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https://hackaday.com/2021/07/15/foam-f-35-learns-to-hover/ | Foam F-35 Learns To Hover | Tom Nardi | [
"Toy Hacks"
] | [
"Dollar Tree Foam",
"F-35",
"flight controller",
"foam",
"hover",
"Teensy 4.0",
"vtol"
] | With cheap RC hardware, powerful motors, and high-capacity battery packs, getting something to fly has never been easier. It also helps that, whether you’re into fixed-wing craft or multirotors, there’s plenty of information and prior art floating around online that you can use to jumpstart your own build. But when it comes to homebrew vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) planes, things are a bit trickier.
Luckily for us,
[Nicholas Rehm] has made all the plans and information necessary to duplicate his incredible RC F-35 available
for anyone who wants to experiment with these relatively niche fliers. Even if it was a standard park flier, the build would be worth a close look thanks to the vectored thrust motors that give it phenomenal maneuverability and a top speed in the neighboorhood of 120 KPH (80 MPH). But with the flick of a switch, the plane transitions into a tricopter-like flight mode that allows it to land and takeoff vertically.
How does it work? The downward facing motor just behind the “cockpit” lifts up the front of the foam flier and tilts left and right to provide yaw control, while the two motors on the back tilt down to lift up the rear of the aircraft. Aviation buffs in the audience may recognize this as being fairly close to how the actual F-35B hovers, although on the real jet fighter, downward thrust under the wings is generated by redirected turbine exhaust rather than dedicated motors, and yaw control is provided by swiveling the engine’s nozzle rather than the front lift fan.
Getting the plane to takeoff vertically was one thing, but being able to transition from a hover into forward flight was quite another. To make this aerial transformation possible [Nicholas] actually had to
write his own flight controller software, which he calls dRehmFlight
. The GPLv3 code runs on the Teensy 4.0 and uses the common GY-521 MPU6050 gyroscope/accelerometer, so you don’t need to get any custom boards spun up just to give it a test
drive
flight. In the video below he walks through configuring the software for VTOL operation by defining how each control surface and motor is to respond to control input given the currently selected flight mode.
It probably won’t surprise you to hear that this isn’t the first time [Nicholas] has experimented with unusual flying machines.
Last year we covered his RC Starship
, which managed to stick the “belly flop” landing even before SpaceX managed to get the real life version down in one piece. | 2 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364539",
"author": "Jan Östman",
"timestamp": "2021-07-15T20:22:39",
"content": "Love it.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6364690",
"author": "Bill",
"timestamp": "2021-07-16T07:40:42",
"content": "That’s impressive... | 1,760,373,018.376609 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/15/diy-pecs-board-uses-pictures-to-communicate/ | DIY PECS Board Uses Pictures To Communicate | Kristina Panos | [
"Arduino Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"arduino pro mini",
"autism",
"communication",
"DF Player",
"mdf",
"non-verbal communication"
] | One way of communicating with autistic and non-verbal people is through the use of a Picture Exchange Communication System or PECS board, which they can use to point out what they need or want throughout the day. However, the commercial versions of these boards have their share of problems — they’re expensive, and they’re fairly rigid as far as the pictures go.
[Alain Mauer] has created an open-source PECS board that is far more personalized, and has audio to boot
.
The number one requisite here is sturdiness, as [Alain]’s son [Scott] has already smashed two smartphones and a tablet. [Alain] went with a laser-cut MDF enclosure that should last quite a while. Inside is an Arduino Pro Mini and a DF Player Mini that plays corresponding clips from a micro SD card whenever [Scott] presses a button on the 16-key copper foil capacitive keypad. This PECS board is smart, too — it will sound a turn-me-off reminder after a few minutes of inactivity, and issue audible low battery warnings.
So far, [Scott] is responding better to photographs of objects than to drawings. Watch him interact with the board after the break.
This is far from the first thing [Alain] has built to help [Scott].
Be sure to check out this Pi-based media player built to engage and not enrage
. | 6 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364509",
"author": "Eric C",
"timestamp": "2021-07-15T19:19:14",
"content": "Reminds me of when I was traveling abroad many moons ago, when cell phones were huge and my wallet was bare. I’m severely hearing impaired so picking up a foreign language was going to be next to impossibl... | 1,760,373,018.415842 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/16/final-weekend-for-work-from-home-challenge-of-the-hackaday-prize/ | Final Weekend For Work-From-Home Challenge Of The Hackaday Prize | Mike Szczys | [
"The Hackaday Prize"
] | [
"2021 Hackaday Prize"
] | This is the final weekend to
enter your work-from-home project in the 2021 Hackaday Prize
. We know how much fun it is to be creative with home setups that keep let you work without disrupting your non-work life. Show off what you’ve done and you’ll be in the running for some big cash prizes.
Among the lowest hanging fruit is improving your home’s window to the work world. Anything you can do to make your audio and video experience better on video calls is going to make you happier and make the virtual office feel more like a team. [Andy Lustig]
built a dedicated video call control panel
that can cut off mic and camera, share his screen, switch views, and leave the meeting. Having always-available physical controls for these is a huge power-up for your cubicle-away-from-the-office.
Long hours hunched over the computer are going to take a toll on your body. There are a number of projects entered in the contest that remind you to take breaks, but [ImageryEel] took at different approach.
It’s a wearable posture pack
that uses an IMU to measure the position of your spine. You’ll get push notifications when the posture pack notices your upper back is beginning to slump. Hopefully this makes it a self-correcting problem!
Having a cozy place to do you work is great for both your physical and emotional health. [Peter van der Walt] is taking the concept of a home “battlestation” to another level, with
a reclining chair design that wraps dual monitors around
you as you settle in for the work day.
It’s not too late. Make this weekend into your own mini hackathon and get those entries in by Monday morning. Ten finalists will each receive a $500 cash prize and be in the running for the final round beginning at the end of October. Ultimately, one entry will claim the $25,000 Hackaday Prize along with top prizes for four other finalists.
Begin your project on Hackaday.io today, and use the “Submit Project To” dropdown box in the left sidebar of your project page to enter it in the contest. Good luck!
The
Hackaday
Prize2021
is Sponsored by: | 0 | 0 | [] | 1,760,373,018.207115 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/16/making-custom-curved-mirrors-at-home/ | Making Custom Curved Mirrors At Home | Tom Nardi | [
"Parts"
] | [
"3D printed mold",
"curved mirror",
"mirror",
"polystyrene",
"vacuum forming"
] | Generally speaking, creating custom mirrors is a complex task that involves a lot of careful grinding, and isn’t something to be taken lightly if you need precision results. Just ask the folks who provided NASA with a wonky mirror for the Hubble. But assuming you’re
not
working on an orbital space telescope (or even a ground based one, for that matter),
[volzo] has recently documented some techniques for producing single and double curved mirrors of reasonable quality
using common workshop tools.
The first step is finding something that’s a bit easier to work with than glass. After testing various reflective materials such as PVC foil and painted PETG sheets by comparing the reflections of projected test patterns, [volzo] found that laminated polystyrene gave the most accurate results. If you just want to make a simple bent mirror, he shows how you can pop one of these sheets on a CNC router, make the appropriate cuts, and fold them into shape.
That part might seem a bit obvious, but what about a more complex shape? Here, [volzo] points to how the thin sheets of polystyrene also lend themselves to vacuum forming. As demonstrated in the video below, all it takes is a 3D printed plug and some basic equipment to rapidly produce mirrors in arbitrary shapes.
Now obviously the optical properties of such mirrors will leave something to be desired, but depending on your application, that might not be such a big deal. As examples [volzo] shows off a few projects using these custom mirrors, such as a tabletop camera that captures both sides of the table simultaneously and a circular projector. Laminated polystyrene could
potentially even be used to create low-cost variable mirrors
. | 8 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364949",
"author": "vib",
"timestamp": "2021-07-16T21:39:52",
"content": "This guy has a great blog, very cool projects!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6365088",
"author": "phil barrett",
"timestamp": "2021-07-17T13:48... | 1,760,373,018.254037 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/16/the-fix-is-in-hubbles-troubles-appear-over-for-now/ | The Fix Is In: Hubble’s Troubles Appear Over For Now | Dan Maloney | [
"Current Events",
"News"
] | [
"glitch",
"HST",
"Hubble",
"Hubble Space Telescope",
"payload computer",
"PCU",
"power supply",
"regulator",
"SI C&DH"
] | Good news this morning from low Earth orbit, where
the Hubble Space Telescope is back online
after a long and worrisome month of inactivity following a glitch with the observatory’s payload computer.
We recently covered
the Hubble payload computer in some depth
; at the time, NASA was still very much in the diagnosis phase of the recovery, and had yet to determine a root cause. But the investigation was pointing to one of two possible culprits: the Command Unit/Science Data Formatter (CU/SDF), the module that interfaces the various science instruments, or the Power Control Unit (PCU), which provides regulated power for everything in the payload computer, more verbosely known as the SI C&DH, or Scientific Instrument Command and Data Handling Unit.
In the two weeks since that report, NASA made slow but steady progress, methodically testing every aspect of the SI C&DH. It wasn’t until just two days ago, on July 14, that NASA made a solid determination on root cause: the Power Control Unit, or more specifically, the power supply protection circuit on the PCU’s 5-volt rail. The circuit is designed to monitor the rail for undervoltage or overvoltage conditions, and to order the SI C&DH to shut down if the voltage is out of spec. It’s not entirely clear whether the PCU is actually putting out something other than 5 volts, or if the protection circuit has perhaps degraded since the entire SI C&DH was replaced in the last service mission in 2009. But either way, the fix is the same: switch to the backup PCU, a step that was carefully planned out and executed on July 15th.
To their credit, the agency took pains that everyone involved would be free from any sense of pressure to rush a fix — the 30-year-old spacecraft was stable, its instruments were all safely shut down, and so the imperative was to fix the problem without causing any collateral damage, or taking a step that couldn’t be undone. And further kudos go to NASA for transparency —
the web page detailing their efforts to save Hubble
reads almost like a build log on one of our projects.
There’s still quite a bit of work to be done to get Hubble back into business — the science instruments have to be woken up and checked out, for instance — but if all goes well, we should see science data start flowing back from the space telescope soon. It’s a relief that NASA was able to pull this fix off, but the fact that Hubble is down to its last backup is a reminder Hubble’s days are numbered, and that the best way to honor the feats of engineering derring-do that saved Hubble this time and many times before is to keep doing great science for as long as possible. | 29 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364888",
"author": "Greg A",
"timestamp": "2021-07-16T18:27:45",
"content": "i used to find it a little nerve wracking to try to fix the server because if i screwed it up, i had to get on a subway to the colo downtown…2 hours out of my day, at least, just because i hit enter before... | 1,760,373,018.164018 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/16/just-what-have-we-become/ | Just What Have We Become? | Jenny List | [
"Current Events",
"Featured",
"Rants"
] | [
"audacity",
"bsnes",
"knife attack",
"near",
"suicide",
"suicide prevention"
] | The world of open source software is one that often sees disputes between developers, some of which spawn lifelong schisms between devotees of different forks, and others mere storms in a teacup that are settled over a few beers. There are a couple of stories of late though that seem to show the worst in the online world, and which all of us should take a moment to think about.
Many of you may have heard two weeks ago of
the passing of [near]
, the software developer and game translator whose
bsnes
emulator for the Super Nintendo was the go-to platform for retro Nintendo enthusiasts intent on the pursuit of the closest possible match to the original without possessing real Nintendo hardware. The details of their passing are particularly distressing, in that they committed suicide after numerous attacks over several years from users of Kiwi Farms, a website notorious for the worst kinds of trolling.
Hot on the heels of that distressing story comes news that [Cookie Engineer] is
stepping down as maintainer of the project that’s now called Tenacity
, a fork of the popular but now-controversial Audacity audio editor. They are doing so after being targeted by users of 4chan, the most well-known of online trolling websites, following an ill-advised
Simpsons
joke in a naming poll for the software. [Cookie Engineer] alleges that the harassers knocked on doors and windows where they live and a real-world knife attack followed.
Nobody deserves to be hounded to death, to suffer the sort of sustained harassment that [near] encountered, or to be confronted with knife-wielding strangers merely because they have stuck their head above the parapet as an open-source developer. There are no excuses to be made, no justifications for this.
All of us who read Hackaday are likely to be regular users of open-source software, many of us will have used bsnes and may yet use Tenacity, but we probably rarely stop for a moment to think of the real people behind them. Countless hours from innumerable highly-skilled people are what makes the open-source world tick, and aside from the immeasurable sadness of suicide or the horror of a knife attack there can only be harm done to open source software as a whole if to be a prominent developer or maintainer is to expose yourself to this.
The Internet will always have raucous communities at its margins and that’s something which still contributes to its unique culture, but when it jumps off the webpage and into damaging real people then perhaps it has become a monster. As a community we can do so much better, and we shouldn’t be prepared to accept anybody who thinks otherwise among our ranks.
We’d like to remind our readers that
help exists for those who have reached the point of considering suicide
, and that should you suffer from mental health problems you are not alone in this. Everybody, take care of yourselves, and keep an eye out for each other. | 69 | 31 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364865",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2021-07-16T17:21:59",
"content": "Kind of comments on the Linux community.https://youtu.be/tshIIEbKa7s",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6365574",
"author": "Elliot Williams"... | 1,760,373,018.515237 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/16/hackaday-podcast-127-whippletree-clamps-sniffing-your-stomach-radio-multimeter-hum-fix-and-c64-demo-no-c64/ | Hackaday Podcast 127: Whippletree Clamps, Sniffing Your Stomach Radio, Multimeter Hum Fix, And C64 Demo; No C64 | Mike Szczys | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Podcasts",
"Slider"
] | [
"Hackaday Podcast"
] | Hackaday editors Mike Szczys and Elliot Williams help you get caught up on a week of wonder hacks. We don’t remember seeing a floppy drive headline the demoscene, but sure enough, there’s a C64 demo that performs after the computer is disconnected. What causes bench tools to have unreliable measurements? Sometimes a poor crystal choice lets AC ruin the party. We dive into the ongoing saga of the Audacity open source project’s change of ownership, and talk about generator exciter circuits — specifically their role in starting grid-scale generators from shutdown.
Take a look at the links below if you want to follow along, and as always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!
Direct download
(60 MB or so.)
Places to follow Hackaday podcasts:
Google Podcasts
iTunes
Spotify
Stitcher
RSS
Episode 127 Show Notes:
What’s that Sound?
Tell us your answer for this week’s “What’s that sound?”
. Next week on the show we’ll randomly draw one name from the correct answers to win a limited-edition Hackaday Podcast T-shirt. (How limited? This will be the 6th ever.)
New This Week:
End Of An Era: NTSC Finally Goes Dark In America
Thread from @CarissaHolohan discussing the NTSC shutdown
Final Weekend for Work-From-Home Challenge of the Hackaday Prize
Interesting Hacks of the Week:
NFC Who’s At The Door
PN532 Datasheet
Fractal Vise Holds Odd-Shaped Objects Tight
Whippletree (mechanism) – Wikipedia
3D printed fractal vise – The coolest tool you didn’t know you needed – YouTube
Rare Antique Fractal Vise [Restoration] – YouTube
Tuning Into Medical Implants With The RTL-SDR
GitHub – merbanan/rtl_433: Program to decode radio transmissions from devices on the ISM bands (and other frequencies)
Fixing Noisy Measurements On An Owon XDM2041 Bench Multimeter
Raspberry Pi Cameras Stand In For Stereo Microscope
New Part Day: Raspberry Pi Camera Gets Serious With 12 Megapixels & Proper Lenses
This Raspberry Pi Is A Stereo Camera And So Much More
C64 Demo, No C64
6502 Extra Opcodes
Quick Hacks:
Mike’s Picks
Home Automation For Fans Of Quick-and-Dirty Solutions
Retrotechtacular: The Secret Life Of The Electric Light
Dial-a-SID Is A Glorious Chiptune Jukebox
Elliot’s Picks:
Tetris Handheld Powered By Tritium Cell, Eventually
Responsive Paintings Do It With Heat And Light
Human-Following Utility Trailer
Can’t-Miss Articles:
Black Starts: How The Grid Gets Restarted
Muse Group Continues Tone Deaf Handling Of Audacity | 0 | 0 | [] | 1,760,373,018.094724 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/16/inside-a-20-watt-traveling-wave-tube-amplifier-from-apollo/ | Inside A 20-Watt Traveling Wave Tube Amplifier From Apollo | Maya Posch | [
"Science",
"Space",
"Wireless Hacks"
] | [
"traveling wave tube amplifier"
] | When the Apollo astronauts made their way to the Moon, their communication equipment had a transmission power of a mere 20 W, which the sensitive receivers back on Earth managed to pick up. But this isn’t just any amplifier, it’s a Traveling Wave Tube amplifier (TWT), as [Ken Shirriff]
explains in a recent article
.
The most fascinating thing about these
TWTs
isn’t just their role during the Apollo missions, but the fact that even today this type of vacuum tube is still among the most efficient and compact types of RF amplifier. As a result today’s high-tech satellites still commonly feature these devices.
As always, [Ken] entertains and enlightens us with how the TWT and the rest of the amplifier system worked. | 21 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364885",
"author": "Skypickle",
"timestamp": "2021-07-16T18:11:11",
"content": "Thank you for a nice article. However I am still mystified as to how an em wave is amplified by an electron stream. If I took regular coax and pumped an rf signal into it while running a current through... | 1,760,373,018.057119 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/16/this-week-is-security-revil-goes-dark-kaseya-cleanup-android-updates-and-terrible-firmware/ | This Week In Security: REvil Goes Dark, Kaseya Cleanup, Android Updates, And Terrible Firmware | Jonathan Bennett | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"News",
"Security Hacks"
] | [
"PrintNightmare",
"ransomware",
"REvil",
"This Week in Security"
] | The funniest thing happened to REvil this week. Their online presence
seems to have disappeared
.
Their Tor sites as well as conventional sites all went down about the same time Tuesday morning, leading to speculation that they may have been hit by a law enforcement operation. This comes on the heels of a renewed push by the US for other countries, notably Russia, to crack down on ransomware groups operating within their borders. If it is a coordinated takedown, it’s likely a response to the extremely widespread 4th of July campaign launched via the Kaseya platform. Seriously, if you’re going to do something that risks ticking off Americans, don’t do it on the day we’re celebrating national pride by blowing stuff up.
All REvil sites are down, including the payment sites and data leak site. 🤔
The public ransomware gang represenative, Unknown, is strangely quiet.
— Lawrence Abrams (@LawrenceAbrams)
July 13, 2021
Speaking of Kaseya, they have finished their analysis, and published
a guide for safely powering on their VSA on-premise hardware
. Now that the fixes are available, more
information about the attack itself is being released
. Truesec researchers have been following this story in real time, and even provided information about the attack back to Kaseya, based on their observations. Their analysis shows that 4 separate vulnerabilities were involved in the attack. First up is an authentication bypass. It takes advantage of code that looks something like this:
if password == hash(row[nextAgentPassword] + row[agentGuidStr])
login ok
elseif password == hash(row[curAgentPassword] + row[agentGuidStr])
login ok
elseif password == hash(row[nextAgentPassword] + row[displayName])
login ok
elseif password == hash(row[curAgentPassword] + row[displayName])
login ok
elseif password == row[password]
login failed
else
login ok
Yeah, their code fails open, rather than failing closed. I have spent some time trying to understand how that code could have ever worked, or what the engineer was thinking that wrote it, and I’ve got nothing. I have to hope the original version makes more sense. One thing to note, in order to get this far in the login process, an attacker would need a valid
agentGuid
.
Next in the attack flow, an unexpected request to the
done.asp
endpoint triggered an unrestricted upload vulnerability. This would theoretically be thwarted by a Cross Site Request Forgery protection token, but that token wasn’t being properly vetted, allowing for another easy bypass. Two files were uploaded by the attacker, a payload to send to the victim machines, as well as an ASP script to execute on the appliance itself. The final step from the attacker was to trigger the execution of this script through another faulty endpoint. From there the attack would be carried out automatically and the logs of the appliance wiped to cover the trail.
Android Wifi Scan RCE
There is always something fun hidden in
the monthly Android security updates
, and this month is no exception. CVE-2021-1965 is
a flaw in Qualcomm driver code
, a buffer overflow in how BSSID beacons are handled when scanning for networks. Part of those beacons is the “Information Element”, which additional information about the network. The code in question didn’t properly handle long IE fields, resulting in a potential buffer overflow.
This is an interesting bug, because unless you put it in airplane mode, a modern phone is always running scans for WiFi networks, and simply being in range of a malicious network is enough to trigger the vulnerability.
PrintNightmare Is Over?
Microsoft pushed a pair of fixes, both aimed at the PrintNightmare flaw, one of which being an Out Of Band (OOB) patch, AKA not put out on Patch Tuesday. Several researchers stepped forward to point out that the vulnerability was still present, if you had a certain system configuration. Microsoft has
responded to those claims
:
Our investigation has shown that the OOB security update is working as designed and is effective against the known printer spooling exploits and other public reports collectively being referred to as PrintNightmare. All reports we have investigated have relied on the changing of default registry setting related to Point and Print to an insecure configuration.
It seems like the ride isn’t quite over, though this time maybe it really is limited to local users:
#printnightmare
– Episode 3
You know that even patched, with default config (or security enforced with
#Microsoft
settings), a standard user can load drivers as SYSTEM?
– Local Privilege Escalation –
#feature
pic.twitter.com/Zdge0okzKi
— 🥝 Benjamin Delpy (@gentilkiwi)
July 15, 2021
You Don’t Need to See My Credentials
Sage X3 is an Enterprise Resource Planning system. Think Quickbooks, but for enterprise scale. Researchers at Rapid7 found a few problems with the program, but the big one is
CVE-2020-7388
. The server and client elements of Sage X3 communicate over a TCP connection, and use a proprietary authentication mechanism to protect that connection. So long as the authentication is successful, commands can be sent back over the connection to execute on the server as the authenticated user. That proprietary authentication mechanism has a little bug in it. If you change one of the bytes in the auth initialization, the server never actually asks for the hashed username and password, and instead runs commands as its own user, SYSTEM. That’s one to hurry up and update.
Insecure Cameras, or, Why Use A VLAN
Researchers at Randorisec seem to have a hobby of
finding security vulnerabilities in UDP Technology cameras
. Continuing in their favorite pasttime, they grabbed the latest firmware for their cameras, and set about looking for vulnerabilities. The problem? Those firmware files were encrypted. Not deterred, they simply looked for an undiscovered RCE on the firmware version they still had access to, and then used that to pop the up-to-date cameras and grab the filesystems. They found twelve more CVEs. The writeup is great, walking through the process of turning a vulnerability into a working exploit — go read it.
There’s a lesson to be learned here. Code that a vendor assumes to be unimportant and never to be seen is almost guaranteed to be garbage in one way or another. How many devices do you have on your networks that are probably in this category? We’re not even talking about hardware that might have intentional backdoors. IP Cameras are useful tools for physical security, but they can be a terrible problem for network security. Is there a solution? Separate networks, most easily done via VLANs. Keep your untrusted devices away from your important network, and even better, keep your cameras off the internet. | 16 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364840",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2021-07-16T15:41:17",
"content": "Seems security much like surgery should be left to the professionals.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6364847",
"author": "X",
"ti... | 1,760,373,018.573966 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/15/recycling-will-be-key-to-the-electric-vehicle-future/ | Recycling Will Be Key To The Electric Vehicle Future | Lewin Day | [
"car hacks",
"Featured",
"green hacks",
"Interest"
] | [
"car hacks",
"cars",
"electric vehicle",
"electric vehicles",
"ev",
"evs",
"rare earth metals",
"rare-earth",
"recycling"
] | Electric vehicles have become a mainstay in the global automotive marketplace, taking on their gasoline rivals and steadily chewing out their own slice of market share, year after year. Government mandates to end the sale of polluting internal combustion engine vehicles and subsidies on cleaner cars promise to conspire to create an electric vehicle boom.
The result should be much cleaner air, as generating electricity in even the dirtiest power plants is far cleaner and more efficient than millions of individual engines puttering about the place. However, if the electric car is to reign supreme, they’ll need to be built in ever greater numbers. To do that is going to take huge amounts of certain materials that can be expensive and sometimes in very limited supply. Thus, to help support the EV boom, recycling of these materials may come to play a very important role.
Batteries, Motors, and Everything Else
We don’t worry too much about the huge amounts of material that go into creating millions of traditional cars every year, as these supply chains have been largely stable for the better part of a century as the automobile developed. However, the uptick in electric vehicle manufacturing will have us on the hunt for greater supplies of a whole raft of materials. Lithium is a primary candidate, as is cobalt and a smattering of other elements that are used in the manufacture of high-capacity, high-output batteries. Motors and related electronic components will also have an impact, demanding large amounts of copper for windings and rare earth metals for high-strength magnets crucial to their production.
The traditional lazy human response to this problem is to simply go outside and dig up some more of whatever we don’t have enough of. Unfortunately, that’s not always easy. The supply of many of these materials is limited, and often in places that makes maintaining supply over long timescales difficult. Labor abuses and civil rights issues can also raise moral quandaries around supply. As an example, the vast majority of the world’s cobalt supply comes from the Congo,
where children are routinely forced to work in dangerous mining operations
. And there are concerns about relying on a single source of the materials;
China happens to be host to the richest deposits of rare earth metals
, currently supplying about 85% of world demand. Large monopolies on supplies can cause shortages and sky-rocketing prices in the event of something going wrong, as companies have nowhere else to turn for vital materials.
The critical nature of these materials to modern technology
have led to calls for mandatory recycling of these materials
. All manner of modern electronics manufacturing, not just electric vehicles, would grind to a halt if the supply of lithium or rare earth materials dried up, for example. Everything from smartphones, to LEDs, to hard drives would all become impossible to manufacture.
Bootstrapping Recycling Channels
While new mining projects aim to get us more of the good stuff, it makes sense to look at what can be done with the materials we’ve already dug out of the ground. Over 10 million electric cars already roam the streets worldwide. As these vehicles age and retire from service, it makes sense to recover and reuse as much material from them as possible to ease the burden of having to continually produce new raw materials.
Motor windings still rely on copper wire, which is readily recyclable with existing techniques. However, demand is set to increase significantly with the rise in electric vehicle sales.
Of course, depending on the material of interest, recycling can be very, very easy or very, very hard. For instance, copper recycling is a mature industry, and recovery of copper wiring from vehicles is a simple and straightforward enough process. However, other materials are not so straightforward.
Modern batteries are not so easily recycled, as our own Dan Maloney laid out in his article
Getting The Lead Out Of Lithium Battery Recycling
.
Yet reprocessing EV batteries is one of the biggest concerns as far as future supplies go. The problem is that existing cells consist of many different valuable materials all mixed up and crammed together in a tight metal container, which is then further encased in a larger battery pack along with supporting electronics and cooling systems. Few to none of these vehicle battery packs are designed for easy disassembly or recycling, as no recycling infrastructure yet exists. Conversely, no recycling infrastructure exists because the process is too difficult and expensive to be commercially viable.
Modern EV battery packs are highly integrated assemblies that take significant effort to disassemble. Often, individual cells are actually glued into place, frustrating any efforts at recycling or reuse. Redesign for recycling may improve this in future.
However, lead-acid batteries show the way,
with 98% of their materials able to be recycled in current processes.
It’s likely that with some effort, designs will improve and processes develop to allow large quantities of the valuable lithium, cobalt, and other materials to be recovered from EV battery packs.
Australian company Neometals is already working on plans for a commercial-scale plant in Germany that would process 18,000 tons of batteries a year.
The intended process works by first shredding and separating out metal and plastic casings and foils, before using what’s called a hydrometallurgical process involving chemical treatment to then separate out lithium, cobalt, nickel, and other elements from the battery anode, cathode, and electrolyte materials. Other options for such processing involve
pyrometallurgy operations which use high temperatures to recover cobalt, nickel and copper
, though the high-temperature processes aren’t able to recover materials such as lithium or aluminium.
Reclaiming Rare Earth
Rare earth metals in oxidized, powdered form. These materials are crucial in everything from magnets to lasers and even fluorescent bulbs and LEDs. Many a Hackaday reader suddenly flinched at the thought of no longer being able to source their favorite RGB blinkables.
Rare earth metals have similarly seen only limited recycling efforts thus far, as fresh supplies have obviated the need to consider recycling. However, with an eye on future demand and potential risks to current supplies, renewed interest has flooded into the sector. Processing methods are similar to those for batteries, involving chemical and high temperature processing methods to recover materials, though neither have yet become financially viable in the marketplace.
Only 1% of these materials are currently recycled
, and thus far recycling efforts remain an academic interest rather than a commercial reality.
As of yet, the electric vehicle revolution is only in its early stages. Thus, efforts to improve supply chains and recycling methods remain in the realm of speculative investment, rather than something being developed in earnest. One of the problems with a market-based economy is that there can be significant lag as the rest of the economy shifts around the development of a new technology, often waiting for it to become widely adopted before major players will spend money on the necessary supporting infrastructure. Regardless, the growing pains are likely to remain for some time as electric vehicles become more popular and the demands for the crucial feedstock materials continue to rise. | 114 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364453",
"author": "Arthur Wolf",
"timestamp": "2021-07-15T17:12:40",
"content": "I have zero trust in the idea that the need for rare earth metals is going to continue in the long run.In a few decades we’ll have something-something-carbon-or-graphene, and nobody will care about ra... | 1,760,373,018.730456 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/15/new-video-series-learning-antenna-basics-with-karen-rucker/ | New Video Series: Learning Antenna Basics With Karen Rucker | Dan Maloney | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"how-to",
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"antenna",
"course",
"HackadayU",
"online learning",
"radio",
"RF",
"seminar"
] | We don’t normally embrace the supernatural here at Hackaday, but when the topic turns to the radio frequency world, Arthur C. Clarke’s maxim about sufficiently advanced technology being akin to magic pretty much works for us. In the RF realm, the rules of electricity, at least the basic ones, don’t seem to apply, or if they do apply, it’s often with a, “Yeah, but…” caveat that’s sometimes hard to get one’s head around.
Perhaps nowhere does the RF world seem more magical than in antenna design. Sure, an antenna can be as simple as a straight piece or two of wire, but even in their simplest embodiments, antennas belie a complexity that can really be daunting to newbie and vet alike. That’s why we were happy to recently host Karen Rucker’s
Introduction to Antenna Basics course
as part of Hackaday U.
The class was held over a five-week period starting back in May, and we’ve just posted the edited videos for everyone to enjoy. The class is lead by Karen Rucker, an RF engineer specializing in antenna designs for spacecraft who clearly knows her business. I’ve watched the
first video of the series
and so far and really enjoy Karen’s style and the material she has chosen to highlight; just the bit about antenna polarization and why circular polarization makes sense for space communications was really useful. I’m keen to dig into
the rest of the series playlist
soon.
The 2021 session of Hackaday U may be wrapped up now, but fear not — there’s plenty of material available to look over and learn from. Head over to
the course list on Hackaday.io
, pick something that strikes your fancy, and let the learning begin! | 21 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364449",
"author": "abjq",
"timestamp": "2021-07-15T17:06:36",
"content": "Look like a good watch.What surprises me in the electromagnetic wave diagrams is that the E and B fields seem to be “in phase”.Intuitively it would be the rate of change of E that produces B (so a peak of B ... | 1,760,373,018.790116 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/15/a-perfect-clock-for-any-hackers-ohm/ | A Perfect Clock For Any Hacker’s Ohm | Adam Zeloof | [
"ATtiny Hacks",
"hardware"
] | [
"attiny",
"clock",
"neopixel",
"resistor",
"rgb",
"time"
] | The vast majority of us are satisfied with a standard, base ten display for representing time. Fewer of us like to be a bit old-fashioned and use a dial with a couple of hands that indicate the time, modulo twelve. And an even smaller minority, with a true love for the esoteric, are a fan of binary readouts. Well, there’s a new time-telling game in town, and as far as we’re concerned it’s one of the best ones yet: resistor color codes.
The Ohm Clock is, as you may have guessed, a giant model of a resistor that uses its color bands to represent time.
Each of the four bands represents a digit in the standard HH:MM representation of time, and for anybody well-versed in resistor codes this is sure to be a breeze to read. The clock itself was designed by [John Bradnam]. It’s body is 3D printed, with RGB LEDs to brightly illuminate each segment. The whole thing is controlled by an old favorite – an ATtiny, supported by a Real Time Clock (RTC) chip for accurate timekeeping.
You can set the time in the traditional fashion using buttons, or — and here’s the brilliant part — you can use a resistor. Yup, that’s right. Connecting a 220 Ohm resistor across two terminals on the clock will set the time to 2:20. Genius.
When you come across an art as old as timekeeping, it’s easy to assume that everything’s already been done. We have sundials, hourglasses, analog clocks, digital watches,
those cool clocks that use words instead of numbers
, the list goes on. That’s why it’s so exciting to see a new (and fun!) idea like this one emerge. | 29 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364420",
"author": "scott.tx",
"timestamp": "2021-07-15T15:47:59",
"content": "just the incentive I needed to learn resistor codes, ha.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6364727",
"author": "Feinfinger (supervillain and... | 1,760,373,018.938185 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/15/black-starts-how-the-grid-gets-restarted/ | Black Starts: How The Grid Gets Restarted | Dan Maloney | [
"Featured",
"Interest",
"Original Art",
"Slider"
] | [
"black start",
"electrical grid",
"generator",
"grid",
"infrastructure",
"power generation",
"power plant"
] | Gripped as we are at the time of this writing by a historic heatwave, it’s hard for those of us in the western United States to picture a time when cold and ice reigned across the land. But really, it was only about four months back that another bit of freakish weather was visited across most of the country, including places ill-equipped to deal with the consequences. The now-fabled “February Freeze” left millions, mostly in Texas, scrabbling about in the dark and cold as a series of cascading engineering failures took apart their electrical grid, piece by piece, county by county.
The event has been much discussed and dissected, as an event with such far-reaching impact should be. Like much discussion these days, precious little of it is either informed or civil, and that’s not good news for those seeking to understand what happened and how to prevent it from happening again, or at least to mitigate the effects somewhat. Part of that is understandable, given the life-disrupting and often life-threatening situations the disaster forced people to suddenly face. It’s also difficult for people to discuss an event so widespread in its scope and impact — there’s just too much for anyone to wrap their head around.
To make the present discussion a little easier, we’ll be focusing on one aspect of the February grid crash that’s often bandied about but rarely explained: that
the Texas grid was mere minutes away from collapsing completely
, and that it would have taken weeks or months to restore had it been able to slip away. Is that really possible? Can the power grid just “go away” completely and suddenly? The answer, sadly, is yes, but thankfully a lot of thought has been put into not only preventing it from happening but also how to restart everything if it does happen, by performing what’s known as a “Black Start.”
All That Overhead
By some measures, the planet’s electrical grid is the largest and most complex machine we’ve ever built. It seems a fair claim; in the USA and Canada alone, the transmission grid has over 120,000 miles (190,000 km) of lines that stretch across the entire continent. And that’s just the system to move bulk electricity from where it’s produced to substations located near population centers; add in the millions of miles of cable that form the distribution system that connects individual customers, and you begin to see the sheer size of the system. Then consider that this system has over 10,000 generation plants, each of which has to be synchronized with all the other plants regardless of demand, and the complexity involved starts to reveal itself.
That’s one big machine. Every power plant and transmission line in the conterminous United States. Everything in this map has to work in unison, regardless of load or local conditions. Source:
US Energy Information Agency
With all the equipment in place to make the power grid work over such a wide area, it’s hard to recall that this was not always the case. The North American grid of today grew bit by bit, starting mainly in the population centers of the east and midwest, electrifying first the cities and later spreading out into the rural areas. Building on existing systems allowed power companies to not only leverage the hard-won knowledge of what works and what doesn’t work when stringing up wires and connecting customers, but also to provide the power needed for their new generation facilities. The simple fact is that it takes power to make power, and that’s the heart of the black start problem.
Power generation is simple in theory, and we all learned the basics at one time or another — turn potential energy into kinetic energy to spin a magnet inside a big coil of wire. But the details are where the complexity lies. For example, in a coal power plant, milling the raw coal to the proper size to be used as fuel in the boilers takes power, as do the conveyors that feed the boilers, the actuators that control the valves, the sensors and control systems that regulate the speed of the turbines, and the switchgear that connects the generators to the grid. It takes power to make power, and a power plant can use a significant fraction of its own power. When a plant can turn out 700 megawatts or more, the overhead load needed to run — or restart — a plant can be huge.
Aside from the equipment needed to fuel and control the power plant, there’s another piece of the black start puzzle that may come into play: excitation current. Most power plants use self-excited generators, meaning a small amount of the current they produce is used to power the field coils of the generator, creating the powerful magnetic field needed to generate electricity. Once a self-excited generator spins to a stop, there’s no current available to excite the field coils. For short outages, that’s generally not a problem, as the residual magnetism of the iron in the generator’s rotor will be enough to start a weak flow of current, which will then excite the field coils and allow the generator to come up to full capacity.
Extended outages, however, may cause a rotor’s magnetic field to weaken enough that it will need a little help getting going. Black start procedures need to account for this eventuality by providing a means to “flash” the field windings with external power. The process for smaller generators is very similar, and it’s worth keeping in mind for anyone who stores a generator without actually taking it out and using it occasionally. Just keep in mind that for a power plant, it’s going to take much more than a hand drill to flash the windings.
Generators? What Generators?
Assuming an idled power plant is still connected to the transmission system, and assuming other plants within the region are still operating, the black start process is pretty simple — just take the power from the grid using switchgear and transformers the plant has for just this purpose. But in the case of a regional catastrophe — like the Texas winter storm, where condensate at natural gas wellheads and in the lines supplying power plants froze solid, pinching off fuel to dozens of operators — plants over a wide area may all go down together, making it impossible to import the power needed to restart. This condition is called “islanding”, and this is where the power plant’s black start procedure comes into play.
Utilities are understandably reluctant to share details publicly, but black starts of islanded plants are generally a cascade of operations where successively larger emergency generators are brought online, until enough power is available to black start the main generator. The process usually starts with diesel generators, which produce enough power to keep the power plant’s lights and control systems on. This will allow operators to start a larger generator, perhaps a gas turbine cogenerator, which then provides enough power to run the pumps, valves, feeds, and switchgear of one of the main generators in the plant. Once one of those is turning, the rest of the generators in the plant can start, and service can be restored.
All the procedures for black starting an islanded power plant are carefully documented, and the plans are supposed to be practiced at regular intervals to make sure everything works. Unfortunately, when crunch time came in Texas last February, and multiple power plants were islanded, the black start process was anything but smooth.
One report
said that nine out of thirteen generators designated as primary black start units were found to be not working, while six of the fifteen generators designated to back up the primary black start generators were also down. The problems with generators ranged from freeze damage to fuel issues, including the inability of trucks to deliver fuel oil on icy roads.
At the risk of oversimplifying a complex and far-flung series of events, for want of a set of tire chains, Texas came astonishingly close to losing their power not just for a couple of days, but for weeks or possibly months. It didn’t happen in this case, but only just barely and by several strokes of luck. We’ve no doubt that a lot of engineering skill and ingenuity went into getting the reluctant black start generators back online, too, so hats off to everyone who worked hard to avert the catastrophe. Hopefully, this will serve as a wake-up call, and that some thought will be put into how to better engineer the whole black start system, not only in Texas but at every power plant in the world. | 96 | 25 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364399",
"author": "Tehp Enismightier",
"timestamp": "2021-07-15T14:05:23",
"content": "I’ve never seen an article that mentioned and showed exciting a generator to get it to generate again…..I’ve done it once myself and taught an NPC how a few weeks ago from FB marketplace",
"... | 1,760,373,019.07019 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/15/amazon-drones-dont-go-far/ | Amazon Drones Don’t Go Far | Al Williams | [
"News"
] | [
"amazon",
"automated delivery",
"drone",
"robot"
] | If you are like us, you’ve wondered what all the hoopla about drones making home deliveries is about. Our battery-operated vehicles carry very little payload and still don’t have a very long range. Add sophisticated smarts and a couple of delivery packages and you are going to need a lot more battery. Or maybe not.
Amazon’s recent patent filing
shows a different way to do it.
In the proposed scheme, a delivery truck drives to a neighborhood and then deploys a bunch of wheeled or walking drones to deliver in the immediate area. Not only does that reduce the range requirement, but there are other advantages, as well.
For one, you’d expect the truck will keep the drones at full charge. In addition, most of the smarts for the drones live in the truck itself. The truck can track the drone position and calculate routes, commanding the relatively dumb drones to do what they are told. There’s even a provision for launching an aerial drone to help monitor the delivery robots.
Of course, you assume the main vehicle could also be autonomous, but too large to, say, drive up to your doorstep and drop off a box. So, when you think about it, it makes sense to have one robot bring a smaller robot or robots to handle the actual delivery. Is it really patentable? Don’t ask us, we aren’t lawyers.
What would the little drones look like? Maybe
like this
? We wonder if they’d communicate via
Sidewalk
? | 41 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364345",
"author": "Pritchard",
"timestamp": "2021-07-15T11:08:52",
"content": "Are the actually autonomous or controlled by people in a less economically developed country?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6364353",
"... | 1,760,373,018.865411 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/15/using-ghidra-to-extract-a-router-configuration-encryption-key/ | Using Ghidra To Extract A Router Configuration Encryption Key | Maya Posch | [
"Security Hacks",
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"Ghidra",
"router hacking"
] | Who doesn’t know the struggle? Buying an interesting piece of hardware for a song and a dance, and then finding that the device’s firmware and/or configuration file is locked down with various encryption or obfuscation methods. This was
the experience [Ali Raheem] had
when he got a
TP-Link TL-MR3020 V3
for a mere 18 British Pounds, intending to use this 4G-capable router to increase internet reliability.
Naturally this can all be done when staying inside the vendor-provided marked lines, which in this case meant ignoring the encrypted configuration files. As the owner of the hardware, this was of course unacceptable and thus [Ali] got a firmware image from the TP-Link site to see what could be gleaned from it in terms of encryption keys and other hints.
After obtaining the TP-Link-provided BIN file, the application of
binwalk
helpfully extracted the files embedded in it, followed by
John the ripper
decrypting the passwords in the
/etc/passwd.bak
file, and ultimately finding the encrypted
/etc/default_config.xml
file. Searching for this filename string in the rest of the extracted files led to
/lib/libcmm.so
.
Dropping this shared library file into
Ghidra
to disassemble its code, [Ali] found a function suspiciously called
decryptFile
. Inside was a reference to the global key string, which when tossed into OpenSSL and after some fiddling turned out to decrypt the XML configuration file in
des-ecdb
mode. From this point dropping in one’s own configuration files should be no problem after encrypting them to make the firmware happy. Nice work! | 24 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364303",
"author": "Alphatek",
"timestamp": "2021-07-15T08:05:07",
"content": "It’s a shame that OpenWRT has got too big to support this and the WR-703n – they’re nice little (with the emphasis on little for the 703n!) boxes.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": ... | 1,760,373,019.610232 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/14/down-the-fabrication-rabbit-hole-to-build-a-recumbent-bike/ | Down The Fabrication Rabbit Hole To Build A Recumbent Bike | Mike Szczys | [
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"bike hacks",
"brazing",
"conduit",
"recumbent",
"recumbent bicycle",
"tube bender"
] | ‘Tis the time of the year to find as many reasons as possible to shut off the smartphone and get yourself outside. [Rich Olson’s] newest excuse is
a recumbent bicycle he built from at least three donor bikes
. Of course we’ve seen any number of bike mods over the years (
the tall bikes that integrate a ladder
to climb up to the saddle have always held a special place in our hearts), but [Rich] left us a nice trail of bread crumbs on how to get into this yourself without breaking the bank.
He worked from
a set of open source plans
, with additional instructions laid out by [Brian in Ohio] in
a bicycle hacking series on the Hacker Public Radio podcast
. We learn in the first installment that you can get your hands on a torch that uses oxygen and MAP gas to braze the pipe joints — a quick Duck Duck Go search turns up kits that have the torch and both gases for about eighty bucks. Ask around your neighbourhood and you’re likely to find some bike frames from the disused and broken cycles lurking in dark garage corners. That first podcast page even has images that show you how to lay out fishmouth cuts where the tubes will meet.
But what really grabbed our attention is the tube bending for the recumbent seat. This is a speciality part that you’re not going to be able to salvage from traditional bikes. [Rich’s] project shows off this image of a bend template and the two main rails he used from the seat; but how did he make those bends? The third episode of [Brian in Ohio’s] series covers
the one simple trick that electricians don’t want you to know
. Those rails are made out of electrical conduit and you can easily buy/rent/borrow a commonplace conduit bending tool which has the handy advantage of including angle guides.
You’ll find [Rich’s] video after the break which begins with a slideshow and ends with a demo ride. That lets us see the lacing on the back side of the seat fabric that keeps it taught, yet comfy in a way a standard bike saddle just can’t be.
If this still hasn’t convinced you to pick up a torch, you can also
build a recumbent with a wooden frame
. | 13 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364334",
"author": "Stajp",
"timestamp": "2021-07-15T09:49:00",
"content": "There is a Facebook group dedicated to homebuilt recumbents.Not all of them have nice videos, but there is everything from top-notch builds to stuff that will fall apart after one rain…https://www.facebook.... | 1,760,373,019.124421 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/14/peeking-inside-a-volcano-sensor/ | Peeking Inside A Volcano Sensor | Chris Lott | [
"Science"
] | [
"hawaii",
"sensor",
"sulfur dioxide",
"volcano"
] | On a recent walk through the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, [Andrew Cooper] stumbled upon an
unlocked monitoring station
. Being an engineer, he couldn’t resist taking a look. This station is one of a network of sulfur dioxide (SO2) monitoring stations installed around the park to keep an eye on volcanic emissions. Unsurprisingly, sulfur dioxide is unhealthy to breathe. Sensors like these keep people informed about local conditions before taking their strolls among the volcanic foothills, enjoying gorgeous vistas as [Andrew] describes it.
[Andrew] wasn’t particularly surprised at the contents of the station, since he builds similar equipment in his day job. Continuous power is provided by lead acid batteries kept charged by an array of three mis-matched solar panels. There are duplicate SO2 monitors, an air particulate meter, and a standard weather station affixed to the top. Data is logged on-site and reported up the chain by a cell-phone modem. [Andrew] wasn’t impressed with the workmanship, noting:
It appeared as if the circuits were wired by a ham-handed grad student with no sense of pride in their work.
Tracking the atmospheric SO2 levels near volcanoes not only helps hikers and park rangers plan their outdoor activities. Gaseous emissions from volcanoes are one of a number of measurements that geologists rely on to monitor and predict volcanic activity, as this sketch from the USGS website depicts.
Have you worked on any projects involving unattended monitoring stations like this, or encountered them in the wild like [Andrew]? Let us know in the comments below. | 21 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364228",
"author": "Charlie",
"timestamp": "2021-07-15T02:20:03",
"content": "The wiring inside that box might work, but one bump and it won’t. I agree that the individual who wired it has zero pride in their work. To do things right does take longer, but not that much longer, and ... | 1,760,373,019.196735 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/14/design-a-custom-enclosure-using-modelling-clay-and-photogrammetry/ | Design A Custom Enclosure Using Modelling Clay And Photogrammetry | Maya Posch | [
"how-to"
] | [
"cad",
"Photogrammetry"
] | When it comes to designing enclosures which aren’t simple boxes or other basic shapes, the design process tends to get somewhat tedious and involved as the number of measurements to be transferred into the CAD program begins to skyrocket. One possible shortcut here is detailed by [Sebastian Sokolowski], who
describes a process
that combines modelling clay with
photogrammetry
.
[Sebastian] covers the design of a hand-held controller that should fit ergonomically when grasped. This starts off with the electronics and mechanical components that have to fit inside the controller: inside a CAD tool (demonstrated in Fusion 360), these components are arranged with a simple box enclosure around them. This box is then 3D printed and with modelling clay the desired shape of the controller is created around this box.
With a modelling clay version of the controller ready, it is photographed from as many angles as possible before these photos are processed by the open source
Meshroom
tool into a 3D model. After fixing up some issues in the mesh and knocking down the vertex count on this model so that the CAD tool doesn’t suffer a seizure importing it, it’s ready for final processing.
Within the CAD tool all that is left now is to refine the imported model to refine its outer shape and to create the inner details for mounting the electronics, switches and other components. | 12 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364216",
"author": "Bradley Woods",
"timestamp": "2021-07-15T00:25:06",
"content": "Just brilliant! Organic shapes are such a challenge in CAD… I think you may have discovered a New Normal.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "636... | 1,760,373,019.333999 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/14/analog-style-vu-meter-with-arduino-and-oled-display/ | Analog Style VU Meter With Arduino And OLED Display | Tom Nardi | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"Musical Hacks"
] | [
"digital gauge",
"oled",
"sound reactive",
"ssd1306",
"VU meter"
] | Looking for a digital recreation of the classic analog volume unit (VU) meter? If you’ve got an Arduino, a few passive components, and a SSD1306 OLED,
then [mircemk] might have the answer for you
. As you can see in the video below, his code turns a handful of cheap parts into an attractive and functional audio display.
The project’s Hackaday.IO page explains that the idea is based on the work of [stevenart], with code adapted for the SSD1306 display and some tweaks made to the circuit. While [mircemk] says the code could be modified for stereo as long as the two displays don’t have conflicting I2C addresses, he decided to simply duplicate the whole setup for each channel to keep things simple. With as cheap as some of these parts are nowadays, it’s hard to blame him.
[mircemk] has provided source code for a couple different styles of VU indicators, the colors of which can easily be inverted depending on your tastes. He also clarifies that the jerky motion of the virtual “needle” seen in the video is due to the camera; in real-life it sweeps smoothly like the genuine article.
Much like the project that aimed to
recreate authentic “steam gauges” with e-paper displays
, this as an excellent technique to file away for use in the future. Compared to authentic analog gauges, these digital recreations are quicker and faster to implement, plus going this route
prevents any antique hardware from going on the chopping block
. | 20 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364162",
"author": "reg",
"timestamp": "2021-07-14T21:53:17",
"content": "Nice looking but a lot f electronics to replace a simple meter. These may cost a bit less to make, but I am old school and I like the look of large real meters. The pictures of this have to be life size or ... | 1,760,373,019.394157 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/14/end-of-an-era-ntsc-finally-goes-dark-in-america/ | End Of An Era: NTSC Finally Goes Dark In America | Jenny List | [
"History"
] | [
"frankenfm",
"ntsc",
"television"
] | A significant event in the history of technology happened yesterday, and it passed so quietly that we almost missed it.
The last few remaining NTSC transmitters in the USA finally came off air
, marking the end of over seven decades of continuous 525-line American analogue TV broadcasts.
We’ve previously reported on the output of these channels
, largely the so-called “FrankenFM” stations left over after the 2009 digital switchover whose sound carrier lay at the bottom of the FM dial as radio stations, and
noted their impending demise
. We’ve even
reported on some of the intricacies of the NTSC system
, but we’ve never taken a look at what will replace these last few FrankenFM stations.
If you are an American you may have heard of
ATSC 3.0
, perhaps by its marketing name of NextGen TV. Just like the DVB-T2 standard found in other parts of the world, it’s an upgrade to digital TV standards to allow for more recent video compression technologies and higher definition broadcasts. It has
an interesting backwards compatibility feature absent in previous ATSC versions
; there is the option of narrowing the digital bandwidth from 6 MHz to 5.5 MHz, and transmitting an analogue FM subcarrier where the old NTSC sound carrier on the same channel would have sat. Thus the FrankenFM stations have the option of upgrading to ATSC 3.0 and transmitting a digital channel package alongside their existing FM radio station. It’s reported that this switchover is happening, with
one example
given in the Twitter thread linked above.
The inexorable march of technology has thus given better quality TV alongside the retention of the FrankenFMs. We have to admit to being sorry to see the passing of analogue TV, it was
an intricate and fascinating system
that provided a testbed for plenty of experimentation back in the day. Perhaps as we see it slip over the horizon it’s worth pondering whether its digital replacement will also become an anachronism in an age of on-demand streaming TV, after all it shouldn’t have escaped most people’s attention that in 2021 the good TV content no longer comes to your screen via an antenna socket. Meanwhile we’ll keep our CRTs running, just in case we ever want to relive a 1980s night in with a VHS tape of
Back To The Future
.
Header image: Mysid,
Public domain
. | 78 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364105",
"author": "John Fenderson",
"timestamp": "2021-07-14T18:41:49",
"content": "“The inexorable march of technology has thus given better quality TV”Not in my area. Every broadcast TV station around here has MUCH worse quality than they had with analog TV.",
"parent_id": n... | 1,760,373,019.501502 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/14/the-case-of-the-mysterious-driveline-noise/ | The Case Of The Mysterious Driveline Noise | Lewin Day | [
"car hacks",
"Hackaday Columns",
"Original Art"
] | [
"car",
"car hacks",
"cars",
"differential",
"mercedes",
"mercedes benz"
] | Spend enough time on the automotive classifieds and you’ll end up finding a deal that’s too good to pass up. The latest of these in one’s own case was a Mercedes-Benz sedan, just past its twentieth birthday and in surprisingly tidy condition. At less than $3,000, the 1998 E240 was too good to pass up and simply had to be seen.
The car in question. Clean bodywork is too tempting to resist, even if there are mechanical issues.
The car was clean, too clean for asking price. Of course, a test drive revealed the car had one major flaw – an annoying hum from the drivetrain that seemed to vary with speed. Overall though, mechanical problems are often cheaper and easier to fix than bodywork, so a gamble was taken on the German sedan. The first order of business was to diagnose and rectify the issue.
Characterise, Research, Investigate
The first step to hunting down any noise is to characterise it as much as possible. In this case, the noise was most noticeable when the car was traveling at speeds from 40 km/h – 60 km/h, present as a vibrational humming noise. The location of the noise source was unclear. Importantly, the noise varied with the speed of the car, raising in pitch at higher speeds and dropping as speeds decreased. Engine speed had no effect on noise whatsoever, and the noise was present regardless of gear selected in the transmission, including neutral.
A worn wheel bearing can create an annoying noise when travelling at speed.
All the above tells us that the noise is not coming from the engine, and likely isn’t coming from the transmission either, barring perhaps the output bearing. The fact that the noise varies with speed tells us that it is coming from something that’s moving in relationship to wheel speed. This could thus be a wheel or tire out of balance, worn wheel bearings or brakes, a noisy differential, or an issue with the driveshaft, its associated bearings, or couplings. That’s a lot to be going on with, and far too much to simply go about replacing parts until the noise goes away. The source of the noise had to be narrowed down if it was to be fixed. This can often be difficult, as components like the suspension and driveshaft can transfer or magnify the noise, obscuring its original location.
Prior to purchase, with the noise quite obvious, due diligence meant doing enough research to ensure the problem wasn’t likely to be catastrophic. Searching forums for common sources of noise revealed the W210 series to have a relatively solid transmission and engine, with everything else downstream in the drivetrain comparatively simple and easy to fix if it was defective. Thus, the car was bought for the price of $2650 Australian dollars, with an earnest belief the problem could be rectified without excessive expenditure.
There are precisely this many bearings in the car’s differential. If any one of them is excessively worn, it could create driveline noise. The pinion bearing is usually the culprit, as it can often receive poor lubrication or excessive load.
To rule out wheel bearing issues, the car was jacked up, and wheels rocked back and forth to check for play. None was found, and similarly the noise was noted not to vary regardless of steering load on the wheels, suggesting the bearings were sound. Visual inspection showed the wheels to be in good condition and tyres to be only a year old; given the inconvenience of sourcing another set to test on the car, they too were set aside at this stage of the investigation. Brakes were also ruled out, as the sound didn’t change whether they were applied or not, and the noise was not the typical grinding sound associated with such parts.
To look further into the drivetrain, the car was placed up on jackstands. This would allow inspection of the differential, driveshaft, rubber driveshaft couplings, and the driveshaft’s center supporting bearing. With some struggle, the rear driveshaft coupling was removed, indicating some age, but overall, the rubber was intact. There was seemingly nothing wrong with the driveshaft or its center bearing, either.
The differential, however, was another story. Rocking the input back and forth revealed significant play in the pinion. The differential would make a noticable clunk when the pinion was jiggled to and fro as it hit the teeth of the ring gear. Some play is normal, but a hunch suggested this was at excessive levels. The pinion also exhibited obvious play fore and aft, suggesting something was sorely wrong with the differential. Turning the pinion by hand also revealed a somewhat crunchy feeling, suggesting bearings in the differential may be worn – a surefire cause of a noisy driveline.
At this point, the vehicle was sent to a mechanic’s workshop for evaluation, and ideally, a new differential. The mechanics were able to readily identify the source of the noise as coming from the differential’s pinion by running the car in gear while on a lift, and localising the noise with a stethoscope. This is unsafe to try on jackstands, but is simple to do in a mechanic’s workshop. It proved useful to verify the differential was indeed the problem. The loudest noise could clearly be heard emanating from the differential itself, even if the driveshaft was acting as somewhat of a speaker to amplify the noise elsewhere on the car. It could also be achieved with a more modern tool,
commonly known as “chassis ears”.
These allow microphones to be placed around the car to easily diagnose problem noises at the source, even while driving around. These kits are nevertheless expensive and often out of reach of the home mechanic. (But might make a nice DIY project on their own.)
The Repair
With the source of the noise now identified, the differential needed to be replaced. With parts difficult to find locally, the job was beyond what the workshop was willing to take on, so naturally it became a DIY job to find and install another differential. Sadly, Mercedes-Benz owners have not historically spent much time working on their own vehicles, meaning DIY manuals simply don’t exist for many models. Instead, the best method for finding clear workshop instructions is to purchase access to the Mercedes-Benz WIS information system through grey-market sellers on various online marketplaces.
Modern Mercedes-Benz vehicles often use E-Torx bolts. Investment in the correct tooling to deal with these should be budgeted into any repair. These bolts were the hardest to remove in the whole repair.
Armed with factory instructions on how to execute the fix, and a good quality used differential from another E-class Mercedes, the only thing left to do was to change over the parts. A differential swap is an intermediate-level job for the shadetree mechanic, requiring some care to avoid being crushed in the process of removal and installation. A custom tool was required to avoid this, in the form of a cradle to support the differential during removal and to help lift the new one into place. Those who can muster a serious bench press number might find it unnecessary, but by and large, it’s better to have a structure in place to hold the differential rather than risking dropping it on one’s own face. Other than that, it’s a simple job requiring the removal of just three main support bolts and a handful of smaller fasteners that hold on the half shafts.
The process naturally proved more difficult than expected. Eight hours were lost tangling with the E-Torx bolts that hold the half-shafts on to the differential output flanges, mostly in yelling, frustration, and trips back to the store for new tools. Eventually, the combination of a large breaker bar and impact wrench got the bolts free. An important thing to note is that an impact gun with a nearly-dead battery may sound like it’s working fine, but its strength is greatly diminished. Recharged batteries make all the difference for the more difficult bolts out there.
A cradle was built out of the very pallet the part was shipped on to enable the differential to be safely removed and replaced. It mimics the custom tool visible in the service illustration above.
The difficulty of loosening the flange bolts lead to further complications. To get a clear shot at loosening them, the rear CV joint boots had to be moved, necessitating their reclamping during reassembly. This required the purchase of new tools solely to reclamp them in place. Removing them also lead to molybdenum grease getting absolutely everywhere. Useful techniques were learned along the way, however, such as jacking up the rear suspension in order to change the angle of the half-shaft to the differential, making access to certain bolts much easier.
Once the old differential was removed, it was comparatively easy to lift the new one in place, and get everything installed as it should be. The homebrewed jack cradle proved invaluable here, as it’s difficult to lift a 30 kg differential into place while simultaneously tightening up the bolts on one’s own. Thanks to the sealed design, the new differential could also be filled with the appropriate lubrication before installation in the car, making the whole process a much cleaner affair. It was tempting to take the opportunity to handle other maintenance jobs while the car was up on jackstands. However, any mistakes could lead to confusion if noises or other issues were present after the differential swap. Thus, the differential was completed, and other work left for a later date.
The new differential, sitting snugly in the rear subframe. Barely visible is a dark splotch of oil by the differential pinion. This may have been due to a spill, or it may be evidence the replacement differential has a leaking pinion seal. Careful monitoring will be required to avoid ruining the replacement differential in short order.
With the car put back together, it was taken out for its first drive with bated breath. Gloriously, the dreaded noise was absent, and the reward was a quiet, comfortable German sedan. Taking around 22 hours of my own unskilled time, and having spent $500 on tooling and fluids, it came out feeling like a win compared to the $1,200 a local garage quoted for the same job. Given that professional mechanics with proper equipment could likely do the same job in under six hours flat, going it alone was surely the right move. As a bonus, plenty was learned along the way.
Noises should be investigated methodically, and ideally localised to a single component prior to replacing any parts if one is to succeed. Patience is also key, to avoid costly mistakes such as rounding off bolts or stripping threads along the way. Overall though, the key is to trust in your ability to learn, and to investigate a problem until you understand what is happening at a fundamental level. Only then will you guarantee that the issue can be properly fixed. | 31 | 20 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364086",
"author": "SteveS",
"timestamp": "2021-07-14T17:13:41",
"content": ">> Visual inspection showed the wheels to be in good condition and tyres to be only a year old; given>> the inconvenience of sourcing another set to test on the car, they too were set aside at this stageIf... | 1,760,373,020.318632 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/14/big-3d-printed-lamp-tries-some-new-features/ | Big 3D-Printed Lamp Tries Some New Features | Donald Papp | [
"3d Printer hacks",
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"3d printed",
"lamp",
"lampshade",
"LED filament",
"PETG",
"UMMD 3D Printer"
] | In lamp design, bulbs are usually given generous clearances because they get hot during use. LED bulbs however give off comparatively little heat, which opens a few new doors. [Mark Rehorst] created this
huge 3D printed lamp, made with his custom 3D printer and a hefty 1 mm diameter nozzle
, and the resulting device not only looks great, but shows off a few neat design features.
The LED filament bulb doesn’t give off much heat, so a PETG partial shade mounted directly to the bulb works fine.
[Mark] printed a partial shade in PETG that is made to sit directly on the bulb itself. The back of the shade is open, allowing light to spill out from behind while the front of the bulb is shielded, making it easier on the eyes. The result is pretty nifty, as you can see here. It sits in the center of the 600 mm tall lamp, which takes up most of the build volume of
his self-made CoreXY-based printer, the UMMD
.
The LED filament strands in this style of bulb are pretty neat in their own way, and some of you may remember that when they first became available as separate components,
no time was lost in finding out what made them tick
. | 10 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364071",
"author": "MW",
"timestamp": "2021-07-14T16:05:47",
"content": "That’s a nice looking lamp and Dr. Rehorst’s blog is a great read. I’d love to build a Dominator myself, however it’s a bit on the large side and the wife would object. :D",
"parent_id": null,
"depth":... | 1,760,373,019.553032 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/14/hands-on-with-the-raspberry-pi-poe-hat/ | Hands On With The Raspberry Pi POE+ HAT | Jonathan Bennett | [
"Featured",
"Raspberry Pi",
"Reviews",
"Slider"
] | [
"Hackaday Review",
"poe hat",
"raspberry pi"
] | There’s a lot happening in the world of Pi. Just when we thought the Raspberry Pi Foundation were going to take a break, they announced
a new PoE+ HAT (Hardware Attached on Top) for the Pi B3+ and Pi 4
, and just as soon as preorders opened up I placed my order.
Now I know what you’re thinking, don’t we already have PoE HATs for the Pis that support it? Well yes, the
Pi PoE HAT was released back in 2018
, and while there were some problems with it, those issues got cleared up through a recall and minor redesign. Since then, we’ve all happily used those HATs to provide up to 2.5 amps at 5 volts to the Pi, with the caveat that the USB ports are limited to a combined 1.2 amps of current.
$20 for either of them. Choose wisely.
The Raspberry Pi 4 came along, and suddenly the board itself can pull over 7 watts at load. Combined with 6 watts of power for a hungry USB device or two, and we’ve exceeded the nominal 12.5 watt power budget. As a result, a handful of users that were trying to use the Pi 4 with POE were hitting power issues when powering something like dual SSD drives over USB. The obvious solution is to make the PoE HAT provide more power, but the original HAT was already at the limit of 802.3af PoE could provide, with a maximum power output of 12.95 watts.
The solution the Raspberry Pi Foundation came up with was to produce a new product, the PoE+ HAT, and sell it along side the older HAT for the same $20. The common name for 802.3at is “PoE+”, which was designed specifically for higher power devices, maxing out at 30 watts. The PoE+ HAT is officially rated to output 20 watts of power, 5 volts at 4 amps. These are the output stats, so the efficiency numbers don’t count against your power budget, and neither does the built-in fan.
More Watts Than We Bargained For
The official specs don’t tell the full story, evidenced by the initial announcement that claimed 5 amps instead of 4. That discrepancy bugged me enough, I reached out to the man himself, CEO [Eben Upton]. The head honcho confirmed:
The spec is that it will supply 20W, but it’s been designed to 25W to give us some engineering margin
So if you want to be super conservative, and ensure the longest possible life, keep your power draw at or under 20 watts. I tested the HAT to the point where it gave up, and not to let the cat out of the bag, 25 watts is still a bit conservative. More on that later.
We know there’s a lot of available power here, but it’s not exactly easy to get to. For instance, the Pi 4 can push up to
1.2 Amps of power through the USB ports
. At 5 volts, that’s only 6 watts of power, where’s the rest? In theory there’s a simple answer, as the HAT delivers power back through the 5v GPIO pins. All we need to do is jumper on to those pins and… Those pins don’t protrude through the HAT at all.
Really an amateur job, but it works!
I would have loved to see an official solution to make the GPIO pins accessible with the HAT on, and not a inelegant solution like using those hokey pin extenders that were recommended for the original PoE HAT. Are we foiled, then? Nope. You see, there’s a good 1/4 inch of GPIO pin visible between the Pi and the HAT. It’s just enough room for a good old fashioned wire-wrapped connection, along with some solder for safety.
OK, now we have access to more than 6 watts of power. There are two obvious questions: How much power, and what can we do with it? To kill two birds with one proverbial stone, I grabbed a string of RGB LEDs and wired the voltage supply directly into the 5v rail. The PoE+ HAT has a wonderful feature — it adds a sysnode that tells you exactly how much current the HAT is providing.
cat /sys/devices/platform/rpi-poe-power-supply@0/power_supply/rpi-poe/current_now
For testing the HAT, I invented a new unit of measure, the Cyberpunk Neon-purple Pixel. I used the PoE+ HAT to measure the power consumed by the Pi and Pixels, also recorded the power use reported by the PoE switch, and used a non-contact IR thermometer to find the hottest point on the HAT after a few minutes of powering the LED strip.
I've invented a new unit of power consumption: cyberpunk neon purple LEDs. Here's 100 CNPs.
pic.twitter.com/aiNEiwfNDc
— Jonathan Bennett (@jp_bennett)
July 5, 2021
I repeated the experiment with the original PoE HAT, and
you can review my raw results if you’d like
. There are a couple minor caveats, mostly related to temperature measurement. My IR Thermometer doesn’t provide the rich data that a full IR camera does. Additionally, I was limited to measuring just one side of the PoE boards. I believe that the hottest spots on the original PoE HAT are on the underside of the board, while on the new HAT, seem to be on the side facing away from the Pi — that’s a win in itself. All that to say, my temperature measurements of the original HAT are probably quite a bit too low.
More Launch Problems?
So remember how the first iteration of the PoE HAT had some problems? The big one was that some USB devices could trip the over-current protection at much lower levels than they should have. There was the additional issue of
the board getting ridiculously hot at full load
. There have been
reports of the PoE+ version having some similar launch warts
. The problems that have been identified are: high temperature, high power draw from the HAT itself at idle, the 1.2 amp USB limit, a long bolt that contacts the camera connector, a louder fan, and odd behavior when powering the Pi and HAT over the USB C connector. I’ll step through these one at a time. These are legitimate concerns, and I’m not necessarily here to debunk them, but I will put them in context of my own testing. Edit: Shoutout to Jeff Geerling and Martin Rowan, linked above and below, for their early work on reviewing the PoE+ HAT.
First up is temperature. The PoE+ HAT measures nearly 52°C at idle, at its hottest measured point. That is quite warm, and is hotter than the 44.5°C I observed on the original PoE HAT under similar conditions. This seems to be in contention with what [Eben] had to say about temperatures:
Thanks to improved thermal design it should run cooler (measured at the hottest point on an uncased board) at any load.
I can think of one explanation that satisfies all the observations. The original HAT’s hottest point is between the HAT and the Pi itself. This is observable in the EEVBlog video linked above. I tested with the HATs installed on the Pis, making it essentially impossible to get a reading on the underside. Setting that explanation aside, my measurements indicated that the original HAT got very hot at higher power outputs, while the PoE+ HAT stayed quite stable. Above 7 watts of power output, the new HAT ran cooler as per my measurements.
The PoE+ HAT pulls 4.9+ watts of power to run an idling Raspberry Pi 4. The original HAT does the same thing for as little as 2.9 watts. At low power levels, the original HAT is definitely more efficient. The difference is that the original HAT runs at about 78% efficiency no matter how much power is being drawn, while the new PoE+ HAT can be as much as 88% efficient at higher power levels. The crossover point is somewhere between 1.5 and 2 amps of output. If power efficiency is of concern, you might want to stick with the original HAT for lower power use.
The USB ports on the Pis only supply 1.2 amps. This is annoying, but isn’t a weakness of the PoE HAT at all. We can hope for a future Pi revision that raises that limit. Until then, the workaround of tapping power directly from the 5v rail works nicely.
As for the long bolt, I’ll let [Eben]’s response speak for itself:
A number of people have found that the bolt touches, but does not damage, their camera connector. We’re likely to back it off to an 11mm bolt (10mm, as has been suggested in one or two places, is definitely too short) in a future production run.
The fan is louder at full speed, but quieter at its lowest speed
. Additionally, it moves more air at full speed, 2.4 CFM compared to 2.2 from the older hardware. With a few tweaks to the fan’s trigger temperatures, the new fan can be quite a bit quieter overall. Just a note, if you have the PoE+ HAT, and the fan isn’t spinning at all, you probably need to pull the latest updates for the Raspberry Pi OS, as the enablement code has landed quite recently.
The final complaint is that the PoE+ HAT doesn’t properly block backfed power when it’s left on a Pi powered via the USB C plug. There is an annoying coil wine, and the HAT actually powers the high voltage side of its power supply circuit. This is obviously not ideal behavior. It would have been nice to have the backfeed protection, but the official documentation does address this: “When the Raspberry Pi PoE+ HAT is connected to your Raspberry Pi, your Raspberry Pi should only be powered through the ethernet cable. Do not use any additional method to power the Raspberry Pi.”
How Much Power
Cyberpunk Purple Pixels
Once I had my cyberpunk lighting rig set up, I thought it would be useful to find the hard limits and see how many pixels each HAT could power. The original HAT lit up 75 of them, but trying for 76 tripped the overcurrent protection. That indicates that 2.5 amps of output power is the threshold.
Now how many pixels can we turn cyberpunk purple with the PoE+ HAT? Once I hit 250 pixels, the resistance of the strip became a major factor, and increasing the driven pixels wasn’t really increasing the load. The last pixels were a noticeably different color as a result. To continue the experiment, I switched over to testing at pure white, AKA the individual red, green, and blue LEDs turned to 100% brightness. In this configuration, I was able to drive 140 pixels. The PoE+ Hat reported a maximum current of 5.4 amps, while my PoE switch showed that port pulling 30.6 watts of power, at a respectable 87.9% efficiency. The hard limit I finally hit was 5.5 amps at the HAT, at which point the Pi power cycled.
After a few minutes of driving the PoE+ HAT way beyond its rated power output, I measured 56.8°C at the hottest point I could find. That is an impressive, tough little board. I wouldn’t be comfortable running at those levels for long, or unattended, but it’s nice to know that it does work, and no magic smoke was released. Based on what Eben had to say about the device, 25 watts of power seems like the maximum power number to aim for. Given that the Pi itself will take at least 2.5 watts, essentially at idle, that leaves 22.5 watts of power you can potentially use for something clever. And all this with just an Ethernet cable running to the Pi. So the question, is what can you do with 22.5 watts? LED lighting is the idea that was obvious to me, but I’m confident the Hackaday community will continue to surprise me in what you can come up with, so let us know what you want to do with the PoE+ HAT. | 25 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364056",
"author": "Sean Faherty",
"timestamp": "2021-07-14T14:22:25",
"content": "Would like to see “the” Cyberpunk Neon-purple Pixel under a bell jar in an internation metrology exhibit!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "636405... | 1,760,373,019.900571 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/14/tetris-handheld-powered-by-tritium-cell-eventually/ | TetrisHandheld Powered By Tritium Cell, Eventually | Tom Nardi | [
"Science",
"Solar Hacks"
] | [
"handheld game",
"solid-state battery",
"tetris",
"Tritium",
"tritium battery"
] | The idea of a tritium power cell is pretty straightforward: stick enough of the tiny glowing tubes to a photovoltaic panel and your DIY “nuclear battery” will generate energy for the next decade or so. Only problem is that the power produced, measured in a few microwatts, isn’t enough to do much with.
But as [Ian Charnas] demonstrates in his latest video
, you can eke some real-world use out of such a cell by storing up its power over a long enough period.
As with previous projects we’ve seen
, [Ian] builds his cell by sandwiching an array of keychain-sized tritium tubes between two solar panels. Isolated from any outside light, power produced by the panels is the result of the weak green glow given off by the tube’s phosphorus coating as it gets bombarded with electrons. The panels are then used to charge a bank of thin-film solid state batteries, which are notable for their exceptionally low self-discharge rate.
Some quick math told [Ian] that a week of charging should build up enough of a charge to power a knock-off handheld
Tetris
game for about 10 minutes. Unfortunately, after waiting the prescribed amount of time, he got only a few seconds of runtime out of his hacked together power source.
His best guess is that he got a bad batch of thin-film batteries, but since he could no longer find the exact part number he used originally, he had to design a whole new PCB for the second attempt. After waiting two long months to switch the game on this time, he was able to play for nearly an hour before his homebrew nuclear energy source was depleted.
We wouldn’t consider this terribly practical from a gaming standpoint, but like
the solar harvesting handheld game we covered last year
, it’s an interesting demonstration of how even a minuscule amount of power can be put to work for intermittent applications. Here it’s a short bout of wonky
Tetris
, but the concept could just as easily be applied to an off-grid sensor.
[Thanks to Dan for the tip.] | 30 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364016",
"author": "Glen Searle (@GenesisMachines)",
"timestamp": "2021-07-14T11:25:02",
"content": "If you can avoid the hydrogen escaping, you should get more power if all the material that absorbed beta radiation was removed, allowing the beta particles to hit the voltaic materi... | 1,760,373,019.688777 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/14/fixing-noisy-measurements-on-an-owon-xdm2041-bench-multimeter/ | Fixing Noisy Measurements On An Owon XDM2041 Bench Multimeter | Maya Posch | [
"Repair Hacks",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"bench multimeter",
"owon"
] | After purchasing an Owon XDM2041 bench multimeter for an automated test setup, [Petteri Aimonen] was disappointed to find that at especially the higher mega Ohm ranges, the measured values were jumping around a lot and generally very inaccurate. Since this is an approximately $170 bench multimeter and Owon support wasn’t cooperating, [Petteri]
set out to fix the issue
, starting with a solid teardown.
As noted by [Petteri], there’s not a whole lot inside one of these multimeters. The main board with the guts of the whole system contains a GigaDevices GD32F103CBT6 MCU coupled with the star of the show: the HYCON Technology Corporation’s
HY3131
multimeter chip. After a peek at the HY3131 datasheet, the culprit was quite apparent: while sampling the presence of mains voltage noise is usually suppressed through the selection of an appropriate crystal.
Unfortunately, instead of the recommended 4.9152 MHz crystal per the reference schematic for the HY3131, Owon’s engineers had apparently opted for a 4 MHz crystal instead, and so it’s essentially
aliasing the line noise
.
[Petteri] figured that the resulting sampling timing might work well enough with 60 Hz line frequency, but clearly with 50 Hz there was a lot of noise sneaking into the measurements. After swapping the crystal with a 3.072 MHz one, there was a marked improvement, as the plot shows. | 21 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363989",
"author": "e",
"timestamp": "2021-07-14T08:09:45",
"content": "Euclid’s Elements, still relevant 2300 years later with fourier transforms on finite groups.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6363995",
"author": "vib",... | 1,760,373,020.018596 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/13/playstation-games-on-the-gba-with-a-few-extra-steps/ | PlayStation Games On The GBA, With A Few Extra Steps | Tom Nardi | [
"Nintendo Game Boy Hacks",
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"emulation",
"game boy advance",
"gba",
"multiboot",
"Retroarch"
] | It might seem impossible, but what you’re looking at is a Sony PlayStation game being played on a Nintendo Game Boy Advance. The resolution is miserable and the GBA doesn’t have nearly enough buttons to do most 3D games justice, but it’s working. There’s even audio support, although turning it on will slow things down considerably.
How does it work? The trick is that creator [Rodrigo Alfonso] is actually
emulating the PlayStation on a Raspberry Pi and simply using Nintendo’s handheld as an external display and controller
. We say “simply”, but of course, it’s anything but. The GitHub page for the project goes into impressive detail on how the whole thing works, but the short version is that the video data is sent from the Linux framebuffer to a small program running on the GBA over the handheld’s serial port using SPI. In testing he was able to push 2.56 Mbps through the link, which is a decent amount of bandwidth when you’ve only got to keep a 240 × 160 screen filled.
Perhaps the best part is that you don’t even need a flash cart to try it at home. [Rodrigo] is using a trick we’ve seen in other GBA projects, where
the program is actually transferred to the handheld over the link cable at boot time
.
Nintendo introduced this “multiboot” feature so multiplayer games could be played between systems even if they didn’t all have a physical cartridge, but now that hackers have cracked the code, it means you can run arbitrary code on a completely unmodified console; though it does get wiped as soon as you power it off.
[Rodrigo] provides all the information and software you need to try it at home, you just need a Raspberry Pi, a Game Boy Advance, and Link Cable you don’t mind cutting up; far less hardware than is required by
the similar project to run
DOOM
on the NES.
Since he’s tied everything into the popular RetroPie frontend, we imagine it would even work when emulating earlier 2D consoles; which would be a much better fit for the GBA’s display and limited inputs. | 15 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364010",
"author": "James",
"timestamp": "2021-07-14T10:14:33",
"content": "This is so cool and it had a great write up. I wonder a cartridge could be made using the same principle. And not be limited by the link cable speed.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": ... | 1,760,373,019.959521 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/13/retrotechtacular-the-secret-life-of-the-electric-light/ | Retrotechtacular: The Secret Life Of The Electric Light | Dan Maloney | [
"Retrotechtacular"
] | [
"electric light",
"light bulb",
"remastered",
"retrotechtactular",
"Rex Garrod",
"The Secret Life",
"Tim Hunkin",
"tv"
] | Normally, when we pick out something to carry the “Retrotechtacular” banner, it’s a film from the good old days when technology was young and fresh, and filmmakers were paid by one corporate giant or another to produce a film extolling the benefits of their products or services, often with a not-so-subtle “celebrate the march of progress” undertone.
So when we spied this remastered version of
The Secret Life of the Electric Light
,
an episode from [Tim Hunkin]’s fabulous educational
The Secret Life of Machines
TV series, we didn’t really think it would be good Retrotechtacular fodder. But just watching a few minutes reminded us of why the series was must-see TV back in the 1990s (when it first aired widely here in the States), especially for the budding geek. When viewed with eyes more used to CGI animations and high production values, what [Tim] and his collaborator, the late [Rex Garrod], accomplished with each of these programs is truly astounding. Almost every bit of the material, as well as the delivery, has an off-the-cuff quality to it that belies what must have taken an enormous amount of planning and organization to pull off. [Tim] and [Rex] obviously went to a lot of trouble to make it look like they didn’t go to a lot of trouble, and the result is films that home in on the essentials of technology in a way few programs have ever managed, and none since. And the set-piece at the end of each episode — often meeting its pyrotechnic destruction — always were real crowd-pleasers. They still are.
We have to say the remastered versions of
The Secret Life
episodes, all of which appear to be posted at
[Tim]’s YouTube channel
, look just great, and the retrospectives at the end of each episode where he talks about the travails of production are priceless. Also posted are his more recent
The Secret Life of Components
, which is a treasure trove of practical tips for makers and backyard engineers that’s well worth watching too. | 22 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363947",
"author": "Jonathan Bennett",
"timestamp": "2021-07-14T02:24:18",
"content": "I have greatly enjoyed these being remastered, particularly with the modern retrospective at the end of each episode. Great stuff!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
... | 1,760,373,020.181349 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/13/stop-touching-my-face/ | Stop Touching My Face | Orlando Hoilett | [
"Lifehacks",
"Wearable Hacks"
] | [
"classical conditioning",
"Conditioning",
"Negative Feedback",
"Pavlovian"
] | We all have a habit or two that we’re not terribly proud of and have probably thought of any number of ways to help rid ourselves of them. Well, [Friedlc] wondered if he could create a mechanism that would get him to stop touching his face using a bit of negative conditioning.
He rigged up a head brace that slaps his forehead whenever reaching for his face
.
The first thing he needed to do was to detect a hand approaching his face. He decided to use a few cheap IR motion sensors he had laying around but noted they had a few limitations. He had a tough time tuning the sensitivity of the motion sensors to prevent false positives and they were completely useless in direct sunlight as the sun’s radiation saturated the photodetector. Despite these problems, [Friedlc] figured he would mostly need his device indoors so he stuck with the IR detectors.
For the “hitter” as he called it, he thought of a few different ideas. Maybe a rotating drum with a flap that would hit his hand or maybe a hitting arm on a bar linkage. He admitted that his rudimentary mechanical design knowledge made thinking of the perfect “hitter” a bit challenging, but like any good hacker, [Friedlc] just kept working at it. He decided on using a
cam mechanism
which allowed him to separate the motor from the hitting action. This choice actually put a lot less load on the motor which kept the motor from stalling and giving him other kinds of trouble.
[Friedlc] was pretty proud of his invention and noted that it really helped him stop touching his face as the successive strikes to the head were definitely quite a deterrent. This certainly isn’t the first time we’ve seen a
Pavlovian Conditioning
project
on Hackaday
. We could probably all use a bit of help curing a few bad habits.
But maybe you prefer positive reinforcement instead
. | 12 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363912",
"author": "ScriptGiddy",
"timestamp": "2021-07-13T23:09:41",
"content": "Haha this is awesome! Can it double as a defense against pinchy cheek grandmas? My old lady neighbor loves to grab my beard 😂",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
... | 1,760,373,020.06688 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/13/wobble-disk-coffee-roaster-looks-good-in-wood/ | Wobble Disk Coffee Roaster Looks Good In Wood | Kristina Panos | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"coffee",
"coffee beans",
"coffee roaster",
"electric screwdriver",
"heat gun",
"wobble disk roaster"
] | If you love coffee, you probably make it yourself at home most of the time using beans from some hipster coffee shop where the employees have full-sleeve tattoos and strong opinions. Maybe you even buy whole beans and grind them right before you use them. If you want to go all the way, you gotta roast those beans yourself. There are various ways to go about it, like repurposing a hot air corn popper.
If you’re [Larry Cotton], you buy heaps of green beans and keep building wobble disk roasters until you’ve achieved DIY perfection
.
[Larry]’s latest roaster boasts all-wood construction with no metal brackets or housings in the structural parts. This is good because you’re less likely to burn yourself on anything, and you aren’t sinking heat away from the beans. Nothing should get hot except the sifter, the beans, and the stiff triangle of wire that holds the heat gun nozzle in place. Once the roasting cycle is complete, [Larry] just shakes out the beans onto an adjacent screen that’s situated over a fan so they can cool off.
Unlike some of
[Larry]’s previous designs
, this one uses an 8-cup flour sifter situated over a heat gun. A battery-powered screwdriver drives the wobbling disk that churns the beans and helps them roast evenly, and a wooden arm holds down the power button. We love the simplicity of this machine, and think wobble disk roasters are mesmerizing to watch. Check out the video after the break to see it in action and learn how to build your own.
There’s more than one way to roast beans, and
one of them is even officially sanctioned by Hackaday editor [Elliot Williams]
. | 3 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363931",
"author": "Robb Smith",
"timestamp": "2021-07-14T00:34:35",
"content": "When my elderly Freshroast 8 finally packs it in, I’m seriously trying this. Well done sir!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6363990",
"autho... | 1,760,373,020.115881 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/13/responsive-paintings-do-it-with-heat-and-light/ | Responsive Paintings Do It With Heat And Light | Kristina Panos | [
"Art",
"The Hackaday Prize"
] | [
"2021 Hackaday Prize",
"acrylic paint",
"art",
"interactivity",
"thermochromic",
"thermoplastic"
] | Art is a conversation, yes. But normally, it’s a short one: the artist makes a statement and the audience responds, each bringing their own interpretations. The hard thing about being an artist is that once you release a piece into the world, it’s sort of bound and gagged in that it can’t defend itself from comments and misinterpretation.
On the other hand, interactive art allows for a longer discussion. Pieces are responsive and no longer mute. But so much of the interactive art out there is purely digital, and lacks a certain analog warmth that comes from physicality.
For this year’s Hackaday Prize, [Laura] sought to put a digital interface on an analog visual piece and make paintings that change based on data inputs
.
For now, [Laura] is focusing on adding two dynamic elements to her paintings: shifting color and light patterns in response to a viewer’s presence and/or actions using an Arduino and TinyML. For the color changes, [Laura] ended up mixing thermochromic pigment powder with a transparent gel medium.
This was a bit of a journey, because the regular kind of transparent medium came out too runny, and mixing the pigments with white paint made the colors come out lighter than [Laura] wanted and left white behind when heated. But transparent gel medium was just right. You can see the difference in this picture — the colors come out darker with the gel medium, and disappear almost completely with heat.
[Laura] didn’t want to just poke LEDs through the canvas, which in this case is a 1/8″ birch panel. Instead, there’s an RGB matrix shining behind a pair of thin, diffused cutouts filled with thermoplastic.
Check out the video after the break of a painting sketch that uses both techniques. Keep your eye on the purple triangles on the right side, and watch them slowly turn blue in real time as light patterns dance behind the diffused cutouts. Stick around for the second brief video that shows an updated light animation.
We’ve seen many ways of making interactive art, like this
Rube Goldberg fairy tale ball maze that you control with your phone
.
The
Hackaday
Prize2021
is Sponsored by: | 2 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364004",
"author": "Menga",
"timestamp": "2021-07-14T09:31:48",
"content": "I Love the idea of paint that changes color. I wonder if could be also done with pigments that respond with non-visible light could achive the same. Like fosforescent pigments. That would probably require t... | 1,760,373,020.463046 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/13/virginia-apgar-may-have-saved-your-life/ | Virginia Apgar May Have Saved Your Life | Kristina Panos | [
"Biography",
"Featured",
"Hackaday Columns",
"Medical Hacks",
"Slider"
] | [
"anesthesiology",
"Apgar score",
"babies",
"infant",
"infant mortality",
"newborns"
] | Between the 1930s and the 1950s, something sort of strange happened in the United States. The infant mortality rate went into decline, but the number of babies that died within 24 hours of birth didn’t budge at all. It sounds terrible, but back then, many babies who weren’t breathing well or showed other signs of a failure to thrive were usually left to die and recorded as stillborn.
As an obstetrical anesthesiologist, physician, and medical researcher, Virginia Apgar was in a great position to observe fresh newborns and study the care given to them by doctors. She is best known for inventing the Apgar Score, which is is used to quickly rate the viability of newborn babies outside the uterus. Using the Apgar Score, a newborn is evaluated based on heart rate, reflex irritability, muscle tone, respiratory effort, and skin color and given a score between zero and two for each category. Depending on the score, the baby would be rated every five minutes to assess improvement. Virginia’s method is still used today, and has saved many babies from being declared stillborn.
Virginia wanted to be a doctor from a young age, specifically a surgeon. Despite having graduated fourth in her class from Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, Virginia was discouraged from becoming a surgeon by a chairman of surgery and encouraged to go to school a little bit longer and study anesthesiology instead. As unfortunate as that may be, she probably would have never have created the Apgar Score with a surgeon’s schedule.
Determined to Be a Doctor
Charles Apgar’s ham shack, including equipment he built. Image via
Wikipedia
Virginia Apgar was born June 7th, 1909 in Westfield, New Jersey, which is about twenty miles outside of New York City. She was the youngest of three children born to Helen May (Clarke) and Charles Emory Apgar.
Her father Charles was an insurance executive, amateur astronomer, amateur inventor, and ham radio enthusiast
whose radio work exposed an espionage ring during WWI
. Apgar had become interested in amateur radio after hearing someone boast about getting election results before the newspapers could print them. He built most of his own equipment and recorded several radio transmissions around the start of the war, some of which aroused his suspicion. Sure enough, the station they were coming from was owned by the German empire.
One of Virginia’s brothers died early on of tuberculosis, and the other suffered a chronic illness. By the time she graduated Westfield High School in 1925, she was determined to become a doctor. Virginia graduated from Mount Holyoke College in 1929 having majored in zoology and minored in physiology and chemistry. Then she went to Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons and graduated fourth in her class in 1933. Four years later, she had completed her surgery residency there as well.
A Medical Wonder Woman
Virginia rates a fresh newborn. Image via
Wikipedia
Although Virginia may have had the credentials and the intelligence to go far as a surgeon, there’s one thing she didn’t have — male genes. Allen Whipple, the chairman of surgery at a nearby hospital discouraged her from pursuing a career as a surgeon simply because he had seen one or two women try and fail. Whipple encouraged her to go into anesthesiology — a relatively new field — instead.
He believed that to advance anesthesiology was to advance surgery itself, and he felt she could make a significant contribution. Undeterred, Virginia studied anesthesiology in residency for six months at the University of Wisconsin, and then spent another six months at Bellevue Hospital in New York City.
In 1938, Virginia returned to Columbia P&S as the director of the college’s newly-established anesthesiology division. She had the honor of being the first woman to head any division at the school, and it came with a lot of responsibilities.
Virginia spent the 1940s being an administrator, teacher, recruiter, coordinator, and practicing physician. In 1949, she became the first female full professor at Columbia P&S and stayed there until 1959.
The Apgar Score
A mind-map of the Apgar scoring matrix. Image via
Wikipedia
Part of her job was providing anesthesia during deliveries, so she spent quite a bit of time around newborns. In the 1950s United States,
one in 30 newborns died at birth
. Virginia was determined to solve this problem, even though she wasn’t really in a position to do anything about it.
She noticed that although the infant mortality rate was decreasing, the number of deaths within 24 hours of birth stayed constant. As she was in a position to see a lot of births and document trends, she came up with a way to rate newborns’ vitality with a simple five-point matrix.
The Apgar Score
is a backronym that stands for Activity, Pulse, Grimace, Appearance, and Respiration. In more revealing terms, the point is to rate the baby’s ability and willingness to move, plus its heart rate, irritability, coloring, and breathing.
Babies are supposed to cry when they’re born — it helps them transition from breathing mucus to breathing air. A non-crying baby would be given a score of 0, while a baby who gasped and sputtered would earn a 1, and a baby with good lungs would rate a 2 in that area. If necessary, all five tests would be run again in five minute increments as long as the baby showed improvement. It worked well, and soon many hospitals had implemented it as standard procedure.
Virginia worked with pediatricians, obstetricians, and other anesthesiologists to establish a physiological foundation for the success rate of using the Apgar Score. To do this, they analyzed babies’ blood chemistry to help correlate the scores with the effects of labor, delivery, and having the mother under anesthesia.
Shining Light on Birth Defects
Virginia left Columbia P&S in 1959 to get a Master of Public Health degree from Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health. She worked for the March of Dimes Foundation from 1959 until her death in 1974, eventually becoming Vice President. She also directed the research program dedicated to the prevention and treatment of birth defects.
Virginia with her tools and a few of the violins she made. Image via
National Institute of Health
During this phase of her life, Virginia also wrote and gave lectures, traveling thousands of miles each year to promote early detection of birth defects and the need for further research. In 1965, she became a clinical professor of pediatrics at Cornell University School of Medicine and taught teratology, which is the study of birth defects.
Honorary Mother of Many
Throughout her career, Virginia published dozens of scientific articles along with several layman-level essays for various newspapers and magazines. She also co-wrote a book called
Is My Baby All Right?
that explains common birth defects and aims to teach expectant mothers how they can prevent them from happening.
Virginia received many awards over the years, including three honorary doctorate degrees. She never married or had children, but considered music to be a big part of her life. During the 1950s, a friend introduced her to the art of making instruments, and together they made a string quartet’s worth of instruments — two violins, a viola, and a cello.
Virginia devoted her life to helping others live, and she never retired. She died of cirrhosis on August 7th, 1974. | 28 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363824",
"author": "Michael Black",
"timestamp": "2021-07-13T17:17:26",
"content": "Her father got interested in radio in 1910, so there wasn’t much choice but to build your own.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6363831",
"a... | 1,760,373,020.247173 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/13/3d-printed-cnc-knee-mill/ | 3D Printed CNC Knee Mill | Danie Conradie | [
"cnc hacks",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"3D printed cnc machine",
"ivan miranda",
"machining"
] | CNC mills will never match real heavy metal mills on hard materials, but that won’t stop people from pushing the limits of these DIY machines. One of the usual suspects, [Ivan Miranda] is at it again, this time building a
knee mill from aluminum extrusions and 3D printed fittings
. (Video after the break.)
Most DIY CNC milling machines we see use a gantry arrangement, where the bed is fixed while everything else moves around it. On most commercial metal milling machines, the table is the moving part, and are known as knee mills. In the case of [Ivan]’s mill, the table can move 187 mm on the X-axis and 163 mm on the Y-axis. The 1.5 kW spindle can move 87 mm in the Z-axis. All axes slide on linear rails and are driven by large stepper motors using ball screws. The table can also be adjusted in the Z-direction to accept larger workpieces, and the spindle can be tilted to mill at an angle.
To machine metal as [Ivan] intended, rigidity is the name of the game, and 3D printed parts and aluminum extrusion will never be as rigid as heavy blocks of steel. He says claims that the wobble seen on the video is due to the uneven table on which the mill was standing. Of course, a wobbly base won’t be doing him any favors. [Ivan] also had some trouble with earthing on the spindle. He nearly set his workshop on fire when he didn’t notice tiny sparks between the cutter and aluminum workpiece while he was cooling it with isopropyl alcohol. This was solved with the addition of the grounding wire.
While the machine does have limitations, it does look like it can machine functional metal parts. It could even machine metal upgrades for its 3D printed components. One possible way to improve rigidity would be to
cast the frame in concrete
. [Ivan] has built several other workshop tools, including a
massive 3D printer
and a
camera crane
. | 52 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363802",
"author": "KG5DXG",
"timestamp": "2021-07-13T15:46:15",
"content": ">CNC mills will never match real heavy metal millsSurely you know better than to conflate CNC with DIY in the very first sentence of the article…Pretty much all modern “real heavy mills” are CNC nowadaysMa... | 1,760,373,020.550122 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/13/muse-group-continues-tone-deaf-handling-of-audacity/ | Muse Group Continues Tone Deaf Handling Of Audacity | Tom Nardi | [
"Current Events",
"Featured",
"Slider",
"Software Development"
] | [
"audacity",
"foss",
"gpl",
"Muse Group",
"open source",
"software licensing"
] | When we last checked in on the Audacity community, privacy-minded users of the free and open source audio editor were concerned over proposed plans to add telemetry reporting to the decades old open source audio editing software. More than 1,000 comments were left on the GitHub pull request that would have implemented this “phone home” capability, with many individuals arguing that the best course of action was to create a new fork of Audacity that removed any current or future tracking code that was implemented upstream.
For their part, the project’s new owners, Muse Group, argued that the ability for Audacity to report on the user’s software environment would allow them to track down some particularly tricky bugs. The tabulation of anonymous usage information, such as which audio filters are most commonly applied, would similarly be used to determine where development time and money would best be spent. New project leader Martin “Tantacrul” Keary personally stepped in to explain that the whole situation was simply a misunderstanding, and that Muse Group had no ill intent for the venerable program. They simply wanted to get a better idea of how the software was being used in the real-world, but after seeing how vocal the community was about the subject, the decision was made to hold off on any changes until a more broadly acceptable approach could be developed.
Our last post on the subject ended on a high note
, as it seemed like the situation was on the mend. While there was still a segment of the Audacity userbase that was skeptical about remote analytics being added into a program that never needed it before, representatives from the Muse Group seemed to be listening to the feedback they were receiving. Keary assured users that plans to implement telemetry had been dropped, and that should they be reintroduced in the future, it would be done with the appropriate transparency.
Unfortunately, things have only gotten worse in the intervening months. Not only is telemetry back on the menu for a program that’s never needed an Internet connection since its initial release in 2000, but this time it has brought with it a troubling Privacy Policy that details who can access the collected data. Worse, Muse Group has made it clear they intend to move Audacity away from its current GPLv2 license, even if it means muscling out long-time contributors who won’t agree to the switch. The company argues this will give them more flexibility to list the software with a wider array of package repositories, a claim that’s been met with great skepticism by those well versed in open source licensing.
License Shell Game
A little more than a week after our previous Audacity article went out, Daniel Ray, Muse Group’s Head of Strategy,
dropped a new bombshell on GitHub in the form of a new Contributor License Agreement (CLA)
. He explained that past and future contributors would be bound by the agreement, which gives Muse Group unlimited rights over how contributed code is used and licensed. The document makes clear that the original contributor is still technically the owner of said code, and that they were free to use it in other projects, but they would have no say in its fate once folded into the Audacity project.
If there was any doubt to what Muse Group had in mind by implementing this CLA, Ray was clear that they were indeed positioning themselves to relicense the project. In the short-term they want to move Audacity from GPLv2 to GPLv3, which he explained would open up compatibility with various libraries and technologies the team had their eye on. This wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing, and while some contributors
might not have agreed with all the changes made in the later revision of the GPL
, it’s unlikely the upgrade would have made too many waves.
The real trouble started when he admitted that Muse Group eventually intended to dual-license the code as well. This would mean that in some situations, and at their sole discretion, Muse Group could offer up a version of Audacity that was bound by an entirely different and yet-to-be-named license. Ray cites issues with listing GPL-licensed projects on the Apple App Store as an example of why this clause is necessary, as it would allow Muse Group to use a more permissive license to satisfy a vendor’s requirements for redistribution.
If that wasn’t enough, the FAQ for the new CLA specifically states that code contributed to Audacity may be used in future closed source projects by Muse Group:
It’s not an exaggeration to say that this is the antithesis of what the open source community, or at least the GPL, stands for. Few individuals who are looking to submit their code for inclusion to a program that’s spent more than 20 years licensed under the GPLv2 would approve of their work ending up as part of a commercial closed source project. When a commenter asked Ray how Muse Group intended to get past contributors to agree to such a document,
he replied that only major contributors needed to sign off
; the team decided that rewriting what he described as “trivial” contributions would be more efficient than getting the original authors to agree to the new terms.
You Must Be This Tall to Ride
While still coming to terms with the CLA, the
community was further riled by the release of a draft version of Audacity’s new Privacy Policy
earlier this month. This document describes an as-of-yet unimplemented telemetry system, and how the information it collects would be shared with outside parties. Of particular concern was language that said Muse Group would share “Data necessary for law enforcement, litigation and authorities’ requests (if any)” while failing to clarify the scope of the data being collected or to which authorities the company was referring. It’s worth mentioning at this point that Muse is based in Kaliningrad, Russia.
Another section of the Privacy Policy, titled simply “Minors”, explains that Audacity is not to be used by individuals under the age of 13. This clause was presumably inserted so that their proposed data collection and reporting would not run afoul of the American Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) and the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which limit the age at which a user can give consent to their information being used online.
Many commenters expressed concerns that Audacity’s new age requirement would mean the free tool could no longer be used in educational settings, forcing schools to find an alternative program. Others pointed out that both the GPLv2 and GPLv3 specifically forbid any limitations being placed on who can run the program. If it was Muse Group’s intent to leverage the CLA to supersede this clause of the GPL, it would be a dangerous precedent; limiting the age at which a user can run a program is a slippery slope towards other forms of discrimination, another inexcusable affront to the values of the open source community.
Squandered Trust
Just as they claimed with the botched telemetry pull request from May, the official company line is that the release of the draft Privacy Policy was a mistake, and that the final document will be revised to more closely align with the company’s goals for Audacity going forward.
According to a post by Daniel Ray
, once telemetry is activated in Audacity version 3.0.3, the only data that will be collected is the user’s IP address, basic information about their computer, and optionally, error reports. Despite what’s stated in the draft, he also assured users no additional data will be collected for the purposes of law enforcement, and should users wish, they can operate Audacity in an offline mode that absolves them from following the Privacy Policy altogether.
The vast differences between the draft of the Privacy Policy currently on the Audacity website and the theoretical revised version are difficult to ignore. A reasonable observer would wonder why this draft was ever publicly posted if the goal was to invalidate most of its controversial clauses in a second revision. The inescapable conclusion is that some element within Muse Group is either dangerously naive as to the realities of managing a large open source project, or more worryingly, that they’re actively trying to see
how far the community can be pushed before they start to push back
.
In the latter case, we may have our answer. A fork of Audacity aimed at undoing the changes being made by Muse Group,
appropriately named Tenacity
, has already amassed more than 4,000 stars on GitHub. Of course there’s no guarantee as to the longevity of such rebellious projects, or critically, whether or not major software repositories will eschew the upstream version in favor of “de-Mused” builds. But there’s an undeniable momentum behind it, fueled purely by the way Muse Group has bungled their interactions with the Audacity community since taking the reins just three months ago.
If this really is the beginning of a hard fork for the legendary open source audio editor, there’s no question as to who should take the blame. In the end, though, if the new Tenacity crew picks up the Audacity torch and runs with it, in a year’s time, we might find ourselves wondering what all the fuss was about. | 133 | 39 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363785",
"author": "Stuart Longland",
"timestamp": "2021-07-13T14:25:09",
"content": "Not amused!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6363792",
"author": "CRImier",
"timestamp": "2021-07-13T15:06:20",
"content": "Having... | 1,760,373,020.975531 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/13/the-linux-kernel-5-14-audio-update/ | The Linux Kernel 5.14 Audio Update | Jonathan Bennett | [
"Linux Hacks",
"News"
] | [
"firewire",
"linux kernel",
"Pipewire"
] | You may remember the Pipewire coverage we ran a couple weeks ago, and the TODO item to fix up Firewire device support with Pipewire. It turns out that this is an important feature for kernel hackers, too, because the Alsa changes just got pulled into the 5.14 kernel, and included is
the needed Firewire audio work
. Shout-out to [Marcan] for pointing out this changeset. Yes, that’s the same as [Hector Martin], the hacker bringing Linux to the M1, who also discovered M1racles. We’ve covered some of his work before.
It turns out that some Firewire audio devices expect timing information in the delivery stream to match the proper playback time for the audio contained in the stream. A naive driver ends up sending packets of sound to the Firewire device that wanted to be played before the packet arrives. No wonder the devices didn’t work correctly. I’m running a 5.14 development kernel, and so far my Focusrite Saffire Pro40 has been running marvelously, where previous kernels quickly turned its audio into a crackling mess.
There is another fix that’s notable for Pipewire users,
a reduction in latency for USB audio devices
. That one turned out to be not-quite-correct, leading to a hang in the kernel on Torvald’s machine. It’s been reverted until the problem can be corrected, but hopefully this one will land for 5.14 as well. (Edit: The patch was cleaned up, and
has been pulled for 5.14
.
Via Phoronix
.) Let us know if you’d like to see more kernel development updates! | 39 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363749",
"author": "Alexandre Peccioli",
"timestamp": "2021-07-13T11:18:16",
"content": "Very good comments, especially for me who works with a Firewire interface… Keep us posted. Thanks!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "63641... | 1,760,373,020.679144 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/13/nfc-whos-at-the-door/ | NFC Who’s At The Door | Michael Shaub | [
"hardware",
"Security Hacks"
] | [
"access control",
"ESP-32",
"github",
"NFC",
"open source",
"pn532",
"security"
] | An early prototype that worked on the first try, except for one LED
[RevK] wanted to learn about NFC readers, and we agree that the best way to do so is to
dive in and build one yourself
.
There are readers available from multiple sources, but [RevK] found them either
compact but with no prototyping space
or plenty of prototyping space and
a large footprint
. High-speed UART (HSU) was selected over I2C for communication with an ESP32 as testing showed it was just as fast and more reliable over long distances at the cost of only one additional wire.
After a few versions, the resulting PN532 based NFC reader has just enough GPIO for a doorbell and tamper switch and three status LEDs, with board files and a 3D-printed case design included in the open source project
on GitHub
. When looking into the project, we appreciated
learning about tamper switches
that can include closed or open contact status when an NFC is read, most often used in the packaging of high-value and collectible products. If you have worked with this tamper feature of NFCs, let us know about it.
Thanks for the tip, [Simon] | 8 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363730",
"author": "Sjaak",
"timestamp": "2021-07-13T08:54:35",
"content": "Tamperproof can be as easy a just wire loop connected to a I/O port and ground. If you want to detect if is shorted near the chip/board you need to add a resistor to Vcc on the I/O, a resistor in the far en... | 1,760,373,020.601244 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/12/human-following-utility-trailer/ | Human-Following Utility Trailer | Chris Lott | [
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"agriculture",
"farm",
"following",
"human following",
"robots"
] | [Théo Gautier] thought that a human-following utility trailer would be helpful for people working on farms. He didn’t just think about it, however, he
designed and built it as a final project
at the Agrilab FabAcademy at the University UniLasalle Polytechnique in northern France. He took the idea from concept to fruition in six weeks.
His build log documents the project very well, and takes you through his design choices and their implementation. The brains of the cart are a SAMD21E board that he made himself, and its sensory perception of the world is provided by HC-SR04 ultrasonic sensors and a PixyCam 2. Locomotion is provided by four each 100W DC motor / gearbox assemblies. He’s put a lot of effort into the construction process and posted a lot of photos of the intermediate steps. One piece of advice that caught our eye was to measure the diagonals of your frame repeatedly when welding it together — things can and do shift around. If you don’t, you may have to rectify the mistake like [Théo] did, with a big hammer.
You can watch the final result in
this short video
, and see the trailer following him around the farm. In this version, the leader has to wear a red shirt to be properly tracked, but future versions can be made to track a variety of wardrobes. This project was a great learning experience, and could also be a great baseline for future cart-like robots. Do you have any ideas for expanding this design? [Théo] has already mentioned he wants more powerful motors. And if you are into this genre, check out
this motorized 3000 W electric wheelbarrow
we wrote about a few years ago or
radio controlled electric wheelbarrow racing
from 2019 (what could possibly go wrong with that?). Thanks to FabAcademy instructor [Luc Hanneuse] for sending in this tip. | 27 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363709",
"author": "macsimski",
"timestamp": "2021-07-13T06:10:11",
"content": "Ah. Finally “the luggage” has arrived. Electronics replaces sentient pear wood. Hopefully it has a more docile character.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comme... | 1,760,373,020.747826 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/12/high-tech-paperweight-shows-off-working-60s-era-thin-film-electronics/ | High-Tech Paperweight Shows Off Working 60s-era Thin-Film Electronics | Donald Papp | [
"Art",
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"60s",
"ge",
"paperweight",
"reverse engineering",
"space race",
"thin film",
"vintage"
] | [Ken Shirriff]’s
analysis of a fascinating high-tech paperweight created by GE at the height of the space race
is as informative as it is fun to look at. This device was created to show off GE’s thin-film electronics technology, and while it’s attractive enough on its own, there’s an added feature: as soon as the paperweight is picked up, it begins emitting a satellite-like rhythmic beep. It is very well-made, and was doubtlessly an impressive novelty for its time. As usual, [Ken] dives into what exactly makes it tick, and shares important history along the way.
Thin-film module with labels, thanks to [Ken]’s vintage electronics detective work. Click to enlarge.
In the clear area of the paperweight is a thin-film circuit, accompanied by a model of an early satellite. The module implements a flip-flop, and the flat conductors connect it to some additional components inside the compartment on the left, which contains a power supply and the necessary parts to create the beeps when it is picked up.
Thin-film electronics reduced the need for individual components by depositing material onto a substrate to form things like resistors and capacitors. The resulting weight and space savings could be considerable, and close-ups of the thin film module sure look like a precursor to integrated circuits. The inside of the left compartment contains a tilt switch, a battery, a vintage earphone acting as a small speaker, and a small block of components connected to the thin-film module. This block contains two oscillators made with unijunction transistors (UJTs); one to create the beep, and one to control each beep’s duration. The construction and overall design of the device is easily recognizable, although some of the parts are now obsolete.
If you’d like a bit more detail on exactly how this device worked, including circuit diagrams and historical context, be sure to click that first link, and pay attention to the notes and references at the end. One other thing that’s clear is that
functional electronics embedded in clear plastic shapes
simply never go out of style. | 9 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363692",
"author": "Drone",
"timestamp": "2021-07-13T02:51:56",
"content": "Circuits and/or systems somewhat like the macro-structure of the encapsulated 1960’s example are still in wide use today and in most cases considered to be high-technology. For example: Low and High Tempera... | 1,760,373,020.799622 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/11/tuning-into-medical-implants-with-the-rtl-sdr/ | Tuning Into Medical Implants With The RTL-SDR | Tom Nardi | [
"Medical Hacks",
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"medical device",
"medical implant",
"RTL-SDR",
"rtl_433",
"software-defined radio"
] | With a bit of luck, you’ll live your whole life without needing an implanted medical device. But if you
do
end up getting the news that your doctor will be installing an active transmitter inside your body, you might as well crack out the software defined radio (SDR) and
see if you can’t decode its transmission like [James Wu] recently did
.
Before the Medtronic Bravo Reflux Capsule was attached to his lower esophagus, [James] got a good look at a demo unit of the pencil-width gadget. Despite the medical technician telling him the device used a “Bluetooth-like” communications protocol to transmit his esophageal pH to a wearable receiver, the big 433 emblazoned on the hardware made him think it was worth taking a closer look at the documentation. Sure enough, its entry in the FCC database not only confirmed the radio transmitted a 433.92 MHz OOK-PWM encoded signal, but it even broke down the contents of each packet. If only it was always that easy, right?
The 433 ended up being a coincidence, but it got him on the right track.
Of course he still had to put this information into practice, so the next step was to craft a configuration file for the popular
rtl_433
program which split each packet into its principle parts. This part of the write-up is particularly interesting for those who might be looking to pull data in from their own 433 MHz sensors, medical or otherwise
Unfortunately, there was still one piece of the puzzle missing. [James] knew which field was the pH value from the FCC database, but the 16-bit integer he was receiving didn’t make any sense. After some more research into the hardware, which uncovered another attempt at decoding the transmissions from the early days of the RTL-SDR project, he realized what he was actually seeing was the combination of two 8-bit pH measurements that are sent out simultaneously.
We were pleasantly surprised to see how much public information [James] was able to find about the Medtronic Bravo Reflux Capsule, but in a perfect world, this would be the norm. You deserve to know everything there is to know about a piece of electronics that’s going to be placed inside your body, but so far, the
movement towards open hardware medical devices
has struggled to gain much traction. | 12 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363408",
"author": "Bret Tschacher",
"timestamp": "2021-07-11T16:06:11",
"content": "Great, now we have the surreal outlook of people hacking into this and seeing how many people they can simply tune in, turn off, hold for ransom or corrupt.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,... | 1,760,373,021.030936 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/11/discount-microfluidics-from-a-9-spree-at-the-dollar-store/ | Discount Microfluidics From A $9 Spree At The Dollar Store | Al Williams | [
"chemistry hacks",
"Science"
] | [
"dollar store",
"microfluidics"
] | Microfluidics — working with tiny volumes of fluids in tiny channels — isn’t something you’d think would be inexpensive. Unless you read [Alexander Bissells’]
post on how he created microfluidic devices
using stuff from the dollar store. The channels in these devices can be much smaller than a millimeter and the fluid volumes are sometimes measured in femtoliters. At those scales, fluids don’t work like we intuitively think they will.
The parts list included gel tape, baby droppers, and some assorted containers and tools. Total price at the dollar store $9. One of the key finds in the dollar store was some small spray bottles. They weren’t important themselves, but they contain small lengths of silicone tubing and that was useful. Plastic fresnel lenses along with the tubing and gel tape worked to make “chips.” The gel tape also gets cut to make the channels. An eyedropper with some modifications makes a reasonable syringe.
We aren’t sure what you can practically do with any of these, but the T-junction looked pretty interesting. If you want some ideas on how these devices work in biology, including COVID-19 testing, check out
this article
. And just last week [Krishna Sanka] hosted a Hack Chat on microfluidics in biohacking,
you can find the transcript on the project page
. If you need a pump, this one uses
3D printer firmware
to control it. | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363378",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2021-07-11T12:48:30",
"content": "Then there’s the use of shrinky-dink.https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2008/lc/b711622e#!divAbstract",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
}
] | 1,760,373,021.37899 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/11/but-does-it-run-toom/ | But Does It Run TOOM? | Jenny List | [
"Games"
] | [
"does it run doom",
"doom",
"Toom"
] | id Software’s iconic 1993 first-person shooter game
Doom
was
the
game to play on your 486 (or fast 386) and was for many their first introduction to immersive 3D environments in gaming. Its eventual release as open-source gave it a new life, and now it’s a rite of passage for newly-reverse-engineered devices:
Will it run Doom?
One type of platform that never ran Doom though was the classic arcade cabinet with its portrait-aligned screen.
This is something [Matt Phillips] has addressed with Toom
, a PC Doom port that — finally — runs on a portrait screen.
To enter the world of a UAC space marine in glorious portrait mode, simply take an installation of Doom 1.9 for DOS, and copy the Toom files from the GitHub repository over the top of it. The minimum spec is a 486 so period hardware will be fine, all you’ll need is a monitor that can be tipped on its side.
Doom consumed far too many hours for gamers of a certain age, and while it may look quaint to modern eyes it can’t be overstated what a giant step it was compared to what had gone before. If any of you install Toom and give it a go, prepare to see its monsters when you close your eyes.
We’ve shown you Doom on all sorts of devices over the years, perhaps the most intriguing is
a no-software version in FPGA hardware
. | 39 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363355",
"author": "gregvaultpress",
"timestamp": "2021-07-11T09:26:55",
"content": "I played Wolfenstein 3D long before Doom, and /that/ game was the one that impressed me to the point of tears.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id"... | 1,760,373,021.93518 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/10/wing-can-expand-to-fly-really-slow-for-short-take-off-and-landing/ | Wing Can Expand To Fly Really Slow For Short Take-Off And Landing | Danie Conradie | [
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"aviation",
"bush plane",
"experimental aircraft",
"mike patey",
"piston engine",
"scrappy"
] | [Mike Patey] had made a name for himself by building high-performance experimental aircraft. In his latest project, he added a
transforming wing that can extend its chord by up to 16 inches
for low speed and high angle of attack performance.
The aircraft in question, a bush plane named
Scrappy
, has been attracting attention long before [Mike] even started building the wings. Designed for extremely short take-off and landing (STOL) performance, only some sections of the fuselage frame remain from the original Carbon Cub kit. The wings are custom designed and feature double slats on the leading edge, combined with large flaps and drooping ailerons on the trailing edge. The slats form an almost seamless part of the wing for normal flying, but can expand using a series of linkages integrated into each precision machine wing rib. Making extensive use of CFD simulations, the slats were designed to keep the center-of-lift close to the center of the wing, even with 50 degrees of flaps. Without the slats, the pilot would need to use almost all the elevator authority to counteract the flaps and keep the aircraft’s nose up.
Leading-edge slats have been around since before WW2, but you don’t see them used in pairs like this. Aircraft like Scrappy will never be commercially viable, but innovation by people like [Mike] drives aviation forward. [Mike]’s previous project plane,
Draco
, was a large turboprop bush plane built around a PZL-104 Wilga. Sadly it was destroyed during an ill-considered take-off in 2019, but [Mike] is already planning its successor,
Draco-X
. | 56 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363334",
"author": "Gravis",
"timestamp": "2021-07-11T05:36:58",
"content": "Those whole people being water balloons in a flying hunk of metal seems dangerous enough. Building your own flying contraption just seems like tempting fate. Physics is not kind to us water balloons; we ... | 1,760,373,021.339913 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/10/astronomical-clock-uses-your-spare-clock-motors/ | Astronomical Clock Uses Your Spare Clock Motors | Al Williams | [
"clock hacks",
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"clock",
"low power",
"microcontroller",
"pic"
] | We’ll admit we are suckers for clock projects, and the more unusual, the better.
We liked the look of [Peter Balch’s] astronomical clock
, especially since it was handcrafted and was a relatively simple mechanism. [Peter] admits that it looks like an astronomical clock, but it isn’t the same as a complex instrument from medieval times. Instead, it uses several standard clock motors modified.
We didn’t quite follow some of the explanations for the rotation of the different elements, but the animated GIF cleared it all up. The inner and outer discs are geared at a 6:5 ratio. It takes 2 hours for the inner disc to make one rotation, meaning that every 12 hours the two discs will be back to where they began relative to one another.
Modifying the motors is fine work, requiring a good bit of disassembly and some glue. The electronics that make it tick are quite interesting. To drive the motors, a very specific pulse train is needed, but you also want to conserve battery as much as possible. A simple oscillator with a hex inverter drew more power than desired and an Arduino, even more so. A PIC12F629, though, could sleep a lot and do the job for a very low current consumption. The final clock should run a year on two AA cells. | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363351",
"author": "Harvie.CZ",
"timestamp": "2021-07-11T08:01:00",
"content": "I’m a simple man. I see orloj, i upvote!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
}
] | 1,760,373,021.111299 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/10/is-it-a-cyberdeck-or-a-vintage-toshiba/ | Is It A Cyberdeck Or A Vintage Toshiba? | Jenny List | [
"laptops hacks"
] | [
"cyberdeck",
"laptop",
"Toshiba"
] | Cyberdecks, the portable computers notable for a freely expressed form factor, owe much to post-apocalyptic sci-fi. But they are not always the most practical devices. There’s a reason that all laptops share a very similar form factor: it’s a convenient and functional way to make a computer to take anywhere. So for the ideal compromise,
why not make a cyberdeck from a vintage laptop
? That’s exactly what [Valrum] has done with a non-functioning Toshiba 3100/20, upgrading the display and slipping in a Raspberry Pi 4, along with a handy removable USB e-ink supplementary screen (The red/black rectangle to the right of the main screen).
These older machines were so bulky that once their original hardware is removed there is plenty of space for upgrades. Even the screen enclosure is big enough to hide the LCD driver board behind a modern panel. It follows a well-worn path for Raspberry Pi builds of using a Teensy as a USB keyboard controller, but unexpectedly the stock keyboard has been entirely replaced with a hand-wired one, which is nicely executed to appear superficially as though it was original. In an amusing twist this machine has no battery, not because it wouldn’t be possible but because the original Toshiba didn’t have one either. The USB ports are brought out to the space where the floppy would once have been.
With a plentiful supply of unexceptional or non functional older laptops to be had it’s clear that there’s a rich vein to be mined in this type of build. It’s something we’ve seen done before,
in a more famous Toshiba laptop
. | 26 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363299",
"author": "Redhatter (VK4MSL)",
"timestamp": "2021-07-10T23:29:35",
"content": "I remember those!Heavy as flipping lead. My first few years of computing was done on a machine very similar to the one that got gutted. Playing early DOS games on a 640×400 pixel monochrome p... | 1,760,373,021.440972 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/10/skin-mounted-wearable-bend-sensor-gets-close-and-personal/ | Skin-Mounted Wearable Bend Sensor Gets Close And Personal | Donald Papp | [
"Wearable Hacks"
] | [
"bend sensor",
"conductive fabric",
"conductive thread",
"e-textile",
"wearable"
] | [Mikst] has been working on wearable electronics and sensors for a long time, and shared the results of
a different kind of bend sensor that fits directly onto the skin
. It’s true that this kind of sensor design isn’t re-usable, but it is also very simple and inexpensive. It’s just a proof of concept right now, but we could see it or some of the other ideas [Mikst] tries, used in niche wearable applications where space is critical, like
cosplay
.
At its heart the sensor is made from two strands of conductive thread and a small strip of stretchy, conductive fabric common in wearable e-textiles. It is stuck directly to the skin using a transparent, non-woven medical adhesive dressing that is particularly good at conforming to contoured areas of the body. In this case, it is used to stick the stretchy piece of conductive fabric directly onto [Mikst]’s knuckle, where it responds to even small movements. You can watch a multimeter measuring the resistance changes in the video, embedded below.
We’ve seen [Mikst]’s work before in finding unusual solutions to e-textile problems, such as
a three-conductor pivoting connection
used to mount a wearable hall effect sensor. | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363308",
"author": "lemny",
"timestamp": "2021-07-11T01:34:02",
"content": "( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
}
] | 1,760,373,021.977953 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/12/3d-printed-hot-swap-keyboard-pcb-generator-is-super-cool/ | 3D-Printed, Hot-Swap Keyboard PCB Generator Is Super Cool | Kristina Panos | [
"3d Printer hacks",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"breadboard",
"cherry mx",
"hot swap",
"keyboard building",
"prototyping"
] | About a month ago, [50an6xy06r6n] shared their hot swap 3D-printed circuit board for keyboard design with the mechanical keyboard subreddit. It’s more of a prototyping tool than a permanent fixture, though nothing is stopping you from using it permanently.
Well, now it’s even better, and open source to boot
.
[50an6xy06r6n] came up with this to test split ergo layouts faster and not have to solder anything — the switch pins make contact with the row wires and folded diode legs. In fact, prepping all the diodes is probably the thing that takes the longest.
The design can be generated from layout data, or you can convert directly from a
KLE
JSON file. We love how delightfully clean this keyboard breadboard generator looks, and we wish we had thought of it!
[50an6xy06r6n]’s PCB generator
currently supports Cherry MX/clones and Kailh Choc switch footprints. If you want ALPS, somebody’s gonna have to send [50an6xy06r6n] some ALPS to make that happen.
As long as all the contact points are good, you should be able to use this as the final PCB indefinitely.
We’ve certainly seen our share of 3D-printed wire guides
. Really, you could print the whole thing,
including the switches
. | 4 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363518",
"author": "Inhibit",
"timestamp": "2021-07-12T11:58:28",
"content": "The last time I needed some keyboard switches for a project it was a bit cheaper to buy a removable switch keyboard on Amazon than to buy the same switches in equivalent quantity. Could’ve been an oddity ... | 1,760,373,021.505278 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/12/the-first-new-vacuum-tube-computer-design-for-well-over-half-a-century/ | The First New Vacuum Tube Computer Design For Well Over Half A Century | Jenny List | [
"computer hacks",
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"colossus",
"tube computer",
"vacuum tube"
] | In a few museums around the world, there lies the special experience of seeing some of the earliest computers. These room-filling monsters have multiple racks of vacuum tubes that are kept working by the dedication and care of their volunteer maintainers. A visit to the primordial vacuum tube computer, Colossus at Bletchley Park, UK, led [Mike] on the path towards designing an entirely new one. He thinks it’s the first to see the light of day in over five decades.
ENA, the Electron tube New Automatic Computer
, is the result.
It uses 550 Soviet 6N3P double triodes, and its 8-bit Von Neumann architecture is constructed from the tubes wired up as 5-input NOR gates. ROM is a diode matrix, and RAM comes courtesy of reed relays. The whole thing is assembled as eleven PCBs on a wall-mounted frame, with a console that holds the piece de resistance, a display made from an array of LEDs. A Pong game is in development, meanwhile the machine makes an impressive room heater.
If you’d like to see some more vacuum tube computational goodness,
we saw Colossus
at
the National Museum of Computing
, back in 1996. | 48 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363497",
"author": "k-ww",
"timestamp": "2021-07-12T08:53:44",
"content": "It gives me a warm feeling just thinking about it.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6363505",
"author": "Scoldog",
"timestamp": "2021-0... | 1,760,373,021.709426 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/11/making-teeny-clamps-with-hand-tools/ | Making Teeny Clamps With Hand Tools | Lewin Day | [
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"clamp"
] | Sometimes you need a small clamp, and sometimes it’s nice to use tools you’ve made yourself. [Neil] from [Pask Makes] delivers on both counts, with incredibly cute little clamps that he whipped up in his own home shop.
You can even make them with hand tools!
The first step is to cut out a section of flat steel bar, and then drill a hole in the middle. The flats that form the key clamping surfaces can then be cut using a hacksaw. From there, it’s a matter of cleaning up the resulting blank with a file to take off sharp edges and neaten up the flats.
Drilling and tapping the main hole through the bottom of the clamp is the next job, and getting the hole straight and true is key to making a good usable clamp. The video shares tips on how to do this with even a simple cordless drill, by using a vice and a wood guide to keep things on track. The swiveling nut is then made out of a piece of round bar, and installed on the end of a bolt to create a nice clamping surface. A cute little brass handle is used to tighten it up.
It’s a useful tool, and the video goes on to show how the clamp can be made more quickly using higher-end facilities. While small clamps can be had cheaply, the video notes that making tools is fun and we think that’s as good a reason as any to make your own.
We’ve seen [Neil]’s work before,
particularly in the case of this stunning “bladeless fan” build
. Video after the break. | 19 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363474",
"author": "Eddy Robinson",
"timestamp": "2021-07-12T05:18:48",
"content": "*vise",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6363476",
"author": "Richard from the UK",
"timestamp": "2021-07-12T06:22:01",
... | 1,760,373,021.766719 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/11/can-bus-wireless-hacking-dev-board/ | CAN Bus Wireless Hacking / Dev Board | Chris Lott | [
"car hacks"
] | [
"automotive",
"can-bus",
"canbus",
"car hacking"
] | [Voltlog] has been hacking away at the CAN bus console of his VW Golf for quite some time now. Presumably, for his projects, the available CAN bus interface boards are lacking in some ways, either technically and/or price. So [Voltlog]
designed his own wireless CAN bus hacking and development module called the ESP32 CanLite
(see the video below the break). The board was tailored to meet the needs of his project and he claims it is not a universal tool. Nevertheless we think many folks will find the features he selected for this module will be a good fit for their projects as well.
In his introduction of the design, he walks through the various design decisions he faced. As the project name suggests, he’s using the ESP32 as the main controller due to it’s wireless radios and built-in CAN controller. The board is powered from the car’s +12V power, so it uses a wide input range ( 4 to 40 V ) switching regulator. One feature he added was the ability to switch automotive accessories using the ST VN750PC, a nifty high-side driver in an SO-8 package with integrated safety provisions.
The project is published as open source and the files can be pulled from his
GitHub repository
. We noticed the debug connector labeled VOLTLINK on the schematic, and found
his description of this custom interface
interesting. Basically, he was not satisfied with the quality and performance of the various USB-to-serial adapters on the market and decided to make his own. Could this be a common theme among [Voltlog]’s projects?
A word of warning if you want to build the ESP32 CanLite yourself. While [Voltlog] had intentionally selected parts that were common and easy to purchase when the project began, several key chips have since become nearly impossible to obtain these days due to the global parts shortage issue (it’s even
out of stock on his Tindie page
).
If you want to dig deeper into CAN bus hacking, check out
this talk that we wrote about back in 2016
. Do you have any favorite CAN bus development boards and/or tools? Let us know in the comments below. | 5 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363503",
"author": "mip",
"timestamp": "2021-07-12T09:43:18",
"content": "Great project, would also be a nice fit for boaters with their NME2000.Too bad its ST VN750PS (sic!) seems to be made from unobtanium, as quite a lot of automotive grade ICs.",
"parent_id": null,
"dep... | 1,760,373,021.816816 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/11/hackaday-links-july-11-2021/ | Hackaday Links: July 11, 2021 | Dan Maloney | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Hackaday links"
] | [
"bsod",
"chip shortage",
"hackaday links",
"interactive",
"laser",
"light show",
"noise",
"scammer",
"Windows 11"
] | Well, at least the acronym will stay the same. It looks like
black is the new blue for Windows 11
, as the BSOD screen gets its first makeover in years. It’s an admittedly minor change, since the on-screen text is virtually identical to the BSOD from recent versions of Windows 10, and the new death-knell even sports the same frowny-face emoji and QR code. Really, the white-on-black color scheme is the only major difference we can see — even the acronym will stay the same. It’s not really that newsworthy, we suppose, although it does make us miss the extremely busy BSODs from back in the Windows NT days.
As the semiconductor shortage continues, manufacturers are getting desperate to procure the parts they need to make their products. And if there’s one thing as certain as death and taxes, it’s that desperation provides opportunity to criminals.
A thread over on EEVBlog
details an encounter one company had with an alleged scammer, who sent an unsolicited offer to them for a large number of ordinarily hard-to-find microprocessors at a good price. Wisely, the company explored the offer in some depth and found that “Brian” (the representative who contacted them) is actually named Nick Martin and, according to an article on the Electronic Resellers Association International (ERAI) website, is
apparently associated with a number of fraudulent operations
. Their list of allegedly fraudulent deals made by Mr. Martin stretches back to 2018 and totals over $300,000 of ill-gotten gain.
Last year, friend-of-Hackaday and laser artist Seb Lee-Delisle spent a lot of time and effort getting together an amazing interactive laser light show for the night skies of cities in the UK.
Laser Light City
, with powerful lasers mounted on the tops of tall buildings, was a smashing success that brought a little cheer into what was an otherwise dreadful time. But we have to admit that the videos and other materials covering Laser Light City left us wanting more — something like that, with a far-flung installation on rooftops and the ability for audience members to control it all from their phone, really needs a deeper “how it works” treatment. Thankfully, Seb has released
a video that dives into the nuts and bolts of the show
, including a look at ludicrously powerful lasers with beams that can still be seen in broad daylight.
And finally, we’ve all heard about noise reduction, but have you ever considered adding a little noise to your systems? It might not be the way to go in all cases, but as
this one-minute video
explains, adding a little noise might just be what makes the difference to an observation. The video uses a simple and somewhat contrived example of a voltmeter with one-volt resolution measuring a badly discharged battery. Adding random noise to the reading and then taking hundreds of readings and averaging the readings can get you the right answer. This has other, more impactful implications which the video mentions, but we won’t spoil the surprise. Just watch it — it only takes a minute. | 5 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363467",
"author": "R",
"timestamp": "2021-07-12T03:58:45",
"content": "glad I don’t live anywhere near those lasers.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6363506",
"author": "Shannon",
"timestamp": "2021-07-12T09:... | 1,760,373,021.85738 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/11/digital-audio-for-microcontrollers-doesnt-come-much-simpler-than-a-wart/ | Digital Audio For Microcontrollers Doesn’t Come Much Simpler Than A WART | Jenny List | [
"digital audio hacks",
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"audio",
"serial",
"uart"
] | Adding an audio channel to your microcontroller project can mean a pile of extra components and a ton of processing power, as a compressed stream must be retrieved and sent to a dedicated DAC. Or if you are [rdpoor], it can mean
hooking up a low-pass filter to the UART that’s present on even the simplest of devices
, and constructing a serial data stream that mimics PWM audio.
Sound on your microcontroller, it’s this simple!
WART is a Python script that converts a WAV file into a C formatted byte array that can be baked into your microcontroller code, and for which playback is as simple as streaming it to the UART. The example uses a Teensy and a transistor to drive a small speaker, we’re guessing that better quality might come with using a dedicated low-pass filter rather than relying on the speaker itself, but at least audio doesn’t come any simpler.
The code can be found in a GitHub repository
and there’s a few recordings of the output
in the files section Hackaday.io page
, one is embedded below. It’s better than we might have expected given that the quality won’t be the best at the PWM data rate of even the fastest UART. But even if you won’t be incorporating it into your music system any time soon we can see it being a useful addition for such things as small warning sounds. Meanwhile if persuading serially driven speakers to talk is of interest, there’s always
the venerable PC speaker
.
https://cdn.hackaday.io/files/1805307723795520/Rolling.wav | 11 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363435",
"author": "Joseph Eoff",
"timestamp": "2021-07-11T20:08:56",
"content": "You have been “Rick rolled.”https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rickrolling",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6363437",
"author": "Cree",
... | 1,760,373,022.026614 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/11/motorized-camera-slider-gives-your-shots-style/ | Motorized Camera Slider Gives Your Shots Style | Tom Nardi | [
"digital cameras hacks",
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"camera slider",
"ESP32",
"stepper motor",
"TMC2209",
"web interface"
] | We’ve all seen those smooth panning shots, which combined with some public domain beats, are a hallmark of the modern YouTube tech video. Recreating that style in your own productions is as easy as pointing your browser to Amazon and picking up a motorized camera slider, so long as you don’t mind parting with a few hundred bucks, anyway. But [Paweł Spychalski] had a better idea. He
decided to build his own camera slider and make it an open source project
so others could spin up their own versions.
His design uses many components that have become popular and affordable thanks to the desktop 3D printer explosion, such as 2020 aluminum extrusion, LM8UU linear bearings, an 8 mm lead screw, and a NEMA 17 stepper motor. In fact, if you’ve got a broken 3D printer that you don’t know what to do with, stripping it for parts would get you a long way towards completing the BOM for this project.
To control the slider, [Paweł] is using an ESP32 and TMC2209 “StepStick” driver connected to an OLED display and a few buttons. As designed, a smartphone connected to a simple web page hosted by the ESP32 is the primary method of controlling the camera, but the buttons and display on the slider itself gives you a physical backup should you need it.
If you need something a bit more advanced than a linear slider, we’ve seen some
impressive DIY motion rigs
that can spin the camera around the target and
produce some very professional looking shots
. | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6464888",
"author": "Mico",
"timestamp": "2022-04-25T08:46:20",
"content": "Hi, thank you for making this OpenSource. May I ask where to get that phone app your using here?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
}
] | 1,760,373,023.996296 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/12/revolving-plant-tower-is-solar-powered/ | Revolving Plant Tower Is Solar-Powered | Kristina Panos | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"carabiner",
"clutch",
"dc motor",
"solar cell",
"solar power",
"strawberries"
] | Do you live in a small or yard-less space, but want to grow things anyway? You’re not totally out of luck — you’ll just have to get creative and probably vertical with your planting scheme. And since apartments and other smallish dwellings often have a limited amount of exposure, it would really help a lot if you could somehow rotate the plants so that they receive even sunlight.
[JT_Makes_It]’s rotating strawberry tower ticks all these boxes and more
. The 12 V solar cell powers a small DC motor that spins at the gentle speed of 0.6 RPM. The tube is hanging from a swiveling carabiner that acts like a clutch — if a strong wind comes along or something bumps into it, the motor will continue to spin the carabiner.
[JT_Makes_It] already had a tube with holes, though they did cut several more into it. As built, this is not exactly apartment dweller-friendly, unless you have off-site access to things like plasma cutters and welding equipment. But as they point out, you could theoretically use PVC and a hole saw and make it shorter and therefore lighter. We think this looks great, although we’re a bit concerned about the weight. Not so much on the mechanism itself; that looks strong. We’re just wondering how long that carport frame will support it. Judge the build quality for yourself from the video after the break.
Did you know that strawberries can do tricks?
Fasciation
makes fanned-out berries, and
vivipary
makes them hairy. | 16 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363672",
"author": "Glamar",
"timestamp": "2021-07-12T23:32:32",
"content": "Does it keep the bird off your berries?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6363861",
"author": "JT Makes It",
"timestamp": "2021-07-13T... | 1,760,373,023.722767 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/12/a-capable-nerf-launcher-robot/ | A Capable Nerf Launcher Robot | Lewin Day | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"compressed air",
"nerf",
"robot"
] | Nerf blasters are fun to play with, and it’s now possible to even get robotic Nerf launchers you can use to chase around your friends. [Engineering After Hours] wasn’t satisfied with the official hardware, though,
so built his own remote control Nerf rig to battle it out in the back yard.
The rig is built around an earlier build from [Engineering After Hours],
a skid-steer RC chassis
that is nice and tough to handle rough and tumble driving. It’s paired with a trailer attached to the center of rotation of the chassis that makes the pair highly maneuverable.
In order to launch rockets, an air tank on the trailer is hooked up to some piping to launch four Nerf rockets. Charged up to just 40 psi, it’s capable of launching the rounds with plenty of power for play purposes. Paired with a elevation control and a servo to trigger the firing valve, it’s a complete system that can shoot on the go.
It’s a fun build that packs a punch, even if it doesn’t quite have the accuracy or range you might desire in an all-conquering Nerf combat platform. We’d love to see a similar build hooked up to some AI smarts to stalk targets independently of human control. Video after the break. | 5 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363659",
"author": "steve.eh",
"timestamp": "2021-07-12T21:38:39",
"content": "pew pew",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6363766",
"author": "Hans",
"timestamp": "2021-07-13T12:27:53",
"content": "Not al... | 1,760,373,024.035706 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/12/get-yourself-a-pupper-for-education/ | Get Yourself A Pupper (For Education) | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Robots Hacks",
"The Hackaday Prize"
] | [
"2021 Hackaday Prize",
"mini",
"open source",
"Pupper",
"raspberry pi",
"servo",
"stanford"
] | While the disquieting appearance of some of the robots coming out of DARPA and other labs might give us some reservations about how much intelligence we want to give to those robots, there’s a lot to be learned from them before their inevitable global takeover.
This small quadruped called the Mini Pupper is just the robot for that job
. With a low cost and familiar platform, it’s the ideal robot to learn some of the tricks of the trade.
For a quadruped so small, some unique changes had to be made to ensure the robot’s functionality. There have been a few developments
since it was first shown over a year ago
. The first was to design a custom servo that could handle the unique characteristics of this robot. From there, some other improvements were made to the robot chassis such as using threaded rods for ease of assembly and maintenance. Some other things have stayed the same though like using a Raspberry Pi to handle the control systems and self-navigation.
Of course everything needed to make this robot yourself is open source, from the code to the schematics. For experimenting with quadrupeds and even with automatic navigation, this would be a great way to get started, and the small size will also limit its ability for a Skynet-style takeover as well. That’s a nice bonus.
The
Hackaday
Prize2021
is Sponsored by: | 14 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363658",
"author": "Phil",
"timestamp": "2021-07-12T21:29:49",
"content": "Awesome little bot! Would have been a great stepping stone between a turtle bot on the way to a biped walker. The gap there is huge and could do with a few steps. Mention this as was working for a start-u... | 1,760,373,023.668708 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/12/teardown-vtech-smart-start/ | Teardown: VTech Smart Start | Tom Nardi | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Teardown",
"Toy Hacks"
] | [
"LED display",
"MCU",
"microcontroller",
"VTech",
"z80",
"zilog",
"Zilog Z80"
] | Regular readers may be aware that I have a certain affinity for vintage VTech educational toys,
especially
ones that attempted to visually or even functionally tie in with contemporary computer design. In the late 1980s, when it became obvious the personal computer was here to stay, these devices were seen as an affordable way to give kids and even young teens hands-on time with something that at least somewhat resembled the far more expensive machines their parents were using.
Much Smarter: VTech PreComputer 1000
A perfect example is the PreComputer 1000, released in 1988. Featuring a full QWERTY keyboard and the ability to run BASIC programs,
it truly blurred the line between toy and computer
. In fact from a technical standpoint it wasn’t far removed from early desktop computers, as it was powered by the same Zilog Z80 CPU found in the TRS-80 Model I.
By comparison, the Smart Start has more in common with a desktop electronic calculator. Even though it was released just two years prior to the PreComputer 1000, you can tell at a glance that it’s a far more simplistic device. That’s due at least in part to the fact that it was aimed at a younger audience, but surely the rapid advancement of computer technology at the time also played a part. Somewhat ironically, VTech did still at least attempt to make the Smart Start look like a desktop computer, complete with the faux disk drive on the front panel.
Of course, looks can be deceiving. While the Smart Start looks decidedly juvenile on the outside, that doesn’t mean there aren’t a few surprising technical discoveries lurking under its beige plastic exterior. There’s only one way to find out.
A Touchy Subject
At a glance the shape and ergonomics of the Smart Start make it abundantly clear that you’re supposed to place it on a table and sit in front of it, which frankly seems overly optimistic for a young child’s toy. Later VTech computers had a strong focus on portability, so that even if you ultimately needed a flat surface to actually operate them, they at least offered a handle or carrying strap so they could be easily moved by a child.
The SmartStart’s keyboard, if one could truly call it that, also defies expectations. The buttons to change modes, which presumably would be the ones least frequently pressed, are placed nearest the user. Above those are 10 number buttons that are also labeled with the solfège syllables, as apparently at least one of the machine’s functions can generate tones. Then we have the huge A/B/C/D buttons that I gather were used by the multiple choice activities featured in the book that would have came with the Smart Start, which incidentally, I don’t have.
In terms of construction, it appears that the keyboard could be repurposed relatively easily. The graphical overlay could be swapped out, and the conductive carbon traces underneath connected to the GPIO pins of your microcontroller of choice. But as far as input devices go, it’s pretty miserable to use, so keep that in mind.
Under the Hood
The upper compartment of the Smart Start holds all of the electronics, which in this case is essentially a single unit made up of two PCBs. The smaller display PCB is permanently affixed to the primary board with metal brackets and an extremely short ribbon cable. Hazarding a guess, I would imagine it was designed this way so the display could be located in a more remote position on other VTech models.
Flipping the board over we can see the Smart Start is powered by a Zilog chip, this time a Z0860008PSC. Unlike the Z80 processors used in the later VTech models, this a single-chip “microcomputer” solution. Today we’d just call it a microcontroller, but microcomputer does sound more impressive.
The chip features an integrated oscillator, 128 bytes of RAM, and 22 I/O pins. But unlike the microcontrollers most of us are used to working with, the code lives on 2 KB of ROM that would have been baked in during manufacture. That makes the Z8600 all but completely worthless in terms of repurposing, but it’s an interesting part nonetheless.
Programming pins? What are those?
Beyond the MCU, the most notable feature of the board are the nine LM90 transistors and array of resistors used to drive the LED display segments in place of a dedicated driver chip. It might seem like nine transistors wouldn’t be enough, but as the display is being multiplexed in software, not all of the digits are actually lit up at the same time, a fact that becomes abundantly clear while trying to photograph the Smart Start.
Solve for X
Speaking of the LED display, a close look uncovers an interesting layout that’s clearly a product of the sort of number games the Smart Start was meant to play. Most of the characters are of the seven segment variety, but the third character has fifteen segments and is designed to fill in for all of the mathematical operators that the machine is capable of using. The fourth character is the second term in the equation, which in the case of the Smart Start can apparently only be 0 through 9. After the equals sign we have three more characters, which makes sense given the highest number it should have to display is the product of 99 and 9, or 891.
The one thing I’m not clear on is the small dash between the second and third characters. As mentioned previously I don’t have any of the Smart Start’s documentation, so if you happened to have one of these gadgets when you were a junior hacker and remember what it means, feel free to leave a comment below.
Humble Beginnings
Image Credit:
VTech Wiki
In doing my research, I found that a variant of this computer called the Smart Start Speller was released in 1988. This computer used the same enclosure as the original Smart Start, shrank down the colored A/B/C/D keys to fit another row on the keyboard, and replaced the LED display with an LCD. It would be interesting to see if the later model Smart Start switched over to the Z80 that was being used in other VTech offerings at that point, or if it stuck with the more simplistic Z8600.
In any event, it’s clear that the differences between the Smart Start and the later VTech computers go beyond cosmetic differences. While this early entry does show that the company’s preference for Zilog silicon started before the PreComputer, it lacks the input, output, and expandability that gave those later machines their edge. We’ve seen modern projects to
bring new software to some of these more capable VTech computers
, but with the one-and-done nature of the Z8600 at the core of the Smart Start, it’s destined to never be anything more than a child’s toy. | 12 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363613",
"author": "Eduardo Habkost",
"timestamp": "2021-07-12T17:30:32",
"content": "The small dash between the third and third characters seems to be used for the “Middle Number” and “Guess the Number” games. At least that’s what the emulator athttp://labs.hardinfo.org/pb/does.",... | 1,760,373,023.896412 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/12/scada-security-hack-chat/ | SCADA Security Hack Chat | Dan Maloney | [
"Hackaday Columns"
] | [
"Hack Chat",
"infrastructure",
"network",
"plc",
"risk",
"SCADA",
"security"
] | Join us on Wednesday, July 14 at noon Pacific for the
SCADA Security Hack Chat
with Éireann Leverett!
As a society, we’ve learned a lot of hard lessons over the last year and a half or so. But one of the strongest lessons we’ve faced is the true fragility of our infrastructure. The crumbling buildings and bridges and their tragic consequences are one thing, but along with attacks on the food and energy supply chains, it’s clear that our systems are at the most vulnerable as their complexity increases.
And boy are we good at making complex systems. In the United States alone, millions of miles of cables and pipelines stitch the country together from one coast to the other, much of it installed in remote and rugged places. Such far-flung systems require monitoring and control, which is the job of supervisory control and data acquisition, or SCADA, systems. These networks have grown along with the infrastructure, often in a somewhat ad hoc manner, and given their nature they can be tempting targets for threat actors.
Finding ways to secure such systems is very much on Éireann Leverett’s mind. As a Senior Risk Researcher at the University of Cambridge, he knows about the threats to our infrastructure and works to find ways to mitigate them. His book
Solving Cyber Risk
lays out a framework for protecting IT infrastructure in general. For this Hack Chat, Éireann will be addressing the special needs of SCADA systems, and how best to protect these networks. Drop by with your questions about infrastructure automation, mitigating cyber risks, and what it takes to protect the endless web of pipes and wires we all need to survive.
Our Hack Chats are live community events in the
Hackaday.io Hack Chat group messaging
. This week we’ll be sitting down on Wednesday, July 14 at 12:00 PM Pacific time. If time zones have you tied up, we have a
handy time zone converter
. | 18 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363605",
"author": "BT",
"timestamp": "2021-07-12T16:46:59",
"content": "Wait until someone takes out the GPS…",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6363616",
"author": "Ragnarok700",
"timestamp": "2021-07-12T17:38:... | 1,760,373,023.776499 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/12/chip-transplant-brings-timex-2048-back-from-grave/ | Chip Transplant Brings Timex 2048 Back From Grave | Tom Nardi | [
"Repair Hacks",
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"repair",
"restoration",
"retrocomputing",
"Timex",
"z80"
] | The 1984 Timex Computer 2048 that [Drygol] recently got his hands on was in pretty poor shape. Not only did it have the mangled exterior that comes from several decades of hard use and furious typing, but the internals appeared to be shot as well, with the machine showing nothing but vertical lines when powered up. Thankfully, this retro computer virtuoso was
more than up to the challenge of bringing it back from the brink
.
After a good cleaning and the installation of a reproduction front panel, the Timex was already looking much better. Unfortunately [Drygol] says he doesn’t currently have the equipment necessary to touch up the graphics and lettering on the key caps, but the fact that he had to qualify that statement with “currently” has us all sorts of excited to see what he’s planning down the line.
A bevy of fresh chips.
Of course beauty is only skin deep, and this particular TC-2048 was still bad to the bone. [Drygol] had a hunch its Z80 processor was dead, but after swapping it and its socket out, the machine still wouldn’t start. Though he did note that the garbled graphics shown on the screen
had
changed, which made him think he was on the right track. He then replaced all the RAM on the board, but that didn’t seem to change anything.
There isn’t a whole lot else to go wrong on these old machines, so the final step was to try and replace the ROM. Sure enough, after installing a new Winbond W27C512 chip with the appropriate software burned onto it, the nearly 40 year old computer sprang back to life.
Another classic computer saved from the trash heap, but it’s all in a day’s work for [Drygol].
Over the years we’ve seen him perform meticulous repairs
on computer hardware that
any reasonable person would have given up on
. Even if you’re not into retro hardware,
his restorations are always full of fascinating tips and tricks
that can be applied when repairing gadgetry from whatever era happens to tickle your fancy. | 16 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363562",
"author": "BrightBlueJim",
"timestamp": "2021-07-12T15:23:17",
"content": "Since EPROM is a form of dynamic memory (just with very (very) long refresh times), it’s not a big surprise that 40 year old chips are losing their data. It’s quite likely that even if it was a one... | 1,760,373,024.248126 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/12/as-chinese-wheels-touch-martian-soil-and-indian-astronauts-walk-towards-the-launch-pad-can-we-hope-for-another-space-race/ | As Chinese Wheels Touch Martian Soil And Indian Astronauts Walk Towards The Launch Pad, Can We Hope For Another Space Race? | Jenny List | [
"Featured",
"Interest",
"Slider",
"Space"
] | [
"Artemis",
"china",
"india",
"nasa",
"russia",
"space race",
"tiangong",
"Zhurong"
] | If you were born in the 1960s or early 1970s, the chances are that somewhere in your childhood ambitions lay a desire to be an astronaut or cosmonaut. Once Yuri Gagarin had circled the Earth and Neil Armstrong had walked upon the Moon, millions of kids imagined that they too would one day climb into a space capsule and join that elite band of intrepid explorers. Anything seems possible when you are a five-year-old, but of course the reality remains that only the very fewest of us ever made it to space.
Did You Once Dream Of The Stars?
The Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin in Finland in 1961. Arto Jousi,
Public domain
.
The picture may be a little different for the youth of a few decades later though, did kids in the ’90s dream of the stars? Probably not. So what changed as Shuttle and Mir crews were passing overhead?
The answer is that the Space Race between the USA and Soviet Union which had dominated extra-terrestrial exploration from the 1950s to the ’70s had by then cooled down, and impressive though the building of the International Space Station was, it lacked the ability to electrify the public in the way that Sputnik, Vostok, or Apollo had. It was immensely cool to people like us, but the general public were distracted by other things and their political leaders were no longer ready to approve money-no-object budgets. We’d done space, and aside from the occasional bright spot in the form of space telescopes or rovers trundling across Mars, that was it. The hit TV comedy series
The Big Bang Theory
even had a storyline that found comedy in one of its characters serving on a mission to the ISS and being completely ignored on his return.
A few years ago a Chinese friend at my then-hackerspace was genuinely surprised that I knew the name of
Yang Liwei
, the
Shenzhou 5
astronaut and the first person launched by his country into space. He’s a national hero in China but not so much on the rainy edge of Europe, where the Chinese space programme for all its progress at the time about a decade after Yang’s mission had yet to make a splash beyond a few space watchers and enthusiasts in hackerspaces. But this might be beginning to change.
Everybody’s Launching Rockets, It Seems
The Tianhe core module for the Chinese Tiangong space station, before launch. 中国新闻网,
CC BY 3.0
.
As we approach two decades since Shenzhou 5, it seems as though the Chinese space program has rarely been away from the news. On the Moon last year the latest in their ongoing Chang’e series of probes
successfully retrieved surface samples and sent them back to Earth
, while looking forward they have inked a deal with the Russians
to co-operate on a manned Lunar outpostin the 2030s
.
In Earth orbit the Tianhe module that will form the heart of the next in the Tiangong series of space stations
received its first crew
, and will be complemented by further modules over the next year. Meanwhile on Mars, their Zhurong rover landed on the red Planet aboard the Tianwen-1 mission and
has been wowing us with pictures of its landing site
, and there are ambitious plans for sample return missions and
an eventual manned presence in the 2030s
.
The sheer variety and pace of these parallel missions is immediately reminiscent of the Cold War era space race and at first sight seems far more ambitious than its Western equivalents, but of course the Chinese program is not the only one pointing its rockets skywards. The Russian space agency Roscosmos will no longer be involved with the ISS after 2025 and
will bring its many decades of experience to the construction of its own orbiting outpost
, while the Indian ISRO agency will continue both its successful Maangalyaan Martian orbiter and Chandrayaan Lunar programmes and
is continuing with the test program
leading to a planned crew in orbit aboard the Gaganyaan craft in 2022. If we thought that a two-pronged space race was exciting, one with four or even five participants should ignite the world’s interest like nothing before!
So given the likely array of craft heading skywards from China, India, and Russia, how is it looking from the side of the planet in which Hackaday’s headquarters are based? We’ve seen enough coverage of the ISS and the various contenders for ferrying crew and supplies to it, the NASA Mars rovers, and other scientific craft to know that American and European space exploration efforts are alive and kicking. But if we’re in a space race how will their near future compare to the others? For that, the special sauce comes in two forms; international co-operation in the form of the
Artemis program
, and the craft and parts from private sector companies that will form part of it. This has the lofty aim of returning humans to the Moon by 2024, and its first mission will launch an uncrewed test capsule aboard an SLS rocket to orbit the moon and return home, in November this year.
Maybe You Don’t Need To Be A Nation State To Race Into Space
The SpaceX Starship SN9 on the launch pad. Jared Krahn,
CC BY-SA 4.0
.
Meanwhile there remains all the hype about the Martian plans of Elon Musk, which has at least satisfied any need we might have had to see prototype mega-rockets crash into the Texas countryside. Aside from the jostling between billionaires for the ultimate space toys though, the arrival of SpaceX, Blue Origin, and their host of competitors signals a new and previously unseen aspect to this space race that couldn’t have happened five decades ago. It’s likely that the market for smaller satellite launches will largely move to the private sector over the coming years, but at the space exploration end this increases the number of players outside the realm of nation states. American spacecraft parts have been made by private aerospace contractors for decades, but the work has been done under the auspices of NASA rather than by a company. What will be the effect of a space race between Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk for example, a dystopian corporate nightmare or a fresh and dynamic competition to those other nations? Time will tell, but one thing’s for sure: there will be a lot for space watchers to consume.
It’s said that there was disillusionment among members of the Apollo-era astronaut and cosmonaut corps during the 1970s as the enthusiasm for space exploration fizzled out and humanity’s next stop remained firmly in orbit rather than against a Martian horizon. It’s fitting then that some of them are still alive to see the start of a new space race, and that the seed will be planted in kids worldwide which will take some of them into careers that power space exploration towards the end of the century. Most of us will probably be too old to wish to be an astronaut or cosmonaut by now, but if the last space race is anything to go by we’re in for a treat as spectators with this one.
Header image: L-BBE,
CC BY 3.0. | 34 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363545",
"author": "Alice Lalita Heald",
"timestamp": "2021-07-12T14:17:31",
"content": "We can’t even colonise the Moon first, why bother with Mars?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6363592",
"author": "bat",
... | 1,760,373,024.115657 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/10/building-a-big-ol-powerful-wheelbarrow/ | Building A Big Ol’ Powerful Wheelbarrow | Lewin Day | [
"Misc Hacks",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"engine",
"wheelbarrow"
] | Sometimes you’ve gotta haul big heavy loads around a wide area. Regular wheelbarrows are fine, but it can quickly grow tiring when one has to make multiple trips. [Workshop from Scratch] instead
elected to build a powered wheelbarrow
, with plenty of grunt to shift loads about.
The build is absolutely from the ground up, welded up from sections of steel RHS, and given rear steering for plenty of maneuverability. The actual job of steering is handled by a rack repurposed from automotive use, set up with a single-sided attachment to the rear wheel assembly. It’s quite a neat and tidy way of doing the job, and seems to work well. Drive is sent to the front wheels through a hydrostatic lawnmower transmission. A 17-horsepower engine provides plenty of grunt for the job at hand, even coming with electric start already fitted for the ultimate in ease-of-use.
It’s impressive to see just how much of the rig was put together from raw materials; even the fuel tank was fabricated in steel. We’ve seen similar builds from [Workshop from Scratch] before,
like this tidy bandsaw
. Video after the break.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVqFvvYOFgM | 16 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363261",
"author": "Bret Tschacher",
"timestamp": "2021-07-10T17:13:46",
"content": "Not exactly a new idea, I have a friend that has a 3 wheeled version of this that was made in a factory. They can be very useful. Instead of a gas powered version, use a brushless electric motor. B... | 1,760,373,023.833466 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/10/you-cant-fix-what-you-cant-measure/ | You Can’t Fix What You Can’t Measure | Elliot Williams | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Rants"
] | [
"antenna",
"measurement",
"newsletter",
"radio"
] | Last year, as my Corona Hobby™, I took up RC plane flying. I started out with discus-launched gliders, and honestly that’s still my main love, but there’s only so much room for hackery in planes that are designed to be absolutely minimum weight and maximum performance; these are the kind of planes that notice an extra half gram in the tail. So I’ve also built a few crude workhorse planes — the kind of things that you could slap a 60 g decade-old GoPro on and it won’t even really notice. Some have ended their lives in trees, but most have been disassembled and reincarnated — the electronics live on in the next body.
The journey has been really fun. I’ve learned about aerodynamics, gotten an excuse to put together a 4-axis hot-wire CNC styrofoam cutter, and covered everything in sight with carbon fiber tow, which is cheaper than you might think but makes the plane space-age. My current workhorse has bolted on an IMU, GPS, and a minimal
Ardupilot
setup, though I have yet to really put it through its paces. What’s holding me back is the video link — it just won’t work reliably further than a few hundred meters, and I certainly don’t trust it to get out of line-of-sight.
My suspicion is that the crappy antennas I have are holding me back, which of course is an encouragement to DIY, but measuring antennas in the 5.8 GHz band is tricky. I’d love to just be able to buy one of the
cheap vector analyzers
that we’ve
covered in the past
— anyone can make an antenna when they can see what they’re doing — but they top out at 2.4 GHz or lower. No dice. I’m blind in 5.8 GHz.
Of course, I do have
one
way in, and that’s tapping into the received signal strength indicator (RSSI) of a dedicated 5.8 GHz receiver, and just testing antennas out in practice, but that only gives a sort of loose better-worse indication. More capacitance or more inductance? Plates closer together or further apart? Try it out and see, I guess, but it’s time-consuming.
Moral of the story: don’t take measurement equipment for granted. Imagine trying to build an analog circuit without a voltmeter, or to debug something digital without a logic probe. Sometimes the most important tool is the one that lets you see the problem in the first place.
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
! | 13 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363238",
"author": "Piotrsko",
"timestamp": "2021-07-10T14:38:14",
"content": "You could do range testing the archaic way: keep moving the object further and further apart. The aircraft FPV forums are full of practical advise for extreme long range.",
"parent_id": null,
... | 1,760,373,023.947291 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/10/fractal-vise-holds-odd-shaped-objects-tight/ | Fractal Vise Holds Odd-Shaped Objects Tight | Lewin Day | [
"3d Printer hacks",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"vice"
] | A regular vice is great if you want to clamp rectangular objects, but it can fall down a little with more complex shapes. Inspired by an ancient vise [Chris Borge]
whipped up his own 3D-printed fractal clamping tool
.
The inspiration for this one comes from
the [Hand Tool Rescue] video that shows of the clever mechanism
. The vice uses a series of interlocking parts that can freely articulate to grip the object of interest via several protruding fingers. In reproducing the design, [Chris] had some issues initially with the joints, but settling on a dovetail similar to that of the original metal vice which got things working nicely.
[Chris] notes that while the design works, it could still use some refinement. Silicone or rubber tips on the fingers could give the vice better grip, and there remain some flexural issues that could be improved. Overall, however, it’s a useful table vice for small jobs on weird shaped things. We’ve seen 3D-printed vices before,
particularly in the PCB vice space
, but the grip scheme user here is totally unique. | 29 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363207",
"author": "Fosselius",
"timestamp": "2021-07-10T11:55:24",
"content": "ok, now i have to change filament spool…",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6363208",
"author": "Dan",
"timestamp": "2021-07-10T11:59:36",
... | 1,760,373,024.316222 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/10/up-close-and-personal-with-some-busted-avionics/ | Up Close And Personal With Some Busted Avionics | Tom Nardi | [
"Teardown"
] | [
"avionics",
"DME",
"microcontroller",
"Mostek"
] | When he found this broken Narco DME 890 that was headed for the trash, [Yeo Kheng Meng] did what any self-respecting hardware hacker would do:
he took it back to his workbench so he could crack it open
. After all, it’s not often you get to look at a piece of tech built to the exacting standards required by even outdated avionics.
DME stands for “Distance Measuring Equipment”, and as you might expect from the name, it indicates how far the aircraft is from a given target. [Yeo Kheng Meng] actually goes pretty deep into the theory behind how it works in his write-up if you’re interested in the nuts and bolts of it all, but the short version is that the pilot selects the frequency of a known station on the ground, and the distance to the target is displayed on the screen.
Inside the device, [Yeo Kheng Meng] found several densely packed boards, each isolated to minimize interference. The main PCB plays host to the Mostek MK3870 microcontroller, an 8-bit chip that screams along at 4 MHz and offers a spacious 128 bytes of RAM. It doesn’t sound like much to the modern AVR wrangler, but for 1977, it was cutting edge stuff.
Digging further, [Yeo Kheng Meng] opens up the metal cans that hold the transmitter and receiver. Thanks to the excellent documentation available for the device, which contains extensive schematics and block diagrams, he was able to ascertain the function of many of the components. Even if you’re unlikely to ever go hands on with this type of technology, it’s fascinating to see the thought and attention to detail that goes into even seemingly mundane aspects of the hardware.
Hungry for more airworthy engineering? We’ve taken
a close look at some hardware pulled from a civilian airliner
, as well as some battle-hardened electronics that
once graced the cockpit of an AH-64 Apache attack helicopter
. | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363198",
"author": "aki009",
"timestamp": "2021-07-10T09:57:42",
"content": "FTA: “Even if you’re unlikely to ever go hands on with this type of technology, it’s fascinating to see the thought and attention to detail that goes into even seemingly mundane aspects of the hardware.”I ... | 1,760,373,024.640944 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/09/a-home-automation-solution-for-fans-of-quick-and-dirty-solutions/ | Home Automation For Fans Of Quick-and-Dirty Solutions | Dan Maloney | [
"home hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"Decora",
"home automation",
"ir",
"servo",
"stepper",
"toggle",
"wall switch"
] | At Hackaday, we celebrate all kinds of projects, but we’ll have to admit that the polished and professional-looking builds tend to catch our eye a lot more than perhaps they should. There’s plenty of love to be had for the rougher builds, though, of which
this quick-and-dirty home automation system
is a perfect example.
Before anyone rushes to state the obvious with, “Should have used some relays,” consider that [MAKE_IT_WITH_ME]’s stated goal was to get the basics of a home automation system built with pretty much nothing but what can be found in one of those Arduino starter kits. And further, consider that landlords might not look kindly on tenants who wire a bunch of SSRs or Sonoff switches into the walls of their building. So this minimalist build is perfect for certain use cases. Its interface to the building’s electrical system is 100% mechanical, via a servo that travels along the bank of switches on a stepper-driven leadscrew. The servo has a modified horn to properly flick the rocker-style switches, and although changing from switch to switch is a bit slow, it works surprisingly well. The video below shows it in action.
While we can see it
possibly working as-is for Decora-style switches
that are seen in some markets, we’d think some mods would be in order for the more standard toggle-style switch — perhaps a finger extending out from the horn, along with a second servo to tilt the whole assembly away from the wall to allow it to clear the switch bats. | 25 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363156",
"author": "Andrew",
"timestamp": "2021-07-10T06:16:04",
"content": "Take your time. No rush.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6363160",
"author": "None",
"timestamp": "2021-07-10T06:43:49",
"content": "I lik... | 1,760,373,024.484112 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/09/3d-printed-copper-rocket-nozzle-costs-under-two-grand/ | 3D Printed Copper Rocket Nozzle Costs Under Two Grand | Al Williams | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"copper",
"metal 3d printing",
"printing",
"rocket nozzle",
"sintering",
"virtual foundry"
] | You don’t think of hobby-grade 3D printing as a good method for
creating rocket nozzles
. But [Mister Highball] managed to create a copper nozzle using a common printer, a kiln, and some special copper-bearing filament.
The copper filament is about 90% metal. Virtual Foundry recommends preheating it before printing and you have to sinter it in an oven to remove the plastic and leave a solid metal piece which will, of course, shrink.
The results were not great at first, but the final run looked pretty good. You’d do well to take note of any advice on using the filament since it is quite a bit more expensive than regular PLA. There are clearly some very specific steps you need to follow to get good results.
Of course, you also need a kiln and the other equipment you need to handle molten metal. While it is impressive that you can create a metal part this easily, it still isn’t as easy as a normal print and it isn’t much easier than simply casting the part using a lost PLA technique.
While
3D printing rocket parts
isn’t a new idea, earlier efforts haven’t used cheap FDM printers. We are looking forward to having
a real metal 3D printer
one day. | 19 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363140",
"author": "Jim Jetson",
"timestamp": "2021-07-10T02:26:30",
"content": "My cousin Dexter and I, both our dad’s having small machine shops at home whie empoyed by the Dow Chemical Corporation, Magnesium Aerospace Division at Bay City Michigan. They bring home bocks of DowM... | 1,760,373,024.693392 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/09/custom-car-horn-makes-many-sounds/ | Custom Car Horn Makes Many Sounds | Lewin Day | [
"car hacks"
] | [
"audio fx",
"car horn",
"horn"
] | A regular car horn is fine, but lacks finesse for more subtle communication. For example, some car horns aren’t particularly adept at short indicatory honks, and can only blare loudly regardless of the situation. For a fancier solution,
[Tom Hammond] whipped up a custom car horn capable of playing a wide variety of sounds.
The system uses the Adafruit Audio FX board. This is a unique part, which is designed to enable people to build sound-based projects without the need for a microcontroller or any other similar hardware. Instead, the device can be connected to a computer over USB in mass storage mode, and its 16MB in-built memory can be loaded with sound files. It then plays these when buttons are pressed, hooked up to its 11 trigger inputs.
The Audio FX board has its output hooked up to a 120W amplifier, which then feeds into a pair of 15W PA-style horns. These are incredibly loud devices, though lack bass, so they’re really only good for throwing low-quality sound out in a noisy environment. For a car horn, that’s perfect.
The result is that [Tom] can press a number of buttons on his dash to play different sounds, from courtesy honks to animal noises and obnoxious sound effects. The great thing is that the sounds in question can be easily customized to the user’s tastes. [Tom] also deserves a tip of the hat for explaining in great detail how to actually install the project in the average car.
We don’t often see car horns around these parts,
though they do make for an awfully loud alarm clock.
If you’ve got your own nifty car accessories that you’re cooking up,
be sure to drop us a line! | 29 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363125",
"author": "ameyring",
"timestamp": "2021-07-10T00:16:32",
"content": "Some railroad lovers put train horns on their cars, but only use them for demo and not in traffic due to the loud sound.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_i... | 1,760,373,024.59575 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/09/zooming-through-the-mandelbrot-set-on-an-atari/ | Zooming Through The Mandelbrot Set On An Atari | Lewin Day | [
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"atari",
"mandelbrot",
"mandelbrot set"
] | The Mandelbrot set, according to Wikipedia, is “the set of complex numbers
for which the function
does not diverge.” Even if you don’t understand the mathematics behind it, you’ve likely seen the complicated fractal images generated by zooming in on the border of the Mandelbrot set. [Scott Williamson] not only got this set rendering on an Atari,
but managed to create animated videos of the results.
Emulators were key to the project’s success.
Doing the work was no mean feat. While it takes just 10 lines of Atari BASIC to render the set on an Atari 800, getting the animations made and into a modern video format took much effort. [Scott] used the Atari800Win-PLus emulator to zoom in on a variety of locations on the fractal curve and recorded the results over a weekend.
However, compositing the various frames into smooth-scrolling videos took more effort, with a Python script and
ffmpeg
required to stitch everything together
into the results you see on YouTube.
The final videos were combined with
Atari chiptune music from [Adam Sporka]
to help round out the presentation.
The result is reminiscent of an old-school demo, even if everything here was assembled slowly on modern computers from the raw Atari output. We’ve seen other great Mandelbrot feats before, too,
like this real-time explorer built on an FPGA
. Video after the break. | 4 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362971",
"author": "lemiel",
"timestamp": "2021-07-09T09:42:56",
"content": "Why he used so old Atari800Win-PLus and not current Altirra version?https://www.virtualdub.org/altirra",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6363114",
"... | 1,760,373,024.529195 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/08/diy-forth-on-arduino/ | DIY Forth On Arduino | Chris Lott | [
"Arduino Hacks"
] | [
"compilers",
"forth",
"optimization"
] | On a recent rainy afternoon, [Thanassis Tsiodras] decided to
build his own Forth
for the Arduino to relieve the boredom. One week of intense hacking later, he called it done and released his project as
MiniForth on GitHub
. [Thanassis] says he was inspired by our
series of Forth articles
from a few years back, and his goal was to build a Forth interpreter / compiler from scratch, put it into a Blue Pill microcontroller. That accomplished, he naturally decides to squeeze it into an Arduino Uno with only 2K of RAM.
Even if you are ambivalent about the Forth language, [Thanissis]’s project has some great ideas to check out. For example, he’s a big proponent of Makefile automation for repetitive tasks, and the project’s Makefile targets implements almost every task needed for development, building and testing his code.
Some development and testing tasks are easier to perform on the host computer. To that end, [Thanassis] tests his programs locally using the
simavr
simulator. The code is also portable, and he can compile it locally on the host and debug it using GDB along with Valgrind and AddressSanitizer to check for memory issues. He chose to write the program in C++ using only zero-cost abstractions, but found that compiling with the ArduinoSTL was too slow and used too much memory. No problem, [Thanassis] writes his own minimalist STL and implements several memory-saving hacks. As a final test, the Makefile can also execute a test suite of Forth commands, including a
FizzBuzz
algorithm, to check the resulting implementation.
Here’s a
short video of MiniForth in action
, blinking an LED on an UNO, and the video below the break shows each of the various Makefile tasks in operation. If you want to learn more, check out
Elliot Williams’s Forth series
which inspired [Thanassis] and
this 2017 article discussing several different Forth implementations
. Have you ever built your own compiler? Let us know in the comments below. | 32 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362928",
"author": "fyllyx",
"timestamp": "2021-07-09T06:26:31",
"content": "Thanks [Thanassis Tsiodras]. Oh and I would have titled this “FORTH Yourself”",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6362955",
"author": "vib",
... | 1,760,373,025.006753 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/08/the-nuclear-powered-car-from-ford/ | The Nuclear Powered Car From Ford | Al Williams | [
"car hacks"
] | [
"car",
"fission",
"ford",
"nuclear power",
"Nuclear Reactor",
"nucleon"
] | We think of electric cars as a new invention, but even Thomas Edison had one. It isn’t so much that the idea is new, but the practical realization for normal consumer vehicles is pretty recent. Even in 1958, Ford wanted an electric car. But not just a regular electric car. The
Ford Nucleon
would carry a small nuclear reactor and get 5,000 miles without a fillup.
Of course, the car was never actually built. Making a reactor small and safe enough to power a passenger car is something we can’t do even today. The real problem, according to experts, is not building a reactor small enough but in dealing with all the heat produced.
In a conventional engine, it is easy to dump the majority of the excess heat out of the tailpipe and handle a small amount via heat exchange in the radiator. However, with a nuclear reactor, you need a way to exchange heat since none of the radioactive gas can escape.
Not that Ford engineers were clueless — they just thought the technology would advance rapidly. The 3/8 scale model makes it clear they knew there would be weight at the reactor-end of the vehicle and that it would require massive radiators.
As for small reactors, NASA’s
KRUSTY
is a good example. It weighs about 300 pounds and produces about 1kW. A V8 engine weighs more than that, although it also puts out quite a bit more power.
We doubt anyone would want to drive around on top of a nuclear reactor. But it will probably be possible eventually. Reactors are
getting smaller
. But we don’t know how you’d make room for
this
. | 42 | 16 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362891",
"author": "John",
"timestamp": "2021-07-09T02:20:48",
"content": "FYI I just checked and a 707 hp v8 would produce 527,210 watts. Wow!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6362902",
"author": "Paul",
"time... | 1,760,373,024.840876 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/08/reverse-engineering-a-very-cheap-fitness-band/ | Reverse Engineering A Very Cheap Fitness Band | Lewin Day | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"fitness band",
"telink",
"wearable"
] | With the rise of big-name smartwatches in the marketplace, there are also a smattering of lower-end offerings. The M6 fitness band is one of them,
and [Raphael] set about hacking the cheap device with a custom firmware of his own creation.
The M6 band, which sells for around $6, appears to trade on name similarity to the more expensive (~$50) Xiaomi Mi Smart Band 6 fitness tracker. Upon disassembly, [Raphael] found that the system-on-chip running the show is a Telink TLSR8232. It’s paired with a 160×80 display, a small LiPo battery for power, and a vibration motor and what appears to be a fake heart rate sensor.
[Raphael] wanted to flash the SOC with a new firmware, and learned a lot from code for a similar part
created by [atc1441].
It took some time to figure out how to program the chip using the somewhat oddball SWire interface, but [Raphael] persevered and eventually got things going after much research and experimentation.
From there, it was yet further work to figure out how to read the capacitive button input as well as how to drive the screen, but [Raphael] succeeded in the end. The final result was whipping up a firmware that allowed him to read Bluetooth Low Energy soil moisture sensors he has installed in his plants at home.
It’s not [Raphael], aka [rbaron]’s first bite at the cherry;
we’ve featured his efforts in hacking similar fitness bands before
! Video after the break.
To draw text, I borrowed the Picopixel bitmap font and wrote a little text rendering function. All so we could enjoy this cinematic masterpiece.
pic.twitter.com/0KqR0RPPt7
— Raphael (@rbaron_)
July 6, 2021 | 10 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362958",
"author": "Alphatek",
"timestamp": "2021-07-09T08:08:29",
"content": "Good writeup. The Telink SOCs look interesting, but don’t seem to be available even on LCSC unfortunately.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6364785... | 1,760,373,024.764165 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/08/hacked-on-so-dimm-slot-was-worth-a-shot/ | Hacked On SO-DIMM Slot Was Worth A Shot | Tom Nardi | [
"computer hacks"
] | [
"footprint",
"memory upgrade",
"SO-DIMM",
"SODIMM"
] | Finding unpopulated pads on a circuit board is often a sign that the device in question has some untapped potential. These blank spots on the board could be left over from features or capabilities that were deleted from the design, or perhaps even represent an optional upgrade that wasn’t installed on this particular specimen. So we certainly understand why [d0rk] was fascinated by the
empty SO-DIMM footprint he recently found on a laptop’s motherboard
.
The budget Celeron machine shipped with 4 GB of RAM installed in its single socket, a situation [d0rk] hoped he could improve upon with the addition of a second module. But could it really be as simple as pulling the socket from a dead motherboard and soldering it into place? Would other components need to be added to the board? Could the BIOS cope with the unexpected upgrade? There was only one way to find out…
Room to grow
At first, it seemed like the patient didn’t survive the operation. But a close look uncovered that the power button had actually gotten damaged somewhere along the line. Once [d0rk] fixed that the machine started up, but unfortunately the operating system didn’t see the extra RAM module. Even after upgrading the BIOS, the computer remained oblivious to the additional memory.
When he went back in to inspect his solder work for shorts or bad joints, disaster struck. For reasons that aren’t immediately clear, the computer no longer starts. Even after pulling the transplanted SO-DIMM slot off the board entirely, [d0rk] says it won’t make it through the self-test. Obviously a disappointing conclusion, but we respect the effort he put into the attempt.
While this memory upgrade didn’t go according to plan, we’ve seen enough success stories over the years to balance it out.
From old wireless routers
to
cutting-edge video cards
, plenty of gadgets have
received a memory boost courtesy of a soldering iron
and a steady hand.
[Thanks to Timothy for the tip.] | 33 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362841",
"author": "Osgeld",
"timestamp": "2021-07-08T20:58:34",
"content": "A lot od the time the bios will limit the max ram on these budget machines for instance I have a dual core Celeron tix board with 2 sockets but the most it can handle is 2 gigs a socket and putting anythin... | 1,760,373,024.924032 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/08/laser-augmented-reality-glasses-show-you-the-way/ | Laser Augmented Reality Glasses Show You The Way | Tom Nardi | [
"Laser Hacks",
"The Hackaday Prize"
] | [
"2021 Hackaday Prize",
"galvanometer laser projection",
"piezo actuator",
"vector graphics"
] | Tech companies like Google and Microsoft have been working on augmented reality (AR) wearables that can superimpose images over your field of view, blurring the line between the real and virtual. Unfortunately for those looking to experiment with this technology, the devices released so far have been prohibitively expensive.
While they might not be able to compete with the latest Microsoft HoloLens,
these laser AR classes from [Joel] promise to be far cheaper
and much more approachable for hackers. By bouncing a low-power laser off of a piezo-actuated mirror, the hope is that the glasses will be able to project simple vector graphics onto a piece of reflective film usually used for aftermarket automotive heads-up displays (HUDs).
Piezo actuators are used to steer the mirror.
[Joel] has put together a prototype of what the mirror system might look like, but says driving the high-voltage piezo actuators poses some unique challenges. The tentative plan is to generate the vector data with a smartphone application, send it to an ESP32 microcontroller within the glasses, and then push the resulting analog signals through a 100 V DC-DC boost converter to get the mirror moving.
We’ve seen the ESP32 drive a laser galvanometer to play a game of
Asteroids
, but recreating such a setup in a small enough package to fit onto a pair of glasses would certainly be an impressive accomplishment. Early tests look promising, but clearly [Joel] has quite a bit of work ahead of him.
As a finalist for the
Rethink Displays
challenge of the 2021 Hackaday Prize
, we’re looking forward to seeing the project develop over the coming months.
The
Hackaday
Prize2021
is Sponsored by: | 52 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362822",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2021-07-08T19:15:00",
"content": "Any noise to deal with?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6362825",
"author": "CityZen",
"timestamp": "2021-07-08T19:46:48",
"content": "I... | 1,760,373,025.659071 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/08/tech-hidden-in-plain-sight-cruise-control/ | Tech Hidden In Plain Sight: Cruise Control | Al Williams | [
"car hacks",
"Hackaday Columns",
"Interest"
] | [
"automotive",
"cars",
"cruise control",
"vacuum",
"vacuum servo"
] | The advent of the microcontroller changed just about everything. Modern gadgets often have a screen-based interface that may hide dozens or hundreds of functions that would have been impractical and confusing to do with separate buttons and controls. It also colors our thinking of what is possible. Imagine if cars didn’t have cruise control and someone asked you if it were possible. Of course. Monitor the speed and control the gas using a PID algorithm. Piece of cake, right? Except cruise control has been around since at least 1948. So how did pre-microcontroller cruise control work? Sure, in your modern car it might work just like you think. But how have we had seventy-plus years of driving automation?
A Little History
A flyball governor from a US Navy training film.
Controlling the speed of an engine is actually not a very new idea. In the early 1900s, flyball governors originally designed for steam engines could maintain a set speed. The idea was that faster rotation caused the balls would spread out, closing the fuel or air valve while slower speeds would let the balls get closer together and send more fuel or air into the engine.
The inventor of the modern cruise control was Ralph Teetor, a prolific inventor who lost his sight as a child. Legend has it that he was a passenger in a car with his lawyer driving and grew annoyed that the car would slow down when the driver was talking and speed up when he was listening. That was invented in 1948 and i
mproved upon over the next few years
.
1958 Imperial [Lars-Goran, CC-BY-SA 3.0.
Frank Riley and Harold Exline had similar inventions in the 1950s, though Teetor’s device won out. In 1958, the Chrysler Imperial, New Yorker, and Windsor offered a dash-mounted speed control. Cadillac renamed the device “cruise control” and the name stuck.
That was the year power door locks came out, too, and as you can tell, the public liked both of these inventions since we still have them today. In fact, the original design by Teetor didn’t actually lock the speed in, but just gave resistance to the gas pedal. Carmakers and consumers demanded the locking feature and Teetor finally consented.
From Flyball to Vacuum
A classic cruise control-equipped car will often have two cables running to the throttle body. One cable goes to your gas pedal and you intuitively know how that works. The other cable does the same thing but instead of a pedal, it is attached to a valve that uses a spring-loaded diaphragm or piston to control the cable — the cruise control servo. A valve draws vacuum or admits air into the chamber causing the diaphragm or piston to move the control cable. Since the cables are attached to each other, when the cruise control engages you can feel it in the gas pedal.
Of course, the actuator doesn’t have to use vacuum. You could as well use an RC servo, but in practice, it is nearly always a diaphragm or piston that has a vacuum on one side. The controller manages the vacuum via a valve that connects to the intake manifold or a dedicated pump along with a valve that bleeds air into the chamber. You can see a typical controller in the video below.
There are variations, of course. Some cars only have a single cable to the throttle body and combine input from the cruise control and gas pedal into that one cable. On newer cars, the throttle is likely operated by an electric motor anyway and a microprocessor determines the throttle position. In an older car, the vacuum setting would be in proportion to the difference between the set speed and the desired speed.
Service manual diagram from AutoZone showing a throttle cable assembly on a Chrysler vehicle.
One common scheme was to have a single wheel that controls the cable to the throttle body. Above and below the wheel are two other wheels. The top wheel connects to the gas pedal and the bottom wheel connects to a motor. The bottom wheel is operated by the controller. In systems like this, a solenoid will lock the position of the wheel, and error signals from the controller will adjust the wheel position slightly to minimize the error using proportional control. For example, a pulse train from a magnetic sensor might be smoothed to a DC voltage and subtracted from a setpoint voltage to generate the error signal.
Integrated Circuitry
The Motorola MC14460 was an “automotive speed control processor” that was common in pre-microprocessor cars. We don’t know for sure what was on the inside, but given the chip-making capabilities of the day and the classification of the chip, we doubt it was a microcontroller internally.
The chip was marvelously economical on external circuits. It would drive two coils that control the throttle body. You can tell the output is made to drive a vacuum actuator as the outputs have names of VAC and VENT; one to open the vacuum valve and the other to admit air. The device also accepted a pulse stream input where 8000 pulses equated to one mile of travel. Another input detected the brake light signal.
Beyond that, there were three switches every modern driver knows: one to speed up, one to slow down, and one to resume speed. This IC made cruise control cheap to include on modern cars even though the computerization of cars eventually pushed it out of favor.
Today and Beyond
Very modern cars do more than just maintaining speed. Using radar above 70 GHz allows your car to see cars and obstacles ahead of you. The car can then adjust the speed to keep a safe following distance or even brake before you have a collision. In addition, some systems will notify you when the car ahead of you drives away, a nice feature if you have the bad habit of getting absorbed in your phone at stoplights.
We assume cars will eventually integrate with your phone. You’ll plug it in and set your speed from there. Or maybe it will all be brainwave-activated. Who knows?
Want to build your own cruise control? Peter and Jakub did and you can read about it in
their scholarly paper
. We feel bad we don’t use vacuum physics in our projects.
Gas pumps
also depend on suction. | 29 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362814",
"author": "srgh",
"timestamp": "2021-07-08T18:00:17",
"content": "Microcontroler didn’t not change anything. My Lifan 168f has 100% mechanic speed control. I think even comunist could make speed control because my friend has PAB-2 agregat and it always run 50 Hz voltage.PS... | 1,760,373,025.100664 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/09/3d-printed-parts-make-for-a-quick-electric-scooter-build/ | 3D Printed Parts Make For A Quick Electric Scooter Build | Lewin Day | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"drill",
"electric scooter",
"power drill",
"scooter"
] | Sometimes, walking even a short distance can grow boring if it’s a part of your regular routine. [Alexandre Chappel] found himself in just such a position,
so elected to quickly whip up a scooter to get around on.
The build is very much of the “parts laying around the shop” genre. An old skateboard deck was fitted with nice rubber scooter wheels and a set of handlebars thanks to a series of 3D printed parts. Unfortunately, the first revision had problems with flex in the skateboard deck, which isn’t designed to take the full weight of an adult human standing on one leg. Another skateboard deck was pressed into service, reinforced with a metal pipe for added strength.
From there, [Alexandre] set about creating a front-wheel-drive system using a power drill, several shaft extensions, and a right-angle drive. Clamped to the handlebar tube, the drill’s trigger is controlled via a twist throttle linked up by a string.
It’s not the easiest scooter to ride, with a bit too much torque from a standing start and somewhat scary handling characteristics at times. However, we’re sure with some practice and some tweaks, [Alexandre] will have a useful ride on his hands. If you prefer something wilder, however,
consider this walking scooter build
. Video after the break. | 13 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363105",
"author": "Osgeld",
"timestamp": "2021-07-09T20:50:22",
"content": "The scooter is a hack I’ll give ya that but are we not past the point of “3d printers make parts”Next headline welder joins metal to make stuff",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
... | 1,760,373,025.152054 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/09/raspberry-pi-cameras-stand-in-for-stereo-microscope/ | Raspberry Pi Cameras Stand In For Stereo Microscope | Tom Nardi | [
"Raspberry Pi",
"The Hackaday Prize",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"2021 Hackaday Prize",
"Raspberry pi camera",
"Raspberry Pi Compute Module",
"stereo microscope",
"stereoscopic"
] | Handling tiny surface mount components and inspecting PCBs is a lot easier with a nice stereo microscope, but because of their cost and bulk, most hobbyists have to do without. At best they might have a basic digital microscope, but with only one camera, they can only show a 2D image that’s not ideal for detail work.
The team behind [Stereo Ninja] hopes to improve on the situation by developing a
stereoscopic vision system that puts tiny objects up on the big screen in three dimensions
. Utilizing the Raspberry Pi Compute Module, a custom carrier board that enables the use of both MIPI CSI camera interfaces, and a 3D gaming monitor, their creation combines the capabilities of a traditional stereo microscope with the flexibility of a digital solution.
With two Raspberry Pi cameras suspended over the work area, and the addition of plenty of LED light, Stereo Ninja is able to generate the 3D image required by the monitor. While the camera’s don’t have the same magnification you’d get from a microscope, they’re good enough for enlarging SMD parts, and looking at a big screen monitor certainly beats hunching over the eyepiece of a traditional microscope. Especially if you’re trying to show something to a group of people, like at a hackerspace.
Of course, not everyone has a large 3D gaming monitor on their workbench. In fact, given how poorly the tech went over with consumers the last time it was pushed on us, we’d wager more hackers have stereo microscopes than 3D displays. Which is why the team’s next step is to have the
Raspberry Pi generate the signals required by the shutter glasses
, allowing Stereo Ninja to show a three dimensional image on 2D monitors; bringing this valuable capability to far larger audience than has previously been possible.
The
Hackaday
Prize2021
is Sponsored by: | 9 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363070",
"author": "CRJEEA",
"timestamp": "2021-07-09T18:51:12",
"content": "I’m not sure about the RasPi camera but I know a few cheap webcams have screw in lenses. Adjusting them can bring at least 80x magnification all be it at pretty close range.I’ve used them for taking pictur... | 1,760,373,025.499955 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/09/checking-up-on-earths-sister-planet-nasas-upcoming-venus-missions/ | Checking Up On Earth’s Sister Planet: NASA’s Upcoming Venus Missions | Maya Posch | [
"Featured",
"Interest",
"News",
"Original Art",
"Science",
"Slider",
"Space"
] | [
"DaVinci",
"venus",
"VERITAS"
] | Even as we bask in the knowledge that our neighboring planet Mars is currently home to a multitude of still functional landers, a triplet of rovers and with an ever-growing satellite network as well as the first ever flying drone on another planet, our other neighboring planet Venus is truly playing the wallflower, with Japan’s
Akatsuki
orbiter as the lone active Venusian mission right now.
That is about to change, however, with NASA having selected two new missions that will explore Venus by the end of this decade. The DAVINCI+ and VERITAS missions aim to respectively characterize Venus’ atmosphere and map its surface in unprecedented detail. This should provide us information about possible tectonic activity, as well as details about the Venusian atmosphere which so far have been sorely missing.
Despite Venus being the closest match to our planet Earth, how is it possible that we have been neglecting it for so long, and what can we expect from future missions, including and beyond these two new NASA missions?
It Wasn’t Always This Way
Soviet 1982 postage stamp celebrating the Venera-13 and Venera-14 probes.
The 1960s saw a total of 18 missions from the USA and USSR that
targeted Venus,
with five successfully completed missions:
Mariner 2 (1962, Flyby)
Venera 4 (1967, Atmospheric)
Mariner 5 (1967, Flyby)
Venera 5 (1969, Atmospheric)
Venera 6 (1969, Atmospheric)
Exploration continued in the 1970s with 11 Venus missions beginning with the Venera 7 lander, which was the first soft landing on another planet, followed soon by the Venera 8 lander. By the time the 1980s were in full swing, the Venera 13 lander was the first to send back audio recorded from the surface of Venus. Yet by the time the Vega 2 mission reported its successful landing in 1984, the USSR which had been running the Venera and Vega programs ceased their exploration of Venus. Even so the 1980s saw 8 Venus missions.
At this point in time, the closest a non-Soviet probe has come to landing on Venus was the
Pioneer Venus 2
(Pioneer 13) mission from 1978 when it launched a number of probes into the Venusian atmosphere, one of which continued submitting data for a while after it had made it to the surface. After this mission, the 1989 Magellan
orbiter mission
was the US’s next and final Venus mission.
The Venus surface, as photographed by the USSR Venera 13 in 1982 (recolorized).
Although the US
Galileo
mission observed Venus on its way to Jupiter, this was not its primary mission, and no following US probes would perform detailed scientific observations of Venus. The Cassini and MESSENGER missions both mostly used Venus for a gravity assist, leaving the 1990s devoid of any Venus missions. It wouldn’t be until the 2000s that ESA’s
Venus Express
would pay Venus a visit. Even then, this ESA probe was made from reused
Mars Express
components rather than as a dedicated Venus mission.
Since the 2010s, Venus has become the sole domain of Japan’s JAXA, with Akatsuki (‘Dawn’) still in orbit, but beyond that nothing but telescopes pointed at our sister planet.
An Intriguing Planet
Venus
is the second planet from the Sun after Mercury, followed by the Earth. Its mass is 81.5% of that of the Earth, 85.7% the volume and ~90% by surface area. Its surface gravity is
8.87 m/s
2
compared to 9.80665 m/s
2
for Earth. In comparison, Mars has 15.1% the volume of Earth and 28.4% the surface area, with a surface gravity of 3.72076 m/s
2
which is just over twice that of the Earth’s Moon (
1.62 m/s
2
). Effectively this means that a human on Venus would weigh nearly as much as on Earth, and the planet itself is only a little bit smaller than the Earth.
Venus also has a very dense atmosphere (9.2 MPa), much more than Earth (~101.325 kPa at sea level), and a molten core. Yet for reasons unknown, Venus does not
generate a magnetic field
using the core’s dynamo, as is the case on Earth. The exact state of Venus’ core and whether it has a (molten core) dynamo that could work again if the right conditions (e.g. sufficient convection) were met remains an active topic of research. All we know at this point is that Venus’ only magnetic field is generated due to the interaction between its ionosphere and the solar wind.
Venus (true color & enhanced contrast) as seen by the Mariner 10 spacecraft in 1974. (Source: NASA/JPL-Caltech)
Exactly why Venus has such a
dense atmosphere
is also unknown. Its atmosphere consists of 96.5% CO
2
, with nitrogen and trace elements making up the rest of the composition, including water vapor (20 ppm). The relatively high levels of sulfur dioxide in the air (150 ppm) combined with the water vapor make clouds of sulfuric acid that shield the planet’s surface from Earth-based telescopes and also gives it a yellowish glow. It’s been suggested that Venus’ atmosphere is the result of a run-away greenhouse (atmospheric warming) effect, but future research will have to confirm or refute that theory.
Also fascinating about Venus is that its axial rotation is opposite to that of Earth, Mars, and all other planets in the Solar System besides Uranus. This means that on Venus the Sun rises in the west and sets in the east. Its rotational velocity is also markedly lower than that of other planets at 224.7 Earth days. All of this raises many questions about why Venus ended up in such a different state compared to Earth when evidence points to both planets having started out much more similar.
Most recently, studies of Venus’ atmosphere using Earth-based measurements have suggested that high levels of
phosphine
exist in its upper levels, which would be a clear sign of organic life. This might be microbial lifeforms existing in the upper regions of the atmosphere. Despite the initial phosphine findings having been refuted by other researchers, a recent follow-up refutal of the refutal
reaffirms these phosphine levels
and thus the tantalizing possibility of life existing on Venus.
New Venus Missions
The DAVINCI+ descent probe mission profile. (Source: NASA/GSFC)
So far the 2020s look to feature a bit of a revival in Venus missions, with five planned missions:
Rocket Lab’s
atmospheric probe
(~2023).
India’s
Shukrayaan-1
(~2024/2026, orbiter).
NASA’s
VERITAS
(~2028, orbiter).
Roscosmos’
Venera-D
(~2029, orbiter & lander).
NASA’s
DAVINCI+
(~2029/2030, atmospheric).
Little is known about Rocket Lab’s proposed Venus mission other than that it would likely involve atmospheric measurements. Meanwhile India’s
Shukrayaan-1
mission comes on the heels of its successful Chandrayaan (Lunar) and Mangalyaan (Mars) programs. This mission is likely to be complementary to the VERITAS mission, and possibly DAVINCI+ if the proposed atmospheric probe is added.
Selected
for NASA’s Discovery Program,
VERITAS
‘s main mission consists of measuring the surface emissivity along with using its synthetic aperture radar (SAR) instrument to create the most detailed topographical map of Venus’ surface to date. It will also carry the new
Deep Space Atomic Clock-2
, whose additional precision will be used to hopefully detect gravitational features of Venus using the Doppler shift of the signal between VERITAS and Earth.
Meanwhile, DAVINCI+’s mission will be to measure properties of the atmosphere which its descent probe will be plunging through, in addition to creating high-resolution photographs of features in the landscape. In particular the mission plans to gather more data on the tesserae, which can be thought of as equivalent to Earth’s plate tectonics.
The new installment in Russia’s revival of the Venera program in the form of Venera-D is perhaps the most ambitious of all these missions. In addition to repeating the Venera-13 & 14 mission profiles with landing a probe on Venus it would feature an orbiter and talks are underway with NASA to include the
VAMP
(Venus Atmospheric Maneuverable Platform) aircraft. The latter is a proposal by Northrop Grumman and L’Garde for what would be essentially a long-duration aircraft, capable of navigating the upper parts of Venus’ atmosphere for up to a year.
If
VAMP
were to be part of the Venera-D mission, it would allow for the first detailed exploration of this part of Venus’ atmosphere during a months-long mission, providing us the best chance at this point to discover the source of the suspected phosphine and possibly life on Venus.
The Final Frontier
NASA concept for a floating Venus colony as part of the HAVOC missions concept. (Source: NASA)
Although these new missions will still take a number of years to materialize, with most of them likely not reaching Venus until the 2030s, the potential of what we can learn not only about Venus, but also Earth is simply too tempting. Even beyond figuring out what makes Venus tick, or perhaps rather what made it take such a different course from Earth, it’s likely one of the easiest planets we could
colonize
, not to mention
terraform
.
The coming decades we can hopefully look forward to the first Venusian rovers like NASA’s
Zephyr
and
AREE
concepts. Rovers like these may arrive before or around the time when concepts like
HAVOC
for floating colonies in Venus’ atmosphere become a reality. The advantage of these would be that at around 55 km altitude, the Venusian atmosphere has roughly the same pressure as on Earth at sea level, with a temperature of around 27 °C (80 °F).
Whether or not all of this will truly materialize over the coming decades is of course anything but certain, not to mention heavily dependent on politics and budget sizes of the relevant space-faring nations. Here a happy note is that Europe’s ESA has announced a new Venus orbiter mission in the 2030s, called
EnVision
. When a manned mission to Venus does get announced, it will probably feel like a consolation to those who had been waiting for the
1973 astronaut flyby
of Venus using a Saturn V rocket.
Here is to an exciting new chapter in humankind’s history and scientific exploration. | 36 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363066",
"author": "Oneiridescent",
"timestamp": "2021-07-09T18:13:11",
"content": "Nicely written. Couldn’t believe, I actually read the whole of it (usually I look for shorter posts) ! Comprehensive and informative.Floating colony would be fascinating !",
"parent_id": null,
... | 1,760,373,025.445804 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/09/hackaday-podcast-126-cable-3d-scanner-tesla-charger-robot-ultrasonic-anemometer-and-a-zoetrope/ | Hackaday Podcast 126: Cable 3D-Scanner, Tesla Charger Robot, Ultrasonic Anemometer, And A Zoetrope | Mike Szczys | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Podcasts"
] | [
"Hackaday Podcast"
] | Hackaday editors Elliot Williams and Mike Szczys dive into a week of exceptional hacks. Tip-top of the list has to be the precision measuring instrument that uses a cable spooling mechanism. There’s news that the Starlink base station firmware has been dumped and includes interesting things like geofencing for the developer modes. We saw a garage robot that will plug in your electric vehicle if you’re the forgetful sort. And we close up by talking about heavier-than-air helium airships and China’s Mars rover.
Take a look at the links below if you want to follow along, and as always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!
Direct download
(55 MB or so.)
Places to follow Hackaday podcasts:
Google Podcasts
iTunes
Spotify
Stitcher
RSS
Episode 126 Show Notes:
What’s that Sound?
Visiting The FACOM 128B 1958 Relay Computer
[Mike from Norwich] wins the shirt!
New This Week:
U.A.E.’s Mars Orbiter Gets New Views of Red Planet Auroras – The New York Times
Richard Branson will fly into space on July 11, beating rival Jeff Bezos by 9 days – CBS News
Interesting Hacks of the Week:
StarLink Terminal Unit Firmware Dumped
3D Zoetrope Uses Illusion To Double The Frames
Bootstrapped Tools, Live Stopped Motion, And A Dekatron Computer
Live Stopped Motion Machine – YouTube
SimpleFOC Demystifies Precision BLDC Motor Control
Open Source Ultrasonic Anemometer
Ultrasonic anemometer (Ultrasonic wind sensor)
Sub-mm Mechanical 3D Scanner With Encoders And String
A Robot To Top Up Your Tesla
Quick Hacks:
Elliot’s Picks:
Discarded Plastic Laser-Cut And Reassembled
How To Drive Smartphone Screens Over HDMI
Evan Doorbell’s Telephone World
Mike’s Picks
Iron Becomes SMD Hot Plate
USB Power Bank’s Auto-Off Becomes Useful Feature In Garage Door Remote
Convert Your Mouse Into A Paddle Controller
Can’t-Miss Articles:
Could Airships Make A Comeback With New Hybrid Designs?
China’s Mars Rover Goes Exploring
China lands its Zhurong rover on Mars – BBC News – YouTube | 0 | 0 | [] | 1,760,373,025.217958 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/09/eliminate-vertical-stabiliser-with-arduplane/ | Eliminate Vertical Stabiliser With ArduPlane | Danie Conradie | [
"drone hacks"
] | [
"ardupilot",
"electric airplane",
"flying wing",
"RC airplane"
] | Flying wings are popular options for fixed-wing FPV flying, but they have one rather annoying characteristic: yaw wag. The flying wing will wobble on the yaw axis while flying, and this side-to-side movement is visible on the pilot’s FPV video feed. With a
combination of split rudders and ArduPilot, [Think Flight] eliminated wing wag without using any vertical stabilizers
.
Yaw wag usually occurs on flying wings that use a pair of small winglets instead of a large vertical stabilizer on the centerline. Split rudders, also known as differential spoilers, can be used for active yaw control by increasing drag on either wing independently. However, this requires very rapid corrections that are very difficult to do manually, so this is where ArduPilot comes in. [Think Flight] used its yaw dampening feature in combination with differential spoilers to completely eliminate vertical stabilizers and yaw wag. This is the same technique used on the B-2 stealth bomber to avoid radar reflecting vertical stabilizers. [Think Flight] also used these clamshells spoilers as elevons.
Using XFLR5 airfoil analysis software, [Think Flight] designed built a pair of flying wings to use these features. The first was successful in eliminating yaw wag, but exhibited some instability on the roll axis. After taking a closer look at the design with XFLR5, he found air it predicted that airflow would separate from the bottom surface of the wing at low angles of attack. After fixing this issue, he built a V2 to closely match the looks of the B2 bomber. Both aircraft were cut from EPP foam with an interesting-looking CNC hot wire cutter and laminated with Kevlar for strength.
ArduPilot is an incredibly powerful open source autopilot system that is constantly evolving. We’ve recently seen it used on an incredible
10 hour 45 minute electric RC flight
, but it can also be used for
ekranoplans
,
rovers
and
boats
.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1DGNQJ3BQg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5be-4j0yLyw | 5 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363041",
"author": "Eric Cherry",
"timestamp": "2021-07-09T15:54:15",
"content": "Way more interested in his wire cutter apparatus.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6363060",
"author": "fiddlingjunky",
"timesta... | 1,760,373,025.260611 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/09/this-week-in-security-print-nightmare-continues-ransomware-goes-bigger-and-atm-jackpots/ | This Week In Security: Print Nightmare Continues, Ransomware Goes Bigger, And ATM Jackpots! | Jonathan Bennett | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"News",
"Security Hacks"
] | [
"NFC",
"Print Nightmare",
"ransomware",
"This Week in Security"
] | For the second time, Microsoft
has attempted and failed to patch the PrintNightmare vulnerability
. Tracked initially as CVE-2021-1675, and the second RCE as CVE-2021-34527.
We warned you about this last week
, but a few more details are available now. The original reporter, [Yunhai Zhang] confirms our suspicions, stating on Twitter that “it seems that they just test with the test case in my report”.
CVE-2021-1675 is meant to fix PrintNightmare, but it seems that they just test with the test case in my report, which is more elegant and also more restricted. So, the patch is incomplete. : (
— Yunhai Zhang (@_f0rgetting_)
July 1, 2021
Microsoft has now shipped an out-of-band patch to address the problem, with the caveat that it’s known not to be a perfect fix, but should eliminate the RCE element of the vulnerability. Except … if the server in question has the point and print feature installed, it’s probably still vulnerable. And to make it even more interesting, Microsoft says
they have already seen
this vulnerability getting exploited in the wild.
Ransomware, The Big One
Kaseya makes remote management, security, and network monitoring products for IT departments and companies. Their VSA product specifically does remote monitoring and management, and had an optional on-premises component. Put simpler, you put their server on your network, and then installed their client on every computer you manage. The clients report back to the server, and you can install updates or fix problems remotely. It sounds great, actually. The only problem is that
there was a pair of vulnerabilities
in those servers.
The Dutch Institute for Vulnerability Disclosure had been doing research work on Kaseya systems, and had disclosed a number of flaws, which were working through the normal process of patching. CVE-2021-30116 seems to be the primary vulnerability used, and Kaseya was painfully close to rolling out a fix. The timing weakly suggests inside knowledge of Kaseya’s vulnerability and patching process, but that is by no means certain. Either way,
the attack was launched over the 4th of July weekend in the US
, and many Kaseya VSA machines were targeted. Once these management endpoints were compromised, a REvil malware binary was pushed out to all connected clients as an update to install. REvil has boasted that they scored over a million infections as a result, and have offered a universal decryptor for a cool $70,000,000.
We’ve discussed here how ransomware groups have put some effort into not making too big of a splash, as getting too much publicity can lead to
seized servers
,
bitcoins mysteriously recovered by the FBI
,
and actual arrests
, depending on what country the group operates out of. It will be interesting to see if an event of this magnitude results in further action.
NFC ATM Jackpot
Near Field Communications (NFC) is the technology that powers non-contact smart cards. You may use one of these for access control to get into your workplace. You probably have NFC tech built into your credit cards, and maybe your passport, too. Most cell phones can do NFC communications, and here’s the important bit, they can mimic a smart card. What do you suppose a security researcher would do with such an ability? Naturally, use this ability to send malformed smart card data to a reader and see what happens.
That’s just what
[Josep Rodriguez] did, to a bunch of ATM machines
. He is part of IOActive, a security research company, and they have a consulting contract with one of the ATM vendors. It seems that his work on the one device inspired security testing of multiple brands. Quite a few can be crashed via unexpected NFC input, and if we know anything from the last few years of security research, that often means that things are vulnerable to full exploit. And, as expected, on the machine he could legally attempt a full exploit against, [Rodriguez] hit the jackpot. Literally.
Jackpotting an ATM
is when an attacker can convince it to dispense all its cash at once. There have been a few ways to do this in the past, from stealing manufacturer’s tools, to attacking the machine physically. This is the first time such an attack has been found over NFC, or at least that has been publicly talked about. More information about the attacks are coming. It seems this initial story is intended to be a warning shot to vendors, that it’s time to get serious about patching their equipment.
Vulnerable Training App
Interested in Android App security? There’s a training tool you might be interested in,
the Damn Vulnerable Bank
. It’s an Android app that looks and works just like a real app might, but without the legal problems that go with hacking into a real bank’s infrastructure. And there’s a getting-started guide that walks you through the process of getting the app running in an emulator, including defeating the built-in protections against such research.
Password Stealing Gets Tricky
Android apps that try to harvest data from users is nothing new, right? I almost passed this story by, until I noticed that these apps were doing something clever. The
set of apps found by analysts at Doctor Web
are working apps, and show ads just as we’ve come to expect. These apps have a unique option to get rid of the ads showing, just log into your Facebook account. Hit that button, and the Facebook login page shows up right in the app, making for an easy experience.
Does that trigger your security spider sense? It should. That app has complete control over what happens in its own browser implementation. In this case, it loads the real Facebook page, and then loads some additional JavaScript to steal the password as it’s typed in. Thanks to this research, Google has
kicked the apps off the play store
, but not before they racked up a combined 5.8 million installs.
All Your Database Are Belong To Us
One of the ways private data leaks out to the world is through an unsecured database. There are quite a few of the non-traditional databases that either complete lack built-in security, or default to an insecure installation. That isn’t a problem, so long as the people using the database take the appropriate steps to keep the data secure. How many such databases do you think are exposed to the internet right now?
Researchers at RedHunt Labs wanted to know, so
they started scanning the IPv4 space for unsecured databases
. They picked eight databases, and started looking, and found a total of 95,321 insecure or totally unsecured databases exposed to the internet. It’s hard to know how many of those have proprietary data, but there’s also the possibility that each of those represents a foothold into a network. Keep your databases off the internet!
How Broken Can You Make A Password Manager
And finally, in the facepalm category, Kaspersky’s Password Manager was
generating extremely insecure passwords
. There were several odd issues at play, but by far the worst was that the only source of randomness the generator used was the current time … in seconds. To quote the article, “every instance of Kaspersky Password Manager in the world will generate the exact same password at a given second.” To put it another way, if you know the day a password was generated by this system, you can immediately narrow it down to a list of 86,400 passwords. That’s just a little bit more than 16 bits, or the equivalent of a three-character password. Oof. | 29 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6363021",
"author": "Bret Tschacher",
"timestamp": "2021-07-09T14:32:33",
"content": "JUST GOES TO SHOW, THE MORE COMPLICATED YOU MAKE SOMETHING SO THAT IT WILL WORK, THE MORE COMPLICATED YOU MAKE SOMETHING TO MAKE SO THAT IT WILL WORK !!!!!! Then you have to make it more complica... | 1,760,373,025.567266 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/09/10-gigabit-ethernet-for-the-pi/ | 10 Gigabit Ethernet For The Pi | Al Williams | [
"Network Hacks",
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"10 Gbe",
"10gbps",
"cat 6 cable",
"ethernet",
"raspberry pi"
] | When people like Bell and Marconi invented telephones and radios, you have to wonder who they talked to for testing. After all, they had the first device. [Jeff] had a similar problem. He got a
10 gigabit network card working
with the Raspberry Pi Compute Module. But he didn’t have any other fast devices to talk to. Simple, right? Just get a router and another network card. [Jeff] thought so too, but as you can see in the video below, it wasn’t quite that easy.
Granted, some — but not all — of the hold-ups were self-inflicted. For example, doing some metalwork to get some gear put in a 19-inch rack. However, some of the problems were unavoidable, such as the router that has 10 Gbps ports, but not enough throughput to actually move traffic at that speed. Recabling was also a big task.
A lot of the work revolved around side issues such as fan noises and adding StarLink to the network that didn’t really contribute to the speed, but we understand distractions in a project.
The router wasn’t the only piece of gear that can’t handle the whole 10 Gbps data stream. The Pi itself has a single 4 Gbps PCI lane, so the most you could possibly get would be 4 Gbps and testing showed that the real limit is not quite 3.6 Gbps. That’s still impressive and the network card offloading helped the PI’s performance, as well.
On a side note, if you ever try to make videos yourself, watching the outtakes at the end of the video will probably make you feel better about your efforts. We all must have the same problems.
If you want to upgrade to 10Gb networking on the cheap,
we have some advice
. Just be careful not to
scrimp on the cables
. | 31 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362981",
"author": "ian 42",
"timestamp": "2021-07-09T11:18:21",
"content": "I too would like to go to 10 Gbe, the trouble is the switch’s (that can actually do it) are very expensive..The problem is that when 1Gbe came cheap enough to do at home (long time ago now, ie 20+ years) i... | 1,760,373,025.770356 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/08/bringing-the-game-boy-camera-into-the-21st-century/ | Bringing The Game Boy Camera Into The 21st Century | Jenny List | [
"digital cameras hacks",
"Nintendo Game Boy Hacks"
] | [
"game boy camera",
"pi zero",
"wifi"
] | The Game Boy Camera is probably one of the most limited-specification digital cameras to have been mass-marketed, yet it occupies a special position in the hearts of many because despite being a toy with a paltry 128×128 monochrome sensor it was for many the first camera they owned. [Matt Grey] was among those people, and was always frustrated by the device’s inability to export pictures except to the Game Boy printer. So after having bodged together an interface a decade ago but not being happy with it, he returned to the project and made
a wireless carrier for the camera that allows easy transfer through WiFi to his mobile phone
.
Inside the slab-like 3D-printed enclosure lies a GBxCart RW Game Boy cartridge reader, whose USB port is wired to a Raspberry Pi Zero on which are a set of scripts to read the camera and make its photos available for download via a web browser. At last the camera is a stand-alone unit, allowing the easy snapping and retrieval of as many tiny black and white images as he likes. There’s a video showing the device in action, which we’ve placed for your enjoyment below the break.
This camera has appeared in so many projects on these pages over the years, but we’re guessing that the work on whose shoulders this one stands would be
the moment its workings were reverse engineered
.
Thanks [Katie] for the tip! | 6 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362800",
"author": "Shannon",
"timestamp": "2021-07-08T16:44:24",
"content": "Oh look, it’s the bounciest man on the internet, Matt Gray.I don’t really get the love of the Game Boy camera, but I guess this is a nice project to keep that love strong.",
"parent_id": null,
"de... | 1,760,373,025.700582 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/08/electric-land-speed-racing-can-be-lightning-fast/ | Electric Land Speed Racing Can Be Lightning Fast | Lewin Day | [
"car hacks",
"Hackaday Columns",
"Original Art"
] | [
"electric vehicle",
"ev",
"land speed racing"
] | Land speed racing is a pursuit of ultimate speed above all else. Most cars typically run on huge, flat salt pans, and racers run flat out for miles in a straight line, attempting to push their machines to the limit. Like most motorsports, the history of land speed racing has traditionally been centred around internal combustion, but electric racers have long been out there chasing land speed records as well.
The Need For Speed
At the most famous land speed trials, such as Bonneville’s Speed Week, speed runs take place over miles and miles of open salt, with timing traps along the way to determine competitor’s speeds. These tracks are long enough that acceleration is of little concern, which is of great benefit to electric runners. Additionally, only one or two runs is required to set a record. This means that heavy batteries aren’t always needed, as the distance a competitor must travel is short, and even if the batteries are heavy, it doesn’t excessively affect top speed.
With an eye to that, land speed competitors in electric classes are typically classified into weight classes. This is due to the fact that bigger, heavier battery packs can deliver more current, and thus potentially have a performance advantage over lighter vehicles. Thus, typical classes run by most salt flats competitions involve the E1 class, which allows for vehicles under 1100 lbs, the E2 class, for vehicles up to 2200 lbs, and the E3 class, which is for anything 2200 lbs and above.
The FIA also publish their own set of classes
, again separated by weight, though to a much more granular degree.
Procedures for setting records vary depending on the venue and the record in question. Local records at salt venues like El Mirage can typically be broken with a single run faster than the standing record, while Bonneville Speed Week competitors must set a higher average speed across two runs on two consecutive days. FIA records differ again, and are perhaps the most stringent, requiring competitors to set a faster average across two runs in opposite directions, set within an hour of each other, to attempt to minimise the effect of wind on the result. Things can sometimes get confusing, as many FIA records, for example, are set at the Bonneville salt flats, but not actually in Speed Week competition or by Speed Week rules.
The Autolite Lead Wedge is one of the first electric land speed racers of the modern era, with its accomplishment still listed in the FIA’s record books.
Unlike more traditional land speed racing classes, electric vehicles typically run in an “unlimited” body class, where anything goes. This is due to the fact that in the early days when rulesets were being figured out, there simply were no “production” electric cars to compete. Thus, the classes have by and large always been open to any and all body designs, with the vast majority of record breakers adopting rail-like streamliner chassis designs.
History
The stories of land speed racing attempts are weaved over many years, as projects coalesce to take on a highly specific record, best it, and move on. Records can stand for decades, before they’re unearthed by a new generation, who spawn a new build and push the record ever higher. Electric land speed records are no different, often standing for long periods of time before tumbling in the face of new teams with new technology.
The Lola-Drayson B12/69EV is a former Le Mans car turned land speed racer, which set the current 500 kg -1000 kg EV land speed record back in 2013.
The Autolite Lead Wedge,
recently for sale by its owner
, is a great example of an early entry to the world of electric land speed racing. In 1968, with Jerry Kugel tucked in under the fibreglass canopy,
it set a record of 138.862 mph over a mile
to claim the FIA record. It was built in part to promote the new line of Autolite lead-acid car batteries, 20 of which were used to propel it across the Bonneville salt flats.
The Venturi Buckeye Bullet 3 holds the title as the fastest EV over a mile in any weight class in the FIA record books.
Amazingly, in the FIA’s 500 kg to 1000 kg weight class for electric competitors, it’s only been beaten twice since.
In FIA records maintained online,
the record next fell in 1974,
to a car by the name of Battery Box
, powered by a General Electric forklift motor and around 30 lead acid batteries, depending on the run. In a two-way average, it bumped the record to 174.981 mph over a mile. The record was then to stand for another 39 years,
beaten by Lord Drayson in the Drayson B12/69EV in 2013 at RAF Elvington.
The modified former Le Mans car, equipped with modern lithium-ion cells and axial-flux motors, clinched the record with a FIA confirmed speed of 205.139 mph. At the absolute top end of performance, however, stands the Venturi Buckeye Bullet 3. Running in the heavier weight class for vehicles between 3500 kg and 4000 kg,
it set a scorching speed of 341.264 mph over a mile
, eclipsing top speeds set by vehicles in lower classes.
The EV West Electraliner snatched the E2 class speed record at Bonneville last year.
Records at salt racing events like Speed Week tend to attract more regular competition. Events run every year and don’t require competitors to arrange their own timing equipment, and records are verified by the volunteer associations that run the events themselves. They also have the benefit of allowing competitors plenty of time to prepare between runs – unlike the FIA’s one hour time restriction, which can be punishing for electric vehicles that need to swap or recharge batteries.
The Southern California Timing Association maintains these records
, with their classes and rulesets adhered to by salt racers the world over. Currently,
the BYU Streamliner has held the E1 weight class record at 204.893 mph since 2014
, while last year saw
the EV West Electraliner take the E2 class record at 229.363 mph.
Meanwhile, the heaviest E3 class has been held by
the Buckeye Bullet since 2004 with a speed of 314.958 mph
– the predecessor to the vehicle currently holding the FIA outright EV speed record. Unlike more modern entries, the original Buckeye Bullet set its record using nickel metal hydride batteries.
Conclusion
Like any land speed record attempt, success in the electric realm requires good engineering, careful planning, and here and there, a dose of luck. Poor conditions and equipment failures have scuppered many a land speed racer’s shot at glory, and it can and will happen again. If you decide you need to take a tilt at entering the history books,
take a gander at our in-depth primer to the sport
. And, most of all, good luck! | 4 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362773",
"author": "Jerry",
"timestamp": "2021-07-08T14:31:49",
"content": "“The Great Salt Lake” seems to falling victim to the drought. Newspaper said (If you believe them) Lowest level ever.Perhaps more room to set speed records.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"rep... | 1,760,373,025.819693 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/08/c64-demo-no-c64/ | C64 Demo, No C64 | Dan Maloney | [
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"1541",
"c64",
"dac",
"demo",
"demoscene",
"floppy",
"floppy music",
"pal",
"serial",
"sync"
] | Never underestimate the ingenuity of the demoscene. The self-imposed limitations lead to incredible creativity, and, the range of devices they manage to get their demos running on never ceases to amaze us. But we never thought we’d see
a C64 demo without one central component: the C64
.
Full disclosure: [Matthias Kramm]’s demo, called “Freespin”, does need a C64 to get started. The venerable 6502-based computer runs a loader program on a 1541 disk drive. But from then on, it’s all floppy drive. And [Matthias] has laid bare all his tricks.
The video below shows the demo in full, including a heart-stopping on-camera cable mod. By adding a single 100 Ω resistor, [Matthias] turned the serial clock and data lines into a two-bit digital-to-analog converter, good enough to generate signals for both black and white pixels and the sync pulses needed for the display.
No demo would be complete without sound, and Freespin’s tunes come from controlling the drive’s stepper motor, like a one-voice Floppotron.
Watching nothing but a floppy drive run a cool demo is pretty amazing. Yes, we know there’s a full-fledged computer inside the floppy, but the bit-banging needed to make this work was still mighty impressive. It might be cool to see what you could do
with multiple drives,
but we understand the minimalistic aesthetic as well. And speaking of tiny little demos: the 256 bytes of [HellMood]’s “
Memories
” or [Linus Åkesson]’s “
A Mind is Born
” still leave us speechless.
[Richy Freeway] wrote in with this one. Thanks! | 24 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362731",
"author": "shrad",
"timestamp": "2021-07-08T11:40:01",
"content": "Mind boggled!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6362739",
"author": "Alysson Rowan",
"timestamp": "2021-07-08T11:57:24",
"content": "Mind bog... | 1,760,373,025.991001 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/08/dial-a-sid-is-a-glorious-chiptune-jukebox/ | Dial-a-SID Is A Glorious Chiptune Jukebox | Lewin Day | [
"classic hacks",
"Musical Hacks",
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"chiptunes",
"sid",
"sid chip"
] | Old-school rotary telephones aren’t particularly useful for their original intended purpose in this day and age, but they’re great fun to hack into new projects. [Linus Åkesson] has done just that, with his
Dial-a-SID jukebox build
. (Video, embedded below.)
The build installs a Raspberry Pi 3 inside the body of the telephone, running a SID chip emulator and loaded up with the
High Voltage SID Collection
. The Pi inside outputs sound to an external stereo system for playing chiptunes at a party.
The real party piece, however, is that the handset can be lifted and the telephone dialled in order to listen to and select tracks for the playlist. Tracks can be selected by individual codes, by composer, or even by year. In the event the playlist grows empty, the default behaviour can be set to keep playing random tracks in the meantime.
With over 2000 hours of SID music inside, it’s unlikely the Dial-a-SID will run out of tunes anytime soon. We’d love to see a similar interface used for a jukebox hooked up to a modern streaming service, too. If you build one,
let us know!
Alternatively,
consider hooking up your rotary phone to your smartphone.
Video after the break. | 8 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362705",
"author": "Arif Hossain",
"timestamp": "2021-07-08T08:17:59",
"content": "Actually, this wrestling with a physical print-out + physical box is a really cool concept. Instead of people randomly tossing tunes from their private device, they’re “forced” to interact with a ph... | 1,760,373,025.860218 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/07/hamster-trades-crypto-better-than-you/ | Hamster Trades Crypto Better Than You | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Lifehacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"crypto",
"cryptocurrency",
"currency",
"hamster",
"live stream",
"nano",
"random",
"trading"
] | The inner machinations of the mind of cryptocurrency markets are an enigma. Even traditional stock markets often seem to behave at random, to the point that several economists seriously suggest that various non-human animals might outperform one market or another just by random chance alone. The classic example is a monkey picking stocks at random, but in the modern world
the hamster [Mr Goxx] actively trades crypto from inside his hamster cage
.
[Mr Goxx]’s home comprises a normal apartment and a separate office where he can make his trades. The office contains an “intention wheel” where he can run in order to select a currency to trade, and two tunnels that [Mr Goxx] can use to declare his intention to buy or sell the currency he selected with the wheel. The wheel is connected to an Arduino Nano with an optical encoder, and the Nano also detects the hamster’s presence in the “buy” or “sell” tunnel and lights up status LEDs when he wants to execute a trade. The Nano also communicates with an intricate Java program which overlays information on the live video feed and also executes the trades in real life with real money.
Live updates are sent directly both on
Twitter
and
Reddit
, besides the live Twitch stream of [Mr Goxx] we linked above. The stream only shows his office and not his apartment, and he’s mostly active at night (Berlin time). But we can’t wait for his random walks to yield long-term results which can be analyzed for years to come. In the meantime we’ll see if
others have been able to make any profits in crypto with any less-random methods
. | 19 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362666",
"author": "Robb Smith",
"timestamp": "2021-07-08T03:55:03",
"content": "Hopefully Mr. Goxx will enjoy a long and happy life, unlike say, Rabio the Octopus.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6362669",
"author": ... | 1,760,373,025.931258 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/07/drink-water-on-schedule-or-else-flood-your-desk/ | Drink Water On Schedule Or Else Flood Your Desk | Kristina Panos | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"The Hackaday Prize"
] | [
"2021 Hackaday Prize",
"arduino",
"Arduino Uno",
"drinking water",
"hydration",
"pomodoro",
"water pump"
] | How much water have you had to drink today? We would venture to guess that the answer is somewhere between ‘absolutely none’ and ‘not not nearly enough’. You can go ahead and blame poor work/life balance — that’s our plan, anyway — and just try to do better. All this working from home means the bathroom situation is now ideal, so why not drink as much water as you can?
But how? Well, you’re human, so you’ll need to make it as easy as possible to drink the water throughout the day. You could fill up one big jug and hoist it to your mouth all day long (or use a straw), but facing that amount of water all at once can be intimidating. The problem with using a regular-sized vessel is that you have to get up to refill it several times per day. When hyper-focus is winning the work/life tug-of-war, you can’t always just stop and go to the kitchen.
What you need is an automatic water dispenser, and you need it right there on the desk
.
[Javier Rengel]’s water pomodoro makes it as easy as setting your cup down in front of this machine and leaving it there between sips. As long as the IR sensor detects your cup, it will dispense water every hour. This means that if you don’t drink enough water throughout the day, you’re going to have it all over the desk at some point. [Javier] simply connected an Arduino UNO to a water pump and IR sensor pair and repurposed the milk dispenser from a coffee machine. Check it out in action after the break.
Of course, if you aren’t intimidated by the big jug approach, you could keep tabs on your intake with
the right kind of straw.
The
Hackaday
Prize2021
is Sponsored by: | 47 | 21 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362621",
"author": "Andy Pugh",
"timestamp": "2021-07-07T23:15:16",
"content": "I wonder what evolutionary pressure has led our thirst instinct to make us drink less than is optimal?Or has it?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "... | 1,760,373,026.073941 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/07/a-plastic-injection-machine-you-can-use-at-home/ | A Plastic Injection Machine You Can Use At Home | Lewin Day | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"injection molding",
"machinery",
"plastic"
] | 3D printing is all well and good if you want one of something, but if you want lots of plastic parts that are all largely identical, you should consider injection molding. You can pay someone to do this for you, or, in true hacker fashion,
you can build an entire injection molding setup in your own garage, as [Action BOX] did.
The build relies on a pair of beefy 3hp motors to drive the screw-based injection system. These are responsible for feeding plastic pellets from a hopper and then melting them and filling the injection reservoir, before then forcing the hot plastic into the mold. Further stepper motors handle clamping the mold and then releasing it and ejecting the finished part. A Raspberry Pi handles the operation of the machine, and is configured with a custom Python program that is capable of proper cycle operation. At its peak, the machine can produce up to 4 parts per minute.
It’s an impressive piece of industrial-type hardware. If you want to produce a lot of plastic things in your own facility, a machine like this is very much the way to go.
It’s not the first machine of its type we’ve seen, either
! Video after the break.
[Thanks to Phil for the tip!] | 25 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362592",
"author": "JWhitten",
"timestamp": "2021-07-07T21:36:13",
"content": "That’s pretty slick. I’ve been wanting to build one of these for a while now, and it’s good to see such a great DIY concept model.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
... | 1,760,373,026.152809 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/06/open-source-ultrasonic-anemometer/ | Open Source Ultrasonic Anemometer | Danie Conradie | [
"Tech Hacks"
] | [
"anemometer",
"ultrasonic sensor",
"weather station",
"wind sensor"
] | Weather stations are a popular project for experimenting with various environmental sensors, and for wind speed and direction the choice is usually a simple cup anemometer and wind vane. For [Jianjia Ma]’s
QingStation
, he decided to build another type of wind sensor: An ultrasonic anemometer.
Ultrasonic anemometers have no moving parts but come at the cost of significantly more electronic complexity. They work by measuring the time it takes for an ultrasonic audio pulse to be reflected the receiver across a known distance. Wind direction can be calculated by taking velocity readings from two ultrasonic sensor pairs perpendicular to each other and using a bit of simple trigonometry. For an ultrasonic anemometer to work properly, it requires a carefully designed analog amplifier on the receive side and a lot of signal processing to extract the correct signal from all the noise caused by secondary echoes, multi-pathing, and the environment. The design and experimentation process is
well-documented
. Since [Jianjia] does not have access to a wind tunnel for testing and calibration, he improvised by mounting the anemometer on his car’s roof and going for a drive. This yielded readings that were proportional to the car’s GPS speed, but a bit higher. This might due to a calculation error, or external factors like wind, or disturbed airflow from the test car or other traffic.
Other sensors include an optical rain sensor, light sensor, lighting sensor, and a BME280 for air pressure, humidity, and temperature. [Jianjia] plans to use the QingStation on an autonomous boat, so he also included an IMU, compass, GPS, and a microphone for environmental sounds. The fact that none of the sensors have moving parts is a major advantage for this use case, and we look forward to seeing the boat project. All the hardware and software are open-source and
available on GitHub
.
We covered
another ultrasonic anemometer
a few years ago, but it had a different sensor arrangement. IF you prefer simplicity, the more common cup anemometers can be built from a range of scrap materials, including
old hard drive parts
and
plastic Easter eggs
. | 12 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362213",
"author": "vazhnov",
"timestamp": "2021-07-06T12:11:27",
"content": "CC BY-NC 4.0 License — it’s not opensource.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6362217",
"author": "Iván Stepaniuk",
"timestamp": "202... | 1,760,373,026.358975 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/06/bellow-cooled-pc-is-a-well-engineered-display-piece/ | Bellow-Cooled PC Is A Well Engineered Display Piece | Danie Conradie | [
"computer hacks"
] | [
"bellows",
"diy perks",
"Gaming Computer",
"PC cooling"
] | The cooling systems on high-performance PCs are often a large part of their visual appeal, but we’ve never seen anything like [DIY Perks]’ latest build: A massive
bellow-cooled PC
.
The system is derived from a
silent bellow system
built by [DIY Perks] in 2020. It uses a clever combination of hydraulics and neodymium magnets to smoothly reciprocate a large plate within a chamber. Instead of blowing the air straight into the room, it pushes it through a pair of wood ducts into a second chamber with PC components, and out through a water-cooling radiator. To prevent the hot air from being sucked back in as the bellow reciprocates, a row of check valves was added on each side of the PC chamber and at the external intakes. The sides of the bellow chamber and PC chamber are made of glass to allow a full view of the internal components.
The build was not without complications. While disassembling the old bellow, the acrylic tube in which the magnet reciprocates shattered. When a replacement rube arrived, [DIY Perks] discovered the magnet’s fit was very loose. He solved this by increasing the thickness of the magnet’s nickel coating with another run of electroplating. To achieve a uniform coating, he agitated the plating solution by suspending the magnet from a small speaker playing a sine-wave tone. The cooling performance is excellent, keeping the CPU and GPU at 60C or below, even while running them at full tilt.
The final product looks so good, we wouldn’t mind its massive size taking up space in our labs. This is true to form [DIY Perks], who has built some very attractive enclosures for
speakers
,
monitors
, and the
PlayStation 5
. | 19 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362175",
"author": "Jonathan Bennett",
"timestamp": "2021-07-06T08:15:57",
"content": "“Bellow-Cooled PC” is a better title in every way than “World’s First Breathing PC”. Well done.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6362183",
... | 1,760,373,026.286022 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/05/how-to-drive-smartphone-screens-over-hdmi/ | How To Drive Smartphone Screens Over HDMI | Lewin Day | [
"Phone Hacks"
] | [
"dsi",
"hdmi",
"iphone",
"mipi",
"mipi dsi",
"smartphone"
] | Compared to most small LCDs sold to makers, smartphone screens boast excellent color, brightness, and insanely high resolution. Unfortunately, driving them is rarely straightforward. In an attempt to make it easier,
[peng-zhihui] set about developing tools to allow such screens to be driven from a simple HDMI feed.
For those whose Chinese is a little rusty,
the Google Translate link might prove useful.
The first attempt was using Toshiba’s TC358870XBG ASIC, capable of driving screens over MIPI DSI 1.1 from an HDMI input. [peng-zhihui] designed a simple test module for the chip based on the company’s evaluation board design,
with [ylj2000] providing software to help get that solution off the ground.
However, for now that solution is imperfect, so [peng-zhihui] also experimented with the Longxun LT6911 HDMI to MIPI driver. While cheap, information on the part is scarce, and the company’s own source code for using the hardware is only accessible by signing an NDA. However, [peng-zhihui] made pre-compiled firmware available for those that wish to work with the hardware.
[peng-zhihui] has put these learnings to good use,
building a power bank with a MIPI screen using what appears to be the Longxun chip
. The device can supply power over USB and also act as an HDMI display.
While it’s early days yet, and driving these screens remain difficult, it’s great to see hackers getting out there and finding a way to make new parts work for them.
We’ve seen similar work before, using an FPGA rather than an off-the-shelf ASIC
. If you’ve found your own way to get these high-end displays working,
be sure to drop us a line!
[Thanks to peterburk for the tip!] | 22 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362152",
"author": "Prasad",
"timestamp": "2021-07-06T05:14:21",
"content": "cool – could use this as UV PCB exposer ; look forward to further developments",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6362157",
"author": "Gravis",... | 1,760,373,026.520314 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/05/you-can-put-toothpaste-in-the-tube-with-effort/ | You Can Put Toothpaste In The Tube (With Effort) | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Science"
] | [
"air pressure",
"chamber",
"idiom",
"pump",
"toothpaste",
"tube",
"vacuum"
] | Old wives’ tales, folk knowledge, common sayings, and even cliches and idioms are often taken as givens since they form an often unnoticed part of our vocabulary and culture. There’s so many examples that it’s possible to fill a 17-season TV show busting potential myths like these, and even then there are some that slipped by. For example, the saying “you can’t put toothpaste back in the tube” which,
as it turns out, is not as impossible as we might be led to believe
.
This video is the product of [Tyler Bell] who has taken this idiom on as a challenge. To figure out if it was possible he first got to work building a vacuum chamber, which turned out to be a little easier than he thought it would be. After cutting a piece of polycarbonate tube and sanding it down, all that was needed were some rubber gaskets and fittings for the vacuum pump.
From there, the theory was to put an empty toothpaste tube into the vacuum chamber, pump all of the air out, and let atmospheric pressure “push” the toothpaste back into the tube. During [Tyler]’s first run he thought that it had worked successfully but it turned out that he had just inflated the empty toothpaste tube like a balloon. Further iterations were able to return some of the toothpaste to the tube, but each time some air would eventually work its way into the toothpaste which would immediately fill the remaining space in the tube with air rather than toothpaste.
While not completely successful, he was able to get
some
toothpaste back into the tube with a relatively small bill of materials. It’s not likely that this experiment will result in a change of this particular idiomatic expression, but it was interesting to put it to the test nonetheless. For other instances of toothpaste and its relationship to tubes, both inside and out,
be sure to check out this recent piece on various methods of toothpaste storage
.
Thanks to [Emiel] for the tip! | 20 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362136",
"author": "mrehorst",
"timestamp": "2021-07-06T02:06:44",
"content": "Now that that problem has been solved, we have to figure out how to unring a bell…",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6362149",
"author": "In... | 1,760,373,026.635045 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/05/wooden-linear-clock-aided-by-gps/ | Wooden Linear Clock Aided By GPS | Matthew Carlson | [
"clock hacks",
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"cnc",
"gnss",
"linear clock",
"stm32",
"stm32g0",
"walnut"
] | The notion of segmenting and quantizing the day into discrete segments of time is perhaps one of the most human things we do. Heralding back to a simpler era when a day was just a progression of sunrise to sunset, [James Wilson] created a
beautiful linear clock that shows time as progress throughout the day
.
For previous projects, [James] had used nixie tubes but the headache of the inverters, high voltages, and tight spaces led him to instead use mini-LED’s. Two PCBs were manufactured, one as the display and one to hold the GNSS module as it works best when mounted horizontally to point at the sky. Two rows of 112 tightly packed LEDs make a great stand-in for bar graph style tubes and are are controlled by TLC5926 shift registers. The venerable STM32G0 was chosen as the microcontroller to power the clock. With the help of some approximating functions and the location provided by the GNSS module [James] had the position of the sun which he then could turn into a % of progress through the sky.
The enclosure was modeled after the mid-century modern look and made of several pieces of wood CNC’d and then glued together. Machining it out of a solid piece of wood would have been difficult as finding long enough end mills that could carve out the interior is tricky. We think the resulting clock looks wonderful and the walnut accents the maple nicely.
The writeup is highly detailed and we love the honest explanations of what choices were made and why. The
code is available on GitHub
. Or if perhaps you’d rather eschew the LED’s and go for something more physical there’s always
this ratcheting linear clock
to draw inspiration from. | 23 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362121",
"author": "Hirudinea",
"timestamp": "2021-07-05T23:46:14",
"content": "Very nice looking, he should add a thermometer function, red for C+ and blue for C- (well I’m assuming outside temp.)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_i... | 1,760,373,026.576128 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/05/diy-air-quality-sensor/ | DIY Air Quality Sensor | Chris Lott | [
"home hacks",
"The Hackaday Prize"
] | [
"2021 Hackaday Prize",
"Air quality sensors",
"home automation",
"weather monitor"
] | [Andrew Lamchenko], who has built a number of small e-ink-based sensors this year, released another design called the
eON Indoor Air Quality Sensor
. As his previous sensor designs, the eON boasts a striking appearance with all the spit and polish of a commercially made product. Except [Andrew]’s design is completely open-source.
Besides showing air quality, it also shows basic weather conditions, and there’s a built-in weather forecasting algorithm as well. It can operate standalone or use the radio module to send readings to a smart home system.
The core sensor is the SGP40, which detects volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in the air while consuming less than 3 mA (compared to the 48 mA of the previous generation). There’s a temperature, barometric pressure, humidity, and light sensors in the package as well. Like many projects these days, [Andrew] encountered parts supply issues along the way. Because of that, and to make the design more flexible, several versions of the board have been made to accommodate the different permutations of:
Displays
2.13-inch e-ink display
DES e-ink display, coming soon
Radio, four flavors
MINEW MS88SF3 (nRF52833, nRF52840)
MINEW MS50SFA1 (nRF52810, nRF52811)
MINEW MS50SFA2 (nRF52832)
EBYTE E73-2G4M08S1C (nRF52833, nRF52840)
Temp / Pressure sensor:
BME280
BMP280
SHTC3
[Andrew] not only designed the sensor but has done a thorough job on the documentation. Check out
the GitHub repository
of the project for a complete data package covering all aspects of the design, including the weather forecasting app note by John Young (an NXP engineer, not the astronaut). Last week
the design was named as a finalist of the 2021 Hackaday Prize
. We’re excited to see where he goes with this between now and the end of October!
Do you use an air quality sensor in your home? If so, is it only for informational purposes or do you take action based on the data, such as automatically turning on a fan or escaping to the countryside? Let us know in the comments below.
The
Hackaday
Prize2021
is Sponsored by: | 6 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362115",
"author": "anon",
"timestamp": "2021-07-05T21:37:23",
"content": "No particulate sensor? Meh",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6362119",
"author": "RÖB",
"timestamp": "2021-07-05T23:32:14",
"con... | 1,760,373,026.909358 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/05/how-to-make-a-collapsible-container-without-breaking-down/ | How To Make A Collapsible Container Without Breaking Down | Kristina Panos | [
"3d Printer hacks",
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"3D printed mold",
"3D printed molds",
"collapsible",
"durometer",
"Shore durometer",
"silicone",
"sla printing"
] | How hard could it be to make a collapsible silicone container? Turns out, it’s really, really hard — collapsible containers have rigid guidelines. Just ask [Eric Strebel], who
failed dozens of times before finally getting it right
(video, embedded below).
[Eric] started with an SLA-printed two-part mold and a silicone formulation with a
Shore durometer
of A 40 — this is the measure of hardness for silicone, polymers, and elastomers in the sense that the piece will resist indentation. The first twenty-four attempts all came out looking great, but not a single one of them would collapse and stay collapsed.
Eventually, [Eric] went back to the drawing board and played with the angles of the flex points, the thickness of the living hinges, and the wall thicknesses, which have to be strong enough to stay collapsed.
For attempt #25, [Eric] took the part out of the mold about three hours in and tried curing it in the collapsed state. Persistence paid off, and the part finally collapses and stays that way. Get yourself some popcorn and check out the fail-fest after the break. You know what we always say — fail fast, fail often.
[Eric] has made many molds both from silicone and for silicone.
Some of them are really big! | 5 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6362088",
"author": "Canoe",
"timestamp": "2021-07-05T17:48:41",
"content": "Overseas makers:We just wanted everything done fast. To free the mold for the next one, we pulled them out as soon as they’d keep their shape, and collapsed them to save space…",
"parent_id": null,
... | 1,760,373,026.7373 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/04/hacking-a-thermal-imager-for-dual-use-of-the-thermal-sensor/ | Hacking A Thermal Imager For Dual-use Of The Thermal Sensor | Donald Papp | [
"digital cameras hacks",
"Peripherals Hacks"
] | [
"HT-A1",
"oem",
"seek",
"Thermal",
"thermal imager"
] | Sometimes a device doesn’t do quite what one needs, and in those cases a bit of tampering might do the trick. That’s what led to
being able to record video from a HTI HT-A1 thermal imager
despite the device not actually supporting that function, thanks to careful investigation and warranty violation.
Plugging in a custom USB cable allows a mobile phone app to access the thermal sensor, while the host device itself remains ignorant.
We’ve seen a teardown of the HT-A1
in the past, and it turns out that Seek — the manufacturer for the actual thermal sensor inside the device —
released an OEM development kit
and mobile phone app for their modules. Could this mean that the raw sensor module in the HT-A1 could be accessed via the developer kit app? One hacked together USB cable later showed that the answer is yes! Not only does the app allow viewing thermal imagery, but it makes it possible to do things like record video (a function the HT-A1 itself does not support.)
But even if the HT-A1 doesn’t allow recording, as a handheld thermal sensor with a screen it’s still pretty useful in its own way and it would be shame to gut the unit just for a raw sensor module. The best solution ended up being to put the sensor back into the HT-A1, and install some switching circuitry to disconnect the sensor from the HT-A1’s CPU and divert its data to the USB plug on demand. This means the HT-A1 can be used normally, but by plugging in a custom-made cable while the unit is off, the thermal sensor can be accessed by the mobile phone app instead. Best of both worlds. You can see a brief celebratory thermal cat video embedded below, proving it works. | 3 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6361935",
"author": "Michael",
"timestamp": "2021-07-04T21:00:33",
"content": "Can you make the image display in red white and blue?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6361967",
"author": "Adrian",
"timestamp": "2021-07-05T... | 1,760,373,026.680058 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/04/machine-extrudes-filament/ | Machine Extrudes Filament | Al Williams | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"3d printing",
"filament extruder",
"PLA"
] | We’ve seen a lot of homebrew filament extruders, but [Stefan] at CNC Kitchen shows off a commercial desktop filament extruder in his
latest video
, which you can see below. The 3DEVO extruder is pretty slick but at around $7,000-$8,000 we probably won’t rush out and buy one. We might, though, get some ideas from it for our next attempt to build something similar.
In concept, any machine that creates filament is pretty straightforward. Melt pellets and push them out of a nozzle. Cool the filament and wind it up. Easy, right? But, of course, the problems are all in the details. Die swell, for example, means you can’t just assume the nozzle’s hole size will give you the right size filament.
The 3DEVO machine apparently actually monitors the diameter of the filament and closes the control loop, changing parameters to keep the filament diameter reasonably constant and on target. Looks like it does a pretty good job, too.
[Stefan] is moving towards recycling old prints and we look forward to seeing that video. We’ve seen quite a few of these
filament extruders
of various levels of success. We’ve also seen some lessons on
how to not build one
. | 28 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6361890",
"author": "Observer",
"timestamp": "2021-07-04T17:43:59",
"content": "The closed-loop mechanism for drawing the filament to final diameter is interesting. The heart of it, of course, is the filament-measuring sensor. I wonder how that works.It occurs to me that you might b... | 1,760,373,026.801948 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/04/vintage-remote-control-gets-bluetooth-upgrade/ | Vintage Remote Control Gets Bluetooth Upgrade | Tom Nardi | [
"classic hacks",
"Peripherals Hacks"
] | [
"bluetooth",
"human interface device",
"TV remote",
"ultrasonic",
"vintage hardware"
] | This swanky Magnavox remote is old enough to predate the use of infrared, and actually relies on ultrasound to communicate with the television. It’s a neat conversation starter, but not terribly useful today. Which is why
[Chad Lawson] decided to gut the original electronics and replace it with a Adafruit Feather 32u4 Bluefruit LE
that can actually talk to modern devices.
We know, we know. Some in the audience will probably take offense to such a cool gadget being unceremoniously torn apart, but to be fair, [Chad] does say he has a second one that will remain in its original state. Plus a quick check on eBay shows these old remotes don’t seem to be particularly rare or valuable. In fact, after some browsing through the recently concluded auctions, we’re fairly sure he paid $27 USD for both of these remotes.
Anyway, [Chad] found that a piece of perfboard in his collection just happened to be nearly the same size as the PCB from the remote, which made the rest of the conversion pretty straightforward. He simply had to mount tactile switches on one side of the perfboard so the remote’s original buttons would hit them when pressed, and then wire those to the Adafruit on the other side. We know there’s a 3.7 V 500 mAh pouch battery in there someplace as well, though it’s not immediately clear where he hid it in the images.
The code [Chad] came up with tells the Adafruit to mimic a Bluetooth Human Interface Device (HID) and send standard key codes to whatever device pairs with it. That makes it easy to use as a media remote on the computer, for example.
We’ve seen something similar done with the ESP32
, if you’ve already got one in the parts bin and are looking to revamp a remote control of your own.
At the end of the write-up, [Chad] mentions he may try developing
an ultrasonic receiver that can pick up the signals from the unmodified remote control
. That would be a nice way to bring this whole thing full circle, and should appease even the most hardcore vintage remote control aficionados. | 20 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6361849",
"author": "jenningsthecat",
"timestamp": "2021-07-04T14:15:10",
"content": "Electronics? Heck, that original Magnavox remote is positively modern compared with the first TV remote I ever laid hands on! It was a Zenith. Four buttons, each of which cocked and released a kind... | 1,760,373,026.863132 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/04/this-arduino-isnt-color-blind/ | This Arduino Isn’t Color Blind | Al Williams | [
"Arduino Hacks"
] | [
"color sensor",
"TCS230",
"TCS3200"
] | You can sense a lot of things with the right sensor, and [Nikhil Nailwal] is here to show us how to
sense colors
using a TCS230. The project is a simple demo. It displays the color and lights up an LED to correspond to the detected color.
If you haven’t seen the TCS230 before, it is a chip with an array of photosensors, for different light wavelengths. The controlling chip — an Arduino, in this case — can read the intensity of the selected color.
The TCS230 uses a 4 x 4 array of photodiodes, along with a Bayer filter. That is, there are four detectors for red, four for green, and four for blue. There are also four unfiltered detectors that aid in low lighting detection.
The host computer controls two lines to select which group of four detectors to read. The output is a frequency from around 2 to 500 kHz that indicates the intensity. You can scale the output frequency if you don’t want to deal with higher frequencies.
From what we understand, the sensor’s resolution isn’t that great. But for simple color detection, it is easy to use and effective. There are very similar chips like the TCS3200 that have more sensors, but work in the same way.
We’ve seen
similar projects
, but we are always struck how simple this sensor is to use. Combine these with an RGB LED and you can make
a chameleon
. | 5 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6361913",
"author": "lacmacfactac",
"timestamp": "2021-07-04T19:45:36",
"content": "I find the APDS 9960 sensor a lot easier to use, and it can also detect up-down-left-right gestures out of the box, and can work as a basic proximity sensor as well.",
"parent_id": null,
"dep... | 1,760,373,027.021298 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/04/extreme-canine-mask-for-protection-from-foxtails/ | Extreme Canine Mask For Protection From Foxtails | Danie Conradie | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"3d printed",
"dog",
"forming",
"foxtail",
"mask"
] | Our canine partners are fortunately not affected by the current global pandemic, but it turns out there are other dangers that might necessitate them to wearing masks: Foxtail seeds. After getting a $400 vet bill for extracting a foxtail from his dog, [Hildeguard]’s ear, [Amos Dudley] decided to take the threat seriously and made her a
form-fitting 3D printed mask
.
The only commercial solution [Amos] could find was the “OutFox Field Guard”, which is a $50 vinyl-coated mesh bag that covers the dog’s entire head. It had the unfortunate side effects of causing some other dogs to try and rip it off and does not allow easy access to the mouth for treats or balls. [Hilde]’s custom mask was designed in CAD after creating a rough 3D scan of her head with an iPhone app. The bottom is open to allow [Hilde] to freely use her mouth, while the nose and ears holes are covered with mesh. Custom heat-formed polycarbonate lenses cover the eye holes. The mask itself was printed using Draft resin, and the inside was padded with a thin layer of foam. It might also be possible to create a
silicone version using a 3D-printed mold
. The top features an integrated GoPro mount, and we can’t help but wonder what other electronic upgrades could be fitted to this sci-fi-looking mask.
In the field, the mask worked well and did not seem to bother [Hilde]. Unfortunately, it did not solve the problem of other dogs trying to rip it off at the park, so for the moment [Amos] is only using it for more solitary activities like hiking.
It doesn’t look like [Amos] is struggling in that department, but if you need some help burning of your dog’s energy, you can always built them a
3D printed automatic ball launcher
. | 33 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6361823",
"author": "Dan",
"timestamp": "2021-07-04T08:54:15",
"content": "That just looks awesome!It’s a cyberpunk dog helmet!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6361828",
"author": "Alexander Wikström",
"timesta... | 1,760,373,026.978481 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/03/internet-chess-on-a-real-chessboard/ | Internet Chess On A Real Chessboard | Al Williams | [
"Games",
"internet hacks"
] | [
"chess",
"chess board",
"ChessBoard",
"opencv"
] | The Internet teaches us that we can accept stand-ins for the real world. We have an avatar that looks like us. We have virtual mailboxes to read messages out of make-believe envelopes. If you want to play chess, you can play with anyone in the world, but on a virtual board. Or, you can use [karayaman’s] software to
play virtual games on real boards
.
The Python program uses a webcam. You point it at an empty board and calibrate. After that, the program will track your moves on the real board in the online world. You can see a video of a test game below.
As you might imagine, the program uses OpenCV. If you have ever wanted to learn OpenCV, this is a nice practical use that is reasonably manageable. You do need a clear view of the chessboard, preferably from above. We wondered how hard it would be to offer a mode that would let you shoot a mirror suspended above the board.
Even if you don’t want to program, there’s something very reassuring about being able to study your position on a real board without having to manually synchronize the board.
If you’d rather build some hardware,
try this chessboard
. Or ditch the Internet and
build a robot
. | 5 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6361804",
"author": "Gravis",
"timestamp": "2021-07-04T05:40:52",
"content": "It’s funny because in computer vision you calibrate cameras using a chess board pattern. Big fan of OpenCV.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6361811",... | 1,760,373,027.141102 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/03/hacking-old-honda-ecus/ | Hacking Old Honda ECUs | Chris Lott | [
"car hacks"
] | [
"ecu hack",
"Honda engine",
"reverse engineering"
] | Automotive security specialist by day [P1kachu] hacks his own cars as a hobby in his free time. He recently began to
delve into the Engine Control Units (ECUs)
of the two old Hondas that he uses to get around in Japan. Both the 1996 Integra and the 1993 Civic have similar engines but different ECU hardware. Making things more interesting; each one has a tuned EPROM, the Civic’s being of completely unknown origin.
[P1kachu] took his Civic to a shop to have some burned-out transistors replaced in the ECU, and a chance conversation with the proprietor [Tuner-san] sends him on a journey into the world of old EPROMs. [Tuner-san] pulled out an old PROM duplicator stashed away under the counter which he originally used as a kid to copy PROM chips from console games like the Famicom. These days he uses it to maintain a backup collection of old ECU chips from cars he has worked on. This tweaked [P1kachu]’s curiosity, and he wondered if he could obtain the contents of the Civic’s mysterious PROM. After a false start trying to use the serial port on the back of the PROM copier, he brute-forces it. A few minutes of Googling reveals the ASCII pinout of the 27C256 EPROM, and he whips out an Arduino Mega and wires it up to the chip and is off and running.
Advantest R4945A EPROM Duplicator c.1980s
He’s currently digging into the firmware, using IDA and a
custom disassembler
he wrote for the Mitsubishi M7700 family of MCUs. He started a
GitHub repository for this effort
, and eventually hopes to identify what has been tweaked on this mysterious ECU chip compared to factory stock. He also wants to perform a little tuning himself. We look forward to more updates as [P1kachu] posts the results of his reverse engineering efforts. We also recommend that you be like [P1kachu] and carry an Arduino, a breadboard, and some hookup wire with you at all times — you never know when they might come in handy. Be sure to checkout
our articles
about his old Subaru hacks from in 2018 if these kinds of projects interest you. | 21 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "6361786",
"author": "James",
"timestamp": "2021-07-04T02:13:15",
"content": "https://hackaday.com/2021/07/02/dumping-90s-honda-ecu-programming-with-arduino/",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6361787",
"author": "irox",
"ti... | 1,760,373,027.399163 |
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