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https://hackaday.com/2013/06/03/a-very-tiny-gamma-ray-detector/ | A Very Tiny Gamma Ray Detector | Brian Benchoff | [
"chemistry hacks"
] | [
"gamma",
"gamma ray",
"geiger",
"geiger counter",
"radiation"
] | When you think of a radiation detector, you’re probably thinking of a Geiger tube and its high voltage circuitry. That isn’t the only way to measure gamma radiation, though, and [Alan] has a great circuit to measure even relatively weak radiation sources.
It uses a very small photodiode
, and draws so little power it’s perfect for projects with the smallest power budgets.
The detector circuit uses a
miniature solar cell
and a JFET wired up in a small brass tube to block most of the light and to offer some EM shielding. This, in turn, is attached to a small amplifier circuit with a LED, Piezo clicker, and in [Alan]’s case a small counter module. The photodiode is actually sensitive enough to detect the small amounts of gamma radiation produced from a smoke alarm americium source, and also registers [Alan]’s other more powerful radioactive sources.
The circuit only draws about 1mA, but [Alan] says he can probably get that down to a few micoAmps. A perfect radiation sensor for lightweight and low power applications, and gives us the inspiration to put a high altitude balloon project together. | 48 | 18 | [
{
"comment_id": "1012214",
"author": "GotNoTime",
"timestamp": "2013-06-03T23:10:19",
"content": "Maxim has an old app note about using PIN diodes as a radiation detector.http://www.maximintegrated.com/app-notes/index.mvp/id/2236It seems the BPW34 is quite a popular diode for this purpose. If you se... | 1,760,376,538.95825 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/06/03/keurig-hack-now-automatically-fills-the-water-reservoir/ | Keurig Hack Now Automatically Fills The Water Reservoir | Mike Szczys | [
"cooking hacks"
] | [
"basic stamp",
"coffee",
"coffee maker",
"keurig",
"solenoid",
"water"
] | This hack makes your Keurig experience fully automatic. For those that aren’t familiar with the hardware: this type of coffee maker includes a water reservoir. Coffee is brewed One cup at a time by drawing from that water, quickly heating it, then forcing it through disposable pods containing coffee grounds and a filter. This takes the user-friendly design one step further by
automatically keeping the water full
.
This goes beyond
the last water reservoir hack we saw
. That one routed a water line to the machine, but included a manually operated valve. [Eod_punk] added a solenoid valve and level sensor in this project. The level sensor is submerged in the tank and is monitored by a Basic Stamp microcontroller. When the level is low the BS1 drives the solenoid via a transistor, letting the water flow. This is all shown in the video below. | 26 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "1012185",
"author": "andrew",
"timestamp": "2013-06-03T21:17:11",
"content": "now someone just needs to make the coffee taste good",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1012186",
"author": "Scuffles",
"timestamp": "2013-06-03T... | 1,760,376,539.24106 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/06/03/quick-and-dirty-touch-sensitive-keyboard-project/ | Quick And Dirty Touch-sensitive Keyboard Project | Mike Szczys | [
"Arduino Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"capsense",
"keyboard",
"piano",
"synthesizer",
"touch sensitive",
"touch sensor"
] | You don’t have to have high-quality parts to play around with electronics and here’s a great example. [Vishal] used junk to play around with CapSense, the touch sensitive Arduino library. What he ended up with is
this touch-based piano keyboard
.
We’ve
featured the CapSense library
in the past, but even that example uses a very meticulously crafted test rig of foil tape, protoboard, and some resistors. If you still haven’t given it a try follow this example of using aluminum foil, electrical tape, and a cardboard box.
[Vishal] just sandwiched the end of jumper wire between two pieces of foil to make each ‘key’. We believe the other end of the wire is soldered to the bias resistors where they connect to a couple of pin headers. The headers were hot-glued in place through holes in the bottom of the box, making the entire rig simple to plug into the Arduino board driving it. After adding in a small speaker and flashing the code he’s finished. It certainly makes for a short afternoon project which you won’t feel bad about taking apart later since you didn’t sink a ton of time or resources into the build. | 8 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "1012148",
"author": "Paul Stoffregen",
"timestamp": "2013-06-03T19:35:38",
"content": "This library we renamed to “CapacitiveSensor”. It might be a good idea to edit this article with the new name, since the old name is a registered trademark for similar technology.",
"parent_i... | 1,760,376,539.005197 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/06/03/the-thinnest-xbox-laptop-yet/ | The Thinnest Xbox Laptop Yet | Brian Benchoff | [
"Xbox Hacks"
] | [
"laptop",
"xbox",
"xbox 360"
] | With every generation of consoles, there comes a time when the price of a new box is cheap enough, and used machines are plentiful enough, that console hackers pull out all the stops before the next generation arrives. For the Xbox 360, that time is now, and with no PS1-like hardware revision on the horizon, it looks like [jhax01]’s
custom Xbox 360 laptop
might be the smallest Xbox casemod we’ll see for a very long time.
[jhax01] was inspired by the work of [Yung Jeezus] and [AllYourXboxNeeds]’ YouTube channels and decided to craft his own custom enclosure for an Xbox 360 slim. The case was made out of aluminum plate cut with a simple angle grinder and bent on a cheap 18″ Harbor Freight brake. Despite these extremely simple tools, [jhax01] managed to fabricate a case that’s right up there with the masters of Xbox laptop craftsmanship.
The CD drive was ditched along with plans for a second hard drive. The display’s enclosure and hinge comes from an ASUS Zenbook, hence this project’s eponym, the ZenBox. The panel from the display was discarded and replaced with one that would work with the LVDS converter [jhax] found, giving the laptop a resolution of 1366×768.
It’s an amazing piece of craftsmanship, and an impressively thin gaming console to boot. Throw in a battery, and we’d be more than happy to carry this one around with us. | 29 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "1012111",
"author": "dubloe7",
"timestamp": "2013-06-03T17:49:22",
"content": "Well yeah, it’s easy to make the smallest thinnest xbox laptop yet when you just toss out the disc drive.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1012135",... | 1,760,376,538.636562 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/06/03/benchmarking-usb-transfer-speeds/ | Benchmarking USB Transfer Speeds | Brian Benchoff | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"ARM",
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"arduino",
"Due",
"Leaf",
"leaf labs",
"leonardo",
"serial",
"Teensy",
"teensy 2.0",
"Teensy 3.0",
"usb"
] | [Paul Stoffregen], creator of the Teensy series of microcontroller dev boards, noticed a lot of project driving huge LED arrays recently and decided to look into how fast microcontroller dev boards can receive data from a computer. More bits per second means more glowey LEDs, of course, so
his benchmarking efforts
are sure to be a hit with anyone planning some large-scale microcontroller projects.
The microcontrollers [Paul] tested included the Teensy 2.0, Teensy 3.0, the Leonardo and Due Arduinos, and the Fubarino Mini and Leaflabs Maple. These were tested in Linux ( Ubuntu 12.04 live CD ), OSX Lion, and Windows 7, all running on a 2012 MacBook Pro. When not considering the Teensy 2.0 and 3.0, the results of the tests were what you would expect: faster devices were able to receive more bytes per second. When the Teensys were thrown into the mix, though, the results changed drastically. The Teensy 2.0, with the same microcontroller as the Arduino Leonardo, was able to outperform every board except for the Teensy 3.0.
[Paul] also took the effort to benchmark the different operating systems he used. Bottom line, if you’re transferring a lot of bytes at once, it really doesn’t matter which OS you’re using. For transferring small amounts of data, you may want to go with OS X. Windows is terrible for transferring single bytes; at one byte per transfer, Windows only manages 4kBps. With the same task, Linux and OS X manage about 53 and 860 (!) kBps, respectively.
So there you go. If you’re building a huge LED array, use a Teensy 3.0 with a MacBook. Of course [Paul] made all the code for his benchmarks open source, so feel free to replicate this experiment. | 46 | 17 | [
{
"comment_id": "1012038",
"author": "Chris",
"timestamp": "2013-06-03T15:15:33",
"content": "Totally awesome! I am just upgrading a project to a ATMega32U4 and wondered this same thing.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1012039",
"author": ... | 1,760,376,539.326492 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/06/03/hardware-store-robot-hand/ | Hardware Store Robot Hand | Mike Szczys | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"chain",
"hand",
"potentiometer",
"robot",
"servo",
"springs"
] | Here’s a robot hand which
can be built using mostly hardware store items
. It doesn’t have the strongest of grips, but it does have lifelike movement. The demonstration video shows it picking up small objects like a metal nut.
The image above shows the ring and pinky fingers of the hand beginning to flex. These are controlled by the servo motors mounted in the palm area. The skeletal structure of each digit begins with the links of a bicycle chain. The links are first separated by removing the friction fit rods. Each rod is replaced with a screw and a nut, which also allows the springs (which open the digits) to be anchored at each ‘knuckle’.
[Aaron Thomen] didn’t stop the design process once the hand was finished. He went on to build a controller which lets you pull some rings with your fingers to affect movement. This movement is measured by a set of potentiometers and translated into electrical signals to position the hand’s servo motors. The demo, as well as two how-to videos are embedded below.
Demo:
How-to Part 1:
How-to Part 2: | 12 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "1011998",
"author": "Matt",
"timestamp": "2013-06-03T13:11:31",
"content": "So I just watched this, and now I’m about to sleep. I have a feeling there will be crazy robot hands in my dreams tonight …",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_... | 1,760,376,538.874135 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/06/02/hackaday-links-sunday-june-2nd-2013/ | Hackaday Links: Sunday, June 2nd, 2013 | Mike Szczys | [
"Hackaday links"
] | [
"mouse trap",
"Radio Telescope",
"raspberry pi",
"RPi",
"shairport"
] | Who knew you could build your own
digital computer out of paperclips
? EMSL did a great feature on
the guide
which was published in 1968.
Trying to keep your Raspberry Pi from overheating? Make it
log its core temperature on the web
.
[Lennart] must be some kind of Eagle CAD guru. Check out these
PCBs that incorporate his logo
in a very artsy way.
No need for a tripod when you can just
strap the video camera to your safety glasses
for some POV project videos.
Turn your Pogoplug E-02 into a Shairport (Airplay clone) music hub. Just
follow this guide
which installs Arch Linux and all the supporting packages you need.
We don’t have the background to judge the quality of this build. But you have to admit it’s pretty neat to see a radio telescope
built using a tin can and an umbrella
.
Dead rodent email: get a notification
every time your mouse trap springs
. | 15 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "1011733",
"author": "Hirudinea",
"timestamp": "2013-06-02T21:32:24",
"content": "That camera on the glasses is a little weak, if you want to be hard core you’ed put it in your eye socket like this guy!http://www.eyeborgblog.com/Nah, I’m kidding, it’s a good idea, I wonder if you mou... | 1,760,376,538.751926 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/06/02/usb-fume-extractor-takes-stink-out-of-soldering-sessions/ | USB Fume Extractor Takes Stink Out Of Soldering Sessions | Mike Szczys | [
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"boost converter",
"fan",
"fume extractor",
"solder"
] | Our homemade shop tools rarely reach this level of finished quality. We probably would have stopped with assembly of
this USB powered fume extractor
. But [X2jiggy] went for style points by adding a coat of paint.
There are several nice features included in his build. He wanted it to be very easy to power the device so he settled on the 5V USB standard. But a PC fan running at 5V won’t pull much air. He used a boost converter board to ramp that up to 12V. The enclosure is a wooden hobby box. He drilled mounting holes and an airflow opening in the bottom of the box for the fan. The lid of the box has a rectangular opening which accepts a carbon filter meant for aquariums. The rocker switch and LED seen above are also nice touches, but not strictly necessary if you build this for yourself.
We’re still in the habit of gently blowing the fumes away from us as we solder. So the question is, will this device save us from a gruesome disease down the road, or is it mostly to capture the odor of the solder fumes?
Looking for a more permanent setup? You should
build a solder hood
for your workbench.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LhZtQ0UQj6c | 41 | 18 | [
{
"comment_id": "1011671",
"author": "biozz",
"timestamp": "2013-06-02T19:09:28",
"content": "i started soldering when i was 12 … .. im now almost 22 and im still debating buying one XDgranted i also started smoking when i was 12 … …",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
... | 1,760,376,539.179009 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/06/02/a-black-box-for-a-motorcycle/ | A Black Box For A Motorcycle | Brian Benchoff | [
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"bike",
"black box",
"ecu",
"motorcycle"
] | [Lukusz] has a new motorcycle – a Yamaha XJ6SA – and since it hasn’t been in an accident yet, he thought building a black box to record telemetry from the last 30 minutes of riding would be a good idea. While
the project
isn’t complete yet, he’s already reading data coming straight from the engine control unit.
After figuring out most of the pinout for his bike’s ECU connector, [Lukasz] found one wire that didn’t actually do anything. This was his ECU’s K line, a serial output that is able to relay the state of the gauges to external devices. The electronic spec of the K line is a bit weird, though, but luckily after
finding a chip
to convert the signal into something a logic analyzer can understand.
With a logic analyzer connected to the K line – and setting it to receive on at 16064 baud – [Lukasz] was able to get a whole lot of data directly from his bike. In the future he plans to pass data such as speed, indicator lights, RPMs, and the current gear to a Raspberry Pi for logging. | 34 | 16 | [
{
"comment_id": "1011657",
"author": "fartface",
"timestamp": "2013-06-02T18:38:15",
"content": "Why? the telemetry in a black box is 100% useless in a crash. a dash cam showing the dumb blonde in the Giant SUV suddenly cutting over and smashing the motorcycle into the railing is far more importa... | 1,760,376,538.824576 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/06/02/building-a-miniature-x-ray-tube/ | Building A Miniature X-ray Tube | Brian Benchoff | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"glass blowing",
"nixie",
"tube",
"vacuum tube",
"x-ray"
] | We’ve seen homemade x-ray devices and we’ve seen people making vacuum tubes at home. We’ve never seen anyone
make their own x-ray tube
, though, and it’s doubtful we’ll ever see the skill and craftsmanship that went into this build again.
An x-ray tube is a simple device; a cathode emits electrons that strike a tungsten anode that emits x-rays. Most x-ray tubes, though, are relatively large with low-power mammography tubes being a few inches in diameter and about 6 inches long. In his amazing 45-minute-long video, [glasslinger] shows us how to make a miniature vacuum tube, a half-inch in diameter and only about four inches long.
For those of you who love glass lathes, tiny handheld spot welders and induction heaters, but don’t want your workshop bathed in x-rays, [glasslinger] has also built a few other vacuum tubes, including
a winking cat Nixie tube.
This alternate cat’s eye tube was actually sealed with JB Weld, an interesting technique if you’d ever like to make a real home made tube amp. | 30 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "1011579",
"author": "tom",
"timestamp": "2013-06-02T15:10:00",
"content": "Look Ma! I made an X-Ray generator, oh and as a side note, no grandkids.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1011596",
"author": "fng",
"ti... | 1,760,376,538.6991 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/06/02/delta-type-3d-printer-built-using-extruded-rails/ | Delta-type 3D Printer Built Using Extruded Rails | Mike Szczys | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"aluminum",
"blender",
"delta",
"extruder"
] | From concept to completion
this delta-style 3D printer
(
translated
) is a sweet build. The quality of the work comes as no surprise. We’re familiar with [Arkadiusz Spiewak’s] craftsmanship from
that H-bot type 3D printer
we saw from him back in April.
Planning started off with a render of the design using Blender 3D. Not only did this give him a 3D model to use as his building reference, but the animation framework allowed him to test the kinematics of the design. After ordering an extruded rail system and assembling the frame he found the pillars had too much flex to them due to the rails used on the top and bottom. The fix was to mill a top and bottom plate to stiffen things up. After testing out the motors and the extruder head mount he made one final design change. He exported his Blender design as dxf files to cut and weld an aluminum replacement for the extruder mounting platform. As you can see in this video, the preliminary results are looking good!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsjL_npPxZo | 18 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "1011555",
"author": "Felix Diaz-Maroto",
"timestamp": "2013-06-02T13:33:30",
"content": "Very nice! I wonder what the advantages of the Delta style printers are, because they seem to have a smaller build area relative to their size.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"repl... | 1,760,376,539.389704 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/06/01/off-the-shelf-eeg-hardware-records-your-dreams/ | Off The Shelf EEG Hardware Records Your Dreams | Brian Benchoff | [
"hardware",
"Lifehacks"
] | [
"eeg",
"lucid dreaming",
"lucid scribe"
] | Over the past few years, we’ve seen [Michael]’s adventures in electronics and lucid dreaming. With commercial EEG hardware, [Michael] is able to
communicate from inside his dreams with Morse code
and record his rhythmic blinking for data analysis when he wakes up. His project is called Lucid Scribe, and now it’s open to just about everyone –
including brain experimenters with OpenEEG hardware
.
OpenEEG is a project that aims to reduce the cost of EEG hardware by providing the hardware, electrodes, software, and documentation to build your own EEG headset. It’s a great tool in the field of biofeedback, but [Michael] is going one step further; he’s busy writing an algorithm that will detect REM sleep and play an audio track while he’s in a dream state to trigger a lucid dream.
[Michael] points out that anyone with OpenEEG hardware including the
DIY Olmex board
can contribute to his Lucid Scribe database. You might also get some lucid dreaming time in, but then you’ll have to wake to the crushing reality of real life. | 28 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "1011374",
"author": "Skeptical",
"timestamp": "2013-06-02T00:02:33",
"content": "Play an audio track? I couldn’t possibly imagine what track that might be…http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3Kvu6Kgp88",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id... | 1,760,376,539.513078 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/06/01/tp-link-router-turned-into-a-dali-automated-lighting-controller/ | TP-Link Router Turned Into A DALI Automated Lighting Controller | Mike Szczys | [
"Network Hacks"
] | [
"at90pwm316",
"automation",
"dali",
"home automation",
"lighting",
"TL-WR703N",
"tp-link"
] | The members of Shackspace continue to put up impressive hacks based around the tiny TP-Link routers. This time around [Timm] has shoehorned
a DALI controller inside the router case
. This is a protocol we don’t remember hearing about before. The
Digital Addressable Lighting Interface
is a control network for commercial lighting. That way people responsible for taking care of large buildings can shut off all the lights at night (to name just one use). The new room at Shackspace has this style of controllers in its lights.
The two brown wires coming into the router make up the data bus for the DALI system. It connects to the add-on PCB which uses an Atmel AT90PWM316 microcontroller. The chip is specifically designed for DALI networks which made the rest of the project quite easy. It talks to the lights, the router talks to it, bob’s your uncle, and you’ve got network controlled lighting. Get this in a big enough building and
you can play some Tetris
.
In case you were wondering. Yes, this project has already been added to
their TP-Link firmware generator
. | 20 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "1011344",
"author": "Eirinn",
"timestamp": "2013-06-01T22:19:32",
"content": "I wish I was able to do something like this. I’d probably resort to an Arduino with an Ethernet shield :/",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1011396",
... | 1,760,376,539.447565 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/06/01/complicated-iphone-garage-door-opener/ | Complicated IPhone Garage Door Opener | Mike Szczys | [
"home hacks",
"iphone hacks"
] | [
"garage door",
"IFTTT",
"relay",
"rube goldberg",
"WeMo"
] | The round-about way
this iPhone garage door opener
was put together borders on Rube Goldberg. But it does indeed get the job done so who are we to judge? Plus you have to consider that the Apple products aren’t quite as hacker friendly as, say, Android phones — so this may have been the easiest non-Jailbreak way.
The main components that went into it are the iPhone, a Wemo WiFi outlet, and a 110V rated mechanical relay. But wait, surely it can’t be that simple? You’re correct, just for added subterfuge [Tall-drinks] rolled IFTTT into the mix.
You may remember hearing about If This Then That from
the Alert Tube project
. It’s a web-based natural language scripting service. Throw everything together and it works like this: The iPhone sends a text message which IFTTT converts to a Wemo command. A power cord connects the Wemo outlet to the 110V electrodes on the relay. The normally open connection of the relay is attached to the same screw terminals of the garage door opener as the push button that operates it. When the relay closes, the garage door goes up or down.
The biggest problem we have with this is the inability to
know if your garage door is open
or closed. | 28 | 16 | [
{
"comment_id": "1011278",
"author": "homeawesomation",
"timestamp": "2013-06-01T19:09:36",
"content": "I will challenge this sometime in the next couple months and post it on my blog. (I don’t own a garage door opener yet, only just recently ran power to my garage). I already planned to do this us... | 1,760,376,539.619907 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/06/01/arduino-compatible-quad-core-arm-dev-board/ | Arduino-compatible, Quad-core ARM Dev Board | Brian Benchoff | [
"ARM",
"hardware"
] | [
"arduino",
"dev board",
"raspberry pi",
"UDOO"
] | The Advent of the Raspberry Pi has seen an explosion in the market for ARM dev boards, sometimes even with pinouts for Arduino shields.
The UDOO
, though, takes those boards and ramps up the processing power for some very, very interesting builds.
The UDOO comes equipped with a dual or quad-core ARM CPU running at 1GHz with 1 GB of RAM. Also on board is the Atmel SAM3X8E – the same chip in
the new Arduino DUE
– and has pinouts for all those Arduino shields you have lying around.
In addition to serving your next project as a souped-up Raspberry Pi, UDOO also includes 78 (!) GPIO pins, Gigabit Ethernet, a camera connector, one SATA port (on the quad-core version), and an LVDS header for attaching LCD monitors. Basically, the UDOO is the motherboard of an ARM-powered laptop with the pinouts to handle Arduino shields. It’s just like
[Bunnie]’s laptop
, only this time you can actually buy it.
The UDOO doesn’t come cheap, though: on the UDOO Kickstarter, the dual-core version is going for $150 while the quad-core is priced at $170. Still, if you need the power to run a pair of Kinects or want to build an awesome torrent box, you’d be hard pressed to find a more powerful board. | 36 | 20 | [
{
"comment_id": "1011221",
"author": "Addidis",
"timestamp": "2013-06-01T16:07:32",
"content": "Its official, people have run out of decent names for arduino clones/spinoffs.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1011255",
"author": "Lloyd A... | 1,760,376,539.746485 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/30/giving-the-nexus-4-a-serial-port/ | Giving The Nexus 4 A Serial Port | Brian Benchoff | [
"Cellphone Hacks"
] | [
"Nexus 4",
"serial",
"uart"
] | Having a serial port on any Linux box is always useful, but with the tiny computers we’re carrying around in our pockets now, that isn’t always an option. Some of the more advanced phones out there break out a UART on their USB OTG port, but the designers of the Nexus 4 decided to do things differently. They chose to put the Nexus 4’s serial port on the mic and headphone input, and [Ryan] and [Josh]
figured out how to access this port
.
Basically, the Nexus 4 has a tiny bit of circuitry attached to the microphone input. If the Nexus detects more than 2.8 Volts on the mic, it switches over to a hardware UART, allowing everything from an Arduino to an old dumb terminal to access the port.
The guys used a USB to serial FTDI board wired up to a 3.5 mm jack with a few resistors to enable the hardware UART on their phone. With a small enclosure, they had a reasonably inexpensive way to enable a hardware serial port on a mobile device with GPS, cellular, a camera, and a whole bunch of other sensors that any portable project would love.
EDIT: An anonymous little bird told us this: “You should add a note to the Nexus 4 serial cable post that TX and RX need to be 1.8V. If you use 3.3V USB cables, you will likely eventually fry something. FTDI makes 1.8V IO cables that work – you just need to make the trigger voltage for the mic line.” Take that for what you will. | 28 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "1010296",
"author": "Ren",
"timestamp": "2013-05-30T17:05:33",
"content": "Double Plus Good!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1010300",
"author": "Ren",
"timestamp": "2013-05-30T17:14:06",
"content": "Bu... | 1,760,376,539.681443 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/30/human-asteroids-makes-you-a-vector-triangle-ship/ | Human Asteroids Makes You A Vector Triangle Ship | Brian Benchoff | [
"Kinect hacks",
"Laser Hacks"
] | [
"Asteroids",
"Kinect",
"laser projector",
"video game"
] | In 1979, [Nolan Bushnell] released
Asteroids
to the world. Now, he’s playing the game again, only this time
with the help of a laser projector and a Kinect
that turns anyone sitting on a stool – in this case [Nolan] himself – into everyone’s favorite vector spaceship. It’s a project for
Steam Carnival
, a project by [Brent Bushnell] and [Eric Gradman] that hopes to bring a modern electronic carnival to your town.
The reimagined Asteroids game was created with a laser projector to display the asteroids and ship on a floor. A Kinect tracks the user sitting and rolling on a stool while a smart phone is the triangular spaceship’s ‘fire’ button. The game is played in a 150 square foot arena, and is able to put anyone behind the cockpit of an asteroid mining triangle.
[Brent] and [Eric] hope to bring their steam carnival to LA and San Francisco next spring, but if they exceed their funding goals, they might be convinced to bring their show east of the Mississippi. We’d love to try it out by hiding behind the score like the original Asteroids and wasting several hours.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhZQKulQx9w&w=580] | 22 | 16 | [
{
"comment_id": "1010255",
"author": "ianstalk",
"timestamp": "2013-05-30T15:20:31",
"content": "Not related to the hack, but the video is wrong: Bushnell didn’t “invent” Asteroids; he wasn’t even part of Atari when it was released. He was forced in out 1978, and Asteroids was first released in 1979... | 1,760,376,539.805078 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/30/hp16500b-logic-analyzer-controlled-with-rs-232-and-more/ | HP16500B Logic Analyzer Controlled With RS-232 And More | Mike Szczys | [
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"hp16500b",
"logic analyzer",
"raspberry pi",
"RPi",
"screenshot",
"serial"
] | We’re pretty spoiled these days in that hobby electronics has made a lot of cool tools available on a budget. It’s hard to think of a better example than a logic analyzer, which you can get for a day or two of pay. Consumer-level devices just didn’t exist until a few years ago. [Jouko S] has this HP16500B industrial grade logic analyzer in his shop. It’s from the early 1990’s and it’s got a ton of features. Grabbing a still functional yet super-old model used to be the only way for hobbyists. But one thing you won’t find on it is the ability to connect it to your USB port to get screen captures. Younger readers might not recognize the slot at the top for magnetic media called a floppy disk which is the in-built way of recording your sessions. He set out to find an easier way to get color screen captures and
ended up adding RS-232 control
to the old hardware.
There is a 25-pin port on the back of the old hulk. But it is a female connector and he didn’t have the adapters on hand to make it work with his serial-to-USB converter. During development he used a breadboard and solder-tail connector to patch into the necessary signals. This was all hooked up to a Raspberry Pi which he planned to dedicate to the system. It worked, and he was able to use an interactive terminal for the rest of his sleuthing. With much trial and error he figured out the commands, and wrote some Python code for the Pi side of the equation. He can now pull color screenshots with ease thanks to the utilities available in the Python Imaging Module. | 15 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "1010219",
"author": "Glynn",
"timestamp": "2013-05-30T13:47:07",
"content": "you can find scopes etc sometimes on gsaauctions.gov",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1010235",
"author": "Rick",
"timestamp": "2013-05-30T14:23... | 1,760,376,539.986353 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/29/programming-a-through-hole-arm-microcontroller/ | Programming A Through-hole ARM Microcontroller | Brian Benchoff | [
"ARM"
] | [
"arm",
"dip",
"nxp"
] | The age of ARM microcontrollers for the electronics hobbyist is upon us, and luckily there are a few breadboard-friendly microcontrollers available in a DIP package. One of these chips is NXP’s LPC810M021FN8 – a tiny little 8-pin DIP with 4 kB of Flash, 1 kB of SRAM, and has a clock fast enough for some really cool stuff. [Joao] needed a way to program one of these microcontrollers and came up with an
easy method using only a USB/UART adapter
.
The key to this build is the fact the LPC810 doesn’t need any additional components to operate; the internal oscillator means the chip will run at 30 MHz with only a power and ground attached. To program the chip, [Joao] attached the Tx and Rx lines of the chip to a USB/UART adapter (at 3.3 V, of course), and uploaded some code with
Flashmagic
.
We’ve seen these
DIP-sized ARM chips before
, but [Joao]’s method of using off-the-shelf tools to write a blinking LED program means it’s a piece of cake to start working with these very cool and very powerful microcontrollers. | 32 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "1009925",
"author": "kay",
"timestamp": "2013-05-29T23:08:43",
"content": "This fits the Picaxe’s niche perfectly.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1010065",
"author": "top lel",
"timestamp": "2013-05-30T06:02:0... | 1,760,376,540.206323 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/29/build-your-own-backyard-pizza-oven/ | Build Your Own Backyard Pizza Oven | Mike Szczys | [
"cooking hacks"
] | [
"clay",
"oven",
"Pizza"
] | Don’t heat up your house this summer,
build your own backyard pizza oven
instead. We love to using our garden produce, homemade dough, and fresh farmer’s market mozzarella to whip up a tasty pie in the summer. But it can be tricky to cook it on the grill and we hate heating up the oven when it’s hot out. This could be a perfect solution.
The footprint of the oven used to be a flower bed in [Furiousbal’s] yard. He removed the soil and side walls, laid down a bed of pea gravel, then started building the brick base for the oven. The base is insulated by encasing beer bottles in a bed of clay which he harvested locally. Fire brick then makes the floor of the cooking area as well as the arched opening. To support the clay during construction he built a dome of wet sand and covered it with damp newspaper. The clay is built up in layers before removing the sand from the inside. The final step (not shown above) is to build a little shelter to ensure the elements don’t wash away your hard work.
Of course you need to build your own fire inside to use it. If that’s too much work
perhaps you should try solar cooking
?
[via
Reddit
]
Help us decide, should this project gone on
LIFE.hackaday
? | 25 | 16 | [
{
"comment_id": "1009895",
"author": "Sm0ker",
"timestamp": "2013-05-29T21:37:51",
"content": "What timing! I’ve been contemplating building a wood burning oven and don’t wanna hog too much of the garden with it, this looks great. I’d love to incorporate a smoker for curing meats too..",
"parent... | 1,760,376,540.049804 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/29/reflow-soldering-improved-with-carbon-dioxide/ | Reflow Soldering Improved With Carbon Dioxide | Mike Szczys | [
"chemistry hacks",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"carbon dioxide",
"co2",
"oven",
"reflow",
"solder"
] | This is exactly what it looks like. [Oleg] calls it
soldering in inert atmosphere
, but it’s just a toaster oven reflow hack dropped into a container full of carbon dioxide.
Why go to this trouble? It’s all about solder wetting. This is the ability of the molten solder paste to flow into all of the tinned areas of a board. [Oleg] talks about the shelf life of hot air leveled PCB tinning, which is about six months. After this the tin has oxidized. It will certainly not be as bad as bare copper would have, but it can lead to bad solder joints if your PCBs are more than about six months off the production line. This is one of the reasons to use solder flux. The acid eats away at the oxidized layer, exposing tin that will have better wetting.
But there is another way. Soldering in the absence of oxygen will also help the wetting process. CO2 is heavier than air, so placing the reflow oven in a plastic container will allow you to purge air from the space. CO2 canisters are cheap and easy to acquire. If you keg your own homebrew beer you already own one!
If you’ve got everything but the reflow oven just look around for
a few examples of how to build your own
. | 30 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "1009857",
"author": "darronb",
"timestamp": "2013-05-29T20:07:46",
"content": "Hmm… I’m a little surprised the plastic didn’t melt or deform. (especially with the lid on) You’d think the heat would build up fairly quickly in there. Good idea though…",
"parent_id": null,
"de... | 1,760,376,540.406343 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/29/charlotte-the-hexapod-with-3d-vision/ | Charlotte, The Hexapod With 3D Vision | Brian Benchoff | [
"Raspberry Pi",
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"asus xtion",
"depth sensor",
"hexapod",
"Kinect"
] | Charlotte’s chassis comes from
as a kit
, but the stock electronics are based on an Arduino – not something for a robot that needs to run computer vision apps. [Kevin] ended up using a Raspi for the controller and gave Charlotte eyes with an Asus XTION. Edit: or
a PrimeSense sensor
These sensors are structured light depth cameras just like the kinect, only about smaller, lighter, and have a better color output.
Hardware is only one half of the equation, so [Kevin] tossed the Arduino-based stock electronics and replaced them with a Raspberry Pi. This allowed him to hone his C++ skills and add one very cool peripheral – the
XTION
depth camera.
To the surprise of many, we’re sure, [Kevin] is running
OpenNI
on his Raspberry Pi, allowing Charlotte to take readings from her depth camera and keep from colliding into any objects. The Raspberry Pi is overclocked, of course, and the CPU usage is hovering around 90%, but if you’re looking for a project that uses a depth sensor with a Pi, there you go.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iE3Yv2s6n4&w=620] | 17 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "1009801",
"author": "fred",
"timestamp": "2013-05-29T17:34:43",
"content": "Impressive work! Just speculating here, but I figure if the rapsi doesn’t cut it, it could be ditched in favor of one of those dual/quad-core, ARM powered pc-on-a-stick for some more horsepower (and connecti... | 1,760,376,540.275827 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/06/01/2013-layerone-badge-hacking-contest-winner/ | 2013 LayerOne Badge Hacking Contest Winner | Mike Szczys | [
"cons",
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"badge",
"layerone",
"vco",
"xmega"
] | [Dynotronix] wrote in to share the news that he won the 2013 LayerOne badge hacking contest. In addition to the good news he included
a description of his badge hack
.
We got
a good look at the hardware
included on the badge several days ago. You may remember that it’s outfitted with footprints for 48 LEDs around the perimeter which are driven by two ICs. Looking at the image above it’s hard to miss the fact that [Dyno] didn’t populate any of that. He went right for the power of the XMEGA processor to analyze and generate signals.
But what specifically can you do with the signal this thing generates? Turns out a rather simple circuit can make it into a transmitter. [Dyno] concedes that it’s a remarkably finicky setup, but just a few components on a scrap of copper clad turned this into an FM transmitter. Check out the video where you can hear the sweeping alarm-type sounds pushed to an FM radio via his voltage controlled oscillator circuit which has a range of about fifteen feet. | 20 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "1011205",
"author": "Caleb",
"timestamp": "2013-06-01T15:07:11",
"content": "While I’m impressed by this project I’m dismayed this is the winning one.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1011214",
"author": "datagram",
... | 1,760,376,540.33555 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/31/led-mortal-board-battles-suns-brightness-with-5-6a-of-power/ | LED Mortar Board Battles Suns Brightness With 21W Of Power | Mike Szczys | [
"Raspberry Pi",
"Wearable Hacks"
] | [
"ap",
"graduation",
"hotspot",
"mortal board",
"RPi",
"wifi"
] | [Jeremy Blum] aimed to be the brightest student at his Master’s graduation ceremony this spring. He designed
an LED rig for his mortar board
which should battle the sun’s intensity by using up to 21 watts of power. But he didn’t stop with eye-catching intensity. while he was at it he also included some interactive features so the guy behind him has a way to keep from going blind.
One thing that really caught our eye is the 3D printed parts he generated for the project. There’s a nice mounting plate for the LED side of things, and a wrist-mounted enclosure for the Raspberry Pi board. Wait, why does he need an RPi to drive some LEDs? We already mention interactivity which is facilitated by the Pi acting as a WiFi hotspot. Connect to the access point and choose a color. If you’re in the seat behind [Jeremy] you’ll want to choose black! All of this and is explained in his video presentation. | 34 | 18 | [
{
"comment_id": "1010929",
"author": "Gert",
"timestamp": "2013-05-31T21:11:11",
"content": "Next up we can have the “Immortal board”, with this on top!http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FrhlYsF2uTU(They’ll probably fix it, but the initial title was “LED mortal board…”)(Hmmm. I haven’t even read the art... | 1,760,376,540.472383 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/31/already-impressive-wolverine-claws-now-energized-with-high-voltage/ | Already Impressive Wolverine Claws Now Energized With High Voltage | Mike Szczys | [
"cnc hacks"
] | [
"claw",
"claws",
"replica",
"wolverine"
] | A few years back [James] built
an utterly amazing set of Wolverine replica claws
. They are held together by a bar that laces between his fingers so that when he’s gripping it you don’t see anything but the claws. Add to that the tail design which makes it look like they’re actually coming out of his skin and he’s made an amazing replica. But they’re also rather utilitarian as you can see in the demo/how-it-was-done video where he spears hay bails as they’re thrown at him from off camera. Machine shop fans are going to love learning how these were made.
More recently he decided to update the project after seeing
our own Thor’s Hammer offering
. He got down to business by salvaging a huge transformer from an old oil furnace. He has no idea what kind of voltage this thing puts out, but that doesn’t stop him from wiring it up to the pair of claws and
letting the sparks fly
. He even creates a Jacob’s Ladder effect by placing the claws at a narrow angle to each other. | 10 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "1010933",
"author": "Eirinn",
"timestamp": "2013-05-31T21:16:48",
"content": "Aren’t they all metal though? You wouldn’t be able to “use” them electrified.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1010953",
"author": "Sparhawk8... | 1,760,376,540.521496 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/31/high-speed-photography-with-friggin-lasers/ | High Speed Photography With Friggin’ Lasers | Mike Szczys | [
"digital cameras hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"dslr",
"flash controller",
"high speed photography"
] | [Bruce] built his own high-speed photography equipment for a fraction of the price it would have cost him to purchase it. He was inspired by a friend who showed him some example images. He headed into his shop and built an
Arduino-based high-speed flash controller
.
To capture an image like this one the camera is placed in a dark room and set for a long exposure. At just the right instant the flash is activating, capturing the image. In this case [Bruce] used an infrared laser diode pointed at a phototransistor to trigger the flash. When the droplet breaks the laser beam the Arduino triggers the flash after a calculated delay. It’s not specifically covered in his guide, but [Bruce] also mentions that this can be modified to use sound as a trigger. Here’s
another sound-activated flash controller
if you need inspiration.
The image at the top was made by dropping dye from a pipette into a pool of water. If you don’t have a pipette on hand you can head over to our LIFE blog to
make one out of heat shrink tubing
. | 14 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "1010895",
"author": "steve eh",
"timestamp": "2013-05-31T19:27:52",
"content": "Nice!, I really like that",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1010905",
"author": "Sheldon",
"timestamp": "2013-05-31T19:47:36",
"content": ... | 1,760,376,540.655184 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/31/jeri-spills-the-beans-on-her-ar-glasses/ | [Jeri] Spills The Beans On Her AR Glasses | Brian Benchoff | [
"Virtual Reality"
] | [
"ar",
"augmented reality",
"castAR",
"jeri ellsworth",
"virtual reality",
"vr"
] | In the last year, [Jeri Ellsworth] has been very busy. She was hired by Valve, started development of an augmented reality system, fired by Valve, and started a new company with [Rick Johnson] to bring her augmented reality glasses to the market. On the
last Amp Hour podcast
she spilled the beans on what went down at Valve, how her glasses work, and what her plans for the future are.
[Jeri] and [Rick]’s castAR glasses aren’t virtual reality glasses like the Oculus Rift or other
virtual
reality glasses that cut you off from the real world. The castAR glasses preserve your peripheral vision by projecting images and objects onto a gray retro-reflective mat and allows you to interact with a virtual environment with an electronic wand. So far, there are a few demos for the castAR system; a Jenga clone, and a game of battle chess called Team For Chess, a wonderful reference to Valve’s hat simulator.
The electronics inside the castAR glasses are fairly impressive; new frames are drawn on the retro-reflective surface at 100 Hz, positioning accuracy is in the sub-millimeter range, and thanks to [Jeri]’s clever engineering the entire system should be priced at about $200. Not too bad for an awesome device that can be used not only for D&D and Warhammer, but also for some very cool practical applications like visualizing engineering models of 3D prints before they’re printed. | 52 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "1010837",
"author": "Andrew",
"timestamp": "2013-05-31T17:05:47",
"content": "Now that sounds better than google glass, much better. I think I will not be getting 2 pairs of google glasses to turn them into one after all. Hope the whole thing works out.",
"parent_id": null,
... | 1,760,376,540.610946 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/30/18-year-old-builds-functioning-submarine/ | 18-year-old Builds Functioning Submarine | Mike Szczys | [
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"submarine"
] | [Justin Beckerman]
built a functioning one-man submarine
. The thing is, this isn’t the first one that he’s built. Looking through the projects on his website we find almost no information about this build, but he does show off one previous model, as well as a couple of unmanned underwater rover projects.
The pressure hull of the sub is made from corrugated drainage pipe. This isn’t a bad idea as the tube is engineered to be buried in the ground and carry the load of earth on top of it. It’s designed to go down just 30 feet, which explains the lack of half-dome caps on either end; the pressure just isn’t that great at that depth. The buoy floating to his left is his tether to the surface. Fresh air is pumped from here into the sub. He’s also included safety features like a 20-minute air tank in case he gets into a bind, and a quick opening top hatch. That hatch is a hemisphere of clear acrylic which lets him view what’s around him.
You’ll learn more from the two video clips he posted. The Fox 5 news interview includes a shot of one of the messiest work benches we’ve seen. A messy bench is the sign of constant project construction, right?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7zgb-Z8LLU4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXHvFPktF_M
[Thanks Greg via
Technabob
] | 92 | 36 | [
{
"comment_id": "1010389",
"author": "Koplimi",
"timestamp": "2013-05-30T21:17:07",
"content": "Mad props!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1010456",
"author": "Joe",
"timestamp": "2013-05-30T23:54:39",
"content": "I see... | 1,760,376,541.513799 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/30/raspberry-pi-helps-with-2-4ghz-home-automation/ | Raspberry Pi Helps With 2.4GHz Home Automation | Mike Szczys | [
"Radio Hacks",
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"2.4 ghz",
"home automation",
"nRF24L01+",
"RPi"
] | Wanting to extend the capabilities of the radio frequency devices in his home [Kalle Löfgren]
turned a Raspberry Pi into an RF control hub
. We’ve seen some of his home automation work in the past. In his media room he built
a universal remote base station
which used the same RF board as in this project. The main difference is that before he went with an AVR microcontroller and this time he’s upgrade to a Raspberry Pi board.
The RPi brings a lot more to the table. Notably, the scripting (whose output is shown above) and networking features. His radio board is an nRF24L01 which he talks to via the SPI protocol. The Raspberry Pi has no problem talking to SPI devices through its GPIO header. [Kalle] just needed to do a bit of setup to configure the pin modes.
A Python script lets him sent commands using his keyboard, but this can also be automated. Combine that with the TCP server script he wrote and it opens up the a wide range of configurations to switch or talk to any device operating on the 2.4 GHz band. | 15 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "1010354",
"author": "Bryan Baker (@XBrav)",
"timestamp": "2013-05-30T19:35:12",
"content": "Couldn’t the whole process be simplified by using wiringPi2? Does Quick2Wire have any advantage over wiringPi?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comme... | 1,760,376,540.76136 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/29/programming-microcontrollers-with-a-raspi/ | Programming Microcontrollers With A Raspi | Brian Benchoff | [
"Microcontrollers",
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"atmega",
"Atmel",
"attiny",
"avrdude",
"raspberry pi",
"spi"
] | The advent of the Arduino brought the world of microcontrollers to hobbyists, students, and artist the world over. Right now we’re in the midst of a new expansion in hobbyist electronics with the Raspberry Pi, but we can’t expect everyone to stay in the comfortable, complex, and power-hungry world of Linux forever, can we? Eventually all those tinkerers will want to program a microcontroller, and if they already have a Raspberry Pi,
why not use that?
[Kevin] wanted to turn his Raspi into an AVR development workstation, without using any external programmers. He decided to use the Raspi’s SPI port to talk to an AVR microcontroller and was able to make the electrical connections with just a few bits of wire an a handful of resistors.
For the software, [Kevin] added support for SPI to avrdude, available
on his git
. Theoretically, this should work with any AVR microcontroller with the most popular ATMegas and ATtinys we’ve come to love. It doesn’t support the very weird chips that use TPI programming, but it’s still extremely useful. | 8 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "1009757",
"author": "Wildhart (@wildhartz)",
"timestamp": "2013-05-29T15:36:01",
"content": "Nice and very useful hack!!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1009778",
"author": "messmaker",
"timestamp": "2013-05-29T16:13:25"... | 1,760,376,540.807021 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/29/ambilight-clone-has-meaningful-amount-of-resolution/ | Ambilight Clone Has Meaningful Amount Of Resolution | Mike Szczys | [
"home entertainment hacks"
] | [
"ambilight",
"arduino",
"led",
"pixel",
"WS2801"
] | We don’t have an Ambilight clone on our own home theater, but seeing this one in action makes us wonder if we shouldn’t add it to the ever-growing list of projects we need to tackle (right below that POV display we’ve been putting off for years). [Falldeaf]
built the colored light augmentation system
using a set of WS2801 controlled LED pixels. There are a lot of them, and this results in the ‘meaningful resolution’ we mentioned in the title. The image on the screen is the opening to a James Bond film. You’ll remember that the camera shot down a rifle barrel follows him as he walks across the screen. There’s enough LEDs here to have to the light follow him across the screen as well. This is a nice touch that we don’t see in every Ambilight clone project.
A frame of fake-wood angle bracket holds each LED pixel in place. The entire assembly attaches to the VESA mounting holes on the back of the television. An Arduino addresses the lights while the Boblight package processes the video to acquire the lighting instructions. We think the hue is a bit off, but otherwise it’s a solid offering.
We’re still hoping
the Microsoft IllumiRoom
becomes a thing. | 37 | 21 | [
{
"comment_id": "1009707",
"author": "Phrewfuf",
"timestamp": "2013-05-29T13:04:26",
"content": "That thing has a serious amount of lag ôo It looks awesome, but the lag would freak me out big time, when watching a movie",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comme... | 1,760,376,541.177422 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/29/announcing-life-hackaday/ | Announcing LIFE.hackaday | Caleb Kraft | [
"Featured",
"News"
] | [
"lifehacks",
"new features"
] | Over the years we’ve had a tons of tips sent in that were more along the lines of “lifehacks”. Simple little tips to make life better. While we would occasionally squeeze them into hackaday, many got left behind. Now
we’ve created an entire site called LIFE.hackaday
that we’re filling with all these great ideas. Finally, a place for all those docks people send us!
Occasionally, there might be something that we feel works for the “classic” hackaday and “LIFE.”, in which case, we may just mention it here. We hope that by creating another site, we can give people the “lifehacks” they want while keeping hackaday focused on hardware hacking.
We have some other tricks up our sleeve, but they aren’t quite ready to be revealed yet. | 80 | 32 | [
{
"comment_id": "1009684",
"author": "alex",
"timestamp": "2013-05-29T12:16:16",
"content": "Be careful with this…Lifehacker.com",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1009686",
"author": "Mekael Hannigan",
"timestamp": "2013-05-29T12:23:54",
... | 1,760,376,541.386735 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/28/one-mans-adventures-in-custom-keyboard-development/ | One Man’s Adventures In Custom Keyboard Development | Brian Benchoff | [
"Peripherals Hacks"
] | [
"cherry mx",
"custom keyboard",
"keyboard"
] | As a software developer, [suka] spends a lot of time every day in front of a keyboard. He had been trying out different keyboard layouts far less common than even the moderetly obscure Dvorak layout, and after some time decided a custom ergonomic keyboard was what he wanted. His progress of
designing his own custom ergonomic keyboard
is a fascinating read, made even cooler by the fact these are real, professional-quality keyboards with mechanical switches and custom enclosures.
After starting off with a few USB numpads, [suka] dove in to the world of Cherry switches by crafting his own wing-style keyboard. [suka] works for one of the larger manufacturers of laser-sintering machines, so he was able to create the enclosures for his keybaord – as well as the key caps – fairly easily. The technology behind laser sintering allowed [suka] to create some strange bowl and trough-shaped keyboards before settling on his daily driver, seen above.
The Blue Cube, as [suka] calls it, includes an integrated stand, an integrated IBM trackpoint mouse, and is powered by a Teensy microcontroller. [suka]’s keyboards might not be heafty enough for melee combat like the venerable IBM Model M, but it’s exactly what [suka] wants, and that’s just fine by us. | 27 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "1009504",
"author": "Kelvin Mead",
"timestamp": "2013-05-28T23:29:35",
"content": "i like the idea, but i cant see how it works… do the letters on the keys have any relevance to anything.kinda looks like a nostromo n52… which is awesome!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
... | 1,760,376,541.052299 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/28/wireless-rover-with-android-control/ | Wireless Rover With Android Control | Mike Szczys | [
"Android Hacks",
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"android",
"ATmega128",
"bluetooth",
"gps",
"lynxmotion",
"rover"
] | [Radu] spend the first portion of this year building and improving upon
this wireless rover project
. It’s actually the second generation of an autonomous follower project he started a few years back. If you browse through his old postings you’ll find that this version is leaps and bounds ahead of the last.
He purchased the chassis which also came with the gear-head motors and tires. Why reinvent the wheel (har har) when you’ve got bigger things on your plate? To make enough room inside for his own goodies he started out by ditching the control board which came with the Lynxmotion chassis in favor of an AVR ATmega128 development board. He also chose to use his own motor controller board. Next he added a metal bracket system to hold the battery pack. Things start to get pretty crowded in there when he installed his own Bluetooth and GPS modules. Rounding out his hardware additions were a set of five ultrasonic sensors (the grey tubes on top), a character display, as well as head and tail lights. The demo video shows off the control app he uses. We like that tic-tac-toe design for motion control, and that he added in buttons to control the lights. | 11 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "1009556",
"author": "Rohit",
"timestamp": "2013-05-29T02:39:19",
"content": "add a camera to this and enable openCV, you would just need a better microcontroller on there…perhaps an Rpi",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1009569",
... | 1,760,376,541.104989 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/28/arduino-particle-light-box-generates-animations-from-sound/ | Arduino Particle Light Box Generates Animations From Sound | Mike Szczys | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"8x8",
"animation",
"matrix",
"sound"
] | Simple tools used well can produce fantastic results. The hardware which [Gilad] uses in this project is the definition of common. We’d bet you have most if not all of them on hand right now. But the end product is a
light box which seems to dance and twirl with every sound
in the room. You should go watch the demo video before reading the bill of materials so that the simplicity doesn’t spoil it for you.
A wooden craft box serves as the enclosure. Inside you’ll find an Arduino board, microphone, and an 8×8 RGB module. The front cover of the project box diffuses the light using a sheet of tracing paper on a frame of foam board. It’s the code that brings everything together. He wrote his own
particle system library
to generate interesting animations.
If you don’t have a project box on hand this
might work with an extra-deep picture frame
. | 14 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "1009409",
"author": "brian",
"timestamp": "2013-05-28T19:12:42",
"content": "oh nice! i like it.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1009410",
"author": "IndianTinker",
"timestamp": "2013-05-28T19:13:14",
"content": "Tha... | 1,760,376,541.564703 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/28/an-overkill-network-adapter-for-retrocomputers/ | An Overkill Network Adapter For Retrocomputers | Brian Benchoff | [
"hardware",
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"amiga",
"network",
"PPP",
"raspberry pi",
"retrocomputing"
] | If you want to get an old Apple, Commodore 64, Amiga, or any other retrocomputer up on the Internet, this is for you. [Stian] had an Amiga 500 lying around and wanted to put it on a network. The A500 isn’t expandable, so he needed to look at some sort of adapter to put it on a network.
The solution came to him in the form of a Raspberry Pi
, a null modem cable, and a few bits of software.
To connect his Amiga to his network, [Stian] made a small serial converter board for his Raspi that breaks out the Tx and Rx pins on the Pi to a 9-pin serial port. With the physical connection to the Pi made, the only thing left to do was to get some software for the Amiga, namely
AmiTCP
and
PPP
. It’s not exactly a
fast
network connection, but this build allows [Stian] to connect to WiFi networks with ancient hardware.
One interesting aspect of [Stian]’s build is the fact it’s completely transferable to other retrocomputers – everything from old S-100 bus computers to classic macs, apples, and pretty much anything else with a serial port that supports PPP. Even with the expense of a Raspberry Pi, it’s much cheaper than
absurdly expensive second-hand SCSI to Ethernet controllers
and other tomfoolery. | 49 | 20 | [
{
"comment_id": "1009373",
"author": "voxnulla",
"timestamp": "2013-05-28T17:16:56",
"content": "“The A500 isn’t expandable”What? With a trapdoor extension slot and a sideways extension slot, it isn’t expandable?There are Ethernet expansion options for the 500 out there.",
"parent_id": null,
... | 1,760,376,541.73633 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/28/shocking-your-brain-and-making-yourself-smarter/ | Shocking Your Brain And Making Yourself Smarter | Brian Benchoff | [
"Medical Hacks"
] | [
"brain",
"constant current",
"neuroscience",
"transcranial"
] | Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation – or tDCS – is the technique of applying electrodes to the skull and running a small but perceptible current through them. It’s not much current – usually on the order of 1 or 2 mA, but the effect of either increasing or decreasing neural activity has led to some interesting studies. [Theo] over on Instructables
wrote a tutorial for making his own tDCS suppy
that will supply 2 mA to electrodes placed on the skull for everyone to experiment with.
The basic idea behind tDCS is to put the positive electrode over the part of the brain to be excited or the negative electrode over the part of the brain to be inhibited. This is a well-studied technique that can be
used to improve mathematical ability
. It’s not electroshock therapy (although that is a valid treatment for depression and schizophrenia) in that a seizure is induced; tDCS just applies a small current to specific areas of the brain to excite or inhibit function.
[Theo]’s device is a simple circuit made of a transistor, resistors, and a few diodes to provide about 2 mA to a pair of electrical contacts. With this circuit and a few gel electrode pads for your head, you too can experiment with direct current stimulation of your brain.
Of course we need to warn you about putting electricity into your head. In any event,
here’s a quadcopter / stun gun mashup we made
. Don’t do that, either. You might get a takedown request. | 52 | 33 | [
{
"comment_id": "1009325",
"author": "Joseph Rissler",
"timestamp": "2013-05-28T15:11:55",
"content": "What could possibly go wrong?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1009330",
"author": "Andrew",
"timestamp": "2013-05-28T15:23:2... | 1,760,376,541.65218 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/28/etch-your-own-cpld-development-board/ | Etch Your Own CPLD Development Board | Mike Szczys | [
"FPGA"
] | [
"attiny2313",
"cpld",
"dev board",
"development board",
"jtag"
] | Ever wanted to make the jump from microcontrollers to logic chips? Although not technically the same thing we consider FPGA and CPLD devices to be in similar categories. Like FPGAs, Complex Programmable Logic Devices let you build hardware inside of a chip. And if you’ve got the knack for etching circuit boards you can now
build your own CPLD development module
. Long-time Hackaday readers will remember
our own offering in this area
.
Our years of microcontroller experience have taught us a mantra: if it doesn’t work it’s a hardware problem. We have a knack for wasting hours trying to figure out why our code doesn’t work. The majority of the time it’s a hardware issue. And this is why you might not want to design your own dev tools when just starting out. But one thing this guide has going for it is incremental testing. After etching and inspecting the board, it is populated in stages. There is test code available for each stage that will help verify that the hardware is working as expected.
The CPLD is programmed using that 10-pin header. If you don’t have a programmer you can
build your own that uses a parallel port
. Included on the board is an ATtiny2313 which is a nice touch as it can simulate all kinds of different hardware to test with your VHDL code. There is also a row of LEDs, a set of DIP switches, and a few breakout headers to boot. | 16 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "1009341",
"author": "Sweeney",
"timestamp": "2013-05-28T15:59:42",
"content": "Given you can pick a new, ready built 5k LUT FPGA dev board up off of eBay these days for $20 I’m not sure this has much practical purpose other than the challenge of building the board.",
"parent_id"... | 1,760,376,541.789701 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/27/blood-glucose-monitor-data-pushed-to-smart-watch/ | Blood Glucose Monitor Data Pushed To Smart Watch | Mike Szczys | [
"Medical Hacks"
] | [
"cgm",
"diabetes",
"glucose"
] | [Don] uses a Continuous Glucose Monitor to stay on top of his diabetes. It means carrying around an expensive and fragile device which acts as the readout. He’s an active guy and doesn’t want to destroy the thing while dirt biking or kick boxing so he’s been trying to
use a TI Chronos smart watch as a display alternative
.
As you can see he has already made some headway. This image shows the watch displaying data from the device. Unfortunately he’s depending on a PC to interface with the CGM display, then pushing it to the watch. He may try moving to a Raspberry Pi to help make this more mobile. This way the sensitive hardware could be tucked safely in a case inside a backpack while the watch shows his current glucose levels. We’d also love to see an embedded solution that would emulate the communications the PC is using to harvest the data. If you’ve got any suggestions in this area we’re sure that [Don] would appreciate the help. | 39 | 22 | [
{
"comment_id": "1009068",
"author": "Mike C",
"timestamp": "2013-05-27T21:40:52",
"content": "If the Pebble smartwatch can’t poll the monitor on its own, the Agent smartwatch will be able to. I think the limitation in this case is the TI watch.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies... | 1,760,376,541.859955 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/27/ws2811-can-be-addressed-at-800khz-using-a-8mhz-clock/ | WS2811 Can Be Addressed At 800kHz Using A 8MHz Clock | Mike Szczys | [
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"AVR",
"led strip",
"ws2811"
] | Timing is everything and that’s why most communication protocols require a very accurate clock source. The WS2811 LED strip controllers are no different. But [Danny] figured out a way to
drive them reliably with an 8MHz clock source
.
The WS2811 has become one of the most popular controllers for RGB pixels and strips alike. We’ve seen several hacks used to address them, including
the 16MHz AVR technique
that inspired [Danny] to take on this project. He planned to use that library but the 25-day shipping time for a 16MHz crystal drove home to invent a way to use the internal oscillator instead.
The gist of the hack is that he wrote assembly code to handle pairs of binary bit values. With a code block for each of the four possible combinations in hand he had to find a way to craft the conditional jumps to preserve accurate timing. After hitting the wall trying to solve this puzzle by hand he wrote a C++ program to solve it for home. The proof is in this video which shows one chip driving multiple Larson scanners on a single strip. | 35 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "1009045",
"author": "Paul Stoffregen",
"timestamp": "2013-05-27T20:19:25",
"content": "That’s a nice writeup.I’m guessing you probably didn’t realize Adafruit’s Neopixel library already supports WS2811 strips on both 8 & 16 MHz AVR-based Arduino? They use pretty much the same appro... | 1,760,376,541.930962 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/27/adding-night-vision-to-the-raspberry-pi-camera/ | Adding Night Vision To The Raspberry Pi Camera | Brian Benchoff | [
"digital cameras hacks",
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"infrared",
"IR filter",
"raspberry pi",
"Raspberry pi camera"
] | After months of promises, the Raspberry Pi camera is finally heading out to hackers and makers across the world.
Of course
the first build with the Pi cam to grace the pages of Hackaday would be removing the IR filter, and it just so happens [Gary] and his crew at the Reading hackerspace
are the first to do just that
.
As [Gary]
shows in his video
, the process of removing the Pi cam’s IR filter is
extremely
fiddly. Getting the filter out of the camera involves removing the sensor, gently cutting it open with a scalpel, and finally gluing the whole thing back together with a tiny bit of superglue. Not for the faint of heart, and certainly not for anyone without a halfway decent bench microscope.
If you’re looking for a Raspberry Pi-powered security camera, game camera, or something for an astronomy application, this is the way to make it happen. You might want to be careful when removing the IR filter; [Gary] broke one camera on their first attempt. They got it to work, though, and the picture quality looks pretty good, as seen in the videos below.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=QlYKBdueH-Y&w=580]
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=ZW1YQkkZOLE&w=580]
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=SHWmEBRKHZo&w=580] | 26 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "1008999",
"author": "reggie",
"timestamp": "2013-05-27T17:25:19",
"content": "Nice work on getting the filter off but the video doesn’t really show anyone anything of any use with regard to dismantling it,not having a go, just pointing out that the bits where the host said ‘as you c... | 1,760,376,541.988529 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/27/book-review-the-good-life-lab/ | Book Review: The Good Life Lab | Caleb Kraft | [
"Reviews"
] | [
"book review"
] | Stop whatever you’re doing and
get this book
. I’ve just finished reading it and I have to say that [Wendy] and [Mikey] could easily be the poster children for modern day hacking, and this book could be the manual for a life built on hacking.
When
I visited [Wendy] and [Mikey] last year
I was blown away. Their little homestead was a veritable smorgasbord of hacks. Everywhere I looked, things were cobbled together, modified, repaired, and improved. There wasn’t a single piece of their lives that wasn’t somehow improved by their efforts to play an active role in their own living.
That sounds a bit cheesy I know. We all play an active role in our lives right? Sure. But what they have done is created a hacker’s homestead. My projects tend to live on my workbench, occasionally poking into my daily life, but they went were there was virtually nothing and hacked together everything they found they needed. Their life is their workbench.
If there was a need, something would be made to satisfy that need. The buildings they built were constructed from scrap and paper, the power they use was harvested from their own cobbled together solar system and battery array, the food they eat was cultivated from the desert using intelligent planning. It was not only an impressive display of hacker ingenuity, but also inspiring.
The book basically comes in two parts.
Part 1. the Story:
[Wendy] and [Mikey] were hackers in New York. You might remember [Mikey] from some articles he wrote for hackaday ages ago, as well as
his projects that appear on our pages
. [Wendy] started
swap-o-rama
, which you may have also seen. This part of the book is an interesting view of hackers struggling to live two different ways at the same time (DIY/Hacking vs Get a job and be normal). Ultimately, they decided they would move to the middle of New Mexico and just make what they need. They’ve been documenting this whole process on their blog,
Holy Scrap
, as well.
I wasn’t too interested in a “hackers falling in love” story, and I was pleasantly surprised to find that this is more of a first hand account of some of the cool stuff they were doing in New york. There are stories of things like when [Wendy] orchestrated a large event involving decorative burn barrels on the streets of New York, or that time when [Mikey] built a bunch of vibrating underwear with remote controls to pass out to strangers at burning man.
Part 2. the Lab.
After spending so much time doing what they do, they’ve compiled chapter upon chapter of projects to survive on. Ranging from electronics projects like harvesting and repairing car batteries to growing and harvesting your own medicinal plants, Creating entire buildings from old phone books to converting vehicles to run on grease. I think this section should be handed out in high schools as part of the curriculum.
In case you couldn’t tell, I loved this book. It almost seemed like a glimpse into an imaginary place that belonged in a [Niel Stephenson] book (I could imagine passing through this area in the Diamond Age). I should also mention that even though I did visit them last year, I don’t really know them. I knew they were in my path for that trip and shot them an email. They were fantastic hosts who fed us, amused us, and took us swimming in the Rio Grande. | 12 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "1008968",
"author": "Will",
"timestamp": "2013-05-27T16:04:55",
"content": "“active roll” (x2)In English, we’d say “active role.”",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1008974",
"author": "smee",
"timestamp": "2013-0... | 1,760,376,542.03586 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/27/moostar-fortune-telling-moose-knock-off-of-zoltar/ | Moostar — Fortune Telling Moose Knock-off Of Zoltar | Mike Szczys | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"Toy Hacks"
] | [
"animatronics",
"moose",
"zoltar"
] | Meet Moostar,
the fortune-telling Moose
inspired by Zoltar. You remember Zoltar, the coin operated fortune-teller who made [Tom Hanks] a rich movie star? Maybe you didn’t see
that flick
, but [Sketchsk3tch] did and he pulled this show piece together for a company-wide conference with relative ease.
If you’re good at choosing parts for your projects it makes things a lot simpler. He started with a singing Christmas moose, a mini plasma ball to act as the crystal ball, and somehow came across a collector’s basketball case which was the perfect size for the enclosure.
The electronics also came together remarkably well. He uses
a thermal printer
to spit out the fortunes — which are actually security tips for employees since that’s the dcpartment he works in. The coin acceptor is a Sparkfun part and he tried two ready made solutions to make the moose talk. The first is seen below and uses pre-recorded messages played by an Arduino Wave shield. This was improved upon by using
an EMIC2
text-to-speech module that really opens up the moose’s range of chatter. | 7 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "1008922",
"author": "Gerald",
"timestamp": "2013-05-27T13:22:38",
"content": "Moosetar, not Moostar",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1009227",
"author": "Zhylo",
"timestamp": "2013-05-28T09:12:23",
"cont... | 1,760,376,542.085951 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/26/hackaday-links-sunday-may-26th-2013/ | Hackaday Links: Sunday, May 26th, 2013 | Mike Szczys | [
"News"
] | [
"burning man",
"Electric Imp",
"h-bot",
"heathkit",
"mouse",
"nixie",
"pong",
"synthesizer"
] | The warmer months cometh and it’s time to think of this year’s Burning Man. [Matt’s] already set himself up with
a sound-reactive LED project
he calls the
Seed of Life
.
Older readers, and those who really know their hobby electronic history, will know the name
Heathkit
. Many readers tipped us off about their triumphant return. We’re not sure what form this reincarnation will take, but you can help shape it by
participating in the survey
.
Dust off that MSP430 launchpad and turn it into
a composite video Pong console
.
Here’s a way to
use your Android phone as a computer mouse
.
We’re not quite sure what this is, but turn your volume down before watching
the video about a modular sythesizer hack
.
[Arkadiusz Spiewak] wrote in to share
some of the printing success
(
translated
) he’s had recently with
the H-bot style printer
we saw a while back.
Strap an Arduino and an Electric Imp to your arm (and everyone else’s) and it’ll
remember everyone you meet
. You know, kind of like Google Glass but with geeky arm-wear instead of geeky headgear?
And finally, [Nerick] has just finished
a thermometer project using Nixie tubes
(
translated
). | 56 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "1008710",
"author": "soundman98",
"timestamp": "2013-05-26T21:27:44",
"content": "this ‘links’ post completely sucks with the new front page layout.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1008714",
"author": "Evocube",
... | 1,760,376,542.17457 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/26/crown-earns-you-the-title-king-of-the-junkyard/ | Crown Earns You The Title King Of The Junkyard | Mike Szczys | [
"Wearable Hacks"
] | [
"chain",
"crown",
"metal",
"welding"
] | [Greg Shikhman] wanted to use the school tools one more time before graduation. After hitting up some local motorcycle shops around town for parts
he fashioned this crown for himself
.
He didn’t pay ‘
the iron price
‘ as the motorcycle roller chain is waste material anyway. Chains do wear out and these were left over after being replaced with new ones. He first cleaned them up with a bit of WD-40 solvent, xylene, and soapy water to cut through the grime. There was also a layer of black oxide which normally keeps them from rusting which he peeled off with a dunk in some hydrochloric acid.
Chains are flexible and this would have made for a disheveled looking crown. The fix involved using an aluminum form the size of his head to keep the crown in round while he did his TIG welding. A double row of polished steel ball bearings take the place of jewels. As if the ten-pounder wasn’t painful enough he added four rings of bicycle chain as accents which he admits makes the thing unwearable because they dig into his noggin. We still don’t think that’s a good enough excuse to post about the project and
not
include an image of him wearing the thing during the junkyard coronation.
It would be fun to see a follow-up king-ring with
similar LED features as that engagement ring
but using this heavy-metal design style. | 17 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "1008684",
"author": "George",
"timestamp": "2013-05-26T19:32:51",
"content": "Sure does look comfortable, altho im not too sure this is really a “Hack” more a creative bit of fun.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1008723",
... | 1,760,376,542.343334 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/26/detecting-galactic-rotation-with-software-defined-radio/ | Detecting Galactic Rotation With Software Defined Radio | Brian Benchoff | [
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"Radio Telescope",
"RTL-SDR",
"sdr",
"software-defined radio"
] | Last summer in the heyday of software defined radio via USB TV tuners we asked hackaday readers a question:
Is anyone using everyone’s favorite method of SDR for radio astronomy?
It took nearly a year, but finally there’s an awesome project to turn a USB TV tuner into a radio telescope.
It’s from the fruitful mind of [Marcus Leech]
(PDF warning), and is good enough to detect the rotation of the galaxy with a three-foot satellite dish.
News of [Marcus]’ work comes to us from [Carl] over at
RTL-SDR.com
who has been keeping tabs on the advances of building a radio telescope in a backyard. He’s been collecting a lot of interesting tidbits including
this gif
showing an arm of the galaxy entering and leaving [Marcus]’ telescope’s field of view over the course of a few hours.
Not only can [Marcus]’ telescope record continium measurements – basically, a single-pixel camera sensitive to only one frequency – it can also produce spectral plots of the sky. Combine the ability to measure multiple frequencies at the same time with the Doppler effect, and [Marcus] can measure the rotation of the galaxy with a USB TV tuner. That’s just awesome in our humble opinion.
If you already have an RTL-SDR TV tuner and a largish satellite dish, [Marcus]’ project should be fairly inexpensive to replicate; the feed assembly is made out of a coffee can, the amplifiers are repurposed satellite television equipment, and all the software – [Marcus]’ own
simple_ra
tool for GNU Radio – is open source. Of course with a 3 foot diameter dish, it will be impossible to replicate the data from huge radio telescopes. Still, it’s an impressive piece of work that leaves us searching craigslist for an old C-band dish. | 27 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "1008629",
"author": "ian",
"timestamp": "2013-05-26T15:27:30",
"content": "Pretty cool!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1008897",
"author": "saimhe",
"timestamp": "2013-05-27T10:14:18",
"content": "Now ... | 1,760,376,542.402461 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/26/update-live-video-played-on-led-strip-display/ | Update: Live Video Played On LED Strip Display | Mike Szczys | [
"ARM",
"LED Hacks",
"Video Hacks"
] | [
"beaglebone",
"beaglebone black",
"led strip",
"maker faire",
"rgb",
"video4linux"
] | [Paul] took this LED display along with him to Maker Faire. To give it some interactivity
he figured out a way to make it play live video
. It is also activated using some stomp actuators built from piezo speaker elements and rubber floor mats.
This moves his original project in new directions. Back in February he was
showing off the RGB LED strip display
. He had it playing video but that was all dependent on using previously processed files. This upgrade uses
a BeagleBone Black
(the newest rendition of the ARM-based development board). [Paul] had tried using a Raspberry Pi board but had trouble with the webcam (mounted above the LED display) dropping frames. With the new board he is able to use the Video4Linux API to capture 30 frames per second and push them out to the display.
So far he’s had five out of the 1920 LEDs die on him. This shows off a couple of good things about using strips like this. A dead pixel doesn’t affect its neighbors. And replacement is as easy as cutting the ribbon on either side of the bad component, then soldering a new segment in place. | 11 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "1008789",
"author": "rasz",
"timestamp": "2013-05-27T02:38:07",
"content": "This has to be the most expensive method EVER to display something on the wall :)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1008842",
"author": "Paul St... | 1,760,376,542.44962 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/25/add-external-power-to-any-usb-hub/ | Add External Power To Any USB Hub | Mike Szczys | [
"Peripherals Hacks"
] | [
"hub",
"psu",
"usb"
] | [Andrew] was getting some poor performance from a couple of USB devices he had connected through an unpowered hub. This is a problem because the hub prevents devices from negotiating with the host controller for more current. He fixed it by
adding an external power supply to his USB hub
.
In this case the PCB already had a footprint for a power connector. The manufacturer uses one board for several different models and just leaves the supply components unpopulated. [Andrew] managed to find a barrel jack in his parts bin that matched the footprint.
One important thing to do before hooking up the source is to disconnect the 5v wire from the incoming cable from the computer. The other tip we can give you is to use a good regulated 5v source to ensure you don’t damage the stuff you’re trying to power. That means avoiding
deals that are too good to be true
. | 38 | 20 | [
{
"comment_id": "1008429",
"author": "Winston",
"timestamp": "2013-05-25T21:26:46",
"content": "been there, done that. although I added a line from the power to go to the computer end. I did this so I could power the cheapo tablet while it was OTG’ing the hub when I had USB memory, mouse and keyboar... | 1,760,376,542.573761 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/25/alert-tube-monitors-all-aspects-of-your-digital-life/ | Alert Tube Monitors All Aspects Of Your Digital Life | Mike Szczys | [
"internet hacks",
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"IFTTT",
"RPi",
"text to speech"
] | This futuristic appliance can keep you apprised of all you social network goings on and much more. [Mike Watson] calls the device
the Alert Tube
because of its functionality and shape. The hardware depends primarily on a Raspberry Pi board which seems tailor-made for this type of use. The information gathering side of this shows off the power of a fledgling services called
If This Then That
.
We’ve heard of IFTTT only because [Chris Gammel] and [Dave Jones] covered it on an episode of
The Amp Hour
. [Dave] dismissed it as have little to no practical use. But this project shows how it can be leveraged to make quick work of pulling your desired data from the Internet. Think of it as a collection of APIs for many sites like Twitter, Facebook, as well as local weather, etc. This project sets up IFTTT to monitor your accounts, alerting you with colors of like, sound, and even text-to-speech.
The project explanation is several pages long but you can get a quick look at it by watching the demo video. | 13 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "1008422",
"author": "pcf11",
"timestamp": "2013-05-25T21:00:13",
"content": "It needs a batman logo stencil on the top of it, or something.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1008459",
"author": "a3",
"timestamp":... | 1,760,376,542.503218 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/25/use-your-ears-as-an-oscilloscope/ | Use Your Ears As An Oscilloscope | Mike Szczys | [
"digital audio hacks",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"headphones",
"motor driver",
"oscilloscope"
] | When work on an engine control circuit [Scott] found himself in need of a way to compare the performance of two control circuits at once. The hobby quality oscilloscope he owns wasn’t up to the task. After thinking about it for a bit he ended up
using his ears as the oscilloscope
.
The signals he was measuring are well suited for the challenge as they fell within the human range of hearing. He used some wire wrapped around each of the three conductors on the jack of his headphones in order to connect them to a breadboard. Then he simply connected each channel to one of the motor driver circuits, and connected the common ground. Listening to the
intonation
of the pitches in each ear he was literally able to tune them up.
If he had been looking for a specific frequency he could have
used his sound card to take and analyze a sample
. But balance was what he needed here and you must admit that this was an easy and clever way to get it! | 15 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "1008268",
"author": "Christopher",
"timestamp": "2013-05-25T13:39:33",
"content": "Rather clever, but I believe he could have mixed both signals into his oscilloscope and just tuned them based on constructive/destructive interference or beat frequency.",
"parent_id": null,
"... | 1,760,376,542.838656 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/24/rpi-control-your-server-psu-over-the-internet/ | RPi Control Your Server PSU Over The Internet | Mike Szczys | [
"Network Hacks",
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"psu",
"remote",
"server",
"web interface"
] | Here’s an interesting use of
a Raspberry Pi to control the PSU on a server
. [Martin Peres] is going to be away for a few months and still wants access to his PC. This isn’t really all that tough… it’s what SSH is made for. But he also wants lower-level access to the hardware. Specifically he needs to control and get feedback on what the PSU is doing, and even wanted to have access to the serial console without having to go through the computer’s NIC.
The image above shows one part of his solution. This is a custom Ethernet port that connects to his Rasberry Pi header breakout board. Inside the computer the jack is wired to the motherboard power LED to give feedback about the current state of the power supply. It also patches into the green wire on the PSU, which lets him turn on the power by pulling it to ground. After working out the cable routing he developed a web interface that makes it easy to interact with the setup.
As with
other hacks along these lines
letting an embedded computer run 24/7 is a lot less wasteful than leaving a PC on. That’s a concept we can really get behind. | 49 | 17 | [
{
"comment_id": "1007965",
"author": "chango",
"timestamp": "2013-05-24T21:22:41",
"content": "I like it, a poor man’s BMC. I’m sure the whole setup costs less than the option to add one to a commercial server.Next step would be to piggyback on the SMBUS to read the motherboard sensors.",
"pare... | 1,760,376,545.048964 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/24/3w-handheld-laser-raises-hope-for-a-real-lightsaber-someday/ | 3W Handheld Laser Raises Hope For A Real Lightsaber Someday | Mike Szczys | [
"Laser Hacks"
] | [
"burning",
"diode",
"dlp",
"handheld",
"lightsaber",
"projector"
] | That banner image may seem a little bit theatric, but it’s a good representation of
what this 3W handheld laser can really do
. Turn the thing on in a slightly smoky room and it looks exactly like a thin beam Lightsaber.
What kind of tricks would you expect this thing to perform? Perhaps it’ll pop some black balloons? Prepare to be shocked because it’s orders of magnitude more powerful than that. The video below shows it burning and igniting a collection of items almost instantly. [Styropyro] tested his creation by igniting paper, cardboard, flash paper, flash powder, burning through a stick of wood, and igniting an undisclosed substance at the end of the video. But one of our favorites is when he drives a solar powered toy car with the intense beam.
He pulled the diode from a DLP projector, and drives it with a pair of 18650 Lithium Ion batteries which are commonly found in laptops. He made the enclosure himself. It looks great but we can’t help but wonder if the components would fit in
a painstakingly made replica
. | 104 | 36 | [
{
"comment_id": "1007914",
"author": "Jordan Liske",
"timestamp": "2013-05-24T19:04:54",
"content": "So, basically to make a light saber we need to experiment on monkeys to find out how many watts are needed to cut through flesh easily. then, we need to make a force field to contain the laser within... | 1,760,376,544.613644 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/24/tamagotchi-rom-dump-and-reverse-engineering/ | Tamagotchi ROM Dump And Reverse Engineering | Mike Szczys | [
"classic hacks",
"Microcontrollers",
"Toy Hacks"
] | [
"chip on board",
"dump",
"general plus",
"reverse engineering",
"rom",
"spi",
"tamagotchi"
] | Often the true key to success is persistence and that holds true for this project which
dumped the ROM from the current generation of Tamagotchi toys
. If you’re a fan of learning the secrets built into consumer electronics — and you know
we
are — you’ll want to go back and
watch the 24-minute lecture on Tamagotchi hacking
which [Natalie Silvanovich] gave a 29C3 last year. She had made quite a bit of headway hacking the playable pods, but wasn’t able to get her hands on a full ROM dump from the General Plus chip on board processor. This update heralds her success and shares the details of how it was done.
As we learned form the video lecture it was a huge chore just to figure out what processor this uses. It turned out to be a 6502 core with a few other things built in. After prowling the manufacturer’s website she found example code for writing to Port A.
She was then able to execute her own code
which was designed to dump one byte of ROM at a time using the SPI protocol.
[Natalie] posted her code dump if you’re interested in digging through it. But as usual we think the journey is the most interesting part.
[Thanks Itay] | 18 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "1007792",
"author": "dALE",
"timestamp": "2013-05-24T13:12:33",
"content": "This is how Skynet begins,",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1007806",
"author": "tech-no-pest",
"timestamp": "2013-05-24T13:39:45",
... | 1,760,376,544.47977 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/23/tweaking-designs-for-theo-jansen-walking-machines/ | Tweaking Designs For [Theo Jansen] Walking Machines | Mike Szczys | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"matlab",
"theo jansen",
"walker"
] | We love the look, and most especially the gait, of [Theo Jansen’s] walker designs. We don’t fully understand them or the math behind them. But that could change if we spend enough time studying [Aaron Birenboim’s] body of work. He wants to incorporate the legs in a project so
he’s been trying to optimize the Jansen leg design
.
The calculations are delivered in a source code package available from his site. To make heads or trails out of the numbers you need a way to visualize them. He has provided that as well in the form of a MATLAB script which shows leg piece design and can even spit out an animated .gif file of the virtual legs in motion.
If you have no idea what we’re talking about make sure to check out
[Jansen’s] original creations
. We’re also excited to read more about the Klann and Ghassaei linkage designs which [Aaron] talks about in his post. | 7 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "1007505",
"author": "Brad",
"timestamp": "2013-05-23T22:06:34",
"content": "Love the Jansen mechanism. Always think about making a walker with it. Maybe a knockoff of the Cajun Crawler.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCPlczI3k-c",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies... | 1,760,376,545.26608 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/23/laptop-vs-thermite-slow-motion-destruction/ | Laptop Vs Thermite: Slow Motion Destruction | Caleb Kraft | [
"chemistry hacks",
"computer hacks",
"Featured"
] | [
"James Bond",
"Thermite"
] | Years ago we covered
using thermite to destroy a hard drive
. The idea is that if you melt through the platters, the data is completely unrecoverable. There are tons of videos of people doing this, but they all have a similar format. There’s a hard drive, with a flower pot or soda can sitting on top full of thermite. They then light this with a strip of magnesium and a torch.
I wanted to do something a little different. I wanted to implement thermite as a self destruct mechanism inside the device. To do this, I had to come up with a way to ignite the thermite. This stuff is very difficult to light. You have to get it really really hot. The easiest way is to use magnesium, which itself isn’t the easiest thing to light.
What I finally landed on was an ignition system that uses model rocket igniters, gun powder, and magnesium to light the thermite. The model rocket igniter can be set off from the 12v line inside your computer. However, it isn’t hot enough to light magnesium shavings, much less thermite. To get it to work, I needed to add some gunpowder. A small amount of gun powder would get hot enough to light the magnesium shavings, which in turn were hot enough to light the thermite. I had to be careful though, because too much gunpowder would cause a rapid expansion, blowing the thermite everywhere instead of lighting it. You can actually see some red thermite being blown out of the external hard drive and the laptop as the gunpowder ignites.
gun powder
model rocket igniters
magnesium shavings
Effectiveness of external hard drive self destruction:
I wasn’t sure about this one. There isn’t a whole lot of space for thermite and the ignition system inside the box. On top of that, the only space was at the side of the hard drive, where the walls are the thickest. I had no idea if the small amount of thermite I used would penetrate the drive. It did, just barely as you can see in these pictures. It looks as if it pooled in the screw holes and made it inside. The platters are damaged.
burnt unit
looking down on hard drive
you can see a hole in the drive from this angle
yuck
yep, appears to be the screw hole
platters are damaged, but not as effective as thermite to the top
Effectiveness of laptop destruction:
I decided to completely replace the cd rom with thermite. This gave me a ton of space to put things. I was pretty positive this would work. The hard drive is in the center of this laptop, which meant I had to place it on its side for this to be effective. You can see the thermite work its way down toward the drive in the video. As you can see in the pictures below, the drive cover is completely gone and the platters are destroyed. Success!
crusty
hard drive is center of the image
platters are clearly visible
completely fried
un covered
no data coming off that
Since this system can be powered by batteries or the internal power of your computer, it can be put inside a working device only to be used when needed. Obviously it is a ridiculous fire hazard that no one should bother with. It was a fun experiment though and I really feel like it is something that would fit in well in the world of [James Bond] | 79 | 31 | [
{
"comment_id": "1007453",
"author": "vince",
"timestamp": "2013-05-23T20:11:27",
"content": "I think I have just found a neat summer time project. Thanks Caleb, for the incredible dangerous inspiration.Did you take the battery out before testing the laptop?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,... | 1,760,376,545.161463 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/23/herd-single-cell-organisms-with-your-mind/ | Herd Single Cell Organisms With Your Mind | Mike Szczys | [
"Medical Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"brainwaves",
"paramecium"
] | Most project tips involving brainwaves get passed over because it’s hard to make much out of that type of control. This project doesn’t necessarily make progress on the control side on this, but you have to admit that
herding life forms with your thoughts
deserves a closer look.
[Geva] set up a rig that allows him to interact with paramecium — tiny single cell organism that are happy to swim around all day long. Just like vertebrates they’re not big fans of electric shocks. Run some current through the fluid and they’ll swim toward the negative electrode.
This experiment uses four pencil leads as electrodes. These are driven by an Arduino which reacts to the input from a toy brain wave device. Concentrate in just the right way and they will swim wherever you will them to.
This isn’t quite as involved as
cockroach mind control
, but it’s every bit as interesting | 7 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "1007433",
"author": "Eirinn",
"timestamp": "2013-05-23T19:15:11",
"content": "Micro torture! :P",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1007492",
"author": "Geva",
"timestamp": "2013-05-23T21:29:04",
"content":... | 1,760,376,544.815004 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/23/listening-to-aircraft-transponders-with-a-raspberry-pi/ | Listening To Aircraft Transponders With A Raspberry Pi | Brian Benchoff | [
"Radio Hacks",
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"ads-b",
"raspberry pi",
"RTLSDR",
"sdr",
"software-defined radio"
] | Last year’s big hack was software-defined radio; a small USB TV tuner that could listen in on radio broadcasts anywhere between 64 and 1200 MHz. This year, it’s all about the Raspberry Pi, so it’s surprising we’re only just now seeing a mashup of these two pieces of hardware. [Corq]
is using a Raspi and RTLSDR TV tuner
to listen in on aircraft transponders, and getting a whole bunch of data from aircraft flying overhead.
Even though the ADS-B decoder [Corq] is using
is written for OS X
, he’s reading the data coming from the USB TV tuner over the network with
a program called Dump1090
. This program allows [Corq] to attach his SDR to a Raspbery Pi and put it somewhere the antenna will get good reception – an attic, or an outdoor weatherproof case – and stream data to his desktop over a WiFi or network connection.
With a USB TV tuner and a Raspberry Pi, [Corq] is able read the tail numbers, altitude, latitude, longitude, speed, heading, and even the type of aircraft currently flying over his house. That’s cool enough, but the fact that he can effectively do this over the Internet makes it a brilliant hardware mashup. | 31 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "1007394",
"author": "vpoko",
"timestamp": "2013-05-23T17:12:48",
"content": "I thought aircraft transponders only squawked a code when interrogated (hit by radar). Or do they just do it every so often, too?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"c... | 1,760,376,545.224611 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/23/tracking-cicadas-with-radiolab-and-an-arduino/ | Tracking Cicadas With Radiolab And An Arduino | Brian Benchoff | [
"Arduino Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"cicadia",
"radiolab",
"thermistor"
] | Once every 17 years, a population of cicadas ranging from Connecticut to the Appalachian highlands of North Carolina emerges to annoy everyone within earshot. The last time east coasters saw this brood was in 1996, making 2013 yet another year of annoying insect pests. The only question is, when will we start to see this year’s cicada brood?
Radiolab, the awesome podcast and public radio show, has put together an awesome project that asks listeners
to track when the cicadas in their area will emerge
. Cicadas generally enter their loud and obnoxious adult stage when the ground temperature 8 inches below the surface reaches 64º F. Armed with an Arduino, thermistor, and a few wires and resistors, any Radiolab listener can upload soil temperature data to Radiolab servers where all the data will be correlated with documented cicada sightings.
After following the page’s instructions for wiring up a bunch of LEDs and a thermistor to an Arduino, just upload
the most well-commented code we’ve ever seen
and go outside to take soil temperature measurements. The temperature is displayed in a pseudo-binary format on nine LEDs. To decode the temperature without counting by powers of two, Radiolab has an online decoder that also allows you to upload your data and location. | 27 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "1007347",
"author": "fred durkin",
"timestamp": "2013-05-23T15:04:46",
"content": "Hint: DS 18B20 1-wire and arduino for a digital output. none of this stoopit led and binary decoding…",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1007442... | 1,760,376,544.876524 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/23/led-etch-a-sketch-built-without-a-microcontroller/ | LED Etch-a-Sketch Built Without A Microcontroller | Mike Szczys | [
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"etch a sketch",
"grid",
"led",
"logic"
] | This project is a wonderful example of what can be accomplished with a rather complicated logic circuit. It’s an
Etch-a-Sketch made from a 16×16 LED grid
. That in itself is only somewhat interesting. But when hearing about the features and that it is driven by logic chips we were unable to dream up how it was designed. There’s no schematic but the video commentary explains all.
The thing that confused us the most is that the cursor is shining brighter than the rest of the pixels. This is done with two different 555 times and a duty cycle trick. When you turn the trimpots the cursor position is tracked by some decade counters. Pixels in your path are written to a RAM chip which acts as the frame buffer. And there’s even a level conversion hack that let’s the display run at 15v to achieve the desired brightness. Top notch!
[via
Reddit
] | 21 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "1007314",
"author": "polossatik",
"timestamp": "2013-05-23T13:23:51",
"content": "cool project and that the dual clock trick is a nice idea …now waiting for the first comment to suggest to use a certain italian designed board :)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies... | 1,760,376,544.769174 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/22/ask-hackaday-what-are-we-going-to-do-with-the-new-kinect/ | Ask Hackaday: What Are We Going To Do With The New Kinect? | Brian Benchoff | [
"Ask Hackaday",
"Kinect hacks"
] | [
"Kinect",
"xbox",
"xbox one"
] | Yesterday Microsoft announced their new cable box, the Xbox One. Included in the announcement is a vastly improved Kinect sensor. It won’t be available until next Christmas, but now the question is what are we going to do with it?
From what initial specs that can be found, the new version of the Kinect will output RGB 1080p video over a USB 3.0 connection to the new Xbox. The IR depth camera of the original Kinect has been replaced with a time of flight camera – a camera that is able to send out a pulse of light and time how long it takes for photons to be reflected back to the camera. While there have been some inroads into making low-cost ToF cameras – namely Intel and Creative’s
Interactive Gesture Camera Development Kit
and the $250
DepthSense 325 from SoftKinetic
– the Kinect 2.0 will be the first time of flight camera you’ll be able to buy for a few hundred bucks at any Walmart.
We’ve seen a ton of awesome Kinect hacks over the years. Everything from
a ‘holographic display’
that turns any TV into a 3D display,
computer vision for robots
, and a
3D scanner
among others. A new Kinect sensor with better 3D resolution can only improve existing projects and the time of flight sensor – like the one found in Google’s driverless car – opens up the door for a whole bunch of new projects.
So, readers of Hackaday, assuming someone can
write a driver in a few days
like the Kinect 1.0, what are we going to do with it?
While we’re at it, keep in mind we
made a call for Wii U controller hacks
. If somebody can crack that nut, it’ll be an awesome remote for robots and FPV airplanes and drones. | 60 | 24 | [
{
"comment_id": "1007025",
"author": "Colin Gidzinski",
"timestamp": "2013-05-22T23:12:24",
"content": "new cable box…. Brilliant",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1007029",
"author": "Alex",
"timestamp": "2013-05-22T23:19:05",
"conten... | 1,760,376,544.712558 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/22/anti-tetris-project-is-a-study-in-hand-tracking/ | Anti-Tetris Project Is A Study In Hand Tracking | Mike Szczys | [
"FPGA",
"Video Hacks"
] | [
"hand tracking",
"ntsc",
"rgb",
"Tetras",
"YUV"
] | The game of Anti-Tetris is played by standing in front of a monitor and watch falling Tetris pieces overlaid on a video image of your body. Each hand is used to make pieces disappear so that they don’t stack up to the top of the screen. We don’t see this as the next big indie game. What we do see are some very interesting techniques for hand tracking.
An FPGA drives the game
, using a camera as input. To track your hands the Cornell students figured out that YUV images show a specific range of skin tones which can be coded as a filter to direct cursor placement. But they needed a bit of a hack to get at those values. They patched into the camera circuit before the YUV is converted to RGB for the NTSC output.
Registering hand movement perpendicular to the screen is also a challenge that they faced. Because the hand location has already been established they were able to measure distance between the upper and lower boundaries. If that distance changes fast enough it is treated as an input, making the current block disappear. | 6 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "1007000",
"author": "Joseph Sammarco",
"timestamp": "2013-05-22T21:54:49",
"content": "Needs to work on that algorithm. Kinda crappy.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1007092",
"author": "toodlestech",
"timestamp": "2013-... | 1,760,376,545.310333 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/22/hackaday-newsletter-now-including-this-day-in-hackaday-history/ | Hackaday Newsletter: Now Including “This Day In Hackaday History” | Caleb Kraft | [
"News"
] | [
"newsletter"
] | A while back we toyed with the idea of doing a look back on hackaday history. We weren’t sure how often to publish it, or what exactly to publish. Now, we’ve decided that this will be the main part of the Hackaday news letter. You can
sign up here
if you haven’t already, but hurry I’m sending out today’s newsletter in a couple hours!
Each email (1-2 a week) will have that day’s history going all the way back to roughly the beginning. It will also have a quick blurb about what video I’m working on or any other little hackaday news bits. | 26 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "1006910",
"author": "vonskippy",
"timestamp": "2013-05-22T18:23:15",
"content": "I don’t get the whole concept of a email newsletter???I get enough business, personal, and way to much spam each day via email – why do I need a newsletter?Put the information you’d put in your newslett... | 1,760,376,545.375312 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/22/submersible-camera-snaps-pics-of-ocean-going-predators/ | Submersible Camera Snaps Pics Of Ocean Going Predators | Mike Szczys | [
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"camera",
"rov",
"RPi",
"shark"
] | This camera rig
uses a Raspberry Pi to send a camera down fifty meters
(
mirror on RPi blog
) in order to spy on sharks. We got really excited at first thinking that it might be using the camera module from the Raspberry Pi Foundation but that isn’t the case. Do keep reading though, there’s a lot of cool stuff involved in this one.
The project used a collection of camera units spread over a large area to monitor shark activity. Each is mounted on an anchored buoy, using solar panels and a lead acid gel battery for power. The RPi itself remains topside in a waterproof box. It connects to the camera using a 50-foot Ethernet patch cable.
We figure the challenge of building the hardware parallels that of
designing an underwater ROV
. The camera needs an enclosure that can stand up to the pressure at that depth while allowing the cable to pass through it. There is also an interesting note in the project log about getting the camera exposure settings to behave. | 9 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "1006924",
"author": "aliveoneee",
"timestamp": "2013-05-22T18:59:44",
"content": "50 ft != 50 m",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1007011",
"author": "John P",
"timestamp": "2013-05-22T22:21:51",
"content... | 1,760,376,545.42307 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/22/adding-stereo-to-monophonic-audio/ | Adding Stereo To Monophonic Audio | Brian Benchoff | [
"digital audio hacks"
] | [
"binarual recording",
"binaural",
"head transfer function",
"recording",
"stereo"
] | A lot of awesome stuff happened up in [Bruce Land]’s lab at Cornell this last semester. Three students – [Pat], [Ed], and [Hanna] put in hours of work to come up with a few algorithms that are
able to simulate stereo audio with monophonic sound
. It’s enough work for three semesters of [Dr. Land]’s ECE 5030 class, and while it’s impossible to truly appreciate this project with a YouTube video, we’re assuming it’s an awesome piece of work.
The first part of the team’s project was to gather data about how the human ear hears in 3D space. To do this, they mounted microphones in a team member’s ear, sat them down on a rotating stool, and played a series of clicks. Tons of MATLAB later, the team had an average of how their team member’s heads heard sound. Basically, they created an algorithm of how
binarual recording
works.
To prove their algorithm worked, the team took a piece of music, squashed it down to mono, and played it through an MSP430 microcontroller. With a good pair of headphones, they’re able to virtually place the music in a stereo space.
The video below covers the basics of their build but because of the limitations of [Bruce]’s camera and YouTube you won’t be able to experience the team’s virtual stereo for yourself. You can, however, put on a pair of headphones
and listen to this
, a good example of what can be done with this sort of setup.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzuu5gRPN50&w=580] | 19 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "1006829",
"author": "parko",
"timestamp": "2013-05-22T15:13:03",
"content": "anyone want to make millions? use this algorithm to decode dolby 5.1 into a stereo binaural sound in realtime. just give me 1 of them :)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
... | 1,760,376,545.479092 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/22/vine-app-hack-on-iphone-makes-time-lapse-movies/ | Vine App Hack On IPhone Makes Time-lapse Movies | Mike Szczys | [
"iphone hacks",
"Video Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"servo",
"stylus",
"time-lapse",
"vine"
] | The Vine app is all the rage these days. It lets you shoot six-second videos on your iPhone and easily post them on the Internet. The problem is that [Sean Hodgins] doesn’t find the time limit to be useful for traditional video. But you can cram a lot more info into a half-dozen seconds if you make it a time-lapse video. The rig above is his solution to
making the Vine app act as a time-lapse recorder
.
The trick is in how the app itself works. It only records video when you’re touching the screen. So you record one second of video, then remove your finger and it ‘pauses’ the recording until you’re ready for the next scene. [Sean] automated this by adding a servo motor and a stylus. An Arduino drives the servo, making quick taps on the screen to get as many different frames into the six seconds as possible. He had a bit of trouble registering quick taps at first. His solution was to inject 3.3V into the stylus he gutted for the project. Click through the link above to see some example videos, or watch this embedded video to see the hardware at work: | 22 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "1006790",
"author": "Frank",
"timestamp": "2013-05-22T13:09:21",
"content": "Looks like he used a hammer to begin with before switching to something softer.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1006803",
"author": "ronin",
... | 1,760,376,545.536786 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/21/scratch-built-desk-adjust-so-you-may-sit-or-stand/ | Scratch-built Desk Adjusts So You May Sit Or Stand | Mike Szczys | [
"home hacks"
] | [
"battlestation",
"computer desk",
"desk"
] | Knowing that this desk was built from scratch is pretty impressive. But the motorized legs that
raise and lower the desk to any height
really puts the project over the top.
Surprisingly this started off as a computer case project. [Loren] upgraded his hardware and couldn’t find a case that would organize it the way he liked. His desk at the time had a glass top and he figured, why not build a new base for the glass which would double as a computer case? From there the project took off as his notebook sketches blossomed into computer renderings which matured into the wooden frame seen above.
Much like
the machined computer desk
from last December this uses motorized legs to adjust the height of the desk. These cost about $50 each, and he used four of them. If you consider the cost of purchasing a desk this size (which would not have been motorized) he’s still not breaking the bank. This battlestation is now fully functional, but he does plan to add automated control of the legs at some point. We think that means that each has an individual adjustment control which he wants to tie into one controller to rule them all. | 52 | 26 | [
{
"comment_id": "1006538",
"author": "Mofidul",
"timestamp": "2013-05-21T21:14:36",
"content": "That is quite a desirable desk. I want one!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1006542",
"author": "Kalfelz Gui",
"timestamp": "2013-05-21T21:29... | 1,760,376,545.623969 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/21/33-node-beowulf-cluster-built-with-raspberry-pi/ | 33 Node Beowulf Cluster Built With Raspberry Pi | Mike Szczys | [
"Network Hacks",
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"Beowulf",
"cluster",
"rack",
"RPi"
] | Not only did [Josh Kiepert]
build a 33 Node Beowulf Cluster
, but he made sure it looks impressive even if you don’t know what it is. That’s thanks to the power distribution PCBs he designed and etched. In addition to injecting power through each of the RPi GPIO headers they host an RGB LED which is illuminated in blue in the images above.
Quite some time ago we saw
a 64-node RPi cluster
. That one used LEGO pieces as a rack system to hold all of the boards. But [Josh] used stand-offs to create the columns of hardware which are suspended between top and bottom plates made out of acrylic. The only thing that’s unique about each board is the SD card and that’s why each has a label on it that identifies the node. These have been flashed with almost identical images; the host name and IP address are the only thing that changes from one to the next. They’ve been put in order physically so that you can quickly find your way through the rack. But functionally this doesn’t matter… put the card in any RPi and it will automatically identify itself on the network no matter where it’s located in the rack.
Don’t miss the demo video where [Josh] explains the entire setup. | 81 | 25 | [
{
"comment_id": "1006506",
"author": "nerd65536",
"timestamp": "2013-05-21T19:27:14",
"content": "You don’t need a custom images for each Pi: Just configure a DHCP server to assign hostnames and IPs based on MAC address.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comm... | 1,760,376,546.270538 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/21/meet-the-2013-layerone-conference-badge/ | Meet The 2013 LayerOne Conference Badge | Brian Benchoff | [
"hardware",
"News"
] | [
"badge",
"conference badge",
"LevelOne"
] | The LayerOne security conference is fast approaching and [charliex] is doing his best to put the finishing touches on
this year’s conference badge
.
Around the perimeter of the badge is 48 LEDs driven by
two LED drivers
. This allows for some crazy hardware hacking to create anything from a TV-B-GONE to a
bulbdial clock
. There’s also a few extra switches and sensors that can be hacked to do some interesting things, but where this badge really shines is the addition of an OLED display, allowing it to transform into an
XMEGA Xprotolab
, a small oscilloscope, spectrum analyzer, and frequency generator. Yes, this badge can be hacked, but it’s also a tool for hacking.
There’s an impressive amount of work that went into this badge, a feat even more impressive given the fact that the LayerOne conference
is this weekend
and the PCBs for these badges won’t arrive until tomorrow. We’ll be the first to say we’re masters of procrastination, but [charliex] really cut it close here. | 18 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "1006463",
"author": "Sir_Chan",
"timestamp": "2013-05-21T17:16:14",
"content": "wish i could get ahold of one of these",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1006467",
"author": "Sven",
"timestamp": "2013-05-21T17:20:28",
"... | 1,760,376,545.838469 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/21/scooterputer-the-all-in-one-scooter-computer/ | Scooterputer, The All-in-one Scooter Computer | Brian Benchoff | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"carputer",
"motorcycle",
"scooter"
] | We’ve seen a fair share of carputer builds involving a Raspberry Pi in the last few months, but even the power of a Raspi can’t compete with the awesomeness of
this Arduino-powered scooterputer
.
Like all awesome projects, this build is the product of a massive case of feature creep. Initially, [Kurt] only wanted a voltage monitor for his battery. With an Arduino Duemilanove, a voltage divider, and an evening of coding, [Kurt] whipped up a simple device with three LEDs to indicate the status of the batter: either low, good, or charging.
The project was complete until he ran across
an awesome OLED screen
. Using a touch screen display for just battery monitoring is a bit overkill, so [Kurt] made a trip over to Sparkfun and got his hands on a temperature sensor, real-time clock, accelerometer, GPS sensor, and even a cellular shield.
The resulting scooterputer is a masterpiece of in-vehicle displays: there’s a digital speedometer and GPS unit, and the cellular shield works as a tracking device and a way to download real-time maps of the scooter’s current location with
itouchmap
.
While the majority of the electronics are hidden under the hood of the scooter, the display of course needed to be out in the weather. To do this, [Kurt] found a nice enclosure with a rubber boot that perfectly fit the OLED display. The display is connected to the Arduino with a cat5 cable, and everything should hold up pretty well as long as [Kurt] doesn’t drive through a hurricane.
You can check out a video of the scooterputuer below.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzzKB-dMWsQ&w=580] | 13 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "1006443",
"author": "Christoffer",
"timestamp": "2013-05-21T16:05:37",
"content": "Has been on Hackaday before:http://hackaday.com/2010/06/28/touchscreen-scooter-computer/",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1006444",
"author": ... | 1,760,376,545.94736 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/21/electric-motorcycle-hits-the-racing-circuit/ | Electric Motorcycle Hits The Racing Circuit | Mike Szczys | [
"green hacks"
] | [
"electric",
"motorcycle",
"racing"
] | Check out that beefy electric motor hanging out where the swing arm connects to the body of this motorcycle. It’s the muscle that makes this
recently completed electric motorcycle ready to race
.
[Jackson Edwards] has been hard at work building this from the ground up. His goal was to make it competitive with production line motorcycles and his most recent test runs are pointing to success. The film shows off a couple of problems with the rear suspension. This actually led to him dumping the bike on a turn. He was unharmed but the control panel on the handlebars was unfortunately trashed. A bit of work fixed the handling and he was able to ride with confidence. We’re struck by how quiet the thing is as it tears past the camera at the very beginning of the video.
Sure, we’ve seen
other electric motorcycles
before. Those were all conversions from gas. Designing from the ground up really opened up a lot of choices not possible with a retrofit. Make sure to dig through all the posts on his blog to get the full picture. | 28 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "1006401",
"author": "jh",
"timestamp": "2013-05-21T13:07:42",
"content": "and now… the fine tuning",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1006408",
"author": "naviathan",
"timestamp": "2013-05-21T13:18:24",
"content": "That... | 1,760,376,546.012012 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/20/automated-cat-feeder-and-large-plastic-screws/ | Automated Cat Feeder And Large Plastic Screws | Brian Benchoff | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"home hacks"
] | [
"auger",
"cat feeder"
] | We’ve seen automated food dispensers for pets, but none that go so far as to
build large plastic screws for dispensing kibble
.
This isn’t [Mathieu]’s first automatic cat feeder; an earlier version used a wheel to dispense cat food in excessively large version. To improve upon his first build, [Mathiu] decided to use an Archimedean screw to dispense food in 5 gram increments. There was a problem, though: a proper industrial screw cost about $1500 and the ‘consumer’ versions of what he wanted were trash. He though about casting one in epoxy but didn’t want to poison his cat with strange chemicals. He ended up using
PolyMorph for his screw
, a plastic that melts at 60º C and
is also used in medical devices
.
The electronics of the build are an Arduino, a DS1307 real-time clock, LCD display, and a relay board powering an electric screwdriver motor. From the video demo below, we’re going to say [Mathieu] put together a pretty nice automated cat feeder.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kR7fvt7PUhk&w=580]
[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=E5H-7zGxXY8&w=580] | 24 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "1006194",
"author": "wretch",
"timestamp": "2013-05-20T23:11:10",
"content": "The cat doesn’t look too happy with the new design. I think it prefers the previous version that dispensed larger quantities of cat food goodness. (c:",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replie... | 1,760,376,545.897395 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/20/trimethyl-borate-lantern-built-from-garbage/ | Trimethyl Borate Lantern Built From Garbage | Mike Szczys | [
"chemistry hacks"
] | [
"glass",
"jar",
"lamp",
"lantern"
] | This lantern was built from recyclable goods. It’s a bit dangerous when used like the image above, but [The Green Gentleman] does give you a few other options in
his build instructions
which make for much safer operation.
The lantern enclosure is made from old cans and a glass jar. He screwed a couple of boards together at a right angle to act as a jig for cutting the glass. The V-shape created by the boards holds the jar on its side, giving his glass cutting tool something to rest upon. He then turns the jar to score it around the top, and then bottom. He alternated pouring boiling and chilled water on the score mark to shock the glass into breaking along the line.
This makes up the clear part of the enclosure which is later mated with metal top and bottom pieces. From there he adds either an LED, an alcohol lamp, or the Trimethyl Borate lamp seen above. The first two are relatively safe, but the latter burns at around 1500 degrees F. We have reservations about using a plain old glass jar as the enclosure for something burning this hot. It really should be heat resistant glass. | 18 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "1006157",
"author": "Doomsday Gap",
"timestamp": "2013-05-20T21:36:13",
"content": "Wait – isn’t that the stuff that the ruskies used to build the doomsday device in Dr. Strangelove?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1006159",
... | 1,760,376,546.161692 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/20/camera-based-touchscreen-input-via-an-fpga/ | Camera-based Touchscreen Input Via An FPGA | Mike Szczys | [
"Multitouch Hacks"
] | [
"camera",
"cornell",
"fpga",
"piano",
"touch screen"
] | [Chonggang Li] wrote in to share a link to the final project he and [Ran Hu] built for their embedded systems class. It’s called Piano Hero and
uses an FPGA to implement a camera-based touch screen system
.
All of the hardware used in the project is shown above. The monitor acts as the keyboard, using an image produced by the FPGA board to mark the locations of each virtual key. It uses a regular VGA monitor so they needed to find some way to monitor touch inputs. The solution uses a camera mounted above the screen at an obtuse angle. That is to say, the screen is tilted back just a bit which allows the images on it to be seen by the camera. The FPGA board processes the incoming image, registering a key press when your finger passes between the monitor and the camera. This technique limits the input to just a single row of keys.
This should be much simpler than
using a CCD scanner sensor
, but that one can track two-dimensions of touch input. | 7 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "1006163",
"author": "airmansnuffy",
"timestamp": "2013-05-20T21:46:24",
"content": "Nice, almost makes me feel ashamed for my embedded systems project.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1016143",
"author": "Leonardo Ruiz... | 1,760,376,546.315464 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/20/turning-a-phone-into-a-media-center-remote/ | Turning A Phone Into A Media Center Remote | Brian Benchoff | [
"Phone Hacks",
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"gpio",
"raspberry pi",
"telephone",
"xmbc"
] | [Kees] wanted a remote for an XBMC audio system. He had a classic T65 Dutch telephone in one of his project boxes and thought this phone with the addition of a Raspberry Pi he
could have a functional media remote
with classic lines and 70s styling.
Each of the digits on the phone were wired up to a small solderless breadboard. With a handful of resistors, [Kees] set up a simple pull up/pull down circuit feeding in to his Raspi’s GPIO input.
With a short Python script, [Kees] managed to map the buttons to XMBC’s play/pause, volume up/down, next, and previous commands. There were a few buttons left over, so those were mapped to online radio stations, playlists, and a strange setting known only as ‘moo’. We’re not sure what that button does, but you can see the other functions of this XMBC phone remote in action in the video below.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=MZjX6UAjFxQ] | 32 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "1006063",
"author": "JJ",
"timestamp": "2013-05-20T17:07:22",
"content": "Hipsters gonna hipst.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1006067",
"author": "M",
"timestamp": "2013-05-20T17:15:15",
"content": "fun, but needs ... | 1,760,376,546.383348 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/20/adding-leds-to-an-engagement-ring/ | Adding LEDs To An Engagement Ring | Brian Benchoff | [
"LED Hacks",
"Wearable Hacks"
] | [
"inductive",
"inductive coupling",
"led",
"ring",
"wedding ring"
] | Once upon a time, a nerd met a girl. Things happen
as they do
, and eventually [Ben] wanted to
create the be-all, end-all engagement ring
. (
here’s a cache
) It’s a simple titanium affair with 23 stones around the perimeter. What makes this ring so cool, though, is that it lights up whenever [Ben] and his girl are holding hands.
The metalworking portion of the build was about as easy as you would expect machining titanium to be. After the ring was cut off its bar stock, [Ben] brought it over to a mill where 23 holes for each of the stones were drilled. The stones were affixed to the ring with jewelers epoxy and the entire ring was buffed to an amazing shine.
The electronics are where this project really shines. Putting a battery of capacitor inside a ring is nigh impossible, so [Ben] decided to power the LEDs with an inductive charging circuit. A coil of wire wound around kapton tape serves as the inductor and a small SMD capacitor powers three very bright and very tiny LEDs.
The inductive charging unit itself is a masterpiece of hackery; [Ben] wanted the ring to light up whenever he and his ladyfriend were holding hands. To do this, [Ben]’s inductive charger is also a wearable device: a large coil of wire is the charger’s transformer and was would to fit around [Ben]’s wrist. The entire charging circuit can be easily hidden under a jacket sleeve, making for a nearly magical light-up ring.
An awesome piece of work, and one of the best jewelry builds we’ve seen in a long time. You can see the inductive coupling and shining LEDs in the video below. | 64 | 30 | [
{
"comment_id": "1006007",
"author": "dALE",
"timestamp": "2013-05-20T15:06:35",
"content": "wow",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1006208",
"author": "n_slash_a",
"timestamp": "2013-05-21T00:03:06",
"content": "seriously... | 1,760,376,546.48237 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/20/uk-hackerspace-builds-mobile-spaceship-disaster-simulator/ | UK Hackerspace Builds Mobile Spaceship Disaster Simulator | Mike Szczys | [
"Hackerspaces"
] | [
"camper",
"caravan",
"maker faire",
"simulator",
"spaceship"
] | A spaceship simulator sounds fun. But a spaceship
disaster
simulator is pure win. Members of the London Hack Space poured their hearts and souls into this build which they call the LHS Bikeshed. Now they’re
taking the show on the road
, letting attendees of Maker Faires all over the UK try their hand at beating the
Kobayashi Maru
disaster simulation.
The real question is how do you take your simulator on the road with you? You build it in an old camper (or caravan as the Brits call it). The towable sleeping quarters were gutted to make room for the well-crafted command center seen above. The demonstration video also shows off some bulkhead doors which open to reveal a wiring mess that must be fixed to prevent a disaster. Not only does the physical build really sell the concept, but the audio and video produced for the simulator look fantastic too. The link above is a recent post, but you should dig through their archives see multiple steps during the project build.
It makes us thing we should keep going with
our VW Bus hacking
. | 38 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "1005973",
"author": "arachnidster",
"timestamp": "2013-05-20T13:12:29",
"content": "The hackspace is the LHS – London Hack Space – and the spacecraft is called the LHS Bikeshed.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1005976",
"aut... | 1,760,376,546.554612 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/19/hackaday-links-sunday-may-19th-2013/ | Hackaday Links: Sunday, May 19th, 2013 | Mike Szczys | [
"Hackaday links"
] | [
"chess",
"diffuse",
"fans",
"fpga",
"full adder",
"laser",
"maze"
] | Laser cutter owners may find
this online box design tool
which [Jon] built quite useful. It’s got a few more joint options than
the Inkscape box design add-on
does.
Apparently the US Navy has the ability to bring down drones in
a flaming pile of laser-caused death
. [Thanks Joshua]
[Michail] has been working on
a transistor-based full adder
. He’s posted a Spice simulation if you want to learn about the design.
Turn your crystal clear LED bodies into diffuse ones
using a wooden dowel, power drill, and sandpaper
. The results look better than what we’ve accomplished by hand. [Thanks Vinnie]
Play your favorite Atari Jaguar games on an FPGA thanks to the work [Gregory Estrade] did to get it running on a Stratix-II board. You can pick
up the VHDL and support tools
in his repo. If you’re just curious you can watch
his demo vid
.
Members of Open Space Aarhus — a hackerspace in Risskov, Denmark — have been playing around with a bunch of old server fans.
They made a skirtless hovercraft
by taping them together and letting them rip. Too bad it can’t carry its own power supply
Here’s another final project from that bountiful Cornell embedded systems class. This team of students made a maze game that
forms the maze by capturing walls drawn on a white board
.
And finally, here’s
a unique chess board you can build
by raiding your parts bin. [Tetris Monkey] made the board from the LCD screen of a broken monitor. The playing pieces are salvaged electronics (like big capacitors) against corroded hardware (like nuts and bolts). We think it came out just great! | 32 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "1005752",
"author": "Frank",
"timestamp": "2013-05-19T21:34:46",
"content": "Please put back the full post on the front page these bits are killing the site for me and I suspect many others.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "100... | 1,760,376,546.623484 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/19/atx-raspi-is-a-smart-power-source-for-raspberry-pi/ | ATX Raspi Is A Smart Power Source For Raspberry Pi | Mike Szczys | [
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"psu",
"relay",
"RPi"
] | One aspect of the Raspberry Pi that has always challenged us is the power supply. It was a great idea to power the board from a standard micro-USB port because economy of scale makes phone chargers (even in the 1A range necessary for stable operation of the RPi) cheap and easy to acquire. The thing we miss is the ability to power the device on and off using the built-in hardware. The quandary has given rise to many different solutions, and
the ATX Raspbi smart PSU
is one of the better ones we’ve come across. It’s a nicely packaged take on
the PIC-based version
we saw earlier in the year.
The device is a small PCB that acts bridge between the micro-USB power supply and the RPi board. It offers several breakout headers, one of which is used for a power button. The button is monitored by a microcontroller that switches the on-board relay accordingly. But it won’t just kill the power when you want to shut down. It first signals one of the RPi GPIO pins, causing the OS to execute a shutdown script. It then monitors the RPi for the shutdown tasks to finish before cutting the power. | 55 | 20 | [
{
"comment_id": "1005709",
"author": "no",
"timestamp": "2013-05-19T19:04:52",
"content": "ATX is a power supply standard. This is not ATX, and should not be called ATX. It’s interesting, but soured by the poor choice of a name.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
... | 1,760,376,546.710312 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/19/wireless-microcontrollerpc-interface-for-3/ | Wireless Microcontroller/PC Interface For $3 | Brian Benchoff | [
"Microcontrollers",
"Radio Hacks",
"Wireless Hacks"
] | [
"433 mhz",
"microcontroller",
"radio",
"wireless"
] | Sending data from a microcontroller to a PC usually requires some sort of serial connection, either through fiddly on-chip USB, FTDI chips, or expensive radio ICs. [Scott] didn’t want to deal with this when creating a network of wireless temperature sensors,
so he hacked up a few cheap 433 MHz radio transmitters
and receivers to transmit data to a PC for about $3.
After sensor data is collected on a microcontroller and sent over radio, there’s still the issue of getting it into a PC. For this, [Scott] piped the data into the microphone port of a cheap USB sound card.
We’ve seen this trick before
both in the world of microcontrollers and loading programs onto a Commodore 64 via a cassette interface.
Once the data is sent into the sound card, it’s decoded with a a small Python app. Given the range and quality of the RF transmitters and receivers [Scott] says it’s not an extremely reliable way to send data to a PC. It is cheap, though, and if you need to read sensors wirelessly on a budget, it’s hard to do much better.
Check out [Scott]’s demo of his creation below.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJHFldPwZvM&w=580] | 48 | 17 | [
{
"comment_id": "1005639",
"author": "Addidis",
"timestamp": "2013-05-19T17:05:48",
"content": "nrf24l01+ modules are pretty cheap. About 2$ on ebay and are remarkably reliable.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1005717",
"author": "frea... | 1,760,376,546.797473 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/19/controlling-a-terminal-with-google-voice/ | Controlling A Terminal With Google Voice | Brian Benchoff | [
"Linux Hacks",
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"google voice",
"raspberry pi",
"sms",
"ssh",
"terminal"
] | For how awesome Google Voice is, we’re surprised we haven’t seen this before. [Steve]
is using Google Voice
to run commands on just about any Linux box.
Google Voice doesn’t have an official API, and existing unofficial APIs weren’t up to snuff for [Steve]’s project. He ended up writing his own that checks his unread message inbox every minute and looks for new text messages beginning with the phrase, ‘Cmd’. If a series of checks pass – the text coming from a known phone number and a proper terminal command – the command runs and sends the a text back indicating success or failure.
While [Steve] probably won’t be playing nethack or Zork via SMS anytime soon, we can see this being very useful for a Raspi home automation task. Just send a text message and a properly configured Linux box can open your garage door, turn on the lights, or even start a webcam. | 17 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "1005621",
"author": "ChalkBored",
"timestamp": "2013-05-19T15:54:56",
"content": "Thanks for giving the headline a title that describes the concept and not the device it happens to run on.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1005622... | 1,760,376,546.918662 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/19/fpga-plays-mario-like-a-champ/ | FPGA Plays Mario Like A Champ | Mike Szczys | [
"FPGA"
] | [
"cornell",
"nes",
"nintendo",
"super mario bros"
] | This isn’t an FPGA emulating Mario Bros., it’s
an FPGA playing the game by analyzing the video and sending controller commands
. It’s a final project for an engineering course. The ECE5760 Advanced FPGA course over at Cornell University that
always provides entertainment
for us every time the final projects are due.
Developed by team members [Jeremy Blum], [Jason Wright], and [Sima Mitra], the video parsing is a hack. To get things working they converted the NES’s 240p video signal to VGA. This resulted in a rolling frame show in the demo video. It also messes with the aspect ratio and causes a few other headaches but the FPGA still manages to interpret the image correctly.
Look closely at the screen capture above and you’ll see some stuff that shouldn’t be there. The team developed a set of tests used to determine obstacles in Mario’s way. The red lines signify blocks he will have to jump over. This also works for pits that he needs to avoid, with a different set of tests to detect moving enemies. Once it knows what to do the FPGA emulates the controller signals necessary, pushing them to the vintage gaming console to see him safely to the end of the first level.
We think this is more hard-core than
some other autonomous Mario playing hacks
just because it patches into the original console hardware instead of using an emulator. | 7 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "1005637",
"author": "lc",
"timestamp": "2013-05-19T17:02:56",
"content": "Nice Project!Full FPGA hardware implementations (without emulation of the NES processor system, or reusing binary cartridge software) of Mario Bros. have been previously made in Verilog. Please have a look to... | 1,760,376,547.076697 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/18/robot-air-hockey-championship-as-a-final-project/ | Robot Air Hockey Championship As A Final Project | Mike Szczys | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"air hockey",
"clemson"
] | My final project is build a robot that plays air hockey? Where do I sign up? Apparently you get yourself a seat in ECE496 at Clemson University. They have been using the concept as a final project for at least a couple of years. [Abe Froman] was on the winning design team this year and
he’s showing off his robot and some winning games
it played.
His robot is in the foreground. It uses a right-angle PVC joint to hold the paddle. The fitting is attached to a rack and pinion that drives it forward and back. The entire assembly is mounted on a rotating rig. Take a look at some of its opponents that use more of a plotter-type arm. Those offerings have too much play in the joints which at times causes the thing to miss.
Chances are good that once you get a job you won’t be asked to do things for the company unless they are money makers. Sure, there are
a few notable exceptions
, but since you’re playing to go to school we really appreciate the professors making the learning as enjoyable as possible before you have to get serious (and maybe even wear a tie!).
[via
Reddit
] | 17 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "1005350",
"author": "ChalkBored",
"timestamp": "2013-05-18T21:55:04",
"content": "The first opponent seems to be designed to hit pucks into it’s own goal.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1005407",
"author": "roboman244... | 1,760,376,546.86721 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/18/just-put-your-lips-together-to-turn-on-a-lamp/ | Just Put Your Lips Together To Turn On A Lamp | Mike Szczys | [
"home hacks"
] | [
"home automation",
"lamp",
"whistle"
] | The inlaid image is a controller board which [Limpkin] developed to
add whistle control as a home automation option
. It has an effective range of around fifteen feet and does a good job of detecting whistles from many different people. Here is one of the test subjects (captured with a hidden camera) whistling to the white LED lamp in order to switch it on.
The board is quite small. [Limpkin] holds it up in the beginning of his test video, which gives a good sense of scale. One end has a barrel jack through which the board gets power. The other end has a two conductor screw terminal which is used for switch your devices. An N-channel MOSFET protects the circuit when a heavy external load is connected. It is capable of driving a respectable 90 watts. If you’re looking to switch mains rated devices you’ll need to bring your own relay to the party.
Audio processing is handled by the Freescale ARM Cortex M4 chip at the center of the board. The Serial Wire Debug (SWD) clock and data pins are both broken out to solder pads so the thing is hackable. [Limpkin] posted the schematic, gerbers, and a code template. But he didn’t release the algorithms he uses for processing so if you want to make this at home you’ll need to figure that out for yourself. If you need help you should check out
this whistle-based remote control
.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1eIxAMKNphw | 14 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "1005301",
"author": "Dinis",
"timestamp": "2013-05-18T19:07:46",
"content": "what if i just came from the dentist? I wont be able to turn on the lights :X",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1005632",
"author": "Scott Hard... | 1,760,376,547.223053 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/18/dermal-implants-means-strapless-watch/ | Dermal Implants Means Strapless Watch | Brian Benchoff | [
"clock hacks",
"Wearable Hacks"
] | [
"body modification",
"dermal implants",
"Sony SmartWatch",
"subdermal",
"watch"
] | Google Glass is a year or so out, and even after that we’re still looking at about five years until we’re all upgraded at the behest of our robotic overlords. [justurn] simply can’t wait, so he decided to submit to the cybermen early with
his Android-controlled wristwatch
attached with dermal implants.
[justurn]’s got the inspiration for his project from
this earlier Hackaday post
involving dermal implants and an iPod nano. The iPod nano doesn’t have a whole lot of functionality, though, but the
Sony SmartWatch
does, and without the inevitable accusations of fanboyism.
To prep his arm for the hardware upgrade, [justurn] had four titanium dermal anchors placed in his wrist. After letting his anchors heal for a few months, [justurn] installed very strong neo magnets in the bases for his anchors and the clip for the SmartWatch’s strap.
The result is a magnetically mounted, Android-controlled watch semi-permanently attached to [justurn] at the wrist. We love it too. | 111 | 34 | [
{
"comment_id": "1005234",
"author": "Ole Wolf",
"timestamp": "2013-05-18T17:03:17",
"content": "Tomorrow: DIY dermal implants.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1006201",
"author": "Patrik D'haeseleer (@PatrikD)",
"timestamp": "... | 1,760,376,547.377426 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/18/filming-light-reflecting-off-objects/ | Filming Light Reflecting Off Objects | Brian Benchoff | [
"digital cameras hacks",
"hardware"
] | [
"light time of flight",
"photography",
"siggraph"
] | With high-speed cameras you’re able to see bullets passing through objects, explosions in process, and other high-speed phenomena. Rarely, though, are you able to see what happens when light shines on an object without hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of equipment. A group of researchers at The University of British Columbia
are doing just that
with hardware that is well within the range of any home tinkerer.
Making videos of light passing through and around objects
has been done before
(great animated gifs of that
here
), but the equipment required of previous similar projects cost $300,000 and couldn’t be used outside the controlled environment of a lab. [Matthias] and his team put together a similar system for about $1,000. The only hardware required is an off-the-shelf 3D time of flight camera and a custom driver powering six red laser diodes.
Aside from having a much less expensive setup than the previous experiments in recording the flight of a pulse of light, [Matthias] and his team are also able to take their and record the flight of light in non-labratory settings. They’ll be doing just that at this year’s SIGGRAPH conference, producing videos of light reflecting off attendee-produced objects in just a few minutes. You can check out the video for the project below. | 13 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "1005227",
"author": "ChalkBored",
"timestamp": "2013-05-18T16:38:18",
"content": "Now fill the room with smoke from a fog machine and re-do the disco ball test.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1005229",
"author": "Gene Abshi... | 1,760,376,547.167454 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/18/north-street-labs-try-to-spice-up-a-game-of-tic-tac-toe/ | North Street Labs Try To Spice Up A Game Of Tic-Tac-Toe | Mike Szczys | [
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"game",
"led strips",
"red bull",
"rgb",
"tic-tac-toe"
] | The team at North Street Labs really went all out with
this Tic-Tack-Toe stomp box
. At its most basic it’s a blinky version of the simple two-player game. But there’s always some added appeal when you make large manifestations of normally small items;
the 10x Arduino
is a good example of this.
The project is NSL’s qualifying entry for this year’s Red Bull Creation Contest (has it already been a year since
the last contest
?). A special Arduino shield was produced once again, this time it features hardware necessary to control LED strips… a lot of them. That led to the creation of this box, which houses a ton of strip sections inside to light the grid based on tapping one of the red buttons with your foot. We’d image the game would be seldom used at your hackerspace, but they take it to show off at the local children’s museum and it’s a huge hit with the kids! | 4 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "1005199",
"author": "Greg",
"timestamp": "2013-05-18T14:48:31",
"content": "Looks like they had fun. :)Exactly the kind of thing that might brighten people’s spirits in some town centre square.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "10... | 1,760,376,547.117165 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/17/reading-game-boy-carts-with-i2c/ | Reading Game Boy Carts With I2C | Brian Benchoff | [
"Nintendo Game Boy Hacks",
"Nintendo Hacks"
] | [
"game boy",
"game boy color",
"nintendo",
"raspberry pi",
"rom"
] | After seeing a Game Boy emulator for the first time, [Thijs] was amazed. A small box with just a handful of electronics that turns a Game Boy cartridge into a file able to be run on an emulator is simply magical. [Thijs] has learned a lot about GB and GBC cartridges in the mean time, but still thinks the only way to
really
learn something is to roll up your sleeves and get your hands dirty. Thus was born
[Thijs]’ Game Boy cartridge dumper
, powered by a pair of I2C port expanders and a Raspberry Pi.
Inspired by a build to
dump ROMs off Super Nintendo games
with the help of a Raspberry Pi, [Thijs] grabbed all the hardware necessary to create his own GB cart dumper. A
DS Lite cartridge adapter
provided the physical connection and a pair of MCP23017 I/O expanders – one soldered to a
Slice of PI/O
board – provided the electrical connections.
In the end, [Thijs] managed to dump the ROMs off the Japanese editions of Pokemon Yellow and Gold in about 13 minutes. This is a much slower transfer rate of 26 minutes per SNES cart
in the post that gave [Thijs] the inspiration
for this build. Still, [Thijs] will probably be the first to say he’s learned a lot from this build, especially after some problems with dumping the right banks from the cartridge. | 18 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "1005007",
"author": "bty",
"timestamp": "2013-05-18T00:11:52",
"content": "I’d just use an AVR to interface with the card and then connect to the pi over high speed serial. All of the IO expanders on the I2C bus controlled by python scripts are making this so slow. Now he’s waiting ... | 1,760,376,547.435026 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/17/led-retrofit-for-vintage-edge-lit-numeric-display-modules/ | LED Retrofit For Vintage Edge-lit Numeric Display Modules | Mike Szczys | [
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"digit",
"display",
"edge-lit",
"module",
"retrofit",
"vintage"
] | This single digit display is an old edge-lit module that [Ty_Eeberfest] has been working with. The modules were built for General Radio Company and have a really huge PCB to control just one digit. [Ty’s] modules didn’t come with that driver board, so he was left with the task of controlling an incandescent bulb for each digit. After a bit of thought he figured it would be much easier to just
replace the edge-light bulbs with a set of LEDs
.
We’ve seen these exact modules before, referenced in a project that
created an edge-lit Nixie tube from scratch
. Each digit in the display is made from a piece of acrylic with tiny drill holes which trace out the numerals. The acrylic is bent so that the edge exits out the back of the module where it picks up light from the bulb. [Ty] laid out his circuit board so that each LED was in the same position as the bulb it was replacing. As you can see, his retrofit works like a charm.
[Thanks Brian] | 20 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "1004973",
"author": "Hirudinea",
"timestamp": "2013-05-17T22:02:21",
"content": "Very nice, not only did he resurrect the display he made it better, this is what hacking is.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1004984",
"author"... | 1,760,376,547.497465 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/17/android-pen-plotter-snaps-processes-and-prints-pictures/ | Android Pen Plotter Snaps, Processes, And Prints Pictures | Mike Szczys | [
"Android Hacks"
] | [
"ioio",
"plotter",
"ytai"
] | Here’s
an Android powered pen plotter
that does it all. It was built by [Ytai Ben-Tsvi] to take with him to Maker Faire. He’s
the creator of IOIO
, a hardware interface module designed to communicate with an Android device via USB (host or OTG are both supported).
The physical hardware is simple enough. He draws on a pad of white paper using a felt-tipped marker. Located at the top of the easel are two wheels with stars etched on them. They are reels which spool and dole-out string to control the pen’s movements. The pen tip can be lifted by a ball bearing mounted just below it.
But the project really takes off when you watch [Ytai’s] demonstration. The Android tablet controlling the device captures a picture of an object — in this case it’s a toy truck. The app then processes it using edge detection to establish how to plot the image. | 14 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "1004943",
"author": "heatgap",
"timestamp": "2013-05-17T19:49:33",
"content": "That is badass. Well done. I like concept and how he went about using a hanging plotter. Very cool.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1004964",
"au... | 1,760,376,547.552185 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/17/drinking-games-and-digital-logic/ | Drinking Games And Digital Logic | Brian Benchoff | [
"Beer Hacks",
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"7 segment",
"atmega8",
"beer",
"centurion"
] | For those of you who might have forgotten, let’s go over the rules of Centurion. The object of the game is for every minute, for 100 minutes, drink a shot of beer. It doesn’t sound like a lot, but after completing the challenge you’ll have had 3 liters of beer (or about eight and a half 12 oz cans) in just under two hours. When [Peter] played Centurion, he found the biggest problem was – understandably – keeping track of the time and who drank what. For an upcoming weekend of drinking, [Peter] decided to solve this problem once and for all with
shift registers and seven-segment displays
.
[Peter]’s Centurion score box comes in two parts. The first and largest part of the build is the main board housing an ATMega8 microcontroller and a huge two digit seven-segment display to keep track of the countdown until the next shot. Two other boards house eight additional two digit seven-segment displays for each player, incremented every time a player presses a giant arcade button.
The entire build is designed around a small travel case that also holds a large battery for cordless drinking parties. Let’s just hope the project is reasonably water-resistant; we can see a lot of spills happening in the future. Check out the video demo below.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=QjgaaoGj2x8&w=580] | 39 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "1004886",
"author": "Blarghklaefjiro",
"timestamp": "2013-05-17T17:04:32",
"content": "Wow. You know you’re an alcoholic when….",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1004890",
"author": "Fractal",
"timestamp": "2013-... | 1,760,376,547.631367 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/17/homebrew-gps-gets-%c2%b11-meter-resolution-with-a-raspberry-pi/ | Homebrew GPS Gets ±1 Meter Resolution With A Raspberry Pi | Brian Benchoff | [
"hardware",
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"fpga",
"gps",
"homebrew",
"raspberry pi"
] | We’ve been following the work of [Andrew Holme] and his homebrew GPS receiver for a while now. A few years ago, [Andrew]
built a four-channel GPS receiver
from scratch, but apparently that wasn’t enough for him. He
expanded his build
last year to track up to eight satellites, and this month
added a Raspberry Pi
for a 12-channel, battery-powered homebrew GPS receiver that has an accuracy of about 3 feet.
The Raspi is attached to an FPGA board that handles the local oscillator, real-time events, and tracks satellites automatically. The Pi handles the difficult but not time-critical math through an SPI interface. Because the Pi is attached to the FPGA through an SPI interface, it can also load up the FPGA with even more custom code, potentially turning this 12-channel receiver into a 16- or 18-channel one.
An LCD display attached to the FPGA board shows the current latitude, longitude, and other miscellaneous data like the number of satellites received. With a large Li-ion battery, the entire system can be powered for about 5 hours; an impressively portable GPS system that rivals the best commercial options out there. | 50 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "1004835",
"author": "Ben",
"timestamp": "2013-05-17T14:59:29",
"content": "It would be interesting to see how easy it would be to add GLONASS support to this receiver. From what I have been reading, the frequencies are “relatively” close, so it might be possible with a few tweaks to... | 1,760,376,547.746531 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/17/flocking-behavior-using-mindstorm-robots/ | Flocking Behavior Using Mindstorm Robots | Mike Szczys | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"computer vision",
"CV",
"flocking",
"mindstorm",
"nxt",
"swarm robotics"
] | Do you ever wonder why geese always fly together in a V-shape? We’re not asking about the fact that it makes the work load much less for all but the lead goose. We mean how is it that all geese know to form up like this? It’s is the act of flocking, and it’s long been a subject of fascination when it comes to robotics. [Scott Snowden] researched the topic while working on his degree a few years ago. Above you can see the demonstration of the behavior using LEGO Mindstorm robots. That’s certainly interesting and you’ll want to check out the video after the break. But his offering doesn’t end with the demo. He also posted
a huge article about his work
that will provide days of fascinating reading.
We can’t begin to scratch the surface of all that he covers, but we can give you a quick primer on his Mindstorm (NXT) setup. He uses these three bots along with a central brick (the computer part of the NXT hardware) which communicates with them. This lets him use a wide range of powerful tools like MatLab and Processing to recognize each robot with a top-down camera, passing it data based on info harvested with computer vision. From there it’s a wild ride of modeling the behavior as a set of algorithms. | 12 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "1004816",
"author": "PR",
"timestamp": "2013-05-17T13:29:35",
"content": "Can this be considered as flocking? The way I understood it is that the camera gets the coordinates of each robot and transmits constantly the best postiion to each robot, depending on the position of the othe... | 1,760,376,547.801201 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/16/magnetic-cnc-marble-maze/ | Magnetic CNC Marble Maze | Mike Szczys | [
"cnc hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"ball bearing",
"gantry",
"maker faire",
"maze"
] | [Martin Raynsford] figured out a way to sneak some learning into a fun package. He did such a good job the test subjects didn’t even know they were teaching themselves just a tiny bit of CNC programming.
The apparatus above is a marble maze, but instead of building walls [Martin] simply etched a pattern on the playing field. The marble is a ball bearing which
moves through the maze using a magnetic CNC gantry
hidden underneath. Where does one get ball bearings of this size? If you’re [Martin] you scavenge them from
your laser-cut Donkey Kong game
.
He showed off the rig at the Maker Faire. It takes simple commands as cardinal directions and units of movement. The ‘player’ (remember, they’re secretly learning something, not just playing a game) inputs a series of movements such as “N10,E10” which are then pushed through a serial connection to the Arduino. It follows these commands, moving the hidden magnet which drags the ball bearing along with it. It’s simple, but watch the clip after the break and we think you’ll agree the sound of the stepper motors and the movement of the ball will be like crack for young minds. | 20 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "1004522",
"author": "roboman2444",
"timestamp": "2013-05-16T21:17:15",
"content": "Would be rather cool if thin little wires ran through the “walls”, to detect if the ball contacted them.Or, he could just etch them on a pcb.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
... | 1,760,376,547.863644 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/16/timelapse-of-the-3d-printed-gun-being-printed/ | Timelapse Of The 3d Printed Gun Being Printed. | Caleb Kraft | [
"3d Printer hacks",
"Featured",
"Weapons Hacks"
] | [
"firearm",
"gun",
"liberator",
"weapon"
] | Once the DoD requested the 3d printed gun files be removed from the internet, a couple things happened.
The
Streisand Effect
went into full force. The file was shared all over and can still be found easily.
I suddenly realized that I was going to be printing a 3d printed gun and doing another article on it even though
I had just written an opinion piece about how I don’t care
.
I’m not above admitting that it is childish of me. I was told I couldn’t have this thing and suddenly I knew I had to make it. I see it with my kids all the time. Toys can sit in a corner collecting dust for ages, but the second it is in threat of being removed, they have renewed interest, at least for a few minutes.
I figured, if I’m going to be childish about it and print a gun that a) won’t work because I don’t have the right printer, and b) I won’t use anyway because I don’t generally play with guns, I might as well make a fun timelapse video of the more recognizable parts being made.
It initially seemed like it was going to be quick and easy. However, I quickly found that just printing this thing was going to be a time consuming and frustrating task.
1. the scale on the individual files was way off.
I suspect this has something to do with the printer it was designed for. It seemed very close to being 1 inch = 1 mm. Not a completely uncommon problem. Manually resizing got some files to look right, but I found many simply wouldn’t resize.
2. Almost every single item had errors.
If you’ve done 3d printing, you’ve found that a model can have all kinds of issues that will stop it from printing correctly. I found every single item for the gun had errors. I actually learned a lot about how to repair non-manifold items from this exercise, so it was good in the end.
Some items, like the hammer and the hammer springs simply would not print. I ran them through systems to repair them and fix errors. It would say that everything was fixed, but when I tried to “slice” them for printing, the software would crash. This means that my gun is incomplete. It has no hammer. Not really that big of a deal to me.
the whole gun
Note that it is missing the hammer mechanism. More on that later.
disassembled
trigger spring. Cool design, I might use this idea for something else later
black: initial print with errors. Red: fixed print.
the gopro fell into the printer stopping it from moving the bed correctly. You can see the top two layers are shifted about an inch. The rest of that mess is just support material I was ripping out.
The hammer that refused to print correctly despite repeated repairs.
what the hammer was supposed to look like.
the spring that crashed my slicing program every time I tried to prepare it for a print.
Do I care now?
Nope. I climbed to the top of the fridge and got my cookies. I’m a happy child. The reality is that a zip gun is still cheaper, easier, safer, and more reliable. Here’s an example. | 196 | 47 | [
{
"comment_id": "1004479",
"author": "Lucky",
"timestamp": "2013-05-16T20:13:38",
"content": "They print fine on Stratasys machines, with no adjustments. Which is what they were designed to be printed on by DD.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "... | 1,760,376,548.384892 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/16/altering-automotive-window-motors-for-use-in-your-projects/ | Altering Automotive Window Motors For Use In Your Projects | Mike Szczys | [
"cnc hacks"
] | [
"machining",
"motor",
"power window",
"robot"
] | We agree with [Mário Saleiro] that the motors from a car’s power windows make for a fantastic high-torque solution to your next project. If you have a you-pick junkyard in your town they’ll be dirt cheap after you put in a bit of time to find and removing the parts from the yard. But you’ll probably want to add a few extra steps to get them ready, and he’s done a great job of documenting
how he augmented them with wheels and rotary encoders
.
One aspect of the project which really struck home with us was his machine-shop-101 style tricks to mate the axle of the motor with the wheel. He has a process which ensures you will find the exact center of a cylinder as you work. This starts by lining up a bench vice on his drill press. He then inserts a drill bit upside down in the drill chuck, lowers it and clamps the vice on the bit. After loosening the chuck he ends up with the bit pointing up at the exact center of the chuck. Next he chucks up a piece of threaded rod, drilling a perfectly centered hole by lowering it into the drill bit while the drill press is rotating. The image above shows him using this machined part as a guide to continue the hole into the motor’s axle. Click through the link above to learn the rest of the tricks he uses. | 22 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "1004467",
"author": "Pieter-Jan",
"timestamp": "2013-05-16T19:04:20",
"content": "Nice work! Definitely going to try this!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1004517",
"author": "Ryan",
"timestamp": "2013-05-16T21:13:10",
... | 1,760,376,547.931224 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/16/rigol-ds1022c-hack-brings-it-up-to-100mhz-speed/ | Rigol DS1022C Hack Brings It Up To 100MHz Speed | Mike Szczys | [
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"100MHz",
"ds1022c",
"firmware",
"oscilloscope",
"rigol"
] | [Andreas Schuler] has been playing around with his Rigol DS1022C digital storage oscilloscope. It’s an older model which can capture samples at up to 25MHz, but [Andreas] claims to have quadrupled that using a service menu hack. His technique
changes the settings to use the DS1022C at 100Mhz
.
Usually a hack like this includes some test measurements that confirm the hardware is actually sampling at the higher rate, and is not just
claiming
that it has the ability to do so. We’d love to hear from you in the comments if you’ve got this piece of bench hardware and decided to try it for yourself. His method enters in a sequence of buttons from the system info menu. If done correctly this will add a service menu option that wasn’t there before. A bit of navigation leads you to the screen seen above, where you can change the model number to DS1102C. This is the more robust 100MHz cousin of the 1022.
If you think you’ve seen this hack before it’s probably because the Rigol 1052E was previously
pulled to 100MHz with a firmware hack
. | 53 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "1004361",
"author": "Roger Wolff",
"timestamp": "2013-05-16T13:21:38",
"content": "The Rigols (at least the older 1052-era ones) sample at a way higher samplerate than should be neccessary for the analog bandwidth they have. The 1052 hack disabled an analog bandwidth-limiting filter... | 1,760,376,548.13987 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/15/converting-a-bottle-style-water-cooler-to-self-fill-from-the-tap/ | Converting A Bottle Style Water Cooler To Self-fill From The Tap | Mike Szczys | [
"home hacks"
] | [
"drinking water",
"sensor",
"water cooler"
] | [Roy Bean] thought it was pretty silly for the Milwaukee Makerspace to keep buying bottles of water for their water cooler. He rigged up a system that
automatically fills the refrigerated reservoir
in their water cooler. It’s a functional hack that also provided an excuse for him to learn about a couple of different sensors.
What you see above is the meat and potatoes of the hack. The well is where water from a bottle drains into the cooler. This has been covered with a sheet of acrylic to keep the drinking water clean. There is a copper pipe which has been plumbed into the tap water supply. The other two bits are redundant level sensors to make sure the water valve shuts off without overflowing. One of them is a capacitive proximity sensor, the other is a conductivity sensor hacked together using stainless steel hardware submerged in the pool.
If you’re worried about the taste or odor of your tap water just add in a single or multiple stage under-counter filter system when plumbing in the water line. The filters are easy to find and we’d bet they cost less than a contract with a bottled water company.
[Thanks Pete] | 70 | 21 | [
{
"comment_id": "1004190",
"author": "peter",
"timestamp": "2013-05-15T21:34:52",
"content": "You have a backup level sensor in case one doesn’t work. What happens if the valve/solenoid fails?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "1004191",
... | 1,760,376,548.67925 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/15/winch-hack-lets-your-change-chandelier-light-bulbs-at-ground-level/ | Winch Hack Lets Your Change Chandelier Light Bulbs At Ground Level | Mike Szczys | [
"home hacks"
] | [
"chandelier",
"light fixture",
"winch"
] | We’ve seen a lot of hacks from [Lou] and his latest continues the tradition of excellence. The entryway of his home is a couple of stories high and features a chandelier. Unfortunately he doesn’t have a ladder tall enough to use when changing light bulbs. Even if he did have a way to get up there it would be nice if the light fixture could come to him instead. This hack makes that happen by
adding an electric winch to lower the light fixture
.
Watching the installation process makes us think that [Lou] might be a little reckless. He’s up in the attic mounting a winch to the rafters before he cuts the board holding the fifty-pound chandelier’s junction box in place. He mentions foregoing the recommended cable fastener in lieu of some baling wire. But he does manage the task without dropping the ball so to speak — perhaps we shouldn’t be so critical of his methods. After altering the chandelier mounting bracket to work with a winch [Lou] wires an outlet in the attic and adds a plug to the cord on the light. This means he needs to go into the attic to unplug the light before lowering the fixture on the winch. But he’s not done yet. After the break you can watch the second part of the project with improves upon this by adding a wall switch to control the winch and extension cord management to route the power.
[Lou] really loves his automated home gadgets. Check out
the gaming table which drops from the ceiling
. | 50 | 21 | [
{
"comment_id": "1004155",
"author": "Homeowner",
"timestamp": "2013-05-15T19:15:59",
"content": "I am sorely in need of *some* solution for a bulb change on a similar located chandelier but I think lowering the entire thing is a bit overly-deisgned. It would have been much easier to deal with indiv... | 1,760,376,548.472758 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/15/3d-scanner-with-remarkable-resolution/ | 3D Scanner With Remarkable Resolution | Mike Szczys | [
"Laser Hacks"
] | [
"3d",
"dslr",
"laser",
"scanner"
] | Modeling simple objects in 3D can take some time. Modeling complex items… well you can get your college degree in that sort of thing. This method side-steps the artistic skill necessary to make the real virtual by
using a laser and camera to map a three-dimensional object
.
[Alessandro Grossi] is breaking the rules by using a 100mW laser for the project. He thinks that the Italian government prohibits anything over 5mW, but also mentions that the lens used to turn the laser dot into a vertical line drops the power dramatically. The beefy diode does still pay off, providing an incredibly intense line of light on the subject being mapped. The high-end DSLR camera mounted on the same arm as the laser captures a detailed image, which can be processed to dump everything other than the laser line itself. Because the two are mounted on different axes, the image provides plenty of perspective. That translates to the 3D coordinates used in the captured model shown in the inlaid image.
We’ve seen
3D scanners that move the subject
; they usually rotate it to map every side. This method only captures one side, but the stepper motor moves in such small increments that the final resolution is astounding. See for yourself in the video after the break.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7Z_mZf9BX4 | 47 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "1004096",
"author": "samimy",
"timestamp": "2013-05-15T13:12:27",
"content": "Awesome work, !please upload more videos about this project :)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "1004097",
"author": "Dax",
"timestamp": "2013-0... | 1,760,376,548.553989 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2013/05/14/one-game-controller-connects-to-many-consoles/ | One Game Controller Connects To Many Consoles | Mike Szczys | [
"Nintendo Hacks",
"Peripherals Hacks"
] | [
"arcade",
"atari",
"cnc",
"controller",
"mill"
] | [Dave Nunez] wanted arcade quality controls when gaming at home. The problem was he couldn’t decide on just one console to target with his build, so he targeted them all. What you see above is
a single controller that connects to many different gaming rigs
.
He took a simple-is-best approach, keeping the main goal of high-quality inputs at the forefront. To start, he built the face plate out of thick MDF to ensure it wouldn’t flex or bounce as he mashed the buttons. To keep the electronics as simple as possible he soldered connections to actual controller PCBs (well, reproductions of controllers), breaking each out to a separate DB9 connector on the back of the case. These connectors interface with one of the three adapter cables seen to the right. This lets the controller work with NES, SNES, and an Atari 2600 system.
To pull the enclosure together [Dave] designed the rounded corner pieces and cut them out with a CNC mill. These connect with flat MDF to make up the sides. To give it that professional look he filled the joints with Bondo and sanded them smooth before painting. | 10 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "1003929",
"author": "DanAdamKOF",
"timestamp": "2013-05-14T21:28:55",
"content": "Great choices in parts. This is one of the few controllers I’ve seen here that doesn’t make me (a longtime joystick modder) cringe :)Can’t go wrong with a Sanwa JLF lever (IMO a lot better than the Zi... | 1,760,376,548.730897 |
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