday, June 12th. This round is all about reusing, recycling, and revamping anything and everything to keep it out of the landfill.
Start your entry today! | 32 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478329",
"author": "gelandangan",
"timestamp": "2022-05-26T23:07:30",
"content": "Wouldn’t it be easier just to fill the base of the can with resin ?3D printing the base is Ok, but they take a lot longer time than pouring and wait for the resin to set.Since the part is unseen, you ... | 1,760,372,680.12365 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/26/upcycled-practice-amp-build-goes-to-eleven/ | Upcycled Practice Amp Build Goes To Eleven | Dan Maloney | [
"Musical Hacks"
] | [
"amp",
"amplifier",
"bridge-tied load",
"class-d",
"uke",
"ukelele"
] | What do you call someone who gives the toddler in your life a musical instrument as a gift? In most cases, “mortal enemy” is the correct answer, but not everyone feels quite so curmudgeonly, and might even attempt to turn up the volume a bit. Such is the case with
this wonderfully detailed practice amp
for the grandkids’ electric ukelele.
The aptly named [packrat]
[Professor Mayhem] really made this build a tour de force of scrap bin sourcing. The amp is built around a module salvaged from an old TV, a stereo Class-D amp that was modified to provide 30 watts output and a volume control. The driver came from a flood-damaged speaker unit, and the power supply from a gutted wall wart. The case was built with scrap plywood and covered with pebble-grain fabric to give it that pro audio look, while the chassis for the electronics was bent from a piece of sheet steel.
But it’s the tiny details that really sell this project. Everything from the pilot light to the pointer knob screams 1970s, as do the painstaking front panel lettering and vinyl “Monkeydyne” logo. [Professor Mayhem] even went the extra mile to create an etched-brass serial number plate, a mock specs and safety label, and even a QA inspection tag that was (sort of) stapled inside the cabinet.
We tip our hats to [Professor Mayhem] for this four-month labor of love and obvious nostalgia trip, which the kids are sure to love. [Professor Mayhem] does admit that some will argue with his decision to use
a Class D amp
and a switch-mode power supply, but let’s be real — for the application, it’s probably more than sufficient.
Thanks for the tip, [packrat]. | 19 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478278",
"author": "scarlson912",
"timestamp": "2022-05-26T21:09:07",
"content": "Why don’t you just make ten louder and make ten be the top number and make that a little louder?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6478402",
... | 1,760,372,679.960565 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/26/robotic-hand-uses-old-cd-rom-parts/ | Robotic Hand Uses Old CD-ROM Parts | Lewin Day | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"cd drive",
"CD ROM drive",
"CD-ROM",
"robotic arm"
] | Robotic arms and actuators are compelling things to watch, and as popular among the maker set as they are crucial to modern industry. [kthod2000] built a design of their own,
which relies on parts salvaged from old CD-ROM drives.
The arm itself is constructed of many components which appear to be 3D printed, with three main motors visible along its length. These look to be the eject motors harvested from several optical drives, which usefully come with a threaded screw on the output shaft that makes them perfect for a linear-drive application. Run by a TMC2208 driver via a microcontroller, the eject motors control the motion of several stages of the robot arm as it moves up and down.
The intention seems to be that one of these three-tiered assemblies could act as a single finger. Ganged up multiple times, this could allow the creation of something akin to a full five-digit robot hand. [kthod2000] has also done plenty of work on the software side of things that handles controlling the arm. The kinematics can all be simulated on screen in concert with the real motion of the arm.
We’ve seen similar builds before, too,
like this plotter built out of scrap DVD drives
. They’re a great source of quality electromechanical components for small projects, so it’s no surprise to see them put to work here. Video after the break. | 12 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478290",
"author": "Thomas Jerome Newton",
"timestamp": "2022-05-26T21:26:02",
"content": "Nice, but those are head-tracking stepper motors, nothing to do with the eject mechanism. That’s usually driven by a 5v motor driving a rack and pinion.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": ... | 1,760,372,681.978959 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/26/auditory-brainstem-implants-the-other-bionic-hearing-device/ | Auditory Brainstem Implants: The Other Bionic Hearing Device | Lewin Day | [
"Interest",
"Medical Hacks",
"Original Art"
] | [
"auditory brainstem implant",
"brain",
"brainstem",
"Cochlear Implant",
"implant",
"medical",
"medical hacks"
] | You might have heard of the cochlear implant. It’s an electronic device also referred to as a neuroprosthesis, serving as a bionic replacement for the human ear. These implants have brought an improved sense of hearing to hundreds of thousands around the world.
However, the cochlear implant isn’t the only game in town. The auditory brain stem implant is another device that promises to bring a sense of sound to those without it, albeit by a different route.
Sensory Implants
Cochlear implants have shown the best results when provided to patients earlier rather than later. It’s likely that ABIs would be subject to a similar effect, though users of all ages often cite measurable benefits from such implant devices. Credit: Matt Ralph.
CC-BY-2.0
While the cochlear implant itself is a highly complicated device, the basic concept behind it is simple. The usual mechanics of the ear, which receive vibrations from the air and turn them into nerve signals, is bypassed entirely. Instead, a small electronic device captures sound with a microphone. The sound is then processed, with a priority on maximising perception of audible speech. This processed sound is used to drive an array of electrodes implanted within the cochlea itself. These electrodes stimulate the auditory nerves in the cochlea, enabling the wearer to perceive sound.
The auditory brain stem implant (ABI) is in many ways similar to the cochlear implant. The basic theory is indeed the same: audio is captured electronically, and then used to stimulate nerves to provide an auditory sense to the brain. Where the ABI differs is that it skips past the cochlea inside the ear entirely. Instead, the ABI stimulates electrodes placed in the cochlear nucleus of the brainstem itself.
The ABI thus has the benefit that it can provide an auditory sense to patients who, for whatever reason, cannot have a cochlear implant fitted to the auditory nerves in the inner ear. Patients with a condition called Neurofibromatosis Type 2 (NF2) were initially the primary group for ABI use. NF2 is a condition that affects the nervous system, and its associated treatment often causes damage to the auditory nerve. Thus, for patients with this condition, an ABI is suitable where a traditional cochlear implant would be impractical. In cases where the auditory nerves in the cochlea may be damaged or destroyed, an ABI may be applicable.
The auditory brainstem implant (ABI) directs pulses to electrodes mounted in the brainstem, instead of the inner ear. Credit: Hear Hear!,
CC-BY-SA-4.0
However, the ABI comes with the drawback that it requires a far more complex implantation than a cochlear implant. Surgery involves opening the skull to access the brain stem, which is far more invasive than the simpler procedure required to implant a cochlear device in the inner ear.
Outcomes for patients are by and large not as successful as patients with cochlear implants when it comes to understanding speech either. With a combination of ABI use with lipreading techniques, many patients go on to learn to understand speech, but few can understand speech relying on an ABI alone.
This is largely down to electrode placement. The cochlea itself has a fairly straightforward map of areas that correspond to high and low tones, which can be stimulated in turn by an implant directly. However, when inserting electrodes into the brainstem, it’s harder to map out and stimulate these regions as accurately, and thus an ABI will struggle to deliver as much tonal information to the brain as a cochlear implant would.
The ABI typically uses a paddle-shaped electrode, in contrast to the linear-type electrode used with a traditional cochlear implant. Credit: Hear Hear!,
CC-BY-SA-4.0
The lower performance, more invasive implantation method, and obscure application of the ABI have meant that cochlear implants are far more commonly used in practice.
Over 700,000 cochlear implants have been fitted worldwide
. However,
only a few thousand
ABI devices have been implanted at most.
While the results from an ABI may not be up to the standards of a cochlear implant, these bionic devices still have value. For patients that can’t use a cochlear implant at all, an ABI still provides a basic auditory sense that can be useful, particularly when it comes to environmental sounds. Overall, it’s an interesting application of the same technology as the cochlear implant, but dialed in to a unique specific use case. | 18 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478198",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2022-05-26T17:12:03",
"content": "Bionic hearing indeed.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6478220",
"author": "Aaron J Scott",
"timestamp": "2022-05-26T18:08:51",
"content... | 1,760,372,681.930538 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/26/the-512-gigabyte-floppy-disk/ | The 512 Gigabyte Floppy Disk | Jenny List | [
"classic hacks",
"Peripherals Hacks"
] | [
"3.5\" floppy disk",
"floppy",
"micro sd"
] | There are times when a technology goes almost overnight as if in a puff of smoke, and others when they fade away gradually over time to the point at which their passing is barely noticed. So it is with removable media, while we still have the occasional USB flash disk or SD card , they do not come anywhere near the floppies, Zip disks, and CD-ROMs of the past in their numbers or ubiquity. If the floppy disk is just a save icon to you there’s still the chance to experience their retro charm though, courtesy of [Franklinstein]. He’s made a 3.5″ floppy disk that eschews 720 k, 1.44 M, or even 2.88 Mb, and goes all the way
with a claimed 512 Gb capacity
. We’re sure we can’t remember these from back in the day!
Of course as we can see in the video below he’s achieved neither an astounding feat of data compression nor a bleeding-edge method of storing bits in individual iron oxide molecules. Instead the floppy hinges open, and there’s a holder for micro SD cards where the disk itself would be. It’s a bit of fun, and we have to agree with him that it makes a very handy holder for micro SDs that can carry that much data. This sets us wondering though, whether it would be possible to somehow multiplex 14 micro SDs to a microcontroller on a PCB that could fit in a floppy shell. Perhaps an ESP32 could be a slow file server through a web interface?
He makes the point that 512 Gb of floppies would comfortably exceed the height of the tallest buildings were they stacked together, so at the very least this represents a space saving. If you’re looking for something slightly more functional and don’t mind modifying the drive,
there’s always this classic approach to marrying a floppy with an SD card. | 79 | 22 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478165",
"author": "Jonathan Pallant",
"timestamp": "2022-05-26T15:46:53",
"content": "Your mix of k, M, Mb and Gb for size units is giving me palpitations. And let’s not get started on how the 3.5” disk is 1440 KiB and not 1.44 M for *any* sensible value of M…",
"parent_id": n... | 1,760,372,681.873437 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/26/sharing-your-projects-with-the-world-how/ | Sharing Your Projects With The World: How? | Ryan Flowers | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"how-to",
"Slider"
] | [
"blogging",
"content creation",
"project sharing",
"writing"
] | So you just built a super-mega robot project that you want to share with the world. Super! But now you’re faced with an entirely new and different problem: documenting the process for the world to see. It’s enough to drive you back down into the lab.
What software should I use to create my project site?
How deep down the rabbit hole should I go when it comes to documenting the project?
What toppings do I want on my something-to-eat-while-hacking pizza?
We’re not going to get into the age old “pineapple or no pineapple” debate, but it’s important to note that the topic of how to share a project with the world has as many choices as toppings, and just as many opinions. The answer will always be simple:
Do what works best for you!
The purpose of this article is to give some options to somebody considering sharing their projects online. There isn’t enough room to talk about every single option available to a hacker, so be sure to fill in your favorite options in the comments below. Let’s dive in!
Considerations Before You Start
Before even beginning to look into all of the options for hosting your projects, there are some basic questions that we need to answer. Consider the following:
Who is your audience, and how will they expect to consume what you present?
How deeply do you want to document your project, and what kind of media will you present?
How will people find your project?
Let’s talk about each of these topics for a moment.
Who is your audience?
This is probably the question that will affect your choices more than any others. Who are you writing for? Are you sharing new ideas for people who are experts in your chosen subject? Are you trying to expose your area of expertise to a new crowd who know little about it? Try to answer these questions before you start. If you’re not sure, that’s okay. You’ll figure it out as you go.
If you’re writing for people who are expected to know as much about your subject as you do, you’ll likely be limiting your audience quite a bit. Instead, try writing for a specific person who knows a bit less. Pick a relative, friend, or another person that you know who you’d like to interest in your project, and write it for them.
For example, if you’re writing an article about a new bed leveling method for 3D printers, take a moment and describe why bed leveling is a problem and perhaps introduce common solutions and their drawbacks. This will help your audience to understand what makes your project unique, and will add a lot to their enjoyment.
How deeply to document your project?
This question is closely related to your audience. If you intend to do deep dives into a subject and explain its underpinnings from scratch, you may choose a platform more suited for long form content vs one geared toward a quick share.
Deeper documentation may mean integrating video, pictures, and text, so you’ll want to pick platforms that will let you integrate all of these media into one presentation.
How will people find your project?
This is where some research will be required on your part. Software developers will find drastically different answers to this question than somebody who wants to publish a deep dive on debugging shift registers in obsolete 10-bit computers.
A great way to determine this is to go to your favorite search engine and do a search for the that you would do to find your own content, and see where others are publishing their projects. You can also take a look at their approach to sharing their works and decide which elements you may wish to emulate, change, or leave out altogether.
Choosing A Platform
Now that you’ve had the opportunity to consider the approach you’d like to take, it’s time to make a decision about how you’d like to share your project with the world. This brings up many of its own questions, but rather than run you through another laundry list of questions, we’re going to look at self-hosted options as well as various services and discuss the pros and cons of each.
Self Hosted
In
a previous article
, we talked about ways that you could host your own project website at home, and that extends easily to hosting things on a very cheap VPS, a free cloud computing instance, or a solar wind and rain powered piduino8266. You get the idea. With the self-hosted option, you’re responsible for the server administration.
WordPress.org
We’re going to get this one out of the way right away for two reasons: If you have never blogged before and want to run your own software, it’s hard to go wrong with
WordPress.org
. Originally designed as a blogging-only platform, it has morphed over the years into being a full on website builder. There are countless themes that let you change the look and feel of the website with just a download, and there are as many plugins that extend the functionality of WordPress.
If you’re wondering just how useful it is, it’s noteworthy that Hackaday, and this very post, are all done in WordPress, and some of the largest sites on the Internet are using WordPress too. WordPress has the great advantage of not requiring any coding skills. Because it’s a
big
project that’s widely used, it gets lots of security attention, on both the white hat and black hat sides of the fence, so you’re going to need to keep your install up to date. This isn’t hard, but there’s some necessary management overhead.
Ghost
Ghost
is a website builder and blogging platform that is based on NodeJS rather than PHP. It’s hailed as being very fast and easy to work with and for a while it was what all the cool kids were using.
Ghost is great if you like to code in NodeJS and don’t want to build something from scratch.
HTML5 and Friends
If you want to build a site from scratch, there are several site builders you can use or you can just code something up in HTML directly. HTML5 is very powerful on its own, and there are many excellent HTML5 templates that can be used to get started. Using just HTML5, CSS, and Javascript, the sky’s the limit.
Building an HTML5 site from scratch or a template is an excellent way to go if you’re in it for the development just as much as for the project sharing.
Hosted Services
Maybe running your own server and website is beyond what you’d like to do, but you still want to have somewhere to share your works and projects. You’re in luck- there are countless services just waiting to host your content, and we’re going to talk about all the ones you can use that are free (as in beer).
WordPress.com
WordPress.com
is a hosted version of the WordPress.org software. Your site is hosted directly on the WordPress.com servers, and that comes with some limitations. But if you like WordPress, or want to try it out without spinning up a server for it, it’s an excellent option.
Github
It may seem like an odd choice, but by creating a new Repository in
Github
, you are given an area to upload files, write HTML, and link to outside sources. Each repository can have a Readme page that shows up when the Repository is loaded, and that page can embed the pictures and other media that you upload to the Repository. Github is especially a good choice if your projects are software only, but works fine for others, too. And, Github has a free tier of service. And, of course, it’s versioned.
Blogger.com
Blogger.com
has been around for ages, and is the place where many bloggers have started. Some have grown away from it, while others have utilized it for many years as a reliable place to host your content. Because it’s a blog-only platform, it doesn’t lend itself to building a website about your project, but rather to sharing multiple projects over time.
Imgur.com / YouTube
Imgur.com
is a photo sharing community that is often used to document projects that are mostly photographs only. Sharing other file formats isn’t allowed, but it could be used in conjunction with Github for sharing files. If your project is video based, the same things are true for
YouTube
. The weakness with YouTube is that it’s not easily searchable, but it is an excellent way to demonstrate projects that are documented more thoroughly in a blog or other website, where the written word reigns king.
Hackaday.io
It may seem rather self-serving to suggest
Hackaday.io
, since it’s our own platform, but the truth is that if this post were being written elsewhere, it would still be on the list. It’s designed to be an excellent way to share files, pictures, and embed YouTube videos. It has the added strength of being searchable on a platform full of similarly minded hackers.
Getting a simple page up and running is extraordinarily easy
, and there’s even a “submit tip to Hackaday” button. What more do you want?
That’s It?
Regardless of which medium you choose- written, photographs, video, or some combination thereof- just get out there and get started! A great way of getting your feet wet is to go through your backlog of completed projects and documented using your chosen means, and see how it feels.
Your first works will probably a bit rough, but once you develop a style and a method, it will get a lot easier. Don’t worry about perfection, and
especially
do not worry about the Internet Popularity Contest. You’ll never be able to please everyone, so focus on your chosen audience and let the cards fall where they may. Every content creator has to do this to some extent.
No doubt, there are countless other options that we’ve omitted because let’s face it, platform options are like pizza topping combinations: there are too many to list! So this is your opportunity to shine- let us know about your favorite platform in the comments below. | 22 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478134",
"author": "BT",
"timestamp": "2022-05-26T14:08:06",
"content": "You forgot Twitter *wincess at the very thought*",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6478181",
"author": "Ryan Flowers",
"timestamp": "2022-... | 1,760,372,682.100225 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/26/nyc-hangs-up-its-last-pay-phone/ | NYC Hangs Up Its Last Pay Phone | Kristina Panos | [
"News",
"Phone Hacks"
] | [
"Captain Crunch",
"manhattan",
"nyc",
"pay phone"
] | It was a melancholy Monday this week in the Big Apple as
the last public payphone was uprooted from midtown Manhattan
near Times Square and hauled away like so much garbage.
That oughta be in a museum
, you’re thinking, if you’re anything like us. Don’t worry; that’s exactly where the pair is headed.
This all started in 2014 when mayor de Blasio pledged to move the concept of street-level public utility into the future. Since then, NYC’s payphones have been systematically replaced with
roughly 2,000 Link Wi-Fi kiosks
that provide free domestic phone calls, device charging, and of course, Internet access. They also give weather, transit updates, and neighborhood news.
There are still a few private payphones around the city, so Superman still has places to change, and Bill and Ted can continue to come home. But if you need to make a phone call and have nowhere to turn, a Link kiosk is the way to go.
Although your Cap’n Crunch whistle hasn’t worked in decades, it’s still a sad day in history for the Jolly Wrencher, whose
maiden message
was about ye olde red boxen.
We’re already seeing pay phones live on as art
, so that’s a good sign.
Images via
PIX11
and
CBS News | 48 | 18 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478103",
"author": "Jerry",
"timestamp": "2022-05-26T11:15:28",
"content": "The steady decline in pay phones has been going on for a number of years. The “Central Office” in Gardena CA. stored pallets of removed pay phones in their back parking lot for a while. A photo of these aba... | 1,760,372,682.311681 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/26/its-easy-to-mod-your-oculus-vr-headset-with-prescription-lenses/ | It’s Easy To Mod Your Oculus VR Headset With Prescription Lenses | Lewin Day | [
"Virtual Reality"
] | [
"Oculus",
"oculus rift",
"vr"
] | The Oculus brand VR headset and other similar devices allow you to view 3D worlds, but they can be blurry and unsatisfying if you’re a glasses wearer. Alternatively, you might be able to see fine, but find your glasses get in the way of a comfortable experience. Either way, you might want to integrate prescription lenses into your headset, and thankfully, there’s a straightforward way to do so
thanks to [tanvach].
The way to do so is by using these 3D-printed lens adaptors. They take standard single vision lenses as designed for the
Zenni #550021 round glasses frames,
and let them fit nicely inside a Oculus Quest, Quest 2, or Rift S headset. [tanvach] supplies instructions on how to order the lenses for your own prescription, and notes that the key is to get the antireflective coating to reduce glare. And, if you don’t want to print your own adapters, you can
source some pre-printed
instead!
The adapters are a great way to improve your VR experience if you’re someone that typically relies on corrective lenses. Of course, it’s getting more popular to simply
DIY your own headset
these days, too. If you’ve got your own neat VR project in the works,
don’t hesitate to let us know!
Thanks to [Keith Olson] for the tip! | 33 | 18 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478078",
"author": "Bleugh",
"timestamp": "2022-05-26T08:07:18",
"content": "Superb work. I’d never really thought to do this before, i’ve never really bothered with VR due to needing glasses – thankyou Tanvach, you’ve now started me down a VR rabbit hole :-)",
"parent_id": nul... | 1,760,372,682.039721 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/25/tame-your-flexible-filaments-with-this-belt-drive-extruder/ | Tame Your Flexible Filaments With This Belt-Drive Extruder | Dave Rowntree | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"3d printing",
"flexible filament",
"Ninjaflex",
"TPU"
] | [Proper Printing] clearly enjoys pushing the boundaries of 3D printed materials, and sometimes this requires building custom 3D printers or at least the business end of them. Flexible filaments can be a bit of a pain to deal with, simply because most extruders are designed to push the filament into the hot end with a simple hobbed bolt (or pinch roller setup) and only work reliably due the rigidity of the plastic itself. Once you go flexible, the rigidity is reduced and the filament often deflects sideways and the extruder jams. The longer the filament path leading to the hotend, the harder it gets. The
dual belt drive extruder
(they’re calling it ‘proper extruder’) grips the filament on two sides with a pair of supported belts, guiding it into the hotend without allowing it to deflect sideways. The extruder body and gears were resin printed (but, we checked — the design is suitable for FDM printing as well) proving that resin printing on modern printers, does indeed maintain adequate dimensional accuracy allowing the building of mechanisms, despite the naysayers!
The extruder design took a bit of tweaking, as the belts themselves, were deflecting, but after a few iterations to add some guide rails, it appears to work rather well. Of course we usually don’t get to see all the failures along the way! That withstanding, they started by testing flexible filaments in a logical manner, starting with a minimally flexible filament, with a shore hardness of 93A, before quickly moving onto NinjaFlex (85A hardness) and even successfully printing a gear in an unidentified 60A hardness filament.
The test printer was a Creality CR-10, with a WhamBam Mutant tool-changer installed, so an adaptor plate was needed for this to allow the ‘proper extruder’ to be mounted. The belt-driven design, with the extra friction from the modifications proved a little too much for the typical NEMA17 stepper motor used for direct drive extruders, so they needed to use a beefier unit. Due to the heat from the this larger motor, it needed to be printed in polycarbonate (we think, the video is unclear) to prevent warpage during operation, but that shouldn’t be a major obstacle for the intrepid builder wanting to duplicate this work, we reckon.
We’re no strangers to 3D printing with flexible materials, and the associated hacks to tame them, such as this
modified bowden driver for TPU
. The applications for printing with flex are numerous and important, such as
printing custom gaskets
, to name but one, so anything that lowers the difficulty of printing with the floppy stuff is a great step in the right direction in our eyes.
Thanks [BaldPower] for the tip! | 8 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478055",
"author": "tomás zerolo",
"timestamp": "2022-05-26T05:40:14",
"content": "Now a peristaltic bowden with tiny cilia to counter backslip would be something of a bio-tech-punk thing…",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "647810... | 1,760,372,681.721211 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/25/geothermal-system-is-a-real-gold-mine/ | Geothermal System Is A Real Gold Mine | Al Williams | [
"Science"
] | [
"energy",
"geothermal",
"gold mine"
] | What do you get when Pacific Northwest National Laboratories takes over what was once the largest and deepest gold mine in North America? The answer might be
enough energy to power 10,000,000 homes
. The enhanced geothermal systems project includes the lab and several partners from academia and industry and aims to test sending fluids down boreholes so the Earth can heat them up. Hot fluids, of course, can easily create electricity.
At 4,100 feet underground, the old mine is not very convenient to get to. However, modern technology means that the equipment is largely automated so workers can carry out experiments from home using a computer or even a phone. The system itself is 7 feet long by 7 feet wide and 30 feet long. It was assembled above ground, tested, and then split into 4×4 sections for transportation deep below the surface.
The work tunnel is airconditioned, although once you go down for your shift at 6:30AM, you don’t get to go back up until 6:30PM so working from home is a definite advantage.
Some researchers on the project hosted a “deep talk” (we see what they did there) recently and you can see the video, below.
Paradoxically, you can get heat from the earth or you can
dump heat into the earth
. Great way to
cool your next gaming rig
. | 57 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478025",
"author": "Paul",
"timestamp": "2022-05-26T02:16:51",
"content": "“enoughenergyto power 10,000,000 homes. ”For how long? Energy = power * time.Thankfully, the original article gets the terminology correct.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
... | 1,760,372,682.23496 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/25/build-a-prop-for-a-tv-premiere-stranger-things-have-happened/ | Build A Prop For A TV Premiere? Stranger Things Have Happened | Kristina Panos | [
"Phone Hacks"
] | [
"dtmf",
"phone",
"prop",
"Stranger Things"
] | Some guys get all the breaks. [Guy Dupont] had the honor of building
a working, interactive wall-mount landline phone
for the red carpet premiere of a certain TV show. The phone was to be an Easter egg inside an 80s-style pizzeria set. About every two minutes the phone would ring, and anyone brave enough to answer would be greeted with either a fake pizza order, an old answering machine message, or a clip from The Show That Cannot Be Mentioned.
Lots of room inside those old housings.
So the phone doesn’t work-work, but the nostalgia is strong — picking up the receiver when the phone isn’t ringing results in a dial tone, and button pushing leads to the busy signal. Those old pleasant-but-stern operator recordings would have been cool, but there was only so much time. (
Your call cannot be completed as dialed. Please check the number and try again.
)
[Guy] used a SparkFun RP2040 to handle input from the DTMF keypad and play the tones, the dial and busy signals, and the various recordings into the ear of the receiver.
Instead of messing around with the high voltage needed to drive the original ringer and bell, [Guy] used a small speaker to play the ringing sound. Everything runs on eight AAs tucked under the keypad, which is stepped down to 5 V.
This project was built under fairly dramatic duress, which makes it that much more exciting to watch the build video after the break. With just five days to get the phone working and in the mail, [Guy] holed up on the floor of his office, his messy mid-move refuge from a house plagued by COVID. Unfortunately, the whole pizzeria thing fell through, so [Guy]’s phone will not get to have its moment on the red carpet. But at least it’s on the site that’s black and white and read all over.
[Guy] is no stranger to the old tech/new spec game.
Remember that time he shoehorned Spotify into an iPod Classic? | 7 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478008",
"author": "Wibble",
"timestamp": "2022-05-26T00:57:16",
"content": "Interesting design choices, why not just asterisk on a pi with an ata? The phone would have been left stock, and the call routing/operator messages could have been nailed too. You’d be done in a morning, I... | 1,760,372,682.149917 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/25/a-nicely-accurate-pcb-drill-press-you-can-build-yourself/ | A Nicely Accurate PCB Drill Press You Can Build Yourself | Lewin Day | [
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"drill",
"drill press",
"pcb",
"pcb drill"
] | Making PCBs isn’t always just about getting nice copper traces on a lovely fiberglass board. There’s often lots of drilling to be done!
This PCB drill press from [w_k_fay] should help you do just that with the finesse and accuracy of a pro.
The design isn’t particularly fancy or pretty, but just simply focuses on doing a simple job well. There’s a basic DC motor, sitting on a linear rail so that it has minimal deflection in the X and Y axes as it moves up and down. Special care was taken to ensure the linear rail was mounted perfectly perpendicular to the base to ensure the drill doesn’t wander or splay off target.
A collet chuck is used to center the bit as well as possible for a good price. The build also includes a bright LED in order to give you the best possible view of your work. Power is via a variable bench supply which allows for variable speed as necessary. There’s a foot pedal to activate the drill which allows both hands to be used for positioning the work for added ease of use.
The total build came in at under $50 spend by the time [w_k_fay] was done. Alternatively, you could use
this 3D printed design to build your own as well.
If you’ve been whipping up your own useful tools for the home shop, though,
don’t hesitate to drop us a line! | 6 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478015",
"author": "Chris",
"timestamp": "2022-05-26T01:26:30",
"content": "Someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6478037",
"author": "BrendaEM",
"timestamp": "2022-05-26T04:05:57... | 1,760,372,681.765678 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/25/hackaday-prize-2022-upcycling-acrylic-scraps/ | Hackaday Prize 2022: Upcycling Acrylic Scraps | Bryan Cockfield | [
"green hacks",
"The Hackaday Prize"
] | [
"2022 Hackaday Prize",
"acrylic",
"dinalab",
"heat",
"jack",
"laser cutter",
"plastic",
"press",
"rainforest",
"recycle",
"scraps"
] | Living and working in a remote rain forest may sound idyllic to those currently stuck in bland suburbia, and to be sure it does have plenty of perks. One of the downsides, though, is getting new materials and equipment to that remote location. For that reason, [Digital Naturalism Laboratories], also known as [Dinalab], has to reuse or recycle as much as they can,
including their scraps of acrylic leftover from their laser cutter
.
The process might seem straightforward, but getting it to actually work and not burn the acrylic took more than a few tries. Acrylic isn’t as thermoplastic as other plastics so it is much harder to work with, and it took some refining of the process. But once the details were ironed out, essentially the acrylic scraps are gently heated between two steel plates (they use a sandwich press) and then squeezed with a jack until they stick back together in one cohesive sheet. The key to this process is to heat it and press it for a long time, typically a half hour or more.
With this process finally sorted, [Dinalab] can make much more use of their available resources thanks to recycling a material that most of us would end up tossing out. It also helps to keep waste out of the landfill that would otherwise exist in the environment indefinitely. And, if this seems familiar to you,
it’s because this same lab has already perfected methods to recycle other types of plastic as well
.
The
Hackaday
Prize2022
is Sponsored by: | 9 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477950",
"author": "Andrew Quitmeyer",
"timestamp": "2022-05-25T19:36:05",
"content": "Aww thanks for sharing hackaday!Also gonna plug offcut studio who gives workshops on this for people who want to learn how to do this in a less janky way than us :)https://instagram.com/offcutstu... | 1,760,372,682.360687 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/25/swo-an-arm-printf-by-any-other-name/ | SWO: An ARM Printf By Any Other Name | Al Williams | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Microcontrollers",
"Slider"
] | [
"arm",
"stm32",
"SWO"
] | I’ll confess. Although
printf
-style debugging has a bad rep, I find myself turning to it on occasion. Sure,
printf
is expensive and brings in a lot of code, but if you have the space and time to use it while debugging you can always remove it before you are finished. However, what if you don’t have an output device or you are using it for something else? If you are using most modern ARM chips, you have another option — a dedicated output channel that is used for several things, including debugging output. I decided I wanted to try that on the Blackpill running mbed, and found out it isn’t as easy as you might think. But it is possible, and when you are done reading, you’ll be able to do it, too.
I’m writing this using the STM32-specific ST-LINK hardware. If you use other JTAG devices like the BlackMagic probe, you probably already have this set up for you.
What You Get
I’ll start backward with the end result, then talk about the software, so you’ll be good and motivated by the time you get to the hardware requirements. Spoiler alert: your existing hardware might need a quick hack to make it work, although you can buy something off the shelf if you prefer.
Here is a very simple test program:
SWO_Channel debugport; // requires #include "SWO.h"
int main()
{
unsigned count=0;
debugport.printf("\r\nHello World from SWO\r\n");
debugport.printf("CPU SystemCoreClock is %d Hz\r\n", SystemCoreClock);
while (1)
{
led = !led; // flip LED if output is true
ThisThread::sleep_for(rate); // sleepy time
if (count % 10) debugport.putc('*'); else debugport.printf("%d\r\n",count);
count++;
}
}
Nothing hard to imagine here. You can use
putc
or
printf
to write to the debugging output. As you can see in the figure, you get a nice window that shows all the output. There are actually 32 channels of output, but channel 0 is reserved for the debugging output. In this case, I picked All because its the only thing coming out of the device, anyway.
What You Need
ST’s STM32CubeProgrammer can display SWO data.
First, you need a compatible ARM chip. Not all ARM chips support ITM — the Integrated Trace Macrocell — but that’s what you need. There will be one pin on the device marked SWO (and probably other things, too). Since I’m using the Blackpill with an STM32F411CE, we know it should work and the output pin will be PB3.
You also need an ST-Link dongle that has an SWO pin. Unfortunately, the cheap ones that look like a USB memory device you typically get don’t have the SWO pin. You can, however, easily hack them. The “full” ST-Link V2 has the pin brought out, but is usually a lot more expensive. However, if you shop the usual Chinese shops, you can usually find one for a reasonable price. I paid less than $10.
Of course, you also need some sort of tool to read the output. A normal terminal won’t do it, but ST’s STM32CubeProgrammer can easily read the data. There are, of course, other options, too. Many IDEs and debuggers can read SWO output. There are also some
open source tools
, but the Ubuntu packages are too old and the release packages didn’t work. Building it from scratch did work, though.
Software Setup
Since I’m using Mbed, the first thing I did was go looking for a library.
I wasn’t disappointed
. The library is a thin wrapper around the ITM functions in CMSIS, so if you aren’t using Mbed, just have a look at those functions and you’ll be able to figure it out. If you prefer STM32Duino,
check this out for something similar
.
Once I added it to the project, I had to fix one small thing. It probably didn’t matter, but there is an instance where an array is allocated for a file name and then deleted improperly. Note the
delete
in the code below:
bool SWO_Channel::claim (FILE *stream) {
if ( FileBase::getName() == NULL) {
error("claim requires a name to be given in the instantiator of the SWO instance!\r\n");
}
//Add '/' before name:
char *path = new char[strlen(FileBase::getName()) + 2];
sprintf(path, "/%s", FileBase::getName());
if (freopen(path, "w", stream) == NULL) {
// Failed, should not happen
return false;
}
delete [] path; // fixed
//No buffering
setvbuf(stream, NULL, _IONBF, 32);
return true;
}
Once that’s done, you are good to go. You just need some hardware.
Hardware Setup
If you have the “normal” ST dongle like the white one in the picture below, the setup is just the normal setup. Connect power, ground, and the two debugging pins to the back connector of the Blackpill and then run a wire from SWO to the B4 pin on the device.
If you have one of the cheap clones like the purple one sitting next to the white device, you’ll need to do some
surgery
to bring out an extra pin.
Load a program that does some simple SWO output and then fire everything up. You may need to upgrade the ST-Link’s firmware — the STM32CubeProgrammer software can do that, too.
When connecting to the hardware with the programmer, I found that the white dongle didn’t reliably connect at 4000 kHz, so I had to select 1800 kHz. That may just be that device or my haphazard wiring. You can see the connection info I’m using in the adjacent screenshot. Press Connect to get started.
When you select the SWV item, you’ll need to set a clock of 96 MHz for this setup. Presumably, if you are running at a different frequency, you’d know the right value for your setup. When you press Start, you should see output from the program.
The only thing to remember is that your software will fight over the dongle unless it has been made to work in the “shared” mode. In my case, Mbed Studio didn’t seem to care about that setting so you have to disconnect if you want it to reprogram the chip. Of course, you could use the programmer to do everything. It will all depend on your tools and setup.
Of course, once you have it going once, it is pretty easy to replicate for future projects. You only have one extra wire and two extra files in your program.
Going Further
You can go further, though. First, there’s colorful output. If your debug string contains #RED#, #GRN#, or #ORG# the remaining characters will be in that color (red, green, or orange) for the rest of the line. Assuming, of course, the viewer understands that and you have it turned on. It is handy to be able to show important messages in red, for example.
However, it is a waste that there are so many extra channels we aren’t using. For example, why not have progress messages on channel 0 and detailed debugging info on channel 1? You could have a dump of what’s coming in from an external device on channel 5. Sure, you could write a prefix on the line and pull the data out that way, but this is more fun.
I rewrote a very small bit of the existing SWO class and, thanks to optional arguments, it still works the same. The only difference is you can add a channel number to the constructor so it is possible to create more than one debug stream:
SWO_Channel debugport;
SWO_Channel dbg2("second",1);
There are very few changes to the code, but I’ll leave the whole project up on
GitHub
.
If you can’t tell, I enjoy working with the STM32 and Mbed. Sure, you can get better performance by sidestepping Mbed, but the good thing is that
you can
. Oddly enough, pushing data over one port into
several channels
is something I’ve done before in a completely different way. | 26 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477904",
"author": "doragasu",
"timestamp": "2022-05-25T17:08:41",
"content": "Other alternatives that work using the debug port and thus do not require other resources such as GPIO pins or UART devices are GDB semihosting and RTT. The later is the one I would recommend because alt... | 1,760,372,682.55207 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/25/golf-club-shooter-is-your-ballistic-friend-on-the-green/ | Golf Club Shooter Is Your Ballistic Friend On The Green | Lewin Day | [
"Lifehacks",
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"compressed air",
"golf",
"golf club",
"launcher"
] | Golf is a sport that has always enjoyed a good gadget or eight. Whether it’s something to measure the wind, or the latest putter guaranteed to save your game, golf enthusiasts have always flocked to such toys. [Nick O’Hara] has something that might just be a little
too
exciting for the golf set, though, in the form of his
golf club launcher
.
The golf club launcher essentially takes the role of a normal golf bag, with a rotating magazine containing all the necessary clubs for a day out on the green. The magazine is rotated into position on request, and the required club is launched out towards the player thanks to a pneumatic cylinder fired at 120 psi. A compressor in the base keeps the system charged with air for repeated launches.
The launcher even has a voice assistant built in. Telling the caddy the distance to the hole, and variables like wind and elevation, allows the device to select the right club for the conditions before blasting it towards the player.
It’s a device that easily puts a smile on the face every time it launches a club.
We’ve seen some other great golf hacks before, too
. Video after the break.
[Thanks to Itay for the tip!] | 17 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477863",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2022-05-25T15:34:44",
"content": "If war ever started using golf balls this guy would be ready.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6477873",
"author": "Scoldog",
"timestamp": "2... | 1,760,372,682.485518 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/25/the-joy-of-broadcast-media-vs-the-paradox-of-choice/ | The Joy Of Broadcast Media Vs. The Paradox Of Choice | Lewin Day | [
"Featured",
"Interest",
"Original Art",
"Rants",
"Slider"
] | [
"media",
"streaming",
"too much"
] | The rise of streaming services on the Internet was a revolutionary shift when it came to the world of media. No more would content be pumped in to homes in a one-way fashion, broadcast by major conglomerates and government-run organizations. Instead, individuals would be free to hunt for content suiting their own desires on an all-you-can-watch basis.
It’s led to a paradigm shift in the way we consume media. However, it’s also led to immense frustration thanks to the overwhelming amount of content on offer. Let’s take a look at why that is, and some creative ways you can get around the problem.
The Paradox of Choice
Many find the masses of content on streaming services to be overwhelming to choose from. Credit: author screenshot
Traditionally, when it came to media, there were two major arms of delivery: broadcast, and home media. One might listen to the radio, or flick on the TV, or alternatively, spin up a record, or select a movie to watch on tape. If none of those options sufficed, one might take a walk down to the local video store to rent something more appealing.
Fundamentally, it was an era in which choices were limited. There were a handful of TV stations to choose from, and if nothing good was on, you could go as far as finding something watchable on tape or going without. Many will remember afternoons and evenings spent watching reruns or a Friday night movie that had been on a million times before. Some shows went as far as becoming legends for their seemingly endless replay, from
The Simpsons
to
M*A*S*H.
As the Internet grew, though, the game started to change. Torrent websites and streaming services came along, offering up the sum total of the world’s cultural output for free, or for a nominal cost for those averse to piracy. Suddenly when it came to choosing a movie to watch, one wasn’t limited to the five or so films on at the local cinema, nor what was left on the shelves at the local video rental. Instead, virtually any movie, from the invention of the format, could be yours to watch at a moment’s notice.
With so many options on the table, many of us find it harder to choose. It’s an idea popularly known as
the Paradox of Choice,
a term popularized by US psychologist Barry Schwartz in 2004. When our options are limited to a select few, choice is easy. They can quickly be compared and ranked and an ideal option chosen.
Add thousands of choices to the pile, and the job escalates in complexity to the point of becoming overwhelming. With so many different choices to contrast and compare, finding the mythical
right choice
becomes practically impossible.
Anyone who’s ever jumped on a streaming service to hunt for something to watch will be familiar with the paralyzing feeling. Rows of colored icons streaming past, barely-recognizable titles fluttering by. Each scroll seeking for a simple standout option, but only revealing yet more to choose from. The pressure builds with the knowledge that making a bad choice is surely inexcusable when virtually everything ever filmed is an option. Whether you’re looking for a movie to watch or you just want to catch an old episode of
Cheers
out of the hundreds that were made
,
the sheer volume of choices is overwhelming.
Respite is at Hand
Builds like
the Simpsons TV
replicate the broadcast television experience, where your only choice is to watch what’s on, or not. credit:
HAD article
There are some workarounds, of course. One such method is to remember that picking a movie is not a life-or-death choice (usually), and that merely
finding something good enough
will usually suffice. The streaming world also comes with a secondary benefit in that there’s no need for commitment. If the film is unwatchably bad, you can always pick another.
If it’s a more regular issue you face, however, you might consider the value in giving up choice entirely. Many hackers have yearned for the days when they could flip on the TV and catch an episode of their favorite show, without having to pick from the entire back catalogue themselves. Builds like
the Simpsons TV
stack a golden collection of episodes on a Raspberry Pi. The played back continually at random, akin to the 24-hour marathons popular on cable TV back in the day. For an even more authentic build, you can use an RF modulator to pump out the video as if it’s coming in
on its very own TV channel.
Date Night Movies
lets two people input a movie choice each, and presents a series of middle-ground options. Credit: screenshot
Services exist to help you choose movies to watch, too. Sites like the
Random Movie Picker
and
PickAMovieForMe
ask a series of simple questions before making suggestions on what to watch.
Netflix Roulette
does much the same, with a focus on titles actually available on that specific service. Meanwhile,
Date Night Movies
takes two suggestions and offers up a series of titles that meet somewhere in the middle.
Overall, there’s some value to be had in these systems that take entire movie catalogues and boil them down to a handful of options for us to choose from. Often, when we’re picking something to watch, we’re looking to relax and unwind. At these moments, wading through innumerable options is unpleasant, and having a way to cut that down is a great thing.
The benefit of understanding the Paradox of Choice is that you can recognize the situation, and react accordingly. Whether employing psychological techniques to ease your selection, or enlisting tools to help take the choice out of your hands, it’s much easier to deal with when you’ve got a strategy for the job. Happy watching! | 61 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477843",
"author": "pmichealh",
"timestamp": "2022-05-25T14:39:25",
"content": "I don’t find it hard. If one of the few things I like isn’t on, I go work on electronics. The paradox only affects those with nothing better to do…",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies"... | 1,760,372,682.734443 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/24/put-another-dime-in-the-jukebox/ | Put Another Dime In The Jukebox | Al Williams | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Slider"
] | [
"electromechanical",
"jukebox",
"music",
"records",
"vinyl"
] | We don’t always acknowledge it, but most people have an innate need for music. Think of all the technology that brings us music. For decades, most of the consumer radio spectrum carried music. We went from records, to tape in various forms, to CDs, to pure digital. There are entire satellites that carry — mostly — music. Piracy aside, people are willing to pay for music, too. While it isn’t very common to see “jukeboxes” these days, there was a time when they were staples at any bar or restaurant or even laundrymat you happened to be in. For the cost of a dime, you can hear the music and share it with everyone around you.
Even before we could record music, there was something like a jukebox. Coin-operated machines, as you’ll recall,
are actually very old
. Prior to the 1890s, you might find coin-op player pianos or music boxes. These machines actually played the music they were set up to play using a paper roll with holes in it or metal disks or cylinders.
Early Days
That changed in 1890 when a pair of inventors connected
a coin acceptor to an Edison phonograph
. Patrons of San Francisco’s Palais Royale Saloon could put a hard-earned nickel in the slot and sound came out of four different tubes. Keep in mind there were no electronic amplifiers as we know them in 1890. Reportedly, the box earned $1,000 in six months.
A 1927 not-a-jukebox
Imitators soon followed, sometimes in the form of companies that made player pianos or other instruments like Wurlitzer. Typically, the coin mechanism would unlock the crank you had to turn to wind up the old-style phonograph. The song you heard was the record on the player. That changed in 1918 when an inventor figured out how to
stop and restart a record automatically
. By 1927, the American Musical Instrument company had a jukebox that allowed you to pick among two sides of ten records, for a total of twenty selections. Keep in mind, that these machines weren’t called jukeboxes yet, but you’d clearly recognize them as one today.
Around the same time, Seeburg — a player piano maker — built a coin-op box with an electrostatic speaker and could pick from one of eight complete turntables. The very first models played the records in sequence, but the 1928 Autophone could select from the eight songs available.
Automation
Most of us can probably imagine how we would build a controller to play a few records on demand. You could stack the records and use multiple needles. You could put the records in a holder that rotates. There are probably a dozen other ways you can think of. But consider this: during most of the jukebox’s life, there were no microcontrollers. Everything had to run with switches, solenoids, timing motors, cams, and things like that. Want a look inside a typical jukebox? Watch the video below.
Golden Years
A classic Wurlitzer jukebox
By the 1940s, jukeboxes begin looking less like furniture and more like the showpieces you think of today. That’s about the time the name was coined, as well. It would be the 1950s, though, before the classic 45 RPM singles would replace other media in the boxes.
Jukeboxes started to get fancy right before World War II, with lights and moving features. During the war, though, unnecessary production was banned, so machines went back to basics for a while. After the war, though, the machines got more and more grand to attract attention.
One thing that became very popular was a wallbox. This was essentially a remote control for the jukebox that allowed, for example, restaurant patrons to pay for and select music from their seats.
When radio became prominent, it seemed to doom the record industry, but it didn’t. The jukebox was a key consumer of records and some estimate that in the 1940s, three-quarters of all records produced in the United States wound up in a coin-op box. By the 1960s, though, the jukebox became less popular, even though around this time the started playing in stereo — a novelty, at the time.
They are still around though, just not as prevalent. A modern jukebox is most likely found in a bar and either uses CDs or digital music, possibly downloaded over the Internet.
The Mob Connection
One popular brand of jukebox that started in the 30s was the Rock-ola. Named after rock music in the 1930s? Actually, no. The company was founded by reputed mobster David Rockola and also made scales, furniture, and rifles for the military. Despite the 1922 blues ballad, “My Man Rocks Me (With One Steady Roll),” the term “rock and roll” didn’t enter music parlance until the 1950s and, in fact, was actually a euphemism for something completely different before then.
Rock-ola wasn’t the only jukebox company associated with organized crime. AMI — formerly the American Musical Instrument company — was reputed to be run by mobsters for a time. In 1949, Chicago mob boss Mooney Giancana took over a jukebox distributor who operated a network of machines. From there, the mob systematically took over other distributors including Century Music company who operated 100,000 machines in 1954, out of a total of around 575,000 machines in the country. The whole affair was subject to a congressional investigation in 1958 where it was revealed that some jukebox operators were even murdered to take over their routes.
Sounds of Silence
Jukeboxes were once so popular, that if you were having a drink or a meal, there was bound to be music. In fact, research showed that if the jukebox was playing, it was more likely to be fed more coins to keep playing. To that end, distributors used to paint nickles a certain color — usually red — and leave them with the owner. When the operator took the money out of the jukebox, the colored coins were not part of the profit sharing.
In addition, sometimes you didn’t want to hear the jukebox. For the cost of a song you could play a blank record called “
Three Minutes of Silence.
” For some machines, it was the most played record at times.
On Your Own
We’ve known people who enjoyed restoring old jukeboxes. However, their relative scarcity makes it expensive to acquire any good ones, unless you happen to get lucky. If you get a real junker, you could trash the insides and do
something more modern
. There’s no reason, of course, that you can’t
build your own from scratch
.
[Banner image: “
Jukebox – 1947 Wurlitzer model 1080
” by Paulo Philippidis. Thumbnail image: “
jukebox
” by Liz West.] | 19 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477619",
"author": "Alex99a",
"timestamp": "2022-05-24T18:03:16",
"content": "PLEASE don’t gut a classic Wurlitzer to put a Raspberry Pi in it.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6477630",
"author": "Josiah Gould",
... | 1,760,372,682.892703 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/24/show-us-your-odd-inputs-and-peculiar-peripherals/ | Show Us Your Odd Inputs And Peculiar Peripherals! | Elliot Williams | [
"contests",
"Hackaday Columns",
"Slider"
] | [
"contests",
"Hackaday Contests",
"input device"
] | Just as the Jedi youngling would have to build their light saber, so is it a rite of passage for a true geek to build their own computer interfaces. And nothing makes a personal computer more personal than a custom keyboard, a bespoke mouse, an omnipotent macropad, a snazzy jog wheel, or a fancy flight yoke.
In this contest, we encourage you to make your strangest, fanciest, flashiest, or most custom computer peripherals, and share that work with all the rest of us.
Wired or wireless, weird or wonderful, we want to see it
. And Digi-Key is sponsoring this contest to offer three winners an online shopping spree for $150 each at their warehouse! More parts, more projects.
Make It Yours
Anyone can just go out an buy a keyboard, but if you want a
custom ergonomic keyboard that’s exactly fit to your own two hands
, you probably have to make one
with
your own two hands. And if you an
engraved brass mouse
, well, you’ve got some engraving to do — Logitech ain’t gonna make one for you. Maybe you
only type in binary
, or maybe you need a keyboard for some
alien language that has 450 individual letters
. Or maybe the
tiniest keyboard ever
? You’ve got this.
[Ren]’s 450-key monstrosity
SuperLyra is super
[Uri Tuchman]’s Fancy Mouse
[TEC.IST]’s keyboard is not big.
CIMDIT: Sharp corners, 3D Joystick
Haptic feedback enables endless interactions.
Real programmers only need ones and zeroes.
Lynx Meow-crow Pad comes from the future
But why stop with “normal” peripherals? We’ve seen a number of devices lately that blur the lines between macro pads and multi-axis joysticks — both in
sensual organic shapes
and in
brutal no-nonsense rectangles
. And [scottbez1]’s explorations with a
haptic smart-knob with a screen
are nothing short of inspirational. It doesn’t have to be an existing device to be awesome.
And is this even a peripheral? It’s a
USB man-in-the-middle device that turns on or off sarcastic capitalization
, for those of you who are just too sarcastic all the time, but simultaneously too lazy to type that way.
Special Categories
As always, we’ve got a handful of special categories to serve as jumping off points to enable your flights of fancy. Whether your project fits into one of these niches or not, you’re eligible to win the prize money, but at the end we’ll be featuring some of our favorite entries on Hackaday.
Strange Topographies:
Tired of the normal old keyboard? Is a split, layered, staggered-row, orthogonal layout more your style? Prefer to type on spheres or in bowls? We’d like to see your craziest keyboard topography.
Building a Better Mouse(trap):
The domestic computer rodent is a prime target for peripheral personalization. DIY mice, trackballs, touch pads, or anything else that can move a cursor around is fair game here.
Press the Any Key:
Sometimes you just need a few more buttons to press or a knob to turn. Maybe it’s special functions for your video conferencing rig, or just a friendly volume control. Here’s a category for these single-purpose helpers that make your desk truly yours.
Cyborg:
If you’ve got a wearable computer, you’ve certainly noticed the dearth of wearable input methods. What have you done about it? Voice control, gesture detection gloves, or one-handed chording keyboards are popular alternatives. Let’s see yours!
Virtual Reality:
Let’s be honest. The normal ways of interacting with VR or AR scenarios are a little bit lame, and playing a driving game on a keyboard just doesn’t cut the mustard. A full-on cockpit for your flight simulator or physical sword for your virtual swordfight makes all the difference. Show us the peripherals that make virtual or game worlds more immersive.
You’ve Got Six Weeks
Many of you have already got a head start on this; you just have to document it up on Hackaday.io and enter in the contest. The rest of you, hopefully this is the inspiration you need. Start small with a scroll wheel, or go all-in and invent your own category of device. Time to make your computer interaction
yours
.
Thanks again to Digi-Key for sponsoring the prizes. | 17 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477586",
"author": "LordNothing",
"timestamp": "2022-05-24T16:10:26",
"content": "needs a crosspost to ksp forum.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6477773",
"author": "Stappers",
"timestamp": "2022-05-25T09:58:... | 1,760,372,683.160908 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/24/psp-turned-robot-remote-with-custom-software/ | PSP Turned Robot Remote With Custom Software | Tom Nardi | [
"Playstation Hacks",
"Robots Hacks",
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"custom firmware",
"playstation portable",
"psp"
] | There’s no question that Sony’s PlayStation Portable (PSP) was an impressive piece of hardware when it was released in 2004, but for all its technical wizardry, it wasn’t able to shake Nintendo’s vice-like grip on the handheld market. Perhaps that explains why we still see so many nostalgia-fueled hacks for Nintendo’s Game Boy and Dual Screen (DS) systems, while PSP hacks tend to be few and far between.
But looking at projects like this one that
turn the PSP into a capable robot controller
(video, embedded below) we can’t help but wonder if the community has been missing out. Thanks to an open source software development kit for the system, [iketsj] was able to write a WiFi controller program that can be run on any PSP with a homebrew-compatible firmware.
The other side of the equation is a simple robot powered by an ESP8266. To take control of the bot, the user connects their handheld to the WiFi network being offered by the MCU and fires up the controller application from the main menu. It’s all very slick, and the fact that you don’t need to make any modifications to the PSP’s hardware is a huge plus. From the video after the break we get the impression that the remote software is pretty simplistic in its current form, but we imagine the only really limitations are how good you are at writing C code for what by today’s standards would be considered a fairly resource constrained system. We’d love to see that widescreen display lit up and showing live first-person video from the bot’s perspective.
Many of the PSP hack’s we’ve seen over the years
have been about repurposing the hardware
, or in some cases,
replacing the system’s internals with something raspberry flavored
. Those projects have certainly been interesting in their own ways, but we really like the idea of being able to push a largely stock system into a new role just by writing some custom code for it. | 2 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477645",
"author": "camc",
"timestamp": "2022-05-24T19:19:57",
"content": "It should be possible to stream 240p AVC video over the PSP’s 802.11b wifi. But you’d have to pipe that through the ESP.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id"... | 1,760,372,683.10079 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/24/handling-bulk-material-why-does-my-catfood-get-stuck/ | Handling Bulk Material: Why Does My Cat Food Get Stuck? | Anne Ogborn | [
"Engineering",
"Featured",
"Interest",
"Original Art",
"Slider"
] | [
"bulk material",
"hardware",
"robots"
] | Bulk material is stuff handled ‘in bulk’. One LEGO piece is a brick but 1,000 poured into a bag is bulk material. Corn starch, sand, flour, powder-coat powder, gravel, cat food, Cap’n Crunch, coins, screws, Styrofoam beads, lead shot, and gummy worms are bulk materials.
Applications abound where you need to move stuff in bulk. Selective sintering 3D printers,
animal feeders
, DIY injection molders, toner based PCB makers, home powder coating,
automatic LEGO/domino/whatever
sorters or assemblers,
automated gardeners
,
airsoft accessories
– handling bulk material is part of hacking. College science classes cover solids and liquids, but rarely bulk materials.
Most hackers just pray it works and tap the bin when it doesn’t. Industry does better, but the slang term “bin rash”
,
the long term result of
tapping
a 300 ton bin with sledgehammers
(video), shows they don’t get it right all the time either. At the same time, it’s a fun area you can experiment with using kitchen items. So come along with us for a short series on the basics of bulk material handling.
Arching, Ratholes, and Slurping
In a typical bin there is a conical or pyramidal
funnel
at the bottom with a cylindrical or rectangular
vertical
section atop it. The joint is called the
hip
. The funnel ends in an
opening
, often with a control
gate
.
Bulk material has little cohesive strength compared to a solid, but of course this varies across materials. For instance, lead shot has little cohesive strength and flows easily. Flour has a higher cohesive strength, and is hard to pour. A material only flows when the forces across a section of the material are greater than the cohesive strength of the material.
Imagine the bin contains only a small amount of wet sand, right above the gate, and we open the gate. Will the sand fall out? The sand is now bridging the opening, and the forces are the same as with any other bridge. We want the bridge to fail reliably.
Usually the first little bit will fail and fall out. But as it does so, it can leave behind a curved surface. If the arched material can bridge the opening, it won’t flow out at all. A little falls out, leaving a cavity with a rounded roof, and flow stops. The material has
arched
.
If the bin is smooth and the funnel has a steep angle, the material flows by
mass flow
. All material is flowing, and in the cylindrical section the flow is only vertical. The material top surface will descend without rearranging until it reaches the hip. For many materials, a smooth inner wall and a cone angle greater than 60 degrees is a good design rule for mass flow.
Rather than slipping at the wall-material interface, if the funnel is too blunt or the walls too rough, the material can cohere somewhere internally. This is
funnel flow
. The material forms its own, sharper funnel inside, and only the material inside the funnel flows. Funnel flow isn’t inherently bad, but has more potential problems. (See this useful
page of flow problems
for more detail.)
When funneling gets extreme, it can even
rathole
– material flows, but makes a nearly vertical hole over the opening. Most of the material isn’t moving, and when the hole reaches the surface, flow stops, a you’ve got a
stable rathole
. Even if the rathole isn’t stable, the material on the outside isn’t moving so you might as well have made a smaller bin. Worse, the trapped material might rot or decompose, or compact into a solid mass.
A couple design tips. The corners of rectangular bins have more wall to ‘support’ the material, so hang ups often occur in the corners. Use a round bin if you have a choice. Also, the rathole’s diameter will be somewhat larger than the diagonal of the opening. Slit openings sometimes perform better than round holes.
The Deluge
When material is dumped it can
fluidize
, becoming not chunks but independent particles. Dump a teaspoon of flour from chest height. It turns to a cloud of dust instead of falling as a pile.
Feeding into a rathole can lead to fluidization as the new stock falls straight through. Worse, it can knock loose some of the rathole wall. It all crashes out at once, at high speed, called
flooding
– the new material and falls down the hole as a fluid and discharges at high speed.
This can break the gate or whatever the bin feeds, and many powders present a respiratory hazard or even an explosion risk when they mix too finely with air. And it can lead to segregation.
Segregation
In most bulk material there are varying sized particles, and often different materials: bottom gravel, mixed nuts, a jar of mixed screws. The Brazil nut effect, where a jar of mixed nuts ends up with the Brazil nuts on the top and the peanuts on the bottom, is one form of
segregation
.
Mix salt and dried peas and pour the mix through a funnel onto a plate. The mix makes a conical pile. The peas roll down the pile and end up at the edges of the plate. Feeding from a small central pipe or chute makes the larger material segregate near the walls. If the hopper is then emptied by funnel flow, the end material is mostly salt. The peas stay behind.
One cure is to have a tall cylinder section with mass flow and keep the material surface above the hip. Then material is removed in the same order it came in, whether it’s from the wall or the center. Inserts can also help exit segregation issues. An upward pointing cone on standoffs inside the funnel forces material from the center to mix with that from was deposited, and
a baffle plate below the inlet can change the inlet character from a central point to many smaller feeds
. Sometimes just lowering the inlet might help.
Other Issues
Dropping potato chips into an empty two meter bin guarantees breakage, but even relatively light abuse can break particles, as the dust at the bottom of the Cap’n Crunch box shows. Presumably our morning cereal was loaded into the bag at the factory without a couple centimeters of tan colored powder — it must have abraded in transit.
Some materials develop a static charge when they move, and this can interfere with movement. Acrylic or polycarbonate laser-cut bins are often a culprit . A simple experiment – rub a balloon in your hair, then hold it against the material you’d like to move in bulk. If it picks up the material, a grounded metal bin is a fix.
Some materials are abrasive. Sandpaper is sand glued to paper after all. Besides tougher bin materials, deliberately inducing funnel flow can protect the walls. A big funnel just blunt enough to funnel flow makes a good hopper for an abrasive.
TL;DR
Next week, we’ll look in more depth at bulk material properties, and the week after, we’ll delve into machinery to move bulk solids around. This has been a whirlwind tour of some of the terminology and problems that simply putting bulk material in a bin can present. Hopefully, it’s at least helped to put names to some of the lessons you’ve learned from playing around in the kitchen or the sandbox.
If it’s possible to summarize, the TL;DR for most bin designs is:
Use a round bin with smooth internal walls.
Keep the funnel section walls above 60 degree incline.
The bigger the opening, the simpler your life is. Slits can be good.
If the surface cones downward internally, it’s a warning sign.
Watch for segregation.
See you next week! | 44 | 23 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477558",
"author": "Severe Tire Damage",
"timestamp": "2022-05-24T14:10:33",
"content": "Nice write up. What happened to “slurping”?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6478627",
"author": "Anne Ogborn",
"timesta... | 1,760,372,683.286678 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/24/point-out-pups-packages-with-this-poop-shooting-laser/ | Point Out Pup’s Packages With This Poop-Shooting Laser | Dan Maloney | [
"home hacks",
"Machine Learning"
] | [
"dog",
"laser",
"opencv",
"pet",
"poop",
"pose estimation",
"turret"
] | When you’re lucky enough to have a dog in your life, you tend to overlook some of the more one-sided aspects of the relationship. While you are severely restrained with regard to where you eliminate your waste, your furry friend is free to roam the yard and dispense his or her nuggets pretty much at will, and fully expect you to follow along on cleanup duty. See what we did there?
And so dog people sometimes rebel at this lopsided power structure, by leaving the cleanup till later — often much, much later, when locating the offending piles can be a bit difficult. So naturally, we now have
this poop-shooting laser turret
to helpfully guide you through your backyard cleanup sessions. It comes to us from [Caleb Olson], who leveraged
his recent poop-posture monitor
as the source of data for where exactly in the yard each deposit is located. To point them out, he attached a laser pointer to a cheap robot arm, and used OpenCV to help line up the bright green spot on each poop.
But wait, there’s more. [Caleb]’s code also optimizes his poop patrol route, minimizing the amount of pesky walking he has to do to visit each pile. And, the same pose estimation algorithm that watches the adorable [Twinkie] make her deposits keeps track of which ones [Caleb] stoops by, removing each from the worklist in turn. So now instead of having a dog control his life, he’s got a dog and a computer running the show. Perfect.
We joke, because poop, but really, this is a pretty neat exercise in machine learning. It does seem like the robot arm was bit overkill, though — we’d have thought
a simple two-servo turret
would have been pretty easy to whip up. | 18 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477506",
"author": "Joseph Eoff",
"timestamp": "2022-05-24T11:24:54",
"content": "Hmm. It’s missing a higher powered laser for fully automated poop disposal.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6477561",
"author": "ben",... | 1,760,372,683.001141 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/24/untangling-the-maze-of-digital-tv-upgrades/ | Untangling The Maze Of Digital TV Upgrades | Jenny List | [
"home entertainment hacks"
] | [
"digital tv",
"DVB-T",
"DVB-T2",
"tv"
] | When we all shifted our television broadcasts to digital, for a moment it looked as though we might have had to upgrade our sets only once and a set-top box would be a thing of the past. In Europe that meant the DVB-T standard, whose two-decade reign is slowly passing to DVB-T2 for higher definition and more channels. All of this might seem simple but for the DVB-T2 standard being a transport layer alone without a specified codec. Thus the first generation of DVB-T2 equipment uses MPEG4 or H.264, while for some countries the most recent broadcasts use HEVC, or H.265.
[CyB3rn0id] is there to guide us through the resulting mess
, and along the way produce a nifty upgrade that integrates a set-top box on the back of an older DVB-T set.
Simply bolting a set-top box to a TV is not the greatest of hacks, however this one takes matters a little further with a 3D printed bracket and an extension which brings the box’s IR receiver out to the front of the TV on a piece of prototyping board. Along with a laptop power supply plumbed directly into the TV, it gives new life into a set which might otherwise have been headed for landfill.
As long-time readers will know,
we quite like a TV retrofit here at Hackaday
. | 24 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477467",
"author": "Truth",
"timestamp": "2022-05-24T09:04:58",
"content": "I wonder which will be the dominant standard in the very near future: H.266 (Versatile Video Coding – patent pool that needs to be licenced and royalties paid to use) or AV1 (AOMedia Video 1 – royalty-free... | 1,760,372,683.058934 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/23/motorcycle-regulator-by-popular-demand/ | Motorcycle Regulator By Popular Demand | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"alternator",
"circuit",
"custom",
"mosfet",
"motorcycle",
"power",
"regulator",
"shunt"
] | A few weeks ago we posted a build of an avid motorcycle enthusiast named [fvfilippetti] who created a voltage regulator essentially from the ground up. While this was a popular build, the regulator only works for a small subset of motorcycles. This had a large number of readers clamoring for a more common three-phase regulator as well. Normally we wouldn’t expect someone to drop everything they’re doing and start working on a brand new project based on the comments here,
but that’s exactly what he’s done
.
It’s important to note that the solutions he has developed are currently only in the simulation phase, but they show promise in SPICE models. There are actually two schematics available for those who would like to continue his open-source project. Compared to shunt-type regulators, these have some advantages. Besides being open-source, they do not load the engine when the battery is fully charged, which improves efficiency. The only downside is that they have have added complexity as they can’t open this circuit except under specific situations, which requires a specific type of switch.
All in all, this is an excellent step on the way to a true prototype and eventual replacement of the often lackluster regulators found on motorcycles from Aprilia to Zero. We hope to see it further developed for all of the motorcycle riders out there who have been sidelined by this seemingly simple part. And if you missed it the first time around,
here is the working regulator for his Bajaj NS200
. | 23 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477415",
"author": "RP",
"timestamp": "2022-05-24T05:23:02",
"content": "Just a minor note: In the simulation image at the top of the article, the 3 phases are 0°, 120° and 270°. I think they intended 240° although it won’t make any appreciable difference to the simulation.",
... | 1,760,372,682.949604 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/29/adjustable-workholding-for-honeycomb-tables-with-a-bit-of-diy/ | Adjustable Workholding For Honeycomb Tables, With A Bit Of DIY | Donald Papp | [
"Laser Hacks",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"honeycomb table",
"offset pins",
"workholding"
] | Honeycomb tables are often found on laser cutters, where they provide a way for work material to be laid flat while not interfering with things like airflow. This leads to a cleaner laser cut and a nicer finish, but if one’s work depends on precise positioning and placement, they leave something to be desired because there’s no good way to attach rails, jigs, or anything of the sort in an easy and stable fashion.
The solution [Ed] found for this was to make himself some
adjustable offset stops designed to fit into his laser cutter’s honeycomb table
. Each consists of a laser-cut disc of wood, which is screwed off-center into an acetal “plug” sized to fit into the vertical gaps in the honeycomb table. This allows each disc to be rotated to fine-tune positioning. With the help of some T-shaped pegs that are also sized to fit into the honeycomb table, [Ed] has all he needs to fix something like a workpiece or jig into a particular and repeatable position.
The whole thing depends on a friction fit, so the sizing of the plug needs to match a particular honeycomb table’s construction. We think this makes it a good match for 3D printing, as one can measure and print plugs (perhaps employing
the Goldilocks approach
) that fit with just the right amount of snug.
Honeycomb tables are fantastic for laser cutting, but if you find yourself in a pinch for a replacement,
an old radiator can make a pretty decent stand-in
. | 6 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479146",
"author": "RW ver 0.0.3",
"timestamp": "2022-05-29T20:39:19",
"content": "I can honestly say that probably wouldn’t have occured to me, as I would have just pinched the ones ouf of my mitre box or off a workmate.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
... | 1,760,372,683.205072 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/29/laser-driver-design-keeps-safety-first/ | Laser Driver Design Keeps Safety First | Arya Voronova | [
"Laser Hacks"
] | [
"laser",
"laser driver",
"laser safety"
] | [Les] from [Les’ Lab] has designed a driver for laser diodes up to 10 watts,
and decided to show us
how it operates, tells us what we should keep in mind when designing such a driver, and talks about laser safety in general. This design is an adjustable current regulator based on the LM350A, able to provide up to 10 watts of power at about 2 volts – which is what his diode needs. Such obscure requirements aren’t easily fulfilled by commonly available PSUs, which is why a custom design was called for.
He tells us how he approached improving stability of the current regulation circuit, the PCB design requirements, and planning user interface for such a driver. However, that’s just part of the battle – regulating the current properly is important, but reducing the potential for accidental injuries even more so. Thus, he talks extensively about designing the driver circuit with safety in mind – using various kinds of interlocks, like a latching relay circuit to prevent it from powering up as soon as power is applied.
Of course, safety concerns go beyond the driver’s features, and so does [Les], feeling that we should know what goes into operating a laser of such power. He explains the importance of choosing proper safety glasses for the wavelengths involved – what the various relevant numbers mean, and how to use these numbers to choose glasses actually able to protect you from going blind on accident. Mounting everything in a solid way is called for, too – you wouldn’t want the laser to accidentally move away from the path you want it to shine in, since even reflections can be quite dangerous.
In the end, [Les] shows the driver in action coupled with a laser diode, and produces enough smoke that we are legally obligated to consider this a ‘smoke test’ – a successful one! He has big plans for that diode, and we can’t wait to see them come into fruition.
[Les]’s
YouTube channel
has videos about all kinds of electronics-related DIY builds, and is definitely worth going through if laser-adjacent topics are of interest to you. We’ve covered a few of his builds in the past, including a
Raspberry Pi-based spectrometer
and
a high-voltage switch
out of a simple spark gap. | 20 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479094",
"author": "Greg Garriss",
"timestamp": "2022-05-29T19:00:23",
"content": "Itʻs nice to hear from someone thatʻs seriously interested in laser safety. Iʻve worked with Class 4 lasers since the 70s and am pretty horrified whenever I see them sold as hobbyist toys.",
"par... | 1,760,372,683.346339 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/29/relax-and-enjoy-this-simple-drone-synthesizer/ | Relax And Enjoy This Simple Drone Synthesizer | Dan Maloney | [
"Musical Hacks"
] | [
"avalanche",
"drone",
"oscillator",
"relaxation",
"sthesizer",
"synth"
] | You’d think that a synthesizer that makes as much noise and sports as many knobs as this one would have more than a dozen transistors on board. Surely the circuit behind the panel is complex, and there must be at least a couple of 555 timers back there, right?
But no,
the “Box of Beezz”
that [lonesoulsurfer] came up with is remarkably simple. It takes inspiration from a [Look Mum No Computer] circuit called the
“Circle Drone of Doom,”
which used six switchable relaxation oscillators to make some pretty cool sounds. The Box of Beezz steps that up a bit, with four oscillators in three switchable banks in the final version. Each oscillator has but one transistor with a floating base connection and a simple RC network on the collector. The sawtooth outputs of these relaxation oscillators can be adjusted and summed together, resulting in some surprisingly complex sounds. Check out the video below for a bit of the synth’s repertoire — we’d swear that there are points where we can hear elements of the
THX Deep Note
in there.
We poked around a bit to understand these oscillators, and it looks like these qualify as
avalanche relaxation oscillators
. [lonesolesurfer]’s notes indicate that SS9018 transistors should be used, but in the photos they appear to all be 2N4401s. We’re not sure how long the transistors will last operating in the avalanche mode, but if they quit,
maybe some neon tubes would work instead
. | 2 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479065",
"author": "cfavreau",
"timestamp": "2022-05-29T16:38:17",
"content": "Also be sure to check out the enclosure construction. It is really neat and looks easy to do. The fellow’s other projects also are really cool too.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies... | 1,760,372,683.383492 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/29/better-robots-through-gallium/ | Better Robots Through Gallium | Al Williams | [
"Science"
] | [
"gallium",
"liquid metal"
] | In the movie Terminator 2, the T-1000 robot was made of some kind of liquid metal that could change shape among other interesting things. According to a chemical engineer at North Carolina State University, there may be something to the idea. [Michael Dickey] has been
experimenting with gallium
, a liquid metal, that scientists think may unlock a new generation of flexible devices.
The most common liquid metal is mercury, of course, and it has its uses. However, its toxicity has led to a reduction in its use. Gallium has low toxicity and also doesn’t easily evaporate. What can you do with it? Check out the video below to see a very simple demonstration of the liquid metal lifting a small — very small — weight with an electrical impulse.
Like most metals, gallium transfers heat and electricity readily but can change shape without the fatigue associated with normal metals. Imagine, for example, headphones that have liquid metal wires that can stretch without breaking. [Dickey] has made them. Self-healing is possible, too, since liquid metal wires would flow together — no soldering needed.
Other properties of the material make it useful for sensing deformation. For example, a mesh of liquid metal wires in a glove could help a VR system understand your hand’s gestures. One downside is that when exposed to air, the material forms a thin oxide layer. However, this also offers some advantages in fabrication that they mention in the post.
Of course, this is far from practical today, but it might just be a technology to watch. We have seen a few flexible boards taking advantage of
liquid metal compounds that contain gallium
so there is some practical application today. Combined in
stretchable substrates like silicone
, they can do some pretty amazing things. | 16 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6479012",
"author": "Iván Stepaniuk",
"timestamp": "2022-05-29T13:25:43",
"content": "T1000",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6479013",
"author": "Iván Stepaniuk",
"timestamp": "2022-05-29T13:27:25",
"con... | 1,760,372,683.434575 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/29/rackmount-hardware-placement-issues-ikea-lack-to-the-rescue/ | Rackmount Hardware Placement Issues? IKEA LACK To The Rescue! | Arya Voronova | [
"classic hacks",
"computer hacks"
] | [
"home server",
"ikea",
"lackrack",
"rack mount",
"rack mount server"
] | [hackbyte] reminds us about a classic hack that, even though we’ve seen floating around for over a decade, has somehow never quite graced our pages before. Many of us keep small home labs and even, at times, collections of servers that we’d be comfortable be calling mini-datacenters. However, if you use the ever-abundant 19″ switches, servers and other hardware, keeping these mounted and out of the way can be a thorny experience. Which leads us to, undoubtedly, unintentional – but exceptionally handy – compatibility between IKEA LACK table series and 19″ rackmount hardware.
The half-humorous half-informative
wiki page on Eth0Wiki
talks about this idea in depth, providing a myriad of examples and linking to pages of other hackerspaces and entities who implemented this idea and improved upon it. These tables look nice and fit anywhere, stack neatly when not in use, and you can put a bottle of Club-Mate on top. Aka, they’re the exact opposite of cheap clunky cabinets actually designed for rackmount you can buy, and cost a fraction of the price. What’s not to love?
You can buy a whole lot of cheap hardware in 19″, and arguably, that’s where you can get the best hardware for your dollar. Many a hackerspace has used these tables for makeshift infrastructure, permanent in all but intent. So, in case some of us missed the memo, now you are aware of yet another, underappreciated solution for mounting all these servers we get for cheap when yet another company replaces its equipment – or undergoes a liquidation. If LackRack hasn’t been on your radar – what have you been using for housing your rackmount hardware collection?
Wondering what to do with an old server? Building a powerful workstation is
definitely on the list.
Alternatively, you could discard the internals and
stuff it full of Raspberry Pi! | 18 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478982",
"author": "Eliot",
"timestamp": "2022-05-29T09:05:46",
"content": "2013 linking to Make which links to the sauce (as does a hackaday commenter )https://hackaday.com/2013/10/23/hackerspacing-in-europe-ackspace-in-heerlen/",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replie... | 1,760,372,683.602431 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/28/annotate-pdfs-on-linux-with-pdfrankenstein/ | Annotate PDFs On Linux With PDFrankenstein | Donald Papp | [
"Linux Hacks"
] | [
"annotate",
"editing PDF",
"inkscape",
"linux",
"pdf",
"qpdf"
] | On Windows and Mac machines, it’s not too troublesome to add text or drawings (such as signatures) to PDF files, but [Mansour Behabadi] found that on Linux machines, there didn’t seem to be a satisfying way or a simple tool. Being an enterprising hacker, [Mansour]
set out to fill that gap
, and the way it works under the hood is delightfully hacky, indeed.
The main thing standing in the way of creating such a tool is that the PDF format is a complex and twisty thing. Making a general-purpose PDF editing tool capable of inserting hyperlinks, notes, images, or drawings isn’t exactly a weekend project. But [Mansour] didn’t let that stop him; he leveraged the fact that tools already exist on Linux that can read and create PDF files, and tied them all together into what was at one point “a horrific patchwork of tools” which inspired the name
pdfrankenstein
.
The tool is a GUI that uses
Inkscape
and
qpdf
to convert a PDF page to an SVG file, set it as a locked background, then let the user add any annotations they desire, using Inkscape as the editor. After changes are made, the program removes the background, overlays the annotations back onto the originals, and exports a final file. Annotations can therefore be anything that can be done in Inkscape.
Curious about these and other tools for handling PDFs?
We’ve shared some programs and tricks when we previously covered dealing with the PDF format in Linux
. | 20 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478951",
"author": "Jeff Kowalski",
"timestamp": "2022-05-29T06:01:52",
"content": "What is wrong withhttps://www.qoppa.com/pdfstudioviewer/?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6479008",
"author": "Mansour",
"tim... | 1,760,372,683.654897 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/28/soap-mouse-is-a-slippery-interface-for-mid-air-input/ | Soap Mouse Is A Slippery Interface For Mid-Air Input | Kristina Panos | [
"Peripherals Hacks"
] | [
"computer mouse",
"gaming mouse",
"mouse",
"off the shelf",
"optical mouse"
] | We all have those gnarly hacks that we still think about years after we first saw them. For serial tipster [Inne], one of those is [Patrick Baudisch]’s soap mouse, which is
a DIY device for mousing in mid-air
that uses components from off the shelf and around the house.
How does it work? The guts are encased in plastic shaped like a flattened pill, which slips into a fuzzy sock. By squeezing it a bit, the plastic pill rotates, spinning the outward-facing sensor round and round. Although we briefly reported on the soap mouse way back in 2006, we think it deserves to be in the spotlight today, especially since there’s
a complete PDF guide to building one
that’s optimized for gaming. If you want a regular pointing device instead, the conversion is described within.
[Patrick] uses a CompUSA (RIP) mouse in the guide, but any sufficiently slim and also short mouse should work as long as it has a decently long focal range, which is necessary for the sensor to see the hull. Plenty of travel mice out there should fit the bill.
The hull itself is made from two small (empty) bottles of hand sanitizer, chosen for their size, shape, and clarity of plastic. The outermost housing is a baby sock with a snap sewn on. [Patrick] says moving the sock against the plastic is difficult, and has tried various methods for lubrication, such as a bit of mineral oil inside some plastic bags.
Be sure to check out the video after the break, which does a great job of explaining everything from the various types of interaction to construction in 5½ minutes.
Since 2006, [Patrick] has held workshops where people have built their own soap mice. Have you built one? Let us know in the comments. And don’t forget about the Digi-Key-sponsored
Odd Inputs and Peculiar Peripherals contest
, which runs through July 4th. Declare your independence from regular keyboards and mice and win big!
Thanks for the tip, [Inne]! | 5 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6478927",
"author": "Rumble_in_the_Jungle",
"timestamp": "2022-05-29T02:15:19",
"content": "Really hope nobody drop it, in the shower.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6478939",
"author": "Gamma",
"timestamp": "2022-05-29... | 1,760,372,683.710769 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/23/european-roads-see-first-zero-occupancy-autonomous-journey/ | European Roads See First Zero-Occupancy Autonomous Journey | Jenny List | [
"Artificial Intelligence",
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"autonomous delivery",
"self-driving",
"self-driving car"
] | We write a lot about self-driving vehicles here at Hackaday, but it’s fair to say that most of the limelight has fallen upon large and well-known technology companies on the west coast of the USA. It’s worth drawing attention to other parts of the world where just as much research has gone into autonomous transport, and on that note there’s an interesting milestone from Europe. The British company Oxbotica
has successfully made the first zero-occupancy on-road journey in Europe
, on a public road in Oxford, UK.
The glossy promo video below the break shows the feat as the vehicle with number plates signifying its on-road legality drives round the relatively quiet roads through one of the city’s technology parks, and promises a bright future of local deliveries and urban transport. The vehicle itself is interesting, it’s a platform supplied by the Aussie outfit
AppliedEV
, an electric spaceframe vehicle that’s designed to provide a versatile platform for autonomous transport. As such, unlike so many of the aforementioned high-profile vehicles, it has no passenger cabin and no on-board driver to take the wheel in a calamity; instead it’s driven by Oxbotica’s technology and has their sensor pylon attached to its centre.
It’s fair to say that despite this milestone it’s still early days, but the company say they’ve inked a deal with the British online supermarket Ocado and hope to start deliveries of customer orders sometime in 2023. It’s worth noting that the action takes place somewhere steeped in automotive history, as Oxford Technology Park North is the former site of the Morris Cowley works, over the road from the plant that currently produces Minis.
Exciting times for self-driving abound for Brits at the moment, as they’re also experiencing
their first autonomous bus route
.
Thanks [Malie Lalor] for posting the tip. | 50 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477322",
"author": "Adrian",
"timestamp": "2022-05-24T02:20:59",
"content": "Very much a “first step” on an idealised empty, straight, well formed piece of road. I don’t think that resembles any “open road” in the UK that I’ve ever seen, can’t wait to see how it handles overlappin... | 1,760,372,683.876359 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/23/ditch-the-laptop-for-the-tabletop/ | Ditch The Laptop For The Tabletop | Matthew Carlson | [
"Cyberdecks"
] | [
"cyberdeck",
"laptop",
"mechanical keyboard"
] | The idea of a cyberdeck is simple. A relatively portable case that is primarily a keyboard with some screen attached. Cyberdecks often try to hit a particular aesthetic or vibe rather than focusing on usability or practicality. [Carter Hurd] took a step back and asked himself
what would be a cyberdeck-like system that he could practically use every day
.
[Carter’s] build is a prototype that allows him to try out the form factor and use it as a daily driver, so many decisions were made to speed up the build and get something functional. For example, rather than spend the time
tweaking and printing his own keyboard
, he used an off-the-shelf keyboard he knew he liked. While a
framework motherboard
would have been perfect for something like this, they, unfortunately, weren’t available when [Carter] started the build. So [Carter] used a used gaming laptop for the task. He had hoped to drive the display directly from the motherboard as many laptops use embedded DisplayPort internally. Unfortunately, this didn’t work as the motherboard didn’t support the resolution he was trying to drive at, so he just used the external port to drive the screen. A 3d printed base fits underneath the keyboard to hold the laptop motherboard with little extensions for bits that don’t work well, such as the wifi card. The chassis also has a slot that allows a secondary display to slot right in.
Ultimately, it is something of a modern-day typewriter and something like a cyberdeck. Either way, we love it. Video after the break. | 42 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477292",
"author": "Ergotron",
"timestamp": "2022-05-24T00:54:53",
"content": "Kind of cringe that he went through all this trouble because he needed it to run Windows. Seems like it would be a lot easier to just learn something new, but this is also a dude who cut an NVME drive in... | 1,760,372,684.0563 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/23/fighting-back-against-dodgy-dyson-batteries/ | Fighting Back Against Dodgy Dyson Batteries | Tom Nardi | [
"Battery Hacks"
] | [
"battery management system",
"battery pack",
"dyson",
"planned obsolescence"
] | If you’ve ever worked with multi-cell rechargeable battery packs, you know that the individual cells will eventually become imbalanced. To keep the pack working optimally, each cell needs to be analyzed and charged individually — which is why RC style battery packs have a dedicated balance connector. So if you know it, and we know it, why doesn’t Dyson know it?
It’s that question which inspired
[tinfever] to start work on the FU-Dyson-BMS project
. As you might have surmised from the name, [tinfever] believes that Dyson has intentionally engineered their V6 and V7 batteries to fail by not using the cell balancing function of the onboard ISL94208 battery management IC. What’s worse, once the cells get as little as 300 mV out of balance, the controller considers the entire pack to be shot and will no longer allow it to be charged.
These missing resistors deserve justice.
Or at least, that’s what used to happen. With the replacement firmware [tinfever] has developed, the pack’s battery management system (BMS) will ignore imbalanced cells so you can continue to use the pack (albeit at a reduced capacity). Of course the ideal solution would have been to enable cell balancing on the ISL94208, but unfortunately Dyson didn’t include the necessary resistors on the PCB. Though it’s worth noting that earlier versions of the board
did
have unpopulated spots for them, lending some credence to the idea that their omission was intentional on Dyson’s part.
But not everyone is onboard with the conspiracy theory.
Over on the EEVBlog forums
, some users pointed out that a poorly implemented cell balancing routine can be more problematic than not having one at all. It’s possible that Dyson had some bad experiences with the technology in earlier packs, and decided to move away from it and try to compensate by using higher-quality cells. That said, at least one person in the thread was able to revive their own “dead” battery pack by installing this unofficial firmware, so whether intentional or not, it seems there’s little debate that usable batteries are indeed being prematurely marked as defective.
Proper cell balancing is key even in DIY projects
, so we do have to agree that it seems more than a little unusual that Dyson would intentionally turn off this
important feature in their packs
. But the jury is still out on whether or not Sir James is trying to pull a fast one on his customers — as Hanlon’s Razor states, “never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity”. | 65 | 27 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477183",
"author": "Beaker",
"timestamp": "2022-05-23T20:27:10",
"content": "This is very timely, I happen to have a Dyson here that just started refusing to charge….",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6478486",
"author"... | 1,760,372,683.981831 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/23/hackaday-prize-2022-glue-hindered-smart-tweezer-repair-involves-a-rebuild/ | Hackaday Prize 2022: Glue-Hindered Smart Tweezer Repair Involves A Rebuild | Arya Voronova | [
"Repair Hacks",
"The Hackaday Prize",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"2022 Hackaday Prize",
"DMM Tweezers",
"Smart Tweezers",
"smd tweezers",
"test equipment",
"tools",
"tweezers"
] | [Dan Julio] owns a pair of Miniware multimeter tweezers, a nifty helper tool for all things SMD exploration. One day, he found them broken – unable to recognize any component between the two probes. He thought it could be a broken connection problem, and
decided to take them apart.
Presence of some screws on their case fooled him – in the end, it turned out that the case was glued together, and could only be opened destructively. For an entry in the “Reuse, Recycle, Revamp” round of 2022 Hackaday Prize, he tells us how he brought these tweezers back from the dead.
During the disassembly, he broke a custom flexible PCB, which wasn’t reassuring either. However, that was no reason to give up – he reverse-engineered the connections and the charging circuitry, then assembled parts of the broken tweezers together using a small generic protoboard as a base. Indeed, it was likely a broken connection between probes, because the reassembled tweezers worked!
Of course, having exposed PCBs wouldn’t do, and from the very start, assembling these tweezers back together was not an option. Instead, he developed a replacement case in OpenSCAD, bringing the tweezers back to life as his trusty tool – and still leaving repairability on the table. If you’re interested in the details, he goes more into how these tweezers are designed when it comes to charging and connectivity, and we recommend that you give
his write-up
a read!
We’ve been seeing smart tweezers around for over a decade now, from
reviews
and
hacks
of commercially made ones, to DIY
chopstick-based
and
PCB-based
ones. If you already own a pair of tweezers you’ve grown attached to, you can neatly
retrofit them
with a capacitance sensing function!
The
Hackaday
Prize2022
is Sponsored by: | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477626",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Known As Ren",
"timestamp": "2022-05-24T18:35:34",
"content": "He started with a pair of broken tweezers,and ended up with a pair of … non-tweezers…",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
}
] | 1,760,372,684.089833 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/23/2022-hackaday-prize-congratulations-to-the-planet-friendly-power-finalists/ | 2022 Hackaday Prize: Congratulations To The Planet-Friendly Power Finalists! | Elliot Williams | [
"contests",
"green hacks"
] | [
"2022 Hackaday Prize",
"finalists",
"winners"
] | The
2022 Hackaday Prize
is focused on lightening our load on the planet, and one obvious way to do so is to get and store renewable power locally — the theme of our first challenge round: Planet-Friendly Power. Our judges have studied all the entries and their votes are in. All of these ten projects will receive $500 right now and are eligible for the Grand Prize of $50,000, to be announced in November.
Most of the alternative energy sources you’d expect to see were represented: solar, wind, and water. But everyone brought their own twists to the topic. For instance, the
Low Cost Solar Panel Solution
demonstrates that there’s a lot more to a DIY solar project than just the panel. You need to support it, protect it, turn it to face the sun, and convert and store the power harvested. And [JP Gleyzes] even goes so far as to use recycled water bottles to make the 3D-printed parts.
Sun Chaser 2
puts the panel on wheels, driving it out of the shade to collect maximum energy in a real-world backyard situation. Cute!
Finally, we had two great kite projects to harvest wind with minimal setups on the go:
Kite Propulsion
and
Energy Independence While Travelling
. Both are still in the experimental stages, but both have great documentation of where the research projects stand.
Finally,
Moss Microbial Fuel Cell
is really out there on the edge of current research. Combining the reasonably well established microbial fuel cell with the photosynthetic power of moss, [Guru-san] is able to light an LED for a few seconds at a time. It’s not much, but it’s also a desktop-scale project. And who can say no to leaf-shaped capacitor circuit sculptures to store the energy?
Hacker Power!
Those are just a few of the ten finalists, listed here in no particular order. Congratulations to all of you! We’re excited to follow your projects along their journey, and wish you all the best.
Ten Finalists from Planet-Friendly Power
Low Cost Solar Panel Solution
Open Concentrating PV Solar Tracker Controller
Energy Independence While Travelling
Kite Propulsion
Scooterbine
Sun Chaser 2
3D Printed Portable Wind Turbine
Moss Microbial Fuel Cell
Printon Turbine – 3D printed Pelton turbine
ArmaLamp
The
Hackaday
Prize2022
is Sponsored by: | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477696",
"author": "Dennis",
"timestamp": "2022-05-25T00:30:39",
"content": "Congratulations all!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
}
] | 1,760,372,684.131906 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/23/vintage-pro-audio-hack-chat/ | Vintage Pro Audio Hack Chat | Dan Maloney | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Slider"
] | [
"Hack Chat"
] | Join us on Wednesday, May 25 at noon Pacific for the
Vintage Audio Hack Chat
with
Frank Olson
!
There was a time, and not all that long ago on the cosmic scale, that if you wanted to hear music, you either needed to make it yourself or hire someone to do it for you. For most of history, music was very much a here and now thing, and when the song was over, that was it.
Thankfully, those days are long gone, and for better or worse, we have instant access to whatever music we’re in the mood for. The Spotify client in your pocket is a far cry from the iPod of a few years back, or the Walkman of the 80s, or even a mid-century transistor radio. But no matter how you listen to your music, it all starts with getting the live music recorded, and that’s where we’ll be going with this Hack Chat.
Hooking up the preamps, mixers, mics, and recorders that make modern music possible is what Frank Olson is all about. You’ll probably recognize Frank’s name from his unique niche as
a maker of wooden microphones
, but dig a little deeper and he’s got a lot of experience with vintage pro audio gear. As both a musician and an audio engineer, Frank brings an enthusiast’s passion for recording gear to the Hack Chat, and we’re looking forward to picking his brain on the unique ways he’s found to turn sounds into music and to get to all down on tape.
Our Hack Chats are live community events in the
Hackaday.io Hack Chat group messaging
. This week we’ll be sitting down on Wednesday, May 25 at 12:00 PM Pacific time. If time zones have you tied up, we have a
handy time zone converter
. | 5 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477086",
"author": "HaHa",
"timestamp": "2022-05-23T18:05:03",
"content": "How do you fix a noisy potentiometer?What do you think of young kids who think Matsushita brands like Pioneer made great gear? I guess it goes well with LP sound quality.Tube microphones. Worth the price?",
... | 1,760,372,684.174362 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/23/an-illuminating-look-at-a-wolf-5151-light-source/ | An Illuminating Look At A Wolf 5151 Light Source | Tom Nardi | [
"Teardown"
] | [
"illuminator",
"medical equipment",
"optics",
"xenon"
] | While originally designed to put light where the sun don’t shine for medical purposes, [Nava Whiteford] says the Wolf 5151 Xenon endoscopic light source also works well for microscopy and general optical experiments, especially since you can get them fairly cheap on the second hand market. His cost just $50 USD, which is a steal when you consider a replacement for its 300 watt Olympus-made bulb will run you about 200 bucks alone.
That said, [Nava] recently moved on to a more compact light source, and figured that was a good enough excuse to
crack open the Wolf 5151 and see what makes it tick
. In this particular post he’s just looking at the optical side of things, which is arguably the most interesting aspect of the device. Helpfully, the whole assembly is mounted to its own sled of sorts that can be pulled from the light source for a closer examination.
A Steampunk dimmer switch.
Beyond that expensive bulb we mentioned earlier, there’s a thick piece of what appears to be standard plate glass being used as an IR and UV filter. [Nava] suspects this component is responsible for keeping the rest of the optics from overheating, which is backed up by the fact that the metal plate its mounted to appears to feature a K-type thermocouple to keep an eye on its operating temperature. Forward of that is a unique aspheric lens that features a rough spot to presumably scatter the light at the center of the beam.
Our vote for the most fascinating component has to go to the Neutral Density (ND) filter, which is used to control the intensity of the light. In a more pedestrian light source you could just dim the bulb, but in this case, the Wolf 5151 uses a metal disk with an array of holes drilled into it. By rotating the disc with a DC motor, the lens can be variably occluded to reduce the amount of light that reaches the aperture, which connects to the fiber cable.
While it’s perhaps no surprise the build quality of this medical gear is considerably beyond the
commercial gadgets most of us get to play with
, it still doesn’t hold a candle (no pun intended) to the
laser module pulled from a Tornado jet fighter. | 8 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477040",
"author": "Michael Henderson",
"timestamp": "2022-05-23T15:16:33",
"content": "This is an arc lamp so, yeah, not really dimmable. The metal ND filter would tolerate the crazy heat of that light beam better than any organic film or plating.",
"parent_id": null,
"dep... | 1,760,372,684.222041 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/23/knowing-your-place-the-implications-of-gps-spoofing-and-jamming/ | Knowing Your Place: The Implications Of GPS Spoofing And Jamming | Maya Posch | [
"Current Events",
"gps hacks",
"Original Art"
] | [
"gnss",
"GNSS spoofing",
"gps"
] | Artificial satellites have transformed the world in many ways, not only in terms of relaying communication and for observing the planet in ways previously inconceivable, but also to enable incredibly accurate navigation. A so-called global navigation satellite system (
GNSS
), or satnav for short, uses the data provided by satellites to pin-point a position on the surface to within a few centimeters.
The US Global Positioning System (GPS) was the first GNSS, with satellites launched in 1978, albeit only available to civilians in a degraded accuracy mode. When full accuracy GPS was released to the public under the 1990s Clinton administration, it caused a surge in the uptake of satnav by the public, from fishing boats and merchant ships, to today’s navigation using nothing but a smartphone with its built-in GPS receiver.
Even so, there is a dark side to GNSS that expands beyond its military usage of guiding cruise missiles and kin to their target. This comes in the form of jamming and spoofing GNSS signals, which can hide illicit activities from monitoring systems and disrupt or disable an enemy’s systems during a war. Along with other forms of electronic warfare (EW), disrupting GNSS signals form a potent weapon that can render the most modern avionics and drone technology useless.
With this in mind, how significant is the threat from GNSS spoofing in particular, and what are the ways that this can be detected or counteracted?
Ephemeral Positioning
GPS autonomous positioning using the satellite navigation solution (Credit: Jan van Sickle, GPS for Land Surveyors)
The basic concept of a GNSS is fairly straight-forward: ground-based receivers listen for the signals from the satellites that are part of the specific GNSS constellation. Each GNSS satellite encodes a collection of information into this signal, which includes the position (
ephemeris
) of the satellite at a given time, as well as the local time on the satellite when the signal was sent.
By taking the signals from at least four of these satellites and applying the
satellite navigation solution
, the absolute position of the receiver can thus be determined. This uses the principle of
trilateration
(distance to a known point) rather than triangulation (using angles). As can be surmised, a potential issue here involves clock drift on the side of the receiver and the satellites. Perhaps less expected is that the travel speed of the signal is also heavily affected by the atmosphere, specifically the
ionosphere
.
This part of the atmosphere changes in thickness and composition over the course of a day, and is heavily affected by exposure to the Sun’s radiation. As a result, part of the GNSS satellite’s message contains the required
atmospheric correction
parameters. Because of clock-drift and the constant changes to the Earth’s atmospheric composition, each GNSS constellation has its own
augmentation system
. These generally consist out of a combination of ground- and satellite-based systems that provide additional information that a receiver can use to adjust the GNSS information it has received.
For use with airplane navigation, for example, it is very common to have a ground-based augmentation system (GBAS) installed using fixed receivers. These GNSS receivers then broadcast correction parameters via the airport’s VHF communication system to the airplane, helping them navigate when they approach or depart the airport.
In addition to the GNSS satellites themselves, each GNSS constellation also has its own ground-based master controller station, from which updated information on atmospheric conditions is regularly uploaded to the satellites, along with time adjustments to compensate for the satellite’s onboard clock drift. This demonstrates that a GNSS constellation is a highly dynamic system which requires constant updates in order to function properly.
Where things get interesting, however, is when attempts are made to circumvent this system, either by jamming or actively spoofing the GNSS signals.
Jam Warfare
GNSS spoofing illustrated. (Credit: C4ADS)
The concept of jamming radio frequency communications is quite straight-forward: simply broadcast on the frequencies you wish to jam with more power than the original transmitter is capable of. Since the GNSS signal is relatively faint, this makes it easy for a ground-based system to jam this signal. Of course, since loss of a GNSS satellite fix is a known issue, backup strategies for this scenario are common, and it’s also very noticeable due to the loss of communication from a satellite.
Spoofing is a lot more subtle than jamming, as well as more versatile. Instead of merely blasting the airwaves with raw power, GNSS spoofing still involves overpowering the original signal, but instead of a denial of service (DoS) attack, spoofing is closer to a man-in-the-middle (MitM) attack, where fake satellite signals are presented to the receiver as being the genuine signals, with of course spoofed parameters that will cause the receiver to calculate a position that’s far away from where it actually is.
In a 2019
report by C4ADS
(Center for Advanced Defense Studies) titled
Above Us Only Stars – Exposing GPS spoofing in Russia and Syria
, a number of observations are reported on where Russia has used GNSS spoofing, for a variety of reasons. An interesting and common use appears to be the spoofing of GNSS signals so that receivers think that they are located at a nearby airport. Presumably this would trigger the geofencing limitations in drones and similar, which would then refuse to take off. This could be useful during VIP visits as an anti-drone strategy, for example.
Less harmless is the military use, where during recent Russian and NATO exercises Norway and Finland reported severe GPS outages. This affected the public by limiting the navigation capacity of commercial airliners, and also disrupted the use of cellphone networks. Supposedly, in 2011 Iran used GPS spoofing to trick a Lockheed Martin RQ-170 drone to land on one of its airfields, where it was subsequently captured. Similarly, there have been multiple occasions now where marine traffic has been disrupted due to faulty GPS data being fed to the automatic identification system (
AIS
).
As the 2019 C4ADS report notes, this has been reported by ships in the Black Sea on multiple occasions, and also in 2019 it was
reported
that an American container ship – the MV
Manukai
– noticed very strange behavior while at the port in Shanghai, China. According to its AIS screen, one ship was shown as moving in the same channel as the
Manukai
, before vanishing from the screen, then appearing at the dock, before appearing in the channel and so on. When the mystified captain picked up the binoculars and scanned for this ship, it was clearly stationary at the dock that entire time.
GNSS Hunting
GPS interference can be pinpointed based on this ring of false AIS positions. Approximately 200 meters in diameter, many of the positions in the ring had reported speeds near 31 knots (much faster than a normal vessel speed) and a course going counterclockwise around the circle. AIS data courtesy Global Fishing Watch / Orbcomm / Spire.
What’s mystifying about the GNSS spoofing as detected in Shanghai is that instead of it merely moving the calculated position to a nearby fixed point, what we see when we collate the wrong AIS data onto a map is that they form near-perfect circles. This is noted by both the MIT Technology Review
article
, as well as a later article by
SkyTruth.
What is interesting is that when using the anonymized route information from
Strava
in Shanghai, this same ‘circle spoofing’ could be observed, independent from the AIS information. Somehow it would seem that the spoofed data is constantly updated, to make it appear that the affected receiver is in motion, and travelling in this large circle.
Exactly how this is done, or why, is still unknown, with no major updates since the initial reporting in 2019. Whether the intent is to hide illicit activity, or whether it’s due to some kind of cyberhacks or a glitch, nobody is entirely sure. Even independent from Iran, China and Russia, GPS-related location glitches
keep happening
.
Yet as a team from the University of Texas at Austin
demonstrated in 2013
already using $2,000 worth of equipment and an $80 million yacht, spoofing GPS signals is relatively easy and straightforward. It doesn’t take a lot of imagination to picture what is possible today, since since that demonstration nine years ago using a university-budget, especially when upgraded to a nation-sized budget.
According to
current reports
, Russia is actively spoofing GPS data during the war in Ukraine, which would affect mostly private and commercial users. Whether the US military has additional backups in the case of spoofing and jamming attempts is naturally unknown, due to national security reasons. Even so, with the importance of GNSS today with navigation and so much more, it would seem pertinent to wonder whether spoofing can be detected or circumvented.
Knowing Is Half The Battle
In an
analysis by Guy Buesnel
, he notes that there are quite a few risks in the GNSS chain, not the least of which is faulty equipment, and sources of interference. Perhaps the most important lesson of the past years has been that solely relying on GNSS is risky, and that adding additional ways to determine one’s position is essential, as well as the ability to detect the act of spoofing.
This aspect of detecting and possibly circumventing spoofing is currently the topic of active research, as noted by e.g.
Mark L. Psiaki, et al.
in a recent paper. While there’s unlikely to be a silver bullet that will fix all ills and return GNSS to the infallible system that was promised to us by glossy flyers years ago, what we are likely to see the coming time are better, more robust GNSS receivers. We’re already seeing that GNSS receivers built into smartphones can use multiple GNSS constellations, with the ability to use local WiFi networks and so on as augmentation.
Using fairly low-tech improvements it would be easy to detect many spoofing attacks, such as when one’s calculated location suddenly and dramatically changes, or when one’s calculated course does not match with the data provided by the augmentation system, cell towers, or other sources of location information.
Even if GNSS isn’t the effortless panacea that many had assumed it to be, it is still a major navigational marvel, and a cornerstone of modern civilization that will continue to see improvements as it has since the first GPS satellite was launched. It just takes staying one step ahead of the meddling hackers. | 30 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6477025",
"author": "RW ver 0.0.3",
"timestamp": "2022-05-23T14:35:19",
"content": "I’ve seen the GPS put me a few hundred meters from where I actually am a handful of times, but usually those resolved quickly so might have been signal obstruction or reflection in the local environm... | 1,760,372,684.291596 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/23/using-a-fusion-splicer-to-repair-a-samsung-tvs-cable/ | Using A Fusion Splicer To Repair A Samsung TV’s Cable | Robin Kearey | [
"Repair Hacks"
] | [
"cable repair",
"fiber optic",
"fusion splicer"
] | Some Samsung TVs come with a system called One Connect, where all external cabling is connected to a separate box so that only one small signal cable goes to the TV. In some versions, the cable linking the TV with its Connect Box is a pure fiber optic cable that’s nearly transparent and therefore easy to hide.
Thin fiber optic cables are fragile however; when [Elecami Wolf] got one of these TVs for a very low price it turned out that this was because its One Connect cable had snapped. Replacement cables are quite expensive, so [Elecami Wolf] went on to investigate the inner workings of the fiber optic cable and
figured out how to repair a broken one
.
The cable consists of four pairs of plastic-coated glass fibers, which are attached to receivers and transmitters inside the thick connectors on either end. Repairing the cable required two things: figuring out which fibers should connect to each other, and a reliable way of connecting them together.
The first was difficult enough: a simple 1:1 connection didn’t work, so it took a bit of work to figure out the correct connection setup. One clever trick was pointing a camera at a working cable and comparing the flashing lights at each end; this helped to identify the right order for two of the four pairs. For the other two, a combination of reverse-engineering the electronic circuits and some systematic trial-and-error yielded a complete wiring diagram.
For the second part, [Elecami Wolf] called on a fiber optic expert who lent him a fusion splicer. This is a rather neat piece of equipment that semi-automatically brings two pieces of fiber together and welds them with an electric arc. Once this was complete, it was a matter of covering the splices to protect them from sharp bends, and the fancy TV was working again.
Although not everyone will have access to a multi-mode fusion splicer machine, [Elecami Wolf]’s videos provide fascinating insights into the workings of modern fiber-optic based consumer electronics. This might be the first fiber-optic splicing attempt we’ve seen; but if you’re trying to hook up an optical fiber to your circuit,
this ball lens setup
is a neat trick.
Thanks for the tip, [X-Cubed]! | 31 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6476999",
"author": "Tom Hargrave",
"timestamp": "2022-05-23T13:10:47",
"content": "I was a Telecomm Tech at Browns Ferry Nuclear Power Plant in the late 1980s and back then people who could splice fiber cable got $2000 a splice. That would be $8000 just for this repair.Now, except ... | 1,760,372,684.354461 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/23/lotus-123-for-linux-is-like-a-digital-treasure-hunt/ | Lotus 123For Linux Is Like A Digital Treasure Hunt | Al Williams | [
"Linux Hacks",
"Retrocomputing",
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"linux",
"lotus 123",
"software archaeology",
"unix"
] | Ever hear of
Lotus 123
? It is an old spreadsheet program that dominated the early PC market, taking the crown from incumbent
Visicalc
. [Tavis Ormandy] has managed to
get the old software running natively
under Linux — quite a feat for software that is around 40 years old and was meant for a different operating system. You can see the results in glorious green text on a black screen in the video below.
If you are a recent convert to Linux, you might not remember what a pain it was “in the old days” to install software. But in this case, it is even worse since the software isn’t even for Linux. The whole adventure started with [Tavis] wanting to find the API kit used to add plugins to
Lotus
. In theory, you could use it to add modern features to the venerable spreadsheet program.
The $395 software development kit wasn’t very common and there was also a Unix version of
Lotus 123
, but no one seemed to have a copy of that. [Tavis] eventually found someone who ran a circa-1990 BBS and had the data on tape. Turned out there was a hot copy of the SDK that he was able to use. But he noticed something else in the BBS’s list of files: the long-lost Unix version of
Lotus
!
An investigation found the installer used TD0 files which took some research. Luckily, a utility exists that can convert these to raw disk images. Inside was a very large object file. Apparently, in the days without dynamic loading, that object would be linked with plug in modules to install them.
The object file had all of its debugging information intact which shed a lot of light on the program’s internal operations. The old executables used COFF format but it is possible to relink it to an ELF file. Of course, it isn’t just that easy. [Tavis] wrote a small program to remove the old-style Unix system calls so they could be rerouted to Linux system calls. Some calls just pass through, but others need some translation due to differences in things like structure layout, sizes, and alignment.
In the end, it all worked but didn’t have a valid license. However, [Tavis] felt like since he did have a license and the software is abandoned, he was within his rights to crack the license check.
We are well-known
abusers of spreadsheets
around here. Of course, we
aren’t the only ones
. | 84 | 33 | [
{
"comment_id": "6476950",
"author": "RetepV",
"timestamp": "2022-05-23T08:34:44",
"content": "I love it. :)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6477692",
"author": "Jaybee Smith",
"timestamp": "2022-05-25T00:13:00",
"conte... | 1,760,372,684.472733 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/22/do-flat-tyres-make-your-speedo-lie/ | Do Flat Tyres Make Your Speedo Lie? | Jenny List | [
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"infaltion",
"tires",
"tyres"
] | There are some engineering questions that may not have huge importance in the world, but which become the subject of intense idle speculation. A good example is the question of whether a lower tyre pressure on a motor vehicle would make a difference to the indicated speed. There are several contrasting intuitive theories as to what should happen, so [
mechatronicsguy
]
has taken the time for a bit of experimentation in order to find out what really happens
.
At stake were the change in effective radius from a flattened portion of the tyre, the so-called tank tracks effect in which the entire circumference of the tyre is still traversed, and the prospect of a change in circumference due to the different pressure. The test wheels were made from foam, and were found to give a different reading when compressed. This might solve toe problem, but of course real car wheels have radial wires to give them stiffness. When these were simulated on the foam wheels with packing tape, the difference evaporated. Later this was confirmed by GPS-measuring a real car with deflated wheels.
All this makes for a fascinating read, because after all,
there’s sometimes no substitute for a real-world test
.
Header image: Gerlach,
Public domain
. | 45 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6476906",
"author": "ccecil",
"timestamp": "2022-05-23T05:18:01",
"content": "Some of the tire pressure monitoring systems (2013 VW) use the ABS systems wheel speed sensors to determine if a tire is low. Low tire has a different rpm than the full ones.",
"parent_id": null,
... | 1,760,372,685.306515 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/22/truly-giant-telescope-could-image-exoplanets/ | Truly Giant Telescope Could Image Exoplanets | Al Williams | [
"Science",
"Space"
] | [
"astronomy",
"exoplanet",
"gravitational lens"
] | Have you ever wished we could peek at all these exoplanets that have been recently discovered? We aren’t likely to visit anytime soon, but it would be possible to build a truly giant telescope that could take a look at something like that. At least according to [SciShow Space] in a recent video you can see below.
The idea put forth in a
recent scientific paper
is to deliberately create the conditions that naturally form gravitational lenses. If you recall, scientists have used these naturally-occurring lenses to image the oldest star ever observed. These natural super-telescopes have paid off many times, but you can’t pick what you want to look at. It is all a function of the distance to the star creating the lens and the direction a line between us points.
But what if you could create your own gravity lens? Granted, we probably aren’t going to do that in our garages. However, a recent paper talks about launching an optical detector that you could maneuver so that it was on a line that would pass through the object you want to see and our own sun. We clearly have the technology to do this. After all, we have several nice space telescopes, and several probes operating far away from the sun.
That is one of the biggest catches, though. This new telescope will need to be some 550 AU from the sun to get good results. For the record, the Earth is 1 AU (about 8 light minutes) out. Pluto — maybe not a planet anymore, but still a signpost on the way out of the solar system — is a scant 39 AU out.
Voyager I
, which has been racing away from the sun since 1977 is only about
156 AU out
.
Because the craft would be so far out, it would be practically a one-shot mission. You also have to have something reliable enough to go the 17 years it would take with today’s technology to get in place. You also need a way to get the data back over that distance. All doable, but non-trivial.
The paper simulates what the Earth would look like using this technique from a nearby star. The images are shockingly good, especially after a bit of post-processing. Meanwhile, we may have to settle for
more modest images
. You might not see detail, but it is possible to find exoplanets with
reasonably modest equipment
. | 20 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6476881",
"author": "RW ver 0.0.3",
"timestamp": "2022-05-23T03:39:54",
"content": "I’d want to goof around closer to home first, like maybe trying to use Earth and Venus together as a synthetic aperture ‘scope. would likely need three compnents buzzing around the solar system like ... | 1,760,372,684.556136 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/22/hackaday-links-may-22-2022/ | Hackaday Links: May 22, 2022 | Dan Maloney | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Hackaday links",
"Slider"
] | [
"ABBA",
"ai",
"autonomous",
"avatars",
"bot",
"hackaday links",
"InSight",
"mars",
"Mayflower",
"solar",
"train"
] | It looks like it’s soon to be
lights out for the Mars InSight lander
. In the two years that the lander has been studying the geophysics of Mars from its lonely post on Elysium Planitia, InSight’s twin solar arrays have been collecting dust, and now are so dirty that they’re only making about 500 watt-hours per sol, barely enough to run the science packages on the lander. And that’s likely to worsen as the Martian winter begins, which will put more dust in the sky and lower the angle of the Sun, reducing the sunlight that’s incident to the panels. Barring a “cleaning event” courtesy of a well-placed whirlwind, NASA plans to shut almost everything down on the lander other than the seismometer, which has already captured thousands of marsquakes, and the internal heaters needed to survive the cold Martian nights.
They’re putting a brave face on it
, emphasizing the continuing science and the mission’s accomplishments. But barely two years of science and
a failed high-profile experiment
aren’t quite what we’ve come to expect from NASA missions, especially one with an $800 million price tag.
Closer to home, it turns out there’s a reason sailing ships have always had human crews: to fix things that go wrong. That’s the lesson learned by the Mayflower Autonomous Ship as it attempted the Atlantic crossing from England to the States, when it had to
divert for repairs recently
. It’s not clear what the issue was, but it seems to have been a mechanical issue, as opposed to a problem with the AI piloting system. The project dashboard says that the issue has been repaired, and the AI vessel has shoved off from the Azores and is once more beating west. There’s a long stretch of ocean ahead of it now, and few options for putting in should something else go wrong. Still, it’s a cool project, and we wish them a fair journey.
Have you ever walked past a display of wall clocks at the store and wondered why someone went to the trouble of setting the time on all of them to 10:10? We’ve certainly noticed this, and always figured it had something to do with some obscure horological tradition, like using “IIII” to mark the four o’clock hour on clocks with Roman numerals rather than the more correct “IV”. But no, it turns out that
10:10 is more visually pleasing
, and least on analog timepieces, because it evokes a smile on a human face. The study cited in the article had volunteers rate how pleasurable watches are when set to different times, and 10:10 won handily based on the perception that it was smiling at them. So it’s nice to know how easily manipulated we humans can be.
If there’s anything more pathetic than geriatric pop stars trying to relive their glory days to raise a little cash off a wave of nostalgia, we’re not sure what it could be. Still, plenty of acts try to do it, and many succeed, although seeing what time and the excesses of stardom have wrought can be a bit sobering. But Swedish megastars ABBA appear to have found a way to cash in on their fame gracefully, by sending
digital avatars out to do their touring for them
. The “ABBA-tars,” created by a 1,000-person team at Industrial Light and Magic, will appear alongside a live backing band for a residency at London’s Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. The avatars represent Benny, Bjorn, Agnetha, and Anni-Frid as they appeared in the 1970s, and were animated thanks to motion capture suits donned while performing 40 songs. It remains to be seen how fans will buy into the concept, but we’ll say this — the Swedish septuagenarians look pretty darn good in skin-tight Spandex.
And finally, not that it has any hacking value at all, but there’s something shamefully hilarious about watching
this poor little delivery bot getting absolutely wrecked by a train
. It’s one of those food delivery bots that swarm over college campuses these days; how it wandered onto the railroad tracks is anyone’s guess. The bot bounced around a bit before slipping under the train’s wheels, with predictable results once the battery pack is smooshed. | 27 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6476831",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2022-05-22T23:16:06",
"content": "“But no, it turns out that 10:10 is more visually pleasing, and least on analog timepieces, because it evokes a smile on a human face. ”Like headlights on some vehicles.",
"parent_id": null,
"dep... | 1,760,372,684.997877 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/22/hack-another-elf-on-the-stack/ | Hack Another ELF On The Stack | Matthew Carlson | [
"Reverse Engineering",
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"elf",
"LLDB"
] | [dropbear] recently found herself in a pickle. Dumping some data out of an Android app at a specific point for reverse engineering purposes. While it worked great in the simulator, it was painfully slow on hardware via lldb. The solution was to write
a patch and apply it to the ELF file
.
Writing the AArch64 assembly to dump the buffer is relatively trivial, but adding it to the existing ELF and repackaging it into a new APK leads to strange errors. The relative offsets into
.rodata
are now all wrong. For those who don’t routinely interface with the format of ELF files, we have a
fantastic resource to take you into the dark depths
. But the quick summary version is that sections contain various resources, and you find parts of those resources by relative offsets. The program header describes what type of resources each section contains.
[dropbear] found a NOTE section that just contained some metadata. She created a new section at the end of the file for her custom assembly and modified the header to declare the NOTE section as a LOAD section that pointed at her new section, which would get mapped into memory. All that was left to do was tweak the assembly in the actual code to jump to her new code that dumps. The BSS section was extended by a few bytes so that her program could store its state there.
It’s an impressive technique, and
her program for modifying the program header is on her website
under a BSD-3 license. | 3 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6476819",
"author": "metalman",
"timestamp": "2022-05-22T21:56:01",
"content": "news.ycombinator.com just saying",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6489868",
"author": "Peter T",
"timestamp": "2022-07-06T03:41:... | 1,760,372,684.78902 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/21/hp-200lx-runs-website-like-its-the-90s/ | HP-200LX Runs Website Like It’s The 90s | Donald Papp | [
"computer hacks",
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"1990s",
"200LX",
"HP",
"hp200lx",
"palmtop",
"vintage computing",
"web server"
] | The HP-200LX palmtop was a fascinating machine for its time, and [Terrence Vergauwen] proves that its time is not yet over, given that one is responsible for
serving up the website for
Palmtop Tube
, a website and YouTube channel dedicated to vintage palmtops.
All by itself a HP-200LX doesn’t have quite what it takes to act as a modern web server, but it doesn’t take much to provide the missing pieces. A PCMCIA network adapter provides an Ethernet connection, and a NAS contains the website content while networking and web server software run locally. Steady power comes from a wall adapter, but two rechargeable AA cells in the 200LX itself act as a mini-UPS, providing backup power in case of outages.
The
HP-200LX was a breakthrough product that came just at the right time
, preceding other true palm top computers like the
IBM PC 110
. In the early 90s, it was unimaginable that one could have a fully functional MS-DOS based machine in one’s pocket, let alone one that could last weeks on a couple of AA cells. It didn’t have some proprietary OS and weird ports, and that kind of functionality is part of why, roughly 30 years later, one is able to competently serve up web traffic.
A video overview of the machine and how it all works is in the video embedded below. And if you’re more interested in what an HP-200LX looks like on the inside?
This video is all about taking apart and repairing a 200LX
. | 20 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6476600",
"author": "Dan",
"timestamp": "2022-05-21T20:34:29",
"content": "F-keys and a numpad?! This is an awesome device!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6476607",
"author": "come2",
"timestamp": "2022-05-21T... | 1,760,372,684.753136 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/21/a-receive-antenna-switcher-with-an-espressif-brain/ | A Receive Antenna Switcher With An Espressif Brain | Jenny List | [
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"ESP32",
"RF",
"RF switch"
] | It’s not uncommon for a radio enthusiast to have multiple antennas for the same radio, so as you might expect it’s also entirely usual to have a bunch of coaxial cables dangling down for fumbling around the back of the rig to swap over. If that describes your radio experience than you might be interested in the
antenna switcher built by [g3gg0]
, which uses solid-state RF switches controlled by an ESP32 module.
At its heart is the
MXD8625C
RF switch, a tiny device designed for cellular phone applications that delivers only a fraction of a dB insertion loss and somehow negates the need for any blocking capacitors. It’s controlled by a GPIO line, and he’s hooked up a brace of them to allow the distribution of three antennas to a couple of radios with the handy option of switching in a preamplifier if required. Of even more interest we note that the device is suitable for transmitter switching too, with a maximum 36.5 dBm throughput that we calculate to be about 4.5 W. This board is fairly obviously for receive use, but perhaps the chip is of interest to anyone considering a transceiver project. Meanwhile the software is a relatively simple web-based control linking on-screen controls to GPIOs.
If you are interested in solid state RF switches, it’s always worth remembering that
at lower frequencies they can be very simple indeed
. | 9 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6476581",
"author": "echodelta",
"timestamp": "2022-05-21T18:11:54",
"content": "I’ve had 4 antennae switched to 2 FM tuners. Something to tape whilst another program to hear live. Just like TV. I used to get 3 states of public and dorm stations in a time of no web streaming. Mostly... | 1,760,372,684.930424 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/21/one-solution-many-problems/ | One Solution, Many Problems | Elliot Williams | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Rants",
"Slider"
] | [
"charliplexing",
"diode matrix",
"ghosting",
"keyboard"
] | You might think you’re lucky when one of your problems has multiple solutions, and you get to pick and choose, but you’re even luckier when one solution has many problems! This week I stumbled on an old solution in a new place. The project was
a fantastic old MIDI guitar build
, the Tryndelka by [Aleksandr Goltsov]. And the old solution? Switch matrix diodes.
You see, [Aleksandr] is making an electric guitar where the strings are pulled up to a certain voltage and then make contact with metal frets. Each fret is cut into six pieces, so that the strings can be read out individually, and the microcontroller scans each string in succession to test if it’s pressed down or not. Done, right? Wrong! The problem comes when two or more strings are pressed at once — the electrical path from the string you want will travel through the closed switch on a string that you’re not scanning.
The solution is a ton of diodes
.
I learned this problem the hard way in wiring up a MAME cabinet, at about 3 A.M. the night before we were going to bring it to Shmoocon. We finally got the whole USB/button code working, so we played some celebratory rounds of Street Fighter. We eventually noticed that hitting one button, or even moving the joystick in a particular direction, would block some of the other buttons from working, or change their function entirely. Quick Internet search later, and we were hand soldering 64 diodes until dawn. Good times!
But the fact that switch matrices need diodes, and exactly why, is forevermore burned in my brain. It’s fun to see it pop up in all sorts of contexts, from DIY keyboards to MIDI guitars, to
Charliplexing
. (It’s the “D” in LED!) It’s one of the classics — a solution to many problems.
This article is part of the Hackaday.com newsletter, delivered every seven days for each of the last 200+ weeks. It also includes our favorite articles from the last seven days that you can see on
the web version of the newsletter
.
Want this type of article to hit your inbox every Friday morning?
You should sign up
! | 7 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6476589",
"author": "YGDES",
"timestamp": "2022-05-21T19:14:09",
"content": "LED matrices are used both for encoding AND decoding.In fact, diodes are even more important than transistors to design digital circuits !",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
... | 1,760,372,685.101171 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/21/turtleauth-diy-security-token-gets-redesigned-for-durable-everyday-use/ | TurtleAuth DIY Security Token Gets (Re)designed For Durable, Everyday Use | Donald Papp | [
"Microcontrollers",
"Security Hacks"
] | [
"durable",
"gpg",
"hardware token",
"pcb",
"security",
"U2F"
] | [Samuel]’s first foray into making DIY hardware authentication tokens was a great success, but he soon realized that a device intended for everyday carry and use has a few different problems to solve, compared to a PCB that lives and works on a workbench. This led to
TurtleAuth 2.1, redesigned for everyday use
and lucky for us all, he goes into detail on all the challenges and solutions he faced.
When we covered
the original TurtleAuth DIY security token
, everything worked fantastically. However, the PCB layout had a few issues that became apparent after a year or so of daily use. Rather than 3D print an enclosure and call it done, [Samuel] decided to try a different idea and craft an enclosure from the PCB layers themselves.
The three-layered PCB sandwich keeps components sealed away and protected, while also providing a nice big touch-sensitive pad on the top, flanked by status LEDs. Space was a real constraint, and required a PCB redesign as well as moving to 0402 sized components, but in the end he made it work. As for being able to see the LEDs while not having any component exposed? No problem there; [Samuel] simply filled in the holes over the status LEDs with some hot glue, creating a cheap, effective, and highly durable diffuser that also sealed away the internals.
Making enclosures from PCB material can really hit the spot, and there’s no need to re-invent the wheel when it comes to doing so. Our own [Voja Antonic] laid out
everything one needs to know about how to build functional and beautiful enclosures in this way
. | 15 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6476537",
"author": "Sjaak",
"timestamp": "2022-05-21T12:31:51",
"content": "Nice build.He should use it to add security traces into the pcb.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6476546",
"author": "RW ver 0.0.3",
"timestamp... | 1,760,372,685.055121 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/21/the-thin-film-flexible-6502/ | The Thin-Film Flexible 6502 | Jenny List | [
"Parts",
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"6502",
"flexible circuits",
"tft"
] | While our attention is mostly directed towards ever smaller-integrated silicon circuits providing faster and faster computing, there’s another area of integrated electronics that operates at a much lower speed which we should be following. Thin-film flexible circuitry will provide novel ways to place electronics where a bulky or expensive circuit board with traditional components might be too expensive or inappropriate, and Wikichip is here to remind us of a Leuven university team who’ve created what is claimed to be the fastest thin-film flexible microprocessor yet. Some of you might find it familiar,
it’s our old friend the 6502
.
The choice of an archaic 8-bit processor might seem a strange one, but we can see the publicity advantage — after all, you’re reading about it here because of it being a 6502. Plus there’s the advantage of it being a relatively simple and well-understood architecture. It’s no match for the MHz clock speeds of the original with an upper limit of 71.4 kHz, but performance is not the most significant feature of flexible electronics. The production technology isn’t quite ready for the mainstream so we’re unlikely to be featuring flexible Commodore 64s any time soon, but the achievement is the impressive feat of a working thin-film flexible microprocessor.
Meanwhile, if you’re curious about the 6502,
we took a look at the life of its designer, [Chuck Peddle]
. | 13 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6476545",
"author": "RW ver 0.0.3",
"timestamp": "2022-05-21T13:29:37",
"content": "Hmmm, a step closer to making the “Young Lady’s Illustrated Primer” in the form factor of an actual book perchance?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_... | 1,760,372,685.149528 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/20/sisyphean-ball-race-robot-toils-gracefully-magnetically/ | Sisyphean Ball Race Robot Toils Gracefully, Magnetically | Kristina Panos | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"ball race",
"f'n magnets",
"linear actuator",
"marble run",
"Sisyphus"
] | Aren’t ball races and marble runs fun? Wouldn’t they be so much more enjoyable if you didn’t have to climb back up the ladder each time, as it were, and reset the thing? [Johannes] wrote in to tell us about
a wee robot with the Sisyphean task of setting a ball bearing on a simple but fun course, collecting it from the end, and airlifting it back to the start of the track
.
[Johannes] built this ‘bot to test small-scale resin printing strength as well as the longevity of some tiny linear actuators from Ali that may or may not be available at a moment’s notice. The point was to see how these little guys fared when connected directly to an Arduino or other microcontroller, rather than going the safer route with a motor driver of some kind.
Some things worked well, like the c-clips that keep the axles together, and using quick pulses to release the magnetically-linked ball from the gripper. Other aspects didn’t work out so well. Tiny resin parts do not respond well to force, for starters. And then there’s the actuators themselves. The connections are fragile and the motors are weak, but they vary wildly in quality from piece to piece, so YMMV. Some lose steps, and others occasionally seize. But you wouldn’t know any of that from the graceful movement capture in the video below. Although it appears to be automated, the bot is under remote control because of the motor issues.
Not into ball runs? There are other Sisyphean tasks available, such as
moving sand around in the name of meditation
. | 5 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6476524",
"author": "boss",
"timestamp": "2022-05-21T09:00:58",
"content": "Nice.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6476528",
"author": "johnrpm",
"timestamp": "2022-05-21T09:53:23",
"content": "I once saw a video of a... | 1,760,372,685.193259 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/20/practice-makes-perfect-for-this-ball-and-socket-robot/ | Practice Makes Perfect For This Ball And Socket Robot | Anne Ogborn | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"ball and socket",
"robot",
"robotics"
] | Ball and socket joints are useful, but making a part slide over the surface of a sphere, held by magnets, requires a lot of fiddling to get right. We admire persistence and nailing all the details. [Matthew Finlay] has been doing just that with his ball and socket robot.
He’s on version six
, a testament to his desire to do the idea justice. Luckily for us, he’s documented each version as he went.
Version one
, made from a DIY Christmas ornament ball, had no stability around the radial axis, and oscillated badly.
Version two
demonstrated the problem of centering the mechanism in the ball. Version 3 fixed this problem (it’s covered in the same video). Then
version four
fixed many of the assembly issues and replaced the servo controllers with an Arduino, but the ‘arm’ piece was too small and mechanically iffy.
Version five
used a fabricated bearing. Matthew used airsoft rounds as the balls. Not a good idea. And assembly was a nightmare. So all this progress up to version six shows his improving technique. Artists say ‘work on your process, not on your pieces’. He’s become much more analytic about what’s needed. He’s started measuring the strength of the robot, and handled issues like adding limit switches so it doesn’t crash at the limits of travel.
Fun build, reminds us of
[Stephen Dufresne]’s BB-8. | 3 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6476482",
"author": "Tom Hargrave",
"timestamp": "2022-05-21T03:22:44",
"content": "This looks like a great project.I’ve been thinking of a project that could use something like this once it’s strong enough – an automatic pulses watering system. Think of something stationary on the ... | 1,760,372,685.228799 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2022/05/22/expedient-jig-lets-you-crank-out-chain-link-fence/ | Expedient Jig Lets You Crank Out Chain Link Fence | Al Williams | [
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"chain link fence",
"fence"
] | After the zombie apocalypse or whatever is coming, folks like us will be in high demand as the people who know how to fix things, generate electricity, and scavenge parts. But keeping out marauding zombies and neighbors requires fencing. Can you make your own chain link fence?
If you watch [Diamleon]’s recent video
, you might be able to. Admittedly, the bulk of the video is about fabricating the jig and you should expect to do some welding and cutting.
However, you might be able to make a similar jig with a little less work. The jig is essential a spool on a shaft with a crosswise cut to guide the wire. The whole thing is powered by an electric drill turning a sprocket much like a bicycle.
One pass through the machine makes a nice twisty wire. Once you’ve run off a few lengths of twisty wire it is relatively easy to interlace them into fencing panels. It is one of those things that is hard to visualize until you see it. We were impressed with the drill drive and immediately thought about modifying the design to wind large coils. There are probably many other uses for such a thing. So even if you don’t want to build a fence, you might want to check it out.
As for us, we’ll probably just make our fence out of wood. Or do something
electric
. Oddly enough, we saw a hand-crank version of this same
type of machine
last year. | 17 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6476774",
"author": "pmichaelh",
"timestamp": "2022-05-22T17:32:38",
"content": "That’s a little bit of awsome! Next step, have it assemble the wires as it bends them!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6476793",
"author": "IIV... | 1,760,372,685.355887 |
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