url stringlengths 37 208 | title stringlengths 4 148 | author stringclasses 173
values | publish_date stringclasses 1
value | categories listlengths 0 12 | tags listlengths 0 27 | featured_image stringlengths 0 272 | content stringlengths 0 56.1k | comments_count int64 0 900 | scraped_comments_count int64 0 50 | comments listlengths 0 50 | scraped_at float64 1.76B 1.76B |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
https://hackaday.com/2011/11/01/amazingly-realistic-skeleton-prop/ | Amazingly Realistic Skeleton Prop | Mike Szczys | [
"Holiday Hacks"
] | [
"crow",
"halloween",
"radio",
"servo",
"skeleton"
] | [Cjmekeel] spent weeks getting his Halloween display ready this year. The centerpiece of his offering is
this full-sized motorized skeleton
. But there’s a few other gems that he worked on to compliment it. There’s an old-fashioned radio whose dial moves mysteriously and plays a news flash warning of an escaped mental patient. He also spent a couple of dollars to outfit a crow with some glowing red eyes and a servo motor.
But the creepiness of the skeleton means you might not even notice those other props. He started with a rather boring looking plain plastic head and did some real magic to build up the rotting flesh and gaping wounds. Those penetrating eyes don’t hurt either. The head moves on a few servo motors which use random values and sleep periods for disturbingly jerky movements. Check out the video after the break to get a glimpse at what kept kids away from his house on Halloween.
This is just a build log and unfortunately there’s no post yet showing the finished product. If we can get enough information together we’ll try to run a follow-up.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHE44vVnX3s&w=470]
[Thanks Skater_j10] | 5 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "496879",
"author": "TSR",
"timestamp": "2011-11-01T20:27:35",
"content": "If he could quiet up that jaw motor, this would be amazing.Next step? Motion tracking, so it just stares at you.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "496881",
... | 1,760,377,042.231009 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/11/01/halloween-hacks-the-headless-dogman/ | Halloween Hacks: The Headless Dogman | Mike Nathan | [
"Holiday Hacks"
] | [
"costume",
"hack a week",
"Halloween hacks"
] | Typically, when people hear that you’ve made a Halloween costume for your dog, the statement is met with the eye rolling and polite lies about how cute the outfit is. There are few exceptions to this rule, and
[Dino’s] latest creation is one of them.
For this week’s entry in his Hack a Week series, he created a “Headless Horseman” costume for his dog [Sophie].
The costume borrows parts from one of his previous hacks,
the Hexababy.
Reclaiming the dismembered head from the disturbing crawler, [Dino] reattaches it to the doll’s body, just not in the traditional manner. He screws the baby’s head to the arm of the doll after fashioning its outfit from some scrap cloth. The doll’s head retains it’s beady red LED eyes from the previous project, but [Dino] added a tilt switch to the setup so that they light up sporadically as the dog runs about.
Be sure to check out the video below to see the final result of [Dino’s] work. The doll looks great, though it seems that its saddle needs some reinforcement to handle [Sophie’s] bountiful energy stores.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=9bZTr5FGqYQ#!&w=470] | 4 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "496810",
"author": "Mike",
"timestamp": "2011-11-01T19:07:59",
"content": "Would love to see a shot of this in the dark… particularly since dogs eyes do that creepy greenish glow in low light.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "496... | 1,760,377,042.187888 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/11/01/skeleton-does-a-looney-tunes-style-song-and-dance/ | Skeleton Does A Looney Tunes Style Song And Dance | Mike Szczys | [
"Holiday Hacks"
] | [
"dancing",
"dyio",
"halloween",
"michigan j. frog",
"skeleton"
] | [Kevin Harrington] throws a curve ball with this skeleton in a coffin. Instead of going for the cheap scare, he conjures memories of old cartoons when
the bony figure puts on a song and dance
. When activated it leans forward to hang out of the coffin donning a tattered tuxedo and top hat. You can hear the servos working as they give jerky yet realistic motion to the tune “Hello! Ma Baby” in
the true Michigan J. Frog style
. Classic!
He figures it took about $36 in parts to put the skeleton together plus
the DyIO module
to control it from a PC. Four servos are used in total, connected to the skeleton with some steel cable. Connecting it via a computer makes it a bit easier to synchronize music with motion than just using a microcontroller capable of playing back audio would have been. Code is available from the site linked at the top, and a demo video is embedded after the break.
This would also have been possible by
using an Arduino as a DMX controller
.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRUoMjDTQ4Q&w=470] | 4 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "496508",
"author": "Hirudinea",
"timestamp": "2011-11-01T17:12:57",
"content": "LOL, that’s great, I’ve never seen a skeleton with epilepsy before!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "496575",
"author": "N0LKK",
"timestamp":... | 1,760,377,042.269742 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/11/01/led-sexting-belt-buckle/ | LED Sexting Belt Buckle | Brian Benchoff | [
"Android Hacks",
"Arduino Hacks",
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"android",
"arduino",
"Belt Buckle",
"LED array",
"sms"
] | For some ungodly reason, [Scott] has a friend that wanted a ‘sexting themed’ Halloween costume. We won’t try to make any presumptions of the creativity or mental stability of [Scott]’s friend, but the
SMS scrolling LED belt buckle
he came up with is pretty cool.
The belt is based around a $13 scrolling LED belt buckle [Scott] found online. There was a problem with the belt buckle, though. Thirteen dollars means [Scott] didn’t get a whole lot of features with his buckle, so there are only 3 buttons on the entire device: letter up, letter down, and enter. Instead of pressing a button 80 times to get a lowercase ‘z,’ an Arduino was thrown into the mix to take care of all the button pressing.
The
Arduino sketch
could now input any message into the belt buckle in a matter of seconds. All that was left to do is taking care of the SMS to text part of the build. For this, [Scott] used the
Sparkfun USB Host Shield
and a custom Android app. Whenever an SMS is received on the phone, the message is sent through the USB shield to the Arduino and output on the belt buckle.
We won’t make any assumptions about the content of the messages during the Halloween party, but at least the video demo of the build is family friendly. Check it out after the break.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=2t_RFcOe61g&w=470] | 11 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "496450",
"author": "HackerK",
"timestamp": "2011-11-01T16:20:05",
"content": "Nice!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "496465",
"author": "N0LKK",
"timestamp": "2011-11-01T16:43:04",
"content": "Probably a good Apple wh... | 1,760,377,041.828126 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/31/insanely-kludgy-pen-plotter-actually-works/ | Insanely Kludgy Pen Plotter Actually Works | Brian Benchoff | [
"hardware"
] | [
"plotter",
"pololu"
] | This pen plotter
, held together with structural epoxy, is an amazing piece of engineering, and almost as impressive as a bridge made entirely out of Bondo.
[Brian] at the Rochester, NY hackerspace
Interlock
needed to build something for the
BarCamp
geek “unconference.” To lure BarCamp attendees over to the Interlock table, they needed a small tabletop device with whirring motors that was able to make some decent swag. Hacking together a pen plotter sounded like the perfect project.
The mechanics of the build were scavenged from old printers and scanners. [Brian] decided to use pin-feed card stock, so the take-up wheels from an old dot matrix printer was sacrificed as well. This paper feed mechanism serves as the Y axis, and the X axis rides above the paper on precision rods. The pen holder is supported by a
tiny solenoid
.
Things start getting crazy at the software level.
grbl
was loaded onto an Arduino with a stepper driver shield, and vector text drawings were printed. After a bit of live-action hackery, [Brian] figured out how to plot captured webcam images. OpenCV captures and does a trace outline. This is converted to vectors with autotrace, and from EPS to HPGL by
pstoedit
. A Python script then cleans up the HPGL and converts it to G code and sends it to the printer. Confused? So are we, so just check out the video of the plotter in action after the break.
[flickr video=6295455826] | 10 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "495755",
"author": "Alex",
"timestamp": "2011-10-31T19:38:34",
"content": "That’s pretty damn cool. I like how he used tractor paper for the feed system. Definitely makes things simpler…",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "495759",
... | 1,760,377,041.763325 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/31/automated-cd-ripper-build-from-lego-and-other-parts/ | Automated CD Ripper Build From Lego And Other Parts | Mike Szczys | [
"cnc hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"cd",
"duplicator",
"dvd",
"lego",
"ripper"
] | [Paul Rea] decided it was finally time to get rid his CD and DVD library by ripping the data onto a hard drive. He has a rather extensive collection of discs and didn’t relish the thought of ripping them one at a time. So he set to work
building his own automatic CD ripper/duplicator
.
Right off the bat he had several specifications for the build. He wanted it to be platform independent, reliable, and cheap to build. We think he really hit the mark, but he does mention that he’s got a second duplicator build in mind already. This version makes heavy use of Lego parts for the arm and gearing. The base has a stepper motor which swings the arm in an arc which reaches the input pile, the optical drive try, and the output bin. The arm itself has a two-part wooden gripper that is positioned over a CD and uses a limiting switch to sense when the vertical orientation is at the proper point for gripping a disc. We enjoyed reading his log as he discusses the various building challenges he encountered and how each was overcome.
We’ve seen a few other builds like this before.
One of our favorites
is from way back.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZD21yVuSk70&w=470] | 7 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "495766",
"author": "Ted",
"timestamp": "2011-10-31T19:59:31",
"content": "“He has a rather extensive collection of discs and didn’t relish the thought of ripping them one at a time.” So instead he opted to spend twice as long building this contraption. ;)It’s ok, I could relate!",
... | 1,760,377,042.015231 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/31/preparing-for-the-zombie-apocalypse/ | Preparing For The Zombie Apocalypse | Brian Benchoff | [
"Weapons Hacks"
] | [
"defense",
"louisville slugger",
"zombie"
] | Every reasonable person prepares for the future. Whether it’s matching your employer’s 401k contributions, making sure you have bread and milk
before
a snow storm, or saving for your kid’s college fund, planning for the future gives you a comfortable life. [Gord] has exceptional foresight; he build an awesome
Louisville Decapitron
for the upcoming zombie apocalypse.
It’s an urban legend that a bullet to the brain will stop a zombie. Instantaneous trepanation is devastating in the living, but we’re talking about the undead here. A melee weapon is what you’re after, and you’ve got to cut off the head. [Gord] based his project around a Louisville Slugger. The blade is a 20 inch long piece of plasma cut mild steel. It’s just a prototype to get the balance figured out; the final version will be done in carbon steel.
The tang of the blade fits into two notches in the bat. The blade is secured with two custom fabricated spacers that are perpendicular to the blade. We’re not quite sure of the nomenclature of the resulting weapon (it’s some type of battle axe, we’re sure), but we couldn’t think of a better way to decapitate the undead. | 30 | 24 | [
{
"comment_id": "495673",
"author": "Hirudinea",
"timestamp": "2011-10-31T17:34:31",
"content": "Batter up, zombie down!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "495677",
"author": "deathventure",
"timestamp": "2011-10-31T17:38:58",
"content"... | 1,760,377,042.083518 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/31/old-school-projector-turned-digital/ | Old-school Projector Turned Digital | Brian Benchoff | [
"classic hacks",
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"Nokia LCD",
"projector",
"slide projector"
] | Who hasn’t thought about turning a 1950s slide projector into a digital projector? [Matt] did, but unlike most of us,
he actually did it
.
[Matt]’s friend [Angus] found an old, single-slide, sans-carousel slide projector in the trash. It’s a wonderful piece of ancient technology with a fabric insulated power cord and bakelite lamp socket. This projector was upcycled to the 21st century by adding a 10 Watt LED and a Nokia 1200 LCD.
For the electronics, [Matt] used an ATmega88 microcontroller. There’s an infrared receiver so the remote from an in-car CD player can be used to advance the slides and turn the projector on and off. The LCD is controlled by a bit of bit-banging from the Mega88, using hard-coded images of Che Guevara, Hendrix, Space Invaders and some old-school
Macintosh/Lisa icons
. Unlike the screen printed t-shirts at American Apparel, Che is the only authentic image in this project; this projector might have been made after Guevara came to prominence.
With a 10 Watt LED, it’s not the brightest projector on the planet and the picture is a little washed out in a bright room. With dim lighting, it’s a very good project even if the images are static. | 21 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "495617",
"author": "Ren",
"timestamp": "2011-10-31T15:20:38",
"content": "I wish the site had included pictures of the LCD and ATMEL circuit boards, and/or schematic.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "495754",
"author": ... | 1,760,377,041.716341 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/31/color-organ-tiki-o-lantern/ | Color Organ Tiki-o’-lantern | Brian Benchoff | [
"Holiday Hacks"
] | [
"color organ",
"Halloween hacks",
"jack-o-latern"
] | The Halloween parties this weekend are over, but that doesn’t mean there’s not time for a few more to finish a build before children start knocking on doors tonight. [formori] at Lakehead University wanted to do something spectacular for a pumpkin carving contest, so he and a few other EE students came up with a
tiki-o’-lantern with music
.
The guys at Lakehead figured a color organ flashing LEDs in the eyes and mouth of the tiki would be a very good and easy project. The circuit they used is a simple Op-amp setup like
one we’ve seen earlier
. The entire pumpkin is powered by a 9 V battery and the music is played with an iPod. There are two colors of LEDs – high frequencies flash a blue LED in the eyes and low frequencies flash a red LED in the mouth.
Aside from the added A/V stuff, [formori]’s
pumpkin
is one of the best we’ve seen on Hack a Day this year. Check out the Youtube of 1st place winner of the Lakehead pumpkin carving contest after the break.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjFhwe5jooU&w=470] | 7 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "495593",
"author": "Brett W. (FightCube.com)",
"timestamp": "2011-10-31T14:27:22",
"content": "Very cool. Now that you said it’s one of the best pumpkins you’ve seen on HAD, be prepared for a flood of “mine’s better!”Here’s mine… not better but similar.http://i.imgur.com/vuWti.jpgI... | 1,760,377,041.872695 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/31/arduino-controlled-four-socket-outlet/ | Arduino Controlled Four Socket Outlet | Brian Benchoff | [
"Arduino Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"relays"
] | Never get between a man and his salami. [Mike] needed a way to control temperature, humidity and airflow with his meat curing setup. Of course he could modify a refrigerator and humidifier to be controlled separately, but [Mike] decided the best course of action would be to control
line voltage with an Arduino
.
[Mike] started his build with a four socket wall housing he picked up at Home Depot for a few dollars. After wiring up each outlet so it can be controlled independently, he set out designing a
four port relay board
. This was a pretty simple build – four 10 Amp relays and a few terminal blocks. The
PCB
was designed in Eagle as a single-side board for ease of manufacturing.
The relay board is meant to fit inside the blue box along with the four sockets, so a few holes were drilled for the power and control wires. The entire assemblage was put together and tested out. [Mike] posted a video of his controllable outlet flashing a light bulb at 10 Hz. Check out that light switch rave after the break.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=B5lXlHG156Y&w=470] | 27 | 16 | [
{
"comment_id": "495474",
"author": "Doc Oct",
"timestamp": "2011-10-31T11:57:45",
"content": "He better be careful flashing a CFL like that. Those things don’t like to be switched a lot, dramatically reduces the lifespan of the bulb. Neat project otherwise.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
... | 1,760,377,042.148638 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/30/two-dj-hero-controllers-turned-into-a-giant-etch-a-sketch/ | Two DJ Hero Controllers Turned Into A Giant Etch A Sketch | Brian Benchoff | [
"Peripherals Hacks"
] | [
"dj hero",
"etch a sketch",
"game controller"
] | [Ryan] sent in a
little project
he’s been working on. After he got his hands on a pair of DJ Hero controllers, he figured he needed to pull controller data off them.
After plugging in his two DJ Hero controllers to a breakout board, [Ryan] discovered the turntables communicate on an I2C bus. A
Teensy
was thrown into the mix, and work began on decoding the turntable output. [Ryan] figured out that by pulling 23 bytes from the turn table, he was left with the necessary data. Byte 20 is the state of the green, red, and blue buttons, byte 21 is the distance traveled, and byte 23 indicates clockwise or counter-clockwise. After [Ryan] figured out how to pull data off his DJ Hero controllers, the only thing left to do was build a giant Etch A Sketch on a 55 inch TV.
By the time the Etch A Sketch was completed, [Ryan] figured out that he had a gigantic rotary encoder – perfect for some classic MAME action. He started up MAME and loaded up
Cameltry
and
Off The Wall
. The DJ Hero controllers seem to work just fine, even if the hunched-over [Ryan] can’t beat the levels. | 12 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "495055",
"author": "AbsoluteZero",
"timestamp": "2011-10-30T19:59:36",
"content": "Nice, I’d like to pick up one of these and integrate it with some music/midi/synth/sequencer stuff I’m working with.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_... | 1,760,377,042.321482 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/29/weekly-roundup-102911/ | Weekly Roundup 10/29/11 | Jack Buffington | [
"Weekly Roundup"
] | [
"weekly roundup"
] | In case you missed them the first time, here are the most popular posts from this week:
Our most popular post this week was about how to
use HTML5 to display sensor data
. This is a pretty interesting demo of the new web technology.
Next up is a post about an
animatronic zombie that can crawl around via remote control
. It is surprisingly maneuverable and would definitely be creepy crawling towards you in the dark dark middle of the night.
After that is a post where our own [Kevin Dady]
created a new charger for a cell phone
that he recently acquired. This is a pretty comprehensive tutorial that could be of use to others who may have misplaced their charger and have some spare parts lying around.
Next we have a post about a new technology that has been created that lets you
render objects into photos that have been previously taken
.
Finally, there is a post about a
research project that uses a Microsoft surface and a whole mess of proximity sensors
to detect where people are located and which hand they are touching the surface with. | 0 | 0 | [] | 1,760,377,042.62446 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/28/ants-duke-it-out-in-the-ai-challenge/ | Ants Duke It Out In The AI Challenge | Mike Szczys | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"ai",
"artificial in",
"programming"
] | All of those orange, cyan, and yellow dots represent digital ants fighting for supremacy. This is a match to see who’s AI code is better in the Google backed programming competition:
The AI Challenge
. Before you go on to the next story, take a hard look at giving this a try for yourself. It’s set up as a way to get more people interested in AI programming, and they claim you can be up and running in just five minutes.
Possibly the best part of the AI Challenge is the resources they provide. The starter kits offer example code as a jumping off point in 22 different programming languages. And a quick start tutorial will help to get you thinking about the main components involved with Artificial Intelligence coding.
The game consists of ant hills for each team, water as an obstacle, and food collection as a goal. The winner is determined by who destroyed more enemy ant hills, and gathered more resources. It provides some interesting challenges, like how to search for food and enemy ant hills, how to plot a path from one point to another, etc. But if you’re interested in video game programming or robotics, the skills you learn in the process will be of great help later in your hacking exploits. | 19 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "493665",
"author": "Punkguyta",
"timestamp": "2011-10-29T00:15:44",
"content": "This is a rather peculiar thing to see Google do, in 3D, let alone 2D. I will definitely keep tuned on this one.I think the demand for AI development should be increased substantially, it would help our ... | 1,760,377,042.454296 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/28/upgrading-a-solar-lamp-to-charge-an-ipad/ | Upgrading A Solar Lamp To Charge An IPad | Mike Nathan | [
"Solar Hacks"
] | [
"ikea",
"MintyBoost",
"solar power",
"Sunnan lamp",
"upgrades"
] | [Phillip] and the crew at Voltaic Systems took a look at the Sunnan solar powered desk lamp from IKEA a while back, and while they thought it was pretty useful, there were definitely
some things they wanted to change.
First on their list of revisions was to increase the capacity of the stock battery pack. Taking the lamp apart and unscrewing the pack’s lid revealed a set of 3 AA cells, which they swapped out for higher-capacity models with more than double the watt-hour rating.
A beefed up battery is a good start, but the lamp’s tiny solar panel has no hope of topping off the batteries outside of Death Valley. To ensure that they get a nice full charge, a small jack was wired into to the battery pack, allowing the group to connect any size external solar panel they pleased.
Finally, [Phillip] and Co. wanted the ability to charge an iPad2 from the lamp’s battery pack. They hacked in a small USB connector and a slightly modified MintyBoost board to provide a little extra juice to their tablet.
While they are still testing the modifications, they say that everything is working nicely, citing that the extra battery capacity and charging abilities are a great addition. | 16 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "493617",
"author": "Oscar",
"timestamp": "2011-10-28T22:19:04",
"content": "This is a really cool Idea. I like how they’ve illustrated every step on the initial website. I want to look at this for myself. Thanks guys.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
}... | 1,760,377,042.507835 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/28/halloween-hacks-arc-reactor-costume/ | Halloween Hacks: Arc Reactor Costume | Brian Benchoff | [
"Holiday Hacks"
] | [
"arc reactor",
"costume",
"Halloween hacks"
] | Halloween is the time of year where you can dress up as a pirate, muppet, or superhero and no one will bat an eye. During this holiday of expanded social permissiveness, [Nbitwonder] decided that
building an Arc Reactor
from
Iron Man
would be appreciated by his engineering cohort.
The ‘body’ of the reactor was manufactured on the RepRap Mendel we covered from
beginning
to
end
. A few minutes with Google Sketchup was all that was needed to generate the files and send them to the printer. In a few short hours, [Nbitwonder] had the body of his Arc Reactor.
The board design was thrown together in Eagle and etched. 11 blue SMD LEDs were thrown into the mix along with some borrowed resistors. Pieces of a hard drive spindle and a little bit of wire rounded out the parts list, and everything was assembled with the DIYers favorite tool, the hot glue gun. Not a bad job for a few hours of work.
The files for the Arc Reactor are
up on Thingiverse
along with a
Flickr photoset
. | 4 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "493560",
"author": "macegr",
"timestamp": "2011-10-28T21:10:43",
"content": "I was hoping they were going as an arc reactor…you know, just a giant, walking, standalone arc reactor with arms legs and head.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comme... | 1,760,377,042.965391 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/28/motor-drivers-half-h-bridge-with-brake-and-more/ | Motor Drivers: Half H-bridge With Brake And More | Mike Szczys | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"brake",
"h-bridge",
"half-bridge",
"motor controller",
"pwm"
] | Here’s a nice little circuit that will drive a motor and allow you to stop its rotation, giving your robot a set of brakes. It’s part of [JM’s] post about
the in’s and out’s of building microcontroller friendly motor controllers
(
translated
).
This particular setup is a half H-bridge. It allows you to drive the motor in one direction only. The MOSFET used on the ground-side of the motor doesn’t actually need to be there. This is the brake which let you electronically stop the motor from spinning. Without it, the motor will keep turning under its own momentum when the half-bridge is shut off. Depending on the application this can be a big problem. There’s a great demonstration of the circuit braking a fast spinning motor in the video clip below the fold.
It is possible to use this driver with PWM, but [JM] has some warnings about inbuilt functions like FastPWM. Make sure you read his admonition, and if you need a refresher
don’t miss this Hackaday video segment
.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lqyuR_iWuY&w=470]
[Thanks Javi] | 11 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "493516",
"author": "pelrun",
"timestamp": "2011-10-28T19:40:14",
"content": "I’d not consider the ground-side mosfet as ‘optional’, since without it the braking mosfet will short Vcc to ground…",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "49... | 1,760,377,043.056121 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/28/the-basics-of-reading-data-from-resistive-touchscreens/ | The Basics Of Reading Data From Resistive Touchscreens | Mike Szczys | [
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"pic",
"resistive",
"touchscreen"
] | [Chris] just posted his latest tutorial which shows you
how to read position data from a resistive touchscreen
. These devices are fairly simple, and since they’re used in a lot of consumer electronics you can pick one up for a few bucks. This looks like it is overstock for an old Palm device.
The interface is simple, there’s just four conductors on the tab at the top of the overlay. But connecting to these is a bit of an issue since you can’t really solder directly to them. [Chris] ended up using scotch-tape to hold wires in place, with a paperclip to keep them presses against the conductors. Those conductors are used in pairs, with a positive and negative lead for the X and Y axis. To take a measurement you use I/O pins to connect voltage and ground, then read the voltage that makes it to the gound side using an ADC. This works because the point that’s being pressed on the screen acts as a variable resistor for the circuit. Data for the two axes must be read in separate operations so that the positive voltages don’t interfere with each other.
The nice thing is that once you’ve got it working with a small screen it is easily scaled up. In fact,
the 23″ touchscreen used on this Android hack
is just another 4-wire resistive device.
You can see a video demonstration of [Chris’] test rig embedded after the break.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXsW0tSgfWY&w=470] | 5 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "493660",
"author": "Rob Wentworth",
"timestamp": "2011-10-28T23:52:06",
"content": "You can *solder* small wires (like magnet wire salvaged from a scrap motor) to these with conductive paint like you can buy at an auto parts store for repairing a rear window defroster.You can then s... | 1,760,377,042.816205 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/28/detailed-tutorial-shows-how-to-unleash-your-inner-michael-knight/ | Detailed Tutorial Shows How To Unleash Your Inner [Michael Knight] | Mike Nathan | [
"LED Hacks",
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"larson scanner",
"leds",
"pwm"
] | Our own [Mike Szczys] recently sat down and put together
a great tutorial on building a Larson Scanner.
The ubiquitous circuit is usually one of the first few projects on a budding hackers list of things to build, since
they are just so darn fun.
Simple versions of the scanner sweep back and forth lighting the LEDs without any sort of transition between them. The configuration most familiar to us all as featured in Knight Rider and Battlestar Galactica are a bit more complex, and have a fading trail of light that follows behind the leading edge of the sweep. [Mike] notes that this fading is traditionally accomplished through the use of capacitors, which cause the light to gradually fade as the animation sweeps across the LED array. He decided to take a different route with his circuit, relying on PWM control of the LEDs instead.
Mike put together a simple circuit using an ATmega168, a handful of resistors, and of course, an array of LEDs. Utilizing interrupts and PWM, he was able to accurately recreate the iconic light sweep without the use of any capacitors. One big benefit to his design aside from the lower component count is the fact that he can easily adjust the speed of the sweep as well as the fading properties with a few small code tweaks.
Be sure to check out his blog at some point, where he shares his code, some circuit diagrams, and plenty more details on how his scanner was built. In the meantime, take a look at the video below to see the result of [Mike’s] work.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=E2wsR8hgIjI&w=470] | 12 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "493415",
"author": "charliex",
"timestamp": "2011-10-28T17:16:44",
"content": "Rather than use 74HC595 for expand-ability you can charlieplex them instead. eghttp://wiki.032.la/nsl/Cylon_III",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "49345... | 1,760,377,042.923561 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/30/pocketstation-as-two-factor-authentication/ | PocketStation As Two-factor Authentication | Brian Benchoff | [
"Security Hacks"
] | [
"two-factor authentication"
] | [DarkFader] sent in his build that implements two-factor authentication
on a Sony PocketStation
.
The
PocketStation
was a PS1 accessory intended to be a competitor to the
Dreamcast VMU
. [DarkFader] wrote an app for his PocketStation using a fabulous
PocketStation emulator
and uploaded it with the PS3 memory card adapter and
MCRWwin
.
The PocketStation app (available
here
) takes a key and hashes it with the current time to generate a six digit code. Combined with
Google’s support
for two-factor authentication, [DarkFader]‘s memory card provides access to his Google profile.
Two-factor authentication is also used in
RSA SecurID
key fobs that were
compromised
earlier this year. This lead to a
huge number
of companies being penetrated. For a single person, obscurity is a reasonable (but still ultimately futile) means of providing a little more security, but a PocketStation hack is still pretty cool.
Check out the video after the break that shows [DarkFader] using his PocketStation token.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3echEnfSEfE&w=470] | 7 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "494932",
"author": "Ptolom",
"timestamp": "2011-10-30T14:16:01",
"content": "But security through depth isn’t the same thing as security through obscurity though. The former uses two different types of authentication, reducing the chances of an attacker compromising both. The latter... | 1,760,377,043.006924 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/29/ball-of-dub-has-lots-of-wub/ | Ball Of Dub Has Lots Of Wub | Brian Benchoff | [
"digital audio hacks"
] | [
"accelerometer",
"arduino",
"dubstep",
"electronic music"
] | [Lizzie] from LustLab sent in her
Ball of Dub
that turns a few accelerometer and a digital audio workstation and turns everything into an aural experience of wubs and dubs. The Ball of Dub can turn just about anything into dubstep, and does so with a fairly interesting user interface.
There isn’t a build log for the Ball of Dub, but the folks at LustLab did send in a basic overview of her project. Inside the ball, there’s a
Razor IMU
from Sparkfun that is attached to the ever-popular XBee wireless transceiver. A tiny program on an Arduino calibrates the gyroscope and accelerometer and sends that data to the DAW at 50Hz.
The host computer is running
Renoise
, a very popular tracker that can accept MIDI and OSC input. A Processing app parses the ball spin, free fall and impact, averages them over a period of time, and pipes that into the OSC input of Renoise. In [Lizzie]’s video, the ball spin is sent to a low-pass filter on the baseline track, and the average impact is applied to the vocal track.
This isn’t the first time we’ve seen some fairly strange ways to modulate wub; we saw
real instruments covering Skrillex
earlier this month. The Ball of Dub wins in the simplicity department, though. | 23 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "494442",
"author": "jeicrash",
"timestamp": "2011-10-29T22:33:19",
"content": "That sounds just like a regular song playing, I can’t think of which one it is, but I’m going to be skeptical on this one till more is posted.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
... | 1,760,377,042.872358 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/29/halloween-hacks-larger-than-life-costume-made-from-an-inflatable-lawn-ornament/ | Halloween Hacks: Larger Than Life Costume Made From An Inflatable Lawn Ornament | Mike Nathan | [
"Holiday Hacks"
] | [
"Halloween hacks",
"lawn ornaments",
"Stay Puft"
] | [Brian] was trying to decide on a Halloween costume this year, and
while looking through his lawn decorations
, inspiration struck. In his collection he had a 9 foot tall inflatable Stay Puft Marshmallow Man, and being a guy who likes to
go big or go home
, he knew he had to find a way to wear it.
The first task he had to tackle was ensuring that he could keep the display inflated while on the go. He was dismayed to see that the fan’s power supply was rated for 12v AC, but when he hooked it up to a DC power supply it worked just fine. While he had his speculations, he wasn’t 100% sure why it worked but he went with it anyway, connecting it up to a battery that would keep the costume inflated throughout the duration of a party.
With that out of the way, he focused more on the mobility of the costume, adding a clear window to allow him to see, along with tweaking a few other small items.
The costume looks great, and we’re sure that [Brian] is yet again the hit of the party. | 27 | 20 | [
{
"comment_id": "494327",
"author": "spiritplumber",
"timestamp": "2011-10-29T19:11:56",
"content": "ARE YOU A GOD?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "494331",
"author": "EFH",
"timestamp": "2011-10-29T19:21:47",
"content": "I emptied m... | 1,760,377,043.193023 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/29/cellphone-battery-booster-built-at-the-checkout-counter/ | Cellphone Battery Booster Built At The Checkout Counter | Mike Szczys | [
"Cellphone Hacks"
] | [
"battery",
"boost",
"charger",
"radio shack",
"smart phone"
] | When you’re away from home and your cellphone runs out of juice it can be a real downer. Sure, you could find a store and buy a wall charger, but wouldn’t it be more fun to
build your own battery booster without using tools
? [Spiritplumber] did just that, popping into a Radio Shack for the parts, then making his how-to video (embedded after the break)
while standing at the checkout counter
. You can see he hust set his camera on top of the battery display case and got to work.
He’s using four D cell batteries to provide 6 volts of power. Assuming your phone charges at 5 volts this is going to be just a bit too high, even though there’s some tolerance with most phones. To overcome that obstacle he added a diode to the circuit, taking advantage of the 0.7 volt drop that it brings to the mix. Grab a plug adapter for your model and then just hand twist the connections. [Spiritplumber] admits it would be better to solder these, but in a bind you can get away with it. We looked up some prices for this method and we figure this would cost around $18 (batteries included) depending on the price of the plug adapter for your phone.
Of course if you’re just looking for a way to charge your phone without paying consumer prices
there are ways of accomplishing that
as well.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVUbIMncjqM&w=470]
[Thanks Mkb] | 40 | 22 | [
{
"comment_id": "494283",
"author": "Dug",
"timestamp": "2011-10-29T18:19:41",
"content": "Great hack, simple but the use of the diode makes it.Maybe I’m missing something; but is there a reason why he says to use Alkaline rather than rechargables? What’s the problem with using rechargables for this... | 1,760,377,043.268959 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/29/bluetooth-for-android-open-accessories/ | Bluetooth For Android Open Accessories | Brian Benchoff | [
"Android Hacks"
] | [
"android",
"Android open accessory",
"bluetooth",
"ioio"
] | [Ytai], the lead developer for the IOIO breakout board for the Android Open Accessory kit, figured out how to control just about anything from an Android phone
wirelessly over Bluetooth
.
When [Ytai]
first announced
the IOIO breakout board for Android devices, one of the commentors on his post said a standard Bluetooth dongle could stand in for the USB cable between the phone and the IOIO. Wireless control of home automation project and robots was just too good of an idea to let go, so [Ytai] dove into this new Bluetooth project.
After getting a cheap Bluetooth dongle from DealExtreme, [Ytai] found
btstack
, a lightweight Bluetooth stack that was perfect for an embedded environment. Dealing with the USB driver for a no-name Bluetooth adapter didn’t come as easily, but after a few long nights, [Ytai] emerged victorious.
He still has a few more problems to overcome. Namely, supporting environments where more than IOIO board is available. [Ytai] is thinking about adding support for WiFi dongles, something we’d love to see. Check out [Ytai]’s demo of wireless control of a servo after the break.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFlJm86Qtuk&w=470] | 13 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "494322",
"author": "trandi",
"timestamp": "2011-10-29T19:00:36",
"content": "just to point out that the IOIO works on principally on ADB, which has the advantage of being supported by all Android versions > 1.5.ADK is also supported, but still in beta I think…",
"parent_id": nul... | 1,760,377,043.316243 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/29/synthesizing-sound-with-a-light-sensitive-pen-and-crt-television/ | Synthesizing Sound With A Light Sensitive Pen And CRT Television | Mike Szczys | [
"digital audio hacks",
"Video Hacks"
] | [
"atmega8",
"crt",
"light",
"pen",
"phototransistor",
"television"
] | Here’s the latest project from [Niklas Roy’s] workshop. Lumenoise is an
audio synthesizer controlled by drawing with a light-sensitive pen
on a CRT television.
The pen is a self-contained module which connects to the TV via audio and composite video RCA plugs. Inside the clear pen housing you’ll find a microcontroller which generates the audio and video. The business end of the pen contains a phototransistor which lets the ATmega8 take a reading from the video screen. Since the chip is generating that video signal, it’s possible to calculate the pen tip’s position on the screen and modulate the sound output based on that data. You can watch a recording of the results in the video after the break.
This is a very simple circuit to build, and [Niklas] makes the point that most of us have a CRT hanging around in a dark corner somewhere. We think this would be a fantastic soldering project to do with the kids, and that this would be right at home as a children’s museum piece because of the wow factor involved in playing around with it.
We can really tell from this and
some of his past projects
that [Niklas] just loves the 8-bit audio.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfrOrR6T9FM&w=470] | 7 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "494219",
"author": "aztraph",
"timestamp": "2011-10-29T17:00:28",
"content": "it’s an 8 bit wonderland!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "494247",
"author": "mjrippe",
"timestamp": "2011-10-29T17:34:48",
"content": "I ... | 1,760,377,043.36251 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/29/wii-remote-controling-the-vehicle-youre-riding-in/ | Wii Remote Controling The Vehicle You’re Riding In | Mike Szczys | [
"Nintendo Hacks",
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"accelerometer",
"arduino",
"go cart",
"wii remote"
] | Make sure your health insurance premiums are all paid up; if you decide to replicate this project you may need it. [Corey], [Kris], and [Jess] built their own
go cart which is controlled with a Wii remote
. The website has a poor navigation scheme, but if you hover over the horizontal menu bar you can get quite a bit of information about the build.
The cart has two motors which use a chain to drive each of the rear wheels. A pair of H-bridge controllers let the Arduino interface with them. It’s also has a Bluetooth module that makes it a snap to pull accelerometer data from the Wii remote. The front end looks like it uses rack and pinion steering, but you won’t find a pinion or a steering column. Instead, a linear actuator is mounted parallel to the rack, moving it back and forth at the command of the Arduino.
We can’t help but think back to silent movies where the steering wheel comes loose in the middle of a car chase. See if you get the same image while watching the demo after the break. This doesn’t seem quite as dangerous as
adding remote control to a full-sized automobile
, but we’ve played MarioKart Wii before and know how lousy the accelerator performance can be. Hopefully the firmware kills the motors if the batteries in the controller die.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BH04PnpoZP0&w=470] | 20 | 17 | [
{
"comment_id": "494137",
"author": "ejonesss",
"timestamp": "2011-10-29T14:15:03",
"content": "while the idea is good for making car platform universal so if you are going to travel overseas you dont need to buy or rent another car because the steering wheel and pedals is on the opposite side.i thi... | 1,760,377,043.464694 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/28/halloween-hacks-a-light-and-music-show-fit-for-jack-skellington/ | Halloween Hacks: A Light And Music Show Fit For [Jack Skellington] | Mike Nathan | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"Holiday Hacks",
"Musical Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"Halloween hacks",
"jack o lantern",
"music",
"singing"
] | [Greg]
was looking for something to build
using his recently acquired Arduino, and with Halloween approaching, he thought a cool light display would make a great project. He browsed around online and
found this tutorial
that shows how to build a chorus of singing pumpkins controlled by a computer’s parallel port. Since he didn’t have any computers with a parallel port kicking around anymore, he decided to try his hand at recreating it with an Arduino.
[Greg] gathered eight light up Jack-o-Lanterns, along with a handful of relays and other miscellaneous components. He wired up the relays to trigger each individual pumpkin’s built in light when switched by the Arduino. He sat down and carefully listened through “This is Halloween” from The Nightmare Before Christmas, choreographing each of the pumpkins to take on the voice of one of the movie’s characters.
When the show begins, the display transforms from a group of unassuming pumpkins with candles a-flicker to a chorus of ghouls extolling the virtues of Halloween.
It really is fun to watch, so be sure to check out the video below. If you’re looking to throw together a quick display before the big day rolls around, [Greg’s] source code and diagrams should get you headed in the right direction.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DV2EiHQ0Fvo&feature=player_embedded&w=470] | 4 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "493538",
"author": "Willy",
"timestamp": "2011-10-28T20:27:37",
"content": "I love that ‘fat’ looking pumpkin (top row second from left)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "493558",
"author": "Jamie",
"timestamp": ... | 1,760,377,043.411221 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/28/you-probably-do-not-have-time-to-build-this-incredible-dead-space-costume/ | You Probably Do Not Have Time To Build This Incredible Dead Space Costume. | Jesse Congdon | [
"Holiday Hacks",
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"Dead Space",
"halloween costume",
"Halloween hacks",
"mold"
] | What happens when an unemployed sailor has a ton of time on his hands? Well, evidently they become an extremely skilled prop builder. Then again our only reference point is [Throssoli]’s excellent
Dead Space suit build
.
[Throssoli] started this ambitious project by setting a months deadline for the
helmet
. Although he did not meet the dead line the results were fantastic and very true to the game models. Noting the reaction people had to the helmet out in the wild, and giving in to the fact that he really wanted the full engineering suit as seen in game, [Throssoli] set off to reproduce the entire RIG down to the illuminated face mask and back mounted spine-like health and stasis indicators. All it really needs are lead weights in the boots to give it that signature stompy Isaac feel. The build incorporates a lot of techniques we typically see in other game related prop builds, such as the black-washing and weathering effects seen in the
wheatley puppet
and mold making as seen in this
Portal Turret
build and even
daft punk helmets
. Keep in mind [Throssoli] is no stranger to prop or suit building, his
portfolio
of finished projects include halo armor and props, various Star Wars costumes, Mass Effect stuff, a Predator outfit you name it. We could easily loose half a day just perusing all the builds at the site so check it out for yourself!
[via
Reddit
] | 7 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "493407",
"author": "MobileWill",
"timestamp": "2011-10-28T16:20:33",
"content": "I found my costume!! This awesome costume for an awesome game.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "493408",
"author": "MobileWill",
"timestamp"... | 1,760,377,043.580535 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/28/hackaday-links-october-28th-2011/ | Hackaday Links: October 28th, 2011 | Brian Benchoff | [
"Hackaday links"
] | [
"cnc",
"halloween costume",
"heat sink",
"led",
"makerbot",
"multicolor",
"pic32mx",
"radial engine"
] | An accidental radial engine
Hack A Day’s very own [Jeremy Cook] was trying to figure out how to push four ‘arms’ out one at a time. What he came up with is a
very nice model of a radial engine
. Everything was cut on a CNC router and a motor from an air freshener provides the power.
Using a candle to produce light
[Chris] sent in his
Candela Amplifier
. It’s a Pentium 4 heat sink with a very bright Cree Xlamp LED attached to the base. A bunch of Peltier thermoelectric units are attached to the underside of the heat sink. Put the whole thing on top of a candle, and you can light a room. With a candle. Oh, he’s
selling these
, by the way.
Objectification
and
video games?!
We really feel sorry for our lady readers. Guys have so many choices for Halloween costumes, but just about every costume available for women can be reduced to, “Sexy [noun].” Whelp, here’s the
Sexy Game Boy
, just in time for Halloween. [kazmataz] gets a few bonus points because she went with the DMG-01. It’s better than
Sexy Chewbacca
, so she’s got that going.
Prototypable 32-bit uCs
[Ng Yong Han] wrote in to tell us about some newish 32-bit PICs that are floating around. The
datasheet
for the PIC32MX1xx/2xx chips is pretty interesting – USB support and an audio and graphics interface. Oh, they come in PDIPs for ease of prototyping as well. We haven’t seen much from the PIC microcontroller faction recently (Atmel is winning the holy war, it seems). Anybody feel like building something with these?
Makerbot dual extruder
[Lomo] at TU-Berlin is taking a class in rapid prototyping. He built a
second print head
for his department’s Makerbot Cupcake with a few other students. The
result
are pretty impressive, although from what
we’ve seen
, it’s generating the G-code that’s a pain in the butt. | 24 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "493319",
"author": "Alex",
"timestamp": "2011-10-28T14:13:55",
"content": "Fix your anchor tag on the radial engine link. You have an escaped set of quotation marks at the end that break the link.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id"... | 1,760,377,043.686562 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/28/pololu-compatable-relay-driver/ | Pololu Compatible Relay Driver | Brian Benchoff | [
"hardware"
] | [
"pololu",
"relay",
"reprap"
] | [Bart] built a couple dozen
Pololu compatible relay drivers
.
If you have a Reprap, you’re probably familiar with the
Pololu stepper motor driver
. These tiny pieces of kit provide stepper motor control for
Gen 6
,
RAMPS
, or
Sanguinololu
Reprap electronics. There’s a small problem with all these boards, though; there’s no way to control any high-power devices from these boards except for stepper motors. Controlling a spindle for a home-built CNC router would be great, but apart from attaching a Dremel to your x-axis, you’re just about out of luck.
[Bart]’s relay driver takes the step and direction inputs from the stock Pololu stepper driver and connects each of those to a MOSFET. From there, a relay can be hooked up to the driver to control the spindle for a router, or a whole bunch of fans for a homebrew laser cutter.
The schematic and
Gerber files
are up on [Bart]’s webzone. The part count is
very
low, and the entire board could easily be built on a piece of perfboard. Check out the demo on the other side of the jump.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=8hWp6x_WIJA&w=470] | 3 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "493288",
"author": "Philippe",
"timestamp": "2011-10-28T13:35:20",
"content": "Compatible",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "493375",
"author": "Brett W. (FightCube.com)",
"timestamp": "2011-10-28T15:28:30",
"content": ... | 1,760,377,043.626929 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/27/crawling-zombie-is-shockingly-creepy/ | Crawling Zombie Is Shockingly Creepy | Mike Szczys | [
"Holiday Hacks"
] | [
"crawler",
"halloween",
"rc",
"zombie"
] | When [Mark] sent in the tip about this crawling zombie prop he said that it didn’t sound scary but warned us that it is terrifying when you see it. He’s absolutely right, the video after the break shows some remarkably undead movement from the thing.
This
crawler is actually radio controlled
. Details are brief, but there’s plenty of pictures and the start of a build tutorial for the hardware. A wood frame serves as collar-bone and spine for the zombie. Attached to the spine are two motors which allow independent shoulder operation. We’d wager that the realistic movements are due to a talented operator at the controls, but it can’t be too hard to master if you play around with it for a while. It looks like the initial build was headless, but we think the addition of the zombie head really makes finishes out the project!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51x_owzUkqE&w=470]
[via
Build Lounge
] | 28 | 24 | [
{
"comment_id": "492777",
"author": "wifigod",
"timestamp": "2011-10-27T23:07:30",
"content": "QWOP: Zombie Edition",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "492789",
"author": "Joe",
"timestamp": "2011-10-27T23:42:27",
"content": "This looks ... | 1,760,377,043.80281 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/27/diy-thermostat-keeps-the-harsh-winter-cold-at-bay/ | DIY Thermostat Keeps The Harsh Winter Cold At Bay | Mike Nathan | [
"ATtiny Hacks",
"home hacks"
] | [
"attiny",
"DS18B20",
"thermostat"
] | [Phil’s] parents grow their own organic food, but the harsh Ukraine winters make storing it a difficult proposition. Since it can drop to -30°C on occasion, they asked him to
find a way to keep their storeroom at around 5-7°C above zero.
He decided to construct his own programmable thermostat to keep things in check, and has been
documenting the process
as he goes along.
The thermostat uses a DS18B20 temperature sensor to monitor the room, and the logic is handled by an ATtiny2313. When the temperature dips low enough, the ATtiny triggers the room’s heater via a standard 240v relay. He can check the current temperature via a small 7-segment display mounted on the control board, which also contains three microswitches for controlling the heater.
It looks like a pretty solid build so far, and while he hasn’t finished coding the thermostat just yet, [Phil] says that those details are forthcoming. He has published a schematic however, so you can get a jump start on building your own if you’re looking to warm things up this winter.
Continue reading to see a video overview of the thermostat’s design.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tsembYXfF7c&w=470] | 13 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "492756",
"author": "Flood_of_SYNs",
"timestamp": "2011-10-27T22:32:56",
"content": "Nice build.His accent reminds me of.. “I know…..how to count….alllll de way to schfifty five.” lol",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "492845",
... | 1,760,377,043.738901 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/27/3d-printed-electromechanical-computer/ | 3D Printed Electromechanical Computer | Brian Benchoff | [
"hardware"
] | [
"3d printer",
"analytical engine",
"electromechanical",
"reprap"
] | A few nights ago, [Chris Fenton] was hanging out at NYC Resistor putting in some time on his
electromechanical computer
project. You might remember [Chris] from his
tiny Cray
that he’s
putting an OS on
. It seems [Chris] is going back in time about 150 years and has set his sights on a 3D printed version of [Babbage]’s
Analytical Engine
.
The Analytical Engine
was
is a remarkable feat of engineering and machining. It was the first programmable computer. Shame, then, that it was never built in the 1800s. [Chris] isn’t building a glorified calculator like [Babbage]’s polynomial-computing
Difference Engine
– he’s going all out and building something with conditional looping.
[Chris] calls his device an electromechanical computer, so we’re assuming it won’t be crank driven like the version in the British Science Museum. Right now, he’s constructed the decade-counting gears that are vitally important for the ALU of his design. All the parts were printed on a Thingomatic, so we’re betting [Chris] is going to be relying heavily on the MakerBot
automated build platform
for the thousands of parts he’ll have to fabricate.
Check out the video from NYC Resistor after the break.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=8TB5lp8Boz4&w=470] | 23 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "492721",
"author": "userjjb",
"timestamp": "2011-10-27T21:23:03",
"content": "Maybe I’m missing something, but nowhere in the video do I hear mention of him planning to build either of Babbage’s machines. He just aays he’s building an “electromechanical computer”.Feel free to point ... | 1,760,377,043.971808 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/27/vigos-stare-follows-you-wherever-you-go/ | [Vigo’s] Stare Follows You Wherever You Go | Mike Szczys | [
"Holiday Hacks",
"Kinect hacks"
] | [
"eyes",
"ghostbusters",
"halloween",
"Kinect",
"painting"
] | To decorate the office for Halloween [Eric] decided to
make [Vigo the Carpathian] stare at passersby
. We hope that readers recognize this image, but for those younger hackers who don’t, this painting of [Vigo] played an important part in
the classic film Ghostbusters II
.
In the movie, his eyes appeared to be following anyone looking at the painting. [Eric] grabbed a Kinect and used Processing to recreate the effect in real life. The image is displayed on an LCD screen. A bit of work with Photoshop allowed him to cut out the eyes from the image, then create sprites which are moved by the Processing sketch. It’s reading data from the Kinect (so it knows where to ‘look’) which you can see perched on the top of the cubicle wall. The illusion is delightful, see for yourself in the clip after the break. We’ve already watched it a half-dozen times, and it looks like it was a real hit with the guests at the open house.
Can you believe they threw this together in just one day?
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7LM9VWiMOhs&w=470]
[Thanks Nicko] | 20 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "492691",
"author": "bob",
"timestamp": "2011-10-27T20:26:45",
"content": "Cool hack to make use of something taken from a really really bad sequel.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "492853",
"author": "Haku",
"ti... | 1,760,377,043.913762 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/27/hacked-parking-disc-can-be-controlled-remotely/ | Hacked Parking Disc Can Be Controlled Remotely | Mike Nathan | [
"Microcontrollers",
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"atmega",
"gps",
"gsm",
"parking disc"
] | If you have ever traveled around Europe, you are likely familiar with parking discs. Required in many countries that would rather not deal with parking meters, these devices are placed in the front of a car’s window, and indicate when the vehicle was parked. When parking enforcement officers come through the area, it makes quick work of identifying which cars need to be ticketed.
[Michael] received
a fancy electronic parking disc
as a gift, but the device was incredibly buggy, causing him all sorts of grief. After contacting the manufacturer and receiving no helpful response, he took it upon himself to get things working properly.
He dismantled the disc and found that like many products today, the microprocessors were locked down behind a layer of hard resin. Undeterred, he decided to rebuild it from the ground up using an ATmega microcontroller to provide basic parking disc functionality. He also armed his disc with a GSM modem and a GPS receiver – the former gives him the ability to communicate with the device, while the latter provides accurate time data while allowing him to keep tabs on the car’s location, should the need arise.
The hacked disc’s guts reside in his glove box, and can be controlled using his iPhone, making it easy to tweak his parking time at will.
Check out the video below to see his parking clock in action, and if you have questions on any part of the build, [Michael] says he’s more than happy to fill in any missing details.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=yF774njhMHU&w=470] | 30 | 18 | [
{
"comment_id": "492640",
"author": "Bigdeal",
"timestamp": "2011-10-27T19:07:48",
"content": "Do you guys have an LCD parking disc? It would cry for hacking! Ours (in Belgium) is in plain paper, and you risk huge fines if you’re found with a disc that isn’t street legal, such as those mounted on a ... | 1,760,377,044.037211 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/27/recreating-the-commodore-pet-with-an-fpga/ | Recreating The Commodore PET With An FPGA | Mike Nathan | [
"classic hacks"
] | [
"commodore",
"fpga",
"pet",
"xilinx"
] | [Thomas’] love affair with Commodore computers spans well over 30 years, and not too long ago he decided to
recreate one of his favorite Commodore offerings
, the PET. As we have seen
with similar undertakings
, this sort of project is no easy task, but [Thomas] seems to be making his way along nicely.
Using a Xilinx Spartan-6 FPGA on the Digilent Nexys3 dev board, he has implemented the Pet in Verilog. Like the original, his clone contains 16K of both ROM and RAM, utilizing the same simulated 6502 microprocessor he used on
a previous Apple ][+ project.
The FPGA version of the computer sports a 640×400 resolution which is twice that of the original, so [Thomas] simply doubled the size of each of the PET’s pixels to fill in the extra space.
[Thomas] has made some great progress so far, including the ability to load games and other programs from cassette images over a serial connection. He says that there are still a few loose ends to tie up, but it all looks good from here!
Continue reading to see a short video of Space Invaders running on he PET recreation.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wCGc7UZX6c&feature=player_embedded&w=470] | 18 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "492626",
"author": "joushou",
"timestamp": "2011-10-27T18:49:25",
"content": "It’s not doubled, it’s quadrupled. If you double vertical (200->400), as well as horizontal resolution (320->640), you get 4 times the area, 64000 pixels vs. 256000 pixels. Therefore, each pixel is quadrup... | 1,760,377,044.09376 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/27/a-simple-induction-heater/ | A Simple Induction Heater | Jeremy Cook | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"eddy current",
"heater",
"induction heater"
] | For those of you not familiar, an induction heater is a device capable of heating something up very rapidly using a changing magnetic field. [RMC Cybernetics] decided to
build one
and was nice enough to write up the project for the Internet’s learning and amusement. A full explanation as well as a schematic and build instructions are provided on their website.
This heater works using a principle involved in most transformers. When there is a change in the magnetic field near a conductive object, a current will be induced in it and it will generate heat. Interestingly enough, while transformers are designed to minimize this heat, an induction heater instead aims to maximize this heat in whatever object is placed within the coils.
[RMC] Has provided a video of how to build the heater as well as it in action after the break! Skip to to 1:42 to see the heating in action. Or watch the whole thing to see how it’s built.
[youtube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-EZ3M31Zj8&w=470&h=315%5D | 23 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "492540",
"author": "grenadier",
"timestamp": "2011-10-27T17:17:57",
"content": "I can do this better :p",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "492555",
"author": "mk2soldier",
"timestamp": "2011-10-27T17:31:03",
"content": ... | 1,760,377,044.244159 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/27/a-smartphone-dock-for-your-arm-why-not/ | A Smartphone Dock For Your Arm? Why Not? | Jeremy Cook | [
"Cellphone Hacks",
"Medical Hacks"
] | [
"disability",
"forearm",
"handicapped",
"nokia",
"phone",
"prosthetic"
] | Why not that is, if you have a prosthetic arm. Although it’s hard to believe we haven’t seen this before, [Trevor Prideaux], according to
[The Telegraph’s] article
, “has become the world’s first ever patient to have a smartphone docking system built into his prosthetic arm.”
[Trevor] was born without a forearm, and, as he puts it, he’s used to adapting to things. However, he thought others might be struggling with the same problem, especially those that become disabled later in life. Once their help was secured, Nokia and the Exeter Mobility Centre got to work on his new limb and produced a prototype in five weeks!
[Trevor] is quite pleased with his new phone docking system. Texting especially is much easier and safer, and the phone can be removed when needed for making calls. We love to see hacks like this where people enhance their abilities using technology! For another hack helping those with disabilities, check out this
wheelchair elevator/winch
made for a non-accessible apartment.
via
[reghardware.com] | 20 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "492500",
"author": "Chris",
"timestamp": "2011-10-27T16:25:07",
"content": "Next hack: writing an Android app to control the action on that hook! 10,000 RPM > GO!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "492503",
"author": "Mike Szcz... | 1,760,377,044.297719 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/27/video-pwm-on-the-atmega328p/ | Video: PWM On The ATmega328p | Jack Buffington | [
"News",
"Video Hacks"
] | [
"3pi",
"atmega328p",
"video hacks"
] | This week we continue on with another video in our series about how to program for the ATmega328p processor using C. The ATmega328p is at the heart of many Arduino boards. If you have been using them but want to add some more horsepower to your projects, this series of videos is for you. In this video, [Jack] talks about various types of pulse width modulation (PWM). You can use PWM to control the speed of a motor, the brightness of a LED, or to generate analog waveforms. [Jack] shows how to set up the processor to do locked anti-phase PWM to drive the wheels of the 3pi robot and then demos a short program that shows the code in action.
If you missed the previous posts in this series and would like to check them out…
Intro and how to set up the development environment :
Click Here
Working with I/O pins:
Click Here
Video is after the break… | 5 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "492474",
"author": "Eraser",
"timestamp": "2011-10-27T15:42:35",
"content": "Awesome, great video.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "492492",
"author": "Kirill",
"timestamp": "2011-10-27T16:07:14",
"content": "This 3pi... | 1,760,377,044.33807 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/27/now-pictures-on-the-internet-can-be-faked/ | Now Pictures On The Internet Can Be Faked | Brian Benchoff | [
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"'shopped!",
"photoshop",
"siggraph"
] | We know it’s shopped, but we can’t tell because of the pixels. PhD student [Kevin Karsch] along with a few other friends will be presenting their methods to
render objects into preexisting photos
at SIGGRAPH Asia next month.
The
paper
(PDF…) covers how [Kevin] et al. go about putting impossible objects into photos. The user first defines the geometry of the picture; legs of tables are defined and the table top is extruded from these legs. The lights are then defined by drawing a bounding box and with a little bit of algorithmic trickery, a 3D object is inserted into the scene.
Comparing the
results
to the original picture is jaw-dropping. For us, photoshopping a bunch of billiard balls on a pool table would take
hours
, and it would never look quite right. [Kevin]’s work for SIGGRAPH can do the whole scene in minutes and produces results we couldn’t dream of.
There’s no downloadable software yet, but the algorithms are there. Check out the video demo of the techniques and results after the break.
[vimeo=28962540] | 56 | 25 | [
{
"comment_id": "492416",
"author": "Fallen",
"timestamp": "2011-10-27T14:12:14",
"content": "Maybe I’m dense, but I didn’t see any impossible shapes.Really cool algorithm nonetheless. I could imagine this has some really neat applications.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
... | 1,760,377,044.471702 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/27/halloween-hacks-simple-robotic-skull-is-a-perfect-last-minute-decoration/ | Halloween Hacks: Simple Robotic Skull Is A Perfect Last Minute Decoration | Mike Nathan | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"Holiday Hacks"
] | [
"animatronic",
"arduino",
"Halloween hacks",
"servo",
"skull"
] | If you haven’t taken the time to put your decorations together it’s time to get a move on. With Halloween just around the corner big elaborate displays are pretty much out of the question, but [Boris] and the team over at Open Electronics have
a simple project that’s sure to be a hit with the Trick or Treaters.
Using a cheap plastic prop that you can likely find at any Halloween store, they have put together a simple talking skull that moves along with whatever music or sound is being piped through it. The skull’s mouth is moved by a single servo mounted inside the brain cavity, which is controlled by an Arduino. The Arduino monitors the sound level of the source audio being played, actuating the servo accordingly.
It’s quick, simple, and effective – perfect for a last minute decorating project. If you are a little more ambitious, you could always put together a whole chorus of skulls without too much additional effort – just a few extra skulls and some servos would do the trick nicely.
Check out a quick video of the skull in action below, along with another short clip showing how the servo is rigged up to move its mouth.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsKBcH7xZBg&feature=player_embedded&w=470]
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1i28teQTdpQ&feature=player_embedded&w=470] | 3 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "492786",
"author": "NewCommenter1283",
"timestamp": "2011-10-27T23:34:01",
"content": "sweet skull, muhahahaha (evil laugh)buuut… if you use a bandpass filter, before feeding the audio to the uC, then you can get the jaw to move to loud VOICE (mid range freq.s) instead of loud voice... | 1,760,377,044.382065 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/26/rooting-sony-prs-t1-lets-you-get-at-the-android-goodies/ | Rooting Sony PRS-T1 Lets You Get At The Android Goodies | Mike Szczys | [
"Android Hacks"
] | [
"ebook",
"prs-t1",
"root",
"rooted",
"rooting",
"sony"
] | Cries of “I am root!” abound once again with the rooting of Sony’s PRS-T1 eBook reader. The eBook Reader Blog took
the original rooting directions
and then looked at
some of the things you can do with root access
.
This hardware is based around an ePaper display, but we must say that the performance seems to be fantastic. There may be a few missing features from the original user interface (like how pages are turned) that can be fixed with root access, but we think it’s the added Android access that makes this worth it. In the video after the break you’ll see that you can drop through to the Android 2.2 desktop and install any application you’re interested in using. This is a multi-touch display so it’s well suited for navigation although applications don’t work well yet because of excessive screen refreshing. But we’re sure that will improve with time. Of note is the ability to play music through apps like Pandora, and the ability to load content from other providers like Amazon books via the Kindle app.
Every time we write one of these rooted features we can’t help but think back to
this I’m a Mac spoof video
…. you’ll see why in the last few seconds.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lr8-aRzdItg&w=470]
[Thanks Nathan] | 26 | 20 | [
{
"comment_id": "491706",
"author": "Brook Keele",
"timestamp": "2011-10-26T21:31:46",
"content": "Be Careful or Sony will sue you for reverse engineering.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "491723",
"author": "kaye",
"timestamp": "2011-10-... | 1,760,377,044.533414 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/26/macetech-takes-on-its-own-ambilight-clone-hack/ | Macetech Takes On Its Own Ambilight Clone Hack | Mike Szczys | [
"home entertainment hacks",
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"ambilight",
"boblight",
"macetech",
"rgb"
] | [Garrett Mace] decided to beef up his 58 inches of plasma with 60 Watts of LED lighting. After seeing a ton of Ambilight clones using his LED modules,
he’s built his own powerful system
. Not surprisingly, it’s nothing short of professional-grade work.
Kudos to [Garrett] for showing the entire process in the video after the break. We’re talking about his planning stages, which are so often left out of build logs. He first measures the back of the television, and does some testing for distance and angle of the Satellite LED modules to establish how many should be used and to estimate the optimal spacing. From there he modelled a framing system before getting down to the actual build.
The wood frame is made up of a box with a horizontal crossbar serving as a place to mount the drivers. Around the edges, tilting rails were added to make the angle of the LED modules adjustable. As with many other Ambilight clones, [Garrett] uses the boblight software to drive his system and we appreciate it that he included his configuration file for reference. Once up and running the effect is breathtaking (and possibly blinding).
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zz2EjUWCqI4&w=470] | 23 | 18 | [
{
"comment_id": "491676",
"author": "dave",
"timestamp": "2011-10-26T20:56:04",
"content": "Amazing results.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "491684",
"author": "Opa",
"timestamp": "2011-10-26T21:01:42",
"content": "just awesome",
... | 1,760,377,044.721319 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/26/halloween-time-machine-simulator-built-into-an-outhouse/ | Halloween Time Machine Simulator Built Into An Outhouse | Mike Szczys | [
"Holiday Hacks"
] | [
"halloween",
"outhouse",
"time machine"
] | [Sam] is an avid Halloween builder and has been hard at work on
a time-machine simulator for this year’s festivities
(
alternate link
). He recently assembled the enclosure which is seen above. It’s got room for two riders who will be strapped in place, with plenty of interior items to keep them occupied. There will be three LCD monitors acting as front and side windows for the time machine.
In the video after the break (taken from his vblog on the page linked above) [Sam] walks us through all of the electronics that went into this. He’s got red lights controlled by a servo motor attached to a dimmer switch. There’s a vibrating seat to give the riders a jolt, and a control panel which shows the status of the time machine. The thing is, it’s not just the physical build that’s impressive. We know from
his past projects
that [Sam] is a showman and he doesn’t disappoint this year. He spent a lot of time filming and generating computer graphics and sound to really make the ride a multimedia odyssey.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vvk_-bgyvg&w=470] | 24 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "491621",
"author": "Yoseph Asher",
"timestamp": "2011-10-26T19:59:30",
"content": "Dude.. This is awesome!.. Makes me wish I could take a ride!..",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "491622",
"author": "Digitalundernet",
"tim... | 1,760,377,044.649043 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/26/custom-flat-cables-to-suit-your-needs/ | Custom Flat Cables To Suit Your Needs | Mike Szczys | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"android",
"motorola",
"on-the-go",
"otg",
"usb",
"usb otg",
"xoom"
] | [Cosimo Orlando] has a Motorola Xoom tablet. It’s an Android device that works great as a tablet, but can double as a Laptop when you need it to by adding a keyboard. The problem he was having is that the USB On-The-Go cables that he tried were never the right size or orientation. So he scavenged them for parts and
built his own flat cable for a custom fit
.
The final product pictured here actually uses protoboard to give the body some strength. [Cosimo] first laid out the dimensions on the substrate using a felt-tipped pen. He then took connectors from his mis-sized commercial cables and affixed them to the board with a combination of hot glue and solder. From there, just connect the five data lines and ground with some jumper wire and test for continuity. He finished this off with what he calls ‘adhesive plastic glossy black’ shaped to make a decent looking case. If you have any idea what product was used here, let us know by leaving a comment. | 17 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "491556",
"author": "nartacht",
"timestamp": "2011-10-26T18:50:21",
"content": "It looks like what we know in the UK as ‘sticky-back plastic’ or Fablon – essentially adhesive backed vinyl or PVC sheet.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_i... | 1,760,377,044.585521 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/26/halloween-hacks-terrifying-mask-follows-you-everywhere/ | Halloween Hacks: Terrifying Mask Follows You Everywhere | Brian Benchoff | [
"Holiday Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"Halloween hacks",
"PIR sensor",
"wave shield"
] | It’s less than 5 days away from Halloween and the projects to scare small children are pouring in. [Noel] sent in his
robotic Halloween mask
he’s been working on, and the only way his build could be any better is by placing it underneath a child’s bed.
[Noel] took the mask he used last year and stuffed a few styrofoam craft balls inside to ‘fill it up.’ Two LEDs and a PIR sensor were fitted into the eyes of the mask and a few more electronics added to the brain. A servo was fitted to the base of the project to turn the head left and right.
The build uses a Gizduino Arduino clone with an Adafruit
Wave shield
. After a little bit of wiring up the LEDs, PIR sensor and neck servo, [Noel] had a bit of coding ahead of him. He ran into a problem with the WaveHC and Servo libraries because they both used the same timer. After finding a another software-based servo libraries, he had a reasonably terrifying project to put in front of a bowl of candy.
Check out the video below for a demo of [Noel]’s work.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWwVeFt4KdM&w=470] | 2 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "491598",
"author": "austin",
"timestamp": "2011-10-26T19:28:51",
"content": "would be more terrifying if it was a weeping angel(from dr who) that moved when someone was in range but NOT looking at it",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id... | 1,760,377,044.791835 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/26/nintenduo-stuffs-an-nes-and-snes-in-the-same-case/ | Nintenduo Stuffs An NES And SNES In The Same Case | Brian Benchoff | [
"Nintendo Hacks"
] | [
"console modding",
"nes",
"retro duo",
"snes"
] | [lovablechevy] loves her Retro Duo console, especially since it takes up less space than the NES and SNES it has replaced. There’s a small problem though: the Retro Duo isn’t 100% compatible with her old Nintendo cartridges.
Battletoads
is a deal breaker for her, so she built
Nintenduo
, an NES/SNES console that uses all original Nintendo hardware.
The Queen of Bondo began her project with a top-loading NES and the smaller revision of the SNES. There’s a
Photobucket gallery
showing the innards lovingly placed in their new plastic home.
Not only can [lovablechevy] play classics like
Paperboy
,
Donkey Kong Country
, and the
Super Mario RPG
that are
incompatable
with the Retro Duo, all the accessories like the Zapper and Power Pad now work.
The finished build is very small; not much bigger than an SNES 2, and is nearly dwarfed by the gigantic NES cartridges. She posted a video of herself trying not to shoot the stupid
Duck Hunt
dog with her Nintenduo. Check it out after the break.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2mISZdpmJL8&w=470] | 26 | 16 | [
{
"comment_id": "491349",
"author": "chango",
"timestamp": "2011-10-26T15:03:45",
"content": "She should put that inside a working Gamecube for good measure. I humbly offer up the name “Nintenducken”.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "491555",
... | 1,760,377,045.729814 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/25/wicked-use-of-html5-to-display-sensor-data/ | Wicked Use Of HTML5 To Display Sensor Data | Mike Szczys | [
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"html5",
"javascript",
"json",
"mbed",
"qr code",
"sensor",
"websockets"
] | This project shows you one possible way to
use HTML5 to fully integrate sensor data from a microcontroller
into our technological lives. Now, when we saw this tip come through our inbox we thought it would be an interesting example to learn from but we weren’t ready for how truly cool the setup is. Take a look at the video after the break and you’ll see that scanning the QR code on the project box will immediately start a 10ms resolution live stream of the accelerometer data. Furthermore, the browser page that the phone loads allows you to send what you’re currently viewing to the main frame of a browser running on a different computer with the touch of a button. In this way you can build a dashboard of streaming sensor data. Talk about the future of home automation. Imagine a QR code on your thermostat that allows you gain access to your home’s heating, air conditioning, humidifier, and water heater performance and controls just by snapping a pic? The sky’s the limit on this one so let us know what you’d use it for by leaving a comment.
In this case an mbed microcontroller is handling the data acquisition and pushing that to a server via a WiFly module using the
WebSockets library
. This data is pushed in the form of a JSON packet which is distributed by the server as a data stream. Clients can access it via a browser through a page that makes use of JavaScript.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JlLfKJ6ZLmw&w=470]
[Thanks Simon] | 33 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "490518",
"author": "Ren",
"timestamp": "2011-10-25T16:47:16",
"content": "Or in the future, photograph the QR code off a friends thermostat and mess with their house temperature while you are both at work?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"co... | 1,760,377,045.135336 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/25/millivolt-meter-nixie-clock/ | Millivolt Meter Nixie Clock | Brian Benchoff | [
"clock hacks",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"nixie clock",
"volt meter"
] | Surprisingly, up until a year ago, [Jimmy] hadn’t seen a Nixie tube. Awful we know, but he has come around to the beauty of glowing numbers in a tube. He recently found an old millivolt meter in a junk pile that used Nixie tubes. The wondrous orange glow beckoned him, so [Jimmy] decided to
build a clock
.
Just
about
all
of the Nixie clocks we’ve seen (including
non-clock
builds) rely on building a controller for the Nixie tubes. The controllers range from
Nixie Arduino shields
to the good ‘ol
74141
IC. [Jimmy] realized he didn’t need to bother with controlling the tubes in an already functional millivolt meter – he only needed to send the right voltage.
For his clock build, [Jimmy] used an Arduino to output a voltage through a bunch of resistor dividers. For example, if the time is 12:30, the output voltage will be 12.30mV. Using this technique, the values for the needed resistors don’t exist, so a little bit of PWM means the Arduino keeps fairly good time.
There’s one added bonus of [Jimmy]’s clock – because the voltage varies around 0.01mV, the finished project acts like a digital version of
Lord Vetinari’s clock
. It may not be perfect, but at least a nice piece of equipment was saved from the trash. | 9 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "490479",
"author": "Rob",
"timestamp": "2011-10-25T15:58:30",
"content": "Love it! Kudos to you Jimmy!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "490683",
"author": "xeracy",
"timestamp": "2011-10-25T19:09:59",
"content": "I ha... | 1,760,377,045.034166 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/25/halloween-hacks-death-throws-a-party/ | Halloween Hacks: Death Throws A Party | Brian Benchoff | [
"Holiday Hacks"
] | [
"halloween",
"prop"
] | If you him the Grim Reaper, Azrail, Magere Hein, or simply, ‘Death,’ he sure throws a good party. [Victor] has an anatomical model of a skeleton at his job named [Hein], and for his birthday party, his coworkers decided to
throw [Hein] a party
.
[Victor]’s
first skeleton-based build
was last summer. The twinkle of the summer sun in [Hein]’s eye socket made for a great occasion to dress the skeleton up in some summer garb. [Hein] was dressed in a fashionable Hawaiian shirt and put in a window along a corridor. Of course, a skeleton is no good if there’s no element of surprise, so [Hein] held disposable camera that flashed every time someone walked by.
[Hein]’s
birthday spectacular
required something a bit more shocking. A
blowout whistle
was added to [Hein]’s mandible. With a PIR sensor and a TI Launchpad, [Hein] was commanded to blow the whistle every time someone walked by.
[Victor]’s builds may not have the shock value – or even be as scary as Halloween necessitates – but he’s got a few good ideas for what could become a great yard display. Check out the video after the break to see [Hein] greeting [Victor]’s coworkers.
[vimeo=31051485] | 3 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "490423",
"author": "Josh Malone",
"timestamp": "2011-10-25T14:51:10",
"content": "Hey – it’s a dead man’s party!http://youtu.be/iypUpv9xelg?t=35s",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "490471",
"author": "Grovenstien",
"timesta... | 1,760,377,044.986835 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/25/minimalist-dioder-hack-requires-no-external-microcontroller/ | Minimalist DIODER Hack Requires No External Microcontroller | Mike Nathan | [
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"dioder",
"ikea",
"microcontrollers",
"PIC16F",
"RGB LED"
] | Hackaday reader [chrysn] picked up a
3-button RGB model DIODER light
from IKEA and thought he might as well take it apart to see what he could do with it. Having seen several
DIODER hacks featured here
, he knew it was easily hackable, but he didn’t want to simply rehash what other had already done.
All of the DIODER hacks we have come across thus far incorporate some sort of
AVR chip
or
add-on board
to expand its capabilities. [chrysn] saw that the controller already had a PIC16F684 inside, and thought that installing his own firmware onto the existing hardware would be a far more simple solution. He installed a small programming cable onto the DIODER’s control board, and using his PICkit2 programmer, flashed the chip with a custom firmware image.
His modifications worked great, and [chrysn] says that there is plenty potential in the existing hardware to have all sorts of fun with it. Even so, he notes that there are several AVR-flavored drop-in replacements that can be used if that happens to be your microcontroller family of choice. | 10 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "490298",
"author": "Eirinn",
"timestamp": "2011-10-25T11:52:40",
"content": "Lucid sofa lightning GET!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "490306",
"author": "Per Jensen",
"timestamp": "2011-10-25T12:06:52",
"content": "... | 1,760,377,045.181647 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/24/you-want-how-much-for-a-phone-charger/ | You Want How Much For A Phone Charger? | Kevin Dady | [
"News",
"Phone Hacks"
] | [
"charging"
] | People quickly find out that I am a dork, and their next question typically is “why do you own that old as dirt dumb phone?”. Well to be honest, I don’t like phones. After a decade of Palm Pilots and Windows CE devices, I really don’t like touch screens either (fat man fingers and a bad habit of chewing nails does not help). I also do not like that in order to get a fancy PDA with a radio you usually have to sign up for a data plan, or pay for the thing in full.
Now
get off my lawn!
Seriously though, I really only need my phone to do two things, make phone calls, and send SMS messages. If I had a wishlist the only other things I would like is mass storage for MP3 files, and Bluetooth. Naturally when I started my new day job I found the geek in the department and shortly there after I got asked about my basic LG flip phone.
After a few days of interrogation I jokingly snapped back with “well since you are so worried about it why don’t you give me a better phone!” With a little hinting around and a bribe of a “Swiss Roll” at lunch, I was given an old HTC phone with Windows Mobile 5.
While it is not exactly an iPhone or an Android, it is much more featured than what I had, and it has a mini SD card slot and Bluetooth! The only catch was, he could not find the charger. We did not know if the thing even worked (he had never seen the thing turned on) , or what condition the battery was in.
As a good little hacker I took it anyway, join me after the break to see me get it fired up and save a quite a bit of change in the process.
The phone in question is a Cingular 2125 (yea Cingular so its about 5-6 years old, but so is my flip phone) which is marked as HTC innovation under the battery. It seems like every page on HTC’s website includes the word “innovation”. It could go by a few other names such as Wizard 1xx and Faraday, but no matter the most useful information comes from the cingular page.
On that page it states that the phone can be charged from 5-9 volts via the mini USB port. You can charge with a standard USB cable, but if the battery is below a certain level you are required to use the wall charger. Since this phone probably has not seen a charger in at least 4 years it is safe to say the battery is flat.
I googled around for a while but never really found anything about the charger, other than their cost, One can pick up a generic USB charger for a few dollars, but I doubt that would do any good because if it would charge off of a 2 wire USB connection, it would have been charging on my computer just as well. The official charger however is 29.99 + shipping, and frankly there is no way I am paying that, and waiting a week for a phone that I don’t even know works.
Going on one of my trademarked “guess and whims” I decided to wire up a USB plug the same way a lot of Motorola phones are using a drawing found with the Adafruit minty boost discussion (and who cares if I fry it) . First up is to find a male mini USB plug, digging around I found the totally useless USB cord that came with my TI lauchpad. Using a utility knife I scored down the side of the plug slowly cutting the plastic boot, quickly removing the plug from its housing.
After removing the plastic boot, I de-soldered the 4 wires connecting to the USB plug and soldered on some long lengths of ribbon cable. Naturally one of the pins I would need was clipped off, they often do this to keep unskilled workers from making incorrect connections, but its highly freaking annoying.
In order to get around that I just used my soldering iron to scoop out the plastic around the pin, and cleaned out all the melted gunk with a knife, leaving enough metal for me to get a good solder connection. Once wires are solder on I soldered the other end to a set of pin headers so it could plug into my breadboard. Hooked it up turned it on and the phone started charging, and after a couple hours it was half charged.
I let it finish overnight on a computer USB port, and though the weekend I made a few calls, many text messages and beat “Super Mario Bothers” using a NES emulator. The battery, after all of that was sill roughly 75% of its full charge. so I know the phone works and the battery is still good at this point.
I could have left it at that, but if I ever let the battery discharge below its USB only threshold I would be doing it all over again, in order to prevent that I decided to move my 3 wires and resistor from the breadboard on to a proper power source and make my own charger.
While the breadboard was still hooked up I measured the phones current, using that setup the phone would draw just under 700ma (678 to be exact) , which is enough to screw up USB ports but low enough I have to question the intentions of HTC as they really could have dropped that.
Anyway, I rummaged around my junk box and got out an LG charger for a phone which I have never seen before, rated for 5 volts 800 milliamp, which is perfect. Now its just a matter of attaching the charger to the USB port with the 2 pins pulled down appropriately.
Cutting the cord to the LG charger I was presented with 4 wires, and since the 24(?) pin connector on the end was just held together with screws I popped it open and compared it to pinouts on google. Strangely enough red is 5 volts, green and black are ground, and yellow is an ID line (similar resistor setup I imagine except it seems backwards to what I need).
It never fails, if I look up the pinouts the wires will match logically, if I don’t look them up then its all kinds of crazy.Its just worth looking them up or probing them out, because color of wires means nothing in most situations, then you have to look them up anyway.
I clipped the green and yellow wires since I did not need them, and to prevent the ends from shorting out I took my wire clippers and tugged at the insulation a bit so the wire was back inside the insulation. Then I put a drop of liquid super glue on the ends so they would not poke back out.
Meanwhile on the USB plug I soldered a 220K ohm resistor bridging pins 2 and 4 together, and connecting the other end to ground. Finally I connected power and ground to pins 1 and 5 of the USB plug, in order to tighten things up a little I pulled on the outside jacket of the power supply cord which hides the 2 cut wires.
Now I have a proper wall wart for this phone, but it iss pretty fragile. There is really nothing holding the metal USB shield in place and there is no strain relief on the solder points. To solve the shield problem I just simply used a thin layer of gel superglue.There is a little bump in it so the boot will hold it. To solve the boot problem I pulled out my favourite little hack tool, putty epoxy. All I have to do is mark off where I don’t want the putty to go, then tape it off so it does not squish inside the plug.
If you have never used putty epoxy before its just epoxy resin and hardener in a putty form. All you have to do is kneed them together into a uniform color (mine is blue and white so it makes a purple color) and apply. You can get this stuff at different strengths with different additives, but I just use cheap “5 minute brand” from Wal-Mart. Since this stuff hardens fast you have to move quick, kneed it together to a uniform color and apply.
Once you have it blobbed on you may want to smooth the surface, since you will have fingerprints, or little spikes where the epoxy sticks to epoxy stuck to your fingers (even wearing latex gloves). The best way to do this is to wet your fingers with some plain old vegetable oil and smooth it out. It will never be 100% perfect but it will be darn good enough.
Finally before it sets up I need to trim the plug end so its not covered in rock hard gunk where it needs to be plugged in. Using a utility knife with the blade wiped down in vegetable oil simply make cuts down until you hit metal and angle away a bit so you pop the cut parts off. At this point the epoxy is starting to set hard so it will feel less like putty and more like sand, just keep making small cuts and eventually when you start seeing the tape move a bit since your now prying at the edge of it, you have gone far enough.
Now I am all set for another half decade and instead of getting grilled on “why are you using that dirt old dumb phone”, I will be getting grilled on “why are you using that dirt old smart phone … oh it plays zelda? Well OK, that’s cool then”
Sounds good to me. | 68 | 40 | [
{
"comment_id": "489796",
"author": "MobileWill",
"timestamp": "2011-10-24T23:15:40",
"content": "Nice job! I used to have the Cingular 8125.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "489801",
"author": "Pete S",
"timestamp": "2011-10-24T23:24:25"... | 1,760,377,048.065866 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/24/laser-cut-3d-sculptures-remind-us-of-an-old-playstation/ | Laser Cut 3D Sculptures Remind Us Of An Old Playstation | Brian Benchoff | [
"cnc hacks",
"Software Development"
] | [
"3d model",
"cnc",
"laser cutter",
"polygon"
] | [Paul] a.k.a. [VoidFraction]
put up the source and documentation
for his
sculptures
made with laser cut polygons.
For computing his triangles, [Paul] developed
LcAgl
, an algorithm that transforms a 3D model into the AutoCAD file needed to cut a whole bunch of triangles and connectors. This file was shot over to a laser cutter and after a confusing assembly, [Paul] can make just about any low polygon count model he wants.
For his sculptures, [Paul] uses Coroplast, a type of corrugated plastic commonly used in political campaign signs. Coroplast is lightweight and flexible, a bonus when [Paul] is fitting his triangles together. The connecting tabs are made from acrylic – a very rigid material, so the triangles are held tightly in place.
Since the models in most 3D games are just a bunch of polygons anyway, this technique reminds us of the first 3D console games. [Paul]’s rhino looks like it walked off the set of a low polygon game like
Virtua Fighter
or
Jumping Flash!
. | 21 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "489788",
"author": "nexekho",
"timestamp": "2011-10-24T22:56:45",
"content": "Why confusing? Figure out an order to put the pieces together in, and engrave a number on each edge. Go sequentially, find matching numbers, hey, you just mixed the jigsaw and the dot-to-dot!",
"pare... | 1,760,377,047.712476 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/24/giving-siri-the-keys-to-your-house/ | Giving Siri The Keys To Your House | Mike Szczys | [
"iphone hacks",
"Security Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"door",
"google app engine",
"lock",
"siri",
"sms",
"text message",
"twilio"
] | We haven’t really covered many hacks having to do with Apple’s newest iPhone feature Siri. We’d bet you’ve already heard a bunch about the voice-activated AI assistant and here’s your chance to give it the keys to your house. This project
uses Siri to actuate the deadbolt on an entry door
in a roundabout sort of way.
This is really just a Siri frontend for an SMS entry system seen in several other hacks. The inside of the door (pictured above) has a servo motor mounted next to, and attached via connecting rod with, the lever-style deadbolt. An Arduino equipped with a WiFly shield controls that servo and is waiting for instructions from the Google app engine. But wait, they’re not done yet. The app engine connects to a Twilio account which gives it the ability to receive SMS messages. Long story short; Siri is sending a text message that opens the door… eventually. You can seen in the demo after the break that the whole process takes over twenty seconds from the time you first access Siri to the point the bolt is unlocked. Still, it’s a fine first prototype.
There’s a fair amount of expensive hardware on that door which we’d like to see converted to extra feaures. [CC Laan] has already added one other entry method, using a piezo element to listen for a secret knock. But we think there’s room for improvement. Since it’s Internet connected we’d love to see a sensor to monitor how often the door is opened, and perhaps a PIR sensor that would act as a motion-sensing burglar alert system.
Don’t need something this complicated? How about
implementing just the secret knock portion of the hack
?
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5cWrTXOvNw&w=470] | 30 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "489632",
"author": "macona",
"timestamp": "2011-10-24T21:17:00",
"content": "RC Servo, not servo motor.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "489653",
"author": "ironring",
"timestamp": "2011-10-24T21:30:17",
... | 1,760,377,047.473523 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/26/minibloq-arduino-ide-is-in-beta-and-in-need-of-testers/ | Minibloq Arduino IDE Is In Beta And In Need Of Testers | Mike Nathan | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"Software Development"
] | [
"arduino",
"drag and drop",
"gui",
"kids",
"Minibloq"
] | If you have been chomping at the bit to give drag and drop Arduino programming a try,
Minibloq is finally in Beta
and ready for you to test!
We mentioned the application
back in April of this year
, when [Julián da Silva] was still in the early stages of developing the software. His graphical programming environment is meant to put the power of the Arduino and its derivatives into the hands of children in an easy fashion, with a gentle learning curve.
A lot has transpired since we first wrote about Minibloq, including a very
successful Kickstarter campaign
, along with many hours of programming and testing. The current Beta release includes a ton of features and programming “blocks” beyond what we saw earlier this year, so be sure to check out the video below for a quick tour of what’s new.
[Julián] says that the application’s source code will be released after they add a few key features, so keep an eye out for that if you’re interested in taking a peek under the hood.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z79N2H8Cjdc&feature=player_embedded&w=470] | 67 | 39 | [
{
"comment_id": "491314",
"author": "THeOReos",
"timestamp": "2011-10-26T14:18:01",
"content": "a pity…they should have made a drag and drop layout-programm editor vor all the dip atmegas out there. but maybe a good idea to get the youngsters ready for realizing their ideas!",
"parent_id": null,... | 1,760,377,047.87038 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/26/huge-flexible-led-matrix-can-be-worn-almost-anywhere/ | Huge Flexible LED Matrix Can Be Worn Almost Anywhere | Mike Nathan | [
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"beagleboard",
"clothing",
"led",
"matrix",
"rgb"
] | [Erik] has been keeping extremely busy with his latest project, a flexible RGB LED matrix that he calls
“Project Light Bright”
. The folks at
BuildLounge
tell us that this is the first entry they have received so far in their “Light Contest”, in which they are giving away
a free laser cutter
to the best entry.
[Erik] hand soldered ten 16×16 RGB LED panels together in order to build this display, and the results are awesome. The entire thing is controlled by a WiFi-enabled Beagleboard, which drives all of the panels and then some. The Beagleboard features embedded web and DNS servers, which allows it to act as a wireless AP, enabling him to control the display using any WiFi capable device. The Light Bright displays all sorts of predefined artwork, but [Erik] can also alter the display on the fly via his phone as well. The entire thing is powered by a reasonably sized LiPo battery pack that he keeps tucked away in his pocket, which allows the display to run continuously for about 20 hours.
Check out the video below to see a quick walkthrough of [Erik’s] Light Bright suit, then be sure to stop by his site for more videos, details and updates on the project.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=-GzDQwgjvU8#!&w=470] | 24 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "491306",
"author": "Chris",
"timestamp": "2011-10-26T14:00:58",
"content": "A tripod would of made that video watchable.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "491397",
"author": "Effigy",
"timestamp": "2011-10-26T15:... | 1,760,377,047.59324 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/25/tilt-compensation-when-reading-a-digital-compass/ | Tilt Compensation When Reading A Digital Compass | Mike Szczys | [
"Arduino Hacks"
] | [
"avr-libc",
"compass",
"magnetometer",
"math",
"trigonometry"
] | If you’re familiar with using a compass (the tool that points to magnetic north, not the one that makes circles) the concept of holding the device level makes sense. It must be level for the needle to balance and rotate freely. You just use your eyes to make sure you’re holding the thing right. Now think of a digital compass. They work by measuring the pull of a magnetic field, and have no visual method of showing whether they’re level or not. To ensure accurate readings you might
use an accelerometer to compensate for a tilted magnetometer
.
The process involves taking measurements from both an accelerometer and a magnetometer, then performing calculations with that data to get a true reading. Luckily the equations have been figured out for us and we don’t need to get too deep into trigonometry. You will, however, need to use sine, cosine, and arctangent in your calculations. These should be available in your programming language of choice. Arduino (used here) makes use of the avr-libc math library to perform the calculations. | 16 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "490962",
"author": "Gatsu",
"timestamp": "2011-10-26T00:20:10",
"content": "If you were to use a cheap tilt compensated compass like the LSM303 you get both sensors in one package.There is also no reason why you can’t use the two sensors independently either.RC pan/tilt head tracker... | 1,760,377,047.764363 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/25/do-you-know-why-youre-supposed-to-use-decoupling-capacitors/ | Do You Know WHY You’re Supposed To Use Decoupling Capacitors? | Mike Szczys | [
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"capacitor",
"decoupling",
"digital logic"
] | [Bertho] really enjoyed pawing through the pile of projects submitted to the 7400 logic contest. But one thing kept hitting him with the vast majority of the entries: decoupling capacitors were missing from the circuits. If you’ve worked with microcontrollers or digital logic chips you probably know that you’re supposed to add a small capacitor in between the voltage and ground pins for decoupling purposes. But do you know why? [Bertho] put together a great post that looks that
the benefits of using decoupling capacitors in your circuits
.
He set up a circuit using a 74HC04 inverter and put it to the test. The image above shows current measurments with the inverter under load. Images on the right show a decoupled circuit and the ones on the left shows a circuit without that capacitor. You can see that the decoupled circuit has much smoother signals when driven high. But it’s not just the smoothness that counts here. [Bertho] goes on to discuss the problem of slow rise-time caused by a dip in current flowing into a chip’s VCC pin. It can take a long time to get above the threshold where a chip would recognize a digital 1. Throwing a capacitor in there adds a little reservoir of current, just waiting to fill in when the power rail dips. This feeds the chip in times of need, keeping those logic transitions nice and snappy. | 57 | 26 | [
{
"comment_id": "490851",
"author": "Monty Werthington",
"timestamp": "2011-10-25T22:05:50",
"content": "Interesting, Now I know why.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "490880",
"author": "Chris",
"timestamp": "2011-10-25T22:35:04... | 1,760,377,047.962802 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/25/singing-house-lights-up-halloween-again-this-year/ | Singing House Lights Up Halloween Again This Year | Mike Szczys | [
"Holiday Hacks",
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"decoration",
"halloween",
"House",
"music"
] | [KJ92508] is flooding the neighborhood with light again this year. Everyone knows of that one house in town that really goes all out, but few put on a show anything like this one. The
four Jack-o’-lantern faces lead the way with the opening sequence from A Nightmare Before Christmas
. Each has at least four different mouth poses, and two eye orientations which are surprisingly well synchronized with the audio. The image above shows mostly orange lighting, but the home is outfitted with addressable RGB LEDs for a full color performance. In fact, it has seen an upgrade this year, increasing the channels by eight-fold to 1144! Don’t miss the performance which we’ve embedded after the break.
We had considered not featuring this, since
we looked in on the same home last year
. But the number of tips that rolled in made us think that a lot of you missed it, or are just delighted by the multitude of blinky lights. Either way, it’s worth the four minutes out of your day– it will either put a smile on your face, or make you glad not to live across the street from this guy.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WAXMtUCcp7o&w=470] | 19 | 16 | [
{
"comment_id": "490805",
"author": "Patrick",
"timestamp": "2011-10-25T21:01:21",
"content": "If you do rename the site it could be called blinkylight.com",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "490817",
"author": "pr",
"timestamp": "2011-10-25... | 1,760,377,047.531981 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/25/tactile-computer-interface-with-electromagnets/ | Tactile Computer Interface With Electromagnets | Brian Benchoff | [
"hardware"
] | [
"electromagnets",
"haptic",
"haptic feedback",
"touchscreen"
] | It’s not that touchscreen keyboards are
horrible
, but it’s nearly impossible to touch type on an iPad or other tablet keyboard. A team at the Media Computing Group at Aachen University figured out how to put a series of electromagnets underneath a display to
provide haptic feedback
for touchscreens. They showed off their tech at the
2011 UIST conference
and made their paper
available
.
For the FingerFlux, as the team likes to call it, a bed of tiny electromagnets is placed underneath a panel display. The user wears a ‘thimble’ with an attached permanent magnet. Driving the bed of electromagnets slightly moves the magnet and provides a little bit of sensation to the user.
The FingerFlux can be used to provide haptic feedback like a keyboard. The system can also be used to model constraints – making sure that users don’t move outside the controls they operate, and can guide the user to the desired button.
A bed of electromagnets would be a welcome addition to tablets, if only to prevent typung luje rhus. Check out the demo of the FingerFlux after the break.
Thanks go to [John] for sending this one in.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=trM7mXOjNFY&w=470] | 29 | 18 | [
{
"comment_id": "490740",
"author": "Dan Fruzzetti",
"timestamp": "2011-10-25T19:59:04",
"content": "So now I have to wear gloves with tiny neodymium magnets embedded into the fingertips? How long will it take before they break?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
... | 1,760,377,047.654373 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/25/recovering-a-corrupted-eee-pc-bios/ | Recovering A Corrupted EEE PC BIOS | Mike Nathan | [
"computer hacks",
"Repair Hacks"
] | [
"bios",
"eee pc",
"netbook",
"recovery",
"repair",
"spi"
] | [Jeremy] had an ASUS EEE PC 1000HE netbook on his hands which had succumbed to
a corrupted BIOS.
In most situations, people replace a motherboard when the BIOS is damaged beyond repair, but considering the price of motherboards, especially those built for portable devices, he simply refused to go that route.
Instead, he took it apart and did a little investigation to find out what SPI flash chip ASUS used in the netbook. With that information in hand, he put together an SPI flash programmer using a breadboard and a DLP-USB1232H USB to UART module. He couldn’t program the flash chip in-circuit, so he had to desolder it and deadbugged it onto his programmer. Using a few Linux-based flashing tools, he was able to reprogram the chip with a functioning BIOS in short order, saving him from a costly motherboard replacement.
While some motherboard manufacturers have built in secondary BIOS chips to prevent the need for this sort of recovery, it’s nice to know that the process is relatively straightforward, provided you have some basic soldering and Linux skills.
This also
isn’t the first time
we’ve seen someone recover an EEE PC from the brink – if you’re looking for an Arduino-based alternative, be sure to
check this out. | 23 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "490739",
"author": "Dan Fruzzetti",
"timestamp": "2011-10-25T19:57:35",
"content": "Time is just as valuable as money. I assume he doesn’t have kids :P Great work, but one should always weigh the monetary value of the time (or the timewise value of the money) in any case.",
"p... | 1,760,377,048.126644 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/24/washing-machine-powered-bike/ | Washing Machine Powered Bike | Mike Szczys | [
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"bicycle",
"bike",
"electric",
"washing machine"
] | [Ameres Valentin] was looking for a less expensive way to get around after spending in excess of 100 Euros a month on public transportation in Munich. His solution is
an electric bicycle powered by a washing machine motor
. It’s a 300 Watt motor that runs on 24 Volts, capable of around 3000 RPM. We’re used to seeing hub motors or chain drives on electric vehicle hacks, but it looks like [Ameres] is using a flywheel on the motor shaft to drive the rear wheel of the bike through direct contact.
Inside the saddle bag you’ll find two 12 volt 12 amp hour sealed lead acid batteries which are used in series. It looks like he charges these with a wall wart (that we think might use a switching power supply) modified with a couple of large alligator clamps. A push button mounted on the handlebars makes it go.We wonder if he’s still able to pedal when the batteries are running low? We don’t see a way to disengage the motor from the rear wheel so we’d bet this is something of an issue. Then again, if that charge actually works you’re never far from an opportunity to top off the batteries.
Check out a quick clip of the motor spinning the wheel embedded after the break.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vecOv8nHsc&w=470] | 62 | 20 | [
{
"comment_id": "489423",
"author": "steve",
"timestamp": "2011-10-24T17:06:57",
"content": "Neat idea. Flywheel is actually no bad idea. SInce the friction can be optimized, the additional wear by it is rather small. The principle is also used in many merry-go-arounds.",
"parent_id": null,
... | 1,760,377,048.220899 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/24/fattening-a-thin-client-to-run-a-debian-desktop/ | Fattening A Thin Client To Run A Debian Desktop | Mike Szczys | [
"Linux Hacks"
] | [
"debian",
"HP",
"t5325",
"thin client"
] | While watching his thin client boot up [Nav] noticed that it’s using some type of Linux kernel. He wondered if it were possible to run a full-blow desktop distribution on the device. A little poking around he got
a Debian desktop distribution running on a thin client
.
The hardware he’s working with is an HP t5325. It’s meant to be a dumb client, connecting to a backend machine like a Windows Terminal Server or via SSH. But it’s got a 1.2 GHz ARM processor and [Nav’s] preliminary investigations revealed the it’s running a version of Debian for ARM. He used CTRL-C during the boot sequence to derail that process and dump him to a shell. The login was easy enough to guess as the username and password are both ‘root’.
Once he’s got that root access it was slash and burn time. He got rid of the HP-specific setup and made way for additional Debian modules like the apt system. This isn’t trivial, but he’s worked out a bunch of sticking points which makes the process easier. With the repository tools loaded you can install Xserver and Gnome for a full-blown desktop on the embedded hardware. | 13 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "489372",
"author": "Zack Carlson",
"timestamp": "2011-10-24T16:04:14",
"content": "1) Link is wrong (goes to watch post, instead of thin client post)2) Great hack, but I am imagining this is far more expensive then it needs to be for a thin client..I mean look at the Rasberry Pi…",
... | 1,760,377,049.081177 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/24/using-an-lcds-poor-viewing-angle-to-your-advantage/ | Using An LCD’s Poor Viewing Angle To Your Advantage | Mike Szczys | [
"Video Hacks"
] | [
"lcd",
"polarized",
"viewing angle"
] | Early LCD monitors had some pretty awful issues when not viewed from directly in front of the screen. These days the technology has really minimized this flaw, but if you still have a cheap monitor on hand you might want to pull it out and give this hack a try. [Chris Harrison] is
using oblique viewing angles to display additional information
on cheap montiors.
Take a look at the two images above. The one on the left is taken from directly in front of the monitor and looks normal. But if you view the same screen from the side, the financial information is obscured. This is by design. Using very light colors, the obscuring characters are almost indiscernible from straight on, but you can just see them there a little bit (they look like burn-in does on a CRT screen). But from the side, these light colors become quite bold and blend with the rest of the data on the screen.
This works because of the polarizing filters on an LCD screen. You might want to watch [Bill Hammack]
explain how an LCD works
if you’re not familiar. Because the viewing angle color changes are a flaw and not a feature, manufacturers make the up-and-down angles the worst to improve on side-to-side viewing. [Chris’] experiments play into that by using a computer monitor on its side. Check out the video after the break to see some of the different applications that he uses this for.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U3g40GCluwU&w=470] | 17 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "489264",
"author": "42",
"timestamp": "2011-10-24T14:14:43",
"content": "wow",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "489289",
"author": "Hirudinea",
"timestamp": "2011-10-24T14:40:15",
"content": "That could come in handy fo... | 1,760,377,048.91766 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/24/logging-bubble-frequency-and-pressure-in-your-fermenter/ | Logging Bubble Frequency And Pressure In Your Fermenter | Mike Szczys | [
"Beer Hacks"
] | [
"bubble",
"fermenter",
"optical",
"pressure",
"sensor"
] | In an attempt to add technology to his brewing process [hpux735] build
a sensor rig that monitors bubbles and pressure during fermentation
. What does this have to do with brewing great beer? We’re not sure and neither is [hpux735], but he’s got some preliminary readings to spark your imagination.
The bubble sensor itself was inspired by
a SparkFun Tutorial
where fermenting wine was monitored with a data logger. It uses an optical gate to detect the passage of air. But the goal here was to combine bubble frequency with internal pressure measurements to calculate how much CO2 is being vented. Perhaps it would be possible to get an idea of how close the batch is to completion based on those calculations. A hole was drilled into the fermenter side of an airlock to take these pressure readings.
This actually works quite well during secondary fermentation when the bubble frequency is quite slow. The hardware is able to discern a pressure difference before and after a bubble has passed the lock. Unfortunately the system breaks down during the vigorous bubbling that takes place soon after pitching yeast. See a few bubble-counting clips in the video after the break.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwRa1jvgRxE&w=470] | 21 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "489228",
"author": "James",
"timestamp": "2011-10-24T13:33:52",
"content": "I’d actually be really interested to hear how this was put to use – I do a lot of wine brewing at home and generally it’s a case of “just leave it in the cupboard until it seems right”. If there were a sane ... | 1,760,377,048.744299 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/23/altoid-tin-etching-tutorial/ | Altoid Tin Etching Tutorial | Brian Benchoff | [
"how-to"
] | [
"altoids",
"electrolisis",
"etching",
"steampunk"
] | Eminent steampunker [Jake Von Slatt] wrote a small article on etching candy tins for
The Steampunk Bible
, but the limited space available in the book didn’t allow for a full exposition. To make amends for his incomplete tutorial, he posted
this walk through
to compliment the Bible’s article.
The process is very similar to the
many
tutorials
we’ve seen on home-etching PCBs using the toner transfer method. Removing the paint from the Altoid tin, creating a mask, printing it on the Sunday circulars, and taking an iron to the tin is old hat for home fabbers.
Unlike PCB manufacturing, [Mr. Von Slatt] doesn’t bother with Ferric Chloride or other nasty chemicals – he does everything with electrolysis. After adding a few tablespoons of table salt to a bucket of water, [Jake] takes a DC power supply and connects the positive lead to the lid and the negative lead to the base. a bit of electrical tape around the corners of the lid keeps the metal from getting too thin.
A nice Copper finish can be applied to a finished tin by swabbing on a solution of Copper Sulfate – a common ingredient in “Root Kill” products. Of course that’s not a necessary step; you can easily enjoy and elegant Altoid tin bare metal. | 20 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "488472",
"author": "mtristan",
"timestamp": "2011-10-23T23:56:34",
"content": "Really good looking! Various ideas come to my mind right now.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "488575",
"author": "MRC",
"timestamp": "2011-10... | 1,760,377,048.801419 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/23/adding-a-compact-flash-reader-to-a-korg-triton/ | Adding A Compact Flash Reader To A Korg Triton | Mike Szczys | [
"Musical Hacks"
] | [
"cf",
"compact flash",
"keyboard",
"korg",
"sampler",
"scsi",
"triton"
] | [Roberto Barrios] has a Korg Triton sampling keyboard which he enjoys very much, but has grown tired of using media of yesteryear to store his work. He had the option of floppy disk or Jazz drive and for a time he was using a floppy-to-USB emulator, but the keyboard still insisted on a 1.44 Mb storage limit using that method. He decided to
crack open the case and add his own CF reader
.
It should be noted that this hack could have been avoided by using the 25-pin connector on the back of the keyboard. He didn’t want to have external hardware, which is understandable if you’re gigging–it’s just more equipment to keep track of. His solution uses the floppy disk drive opening to mount the card reader. His electrical connections are made with a ribbon cable. He cut off one end, and soldered the individual wires to the contacts on the motherboard. The reader is seen as a SCSI drive by the Korg firmware thanks to a SCSI-to-IDE adapter, so the storage limitation is based quite fittingly on the size of the CF card used.
Look at that cable management. You’d think it came straight from the factory like this! | 22 | 16 | [
{
"comment_id": "488417",
"author": "Paul Potter",
"timestamp": "2011-10-23T23:13:47",
"content": "Very nicely done.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "488459",
"author": "M4CGYV3R",
"timestamp": "2011-10-23T23:35:43",
"content": "Takin... | 1,760,377,048.856577 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/23/snooping-around-in-the-iclicker-hardware-and-firmware/ | Snooping Around In The Iclicker Hardware And Firmware | Mike Szczys | [
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"atmega8",
"i>clicker",
"reverse engineering",
"RF"
] | [Arko] was compelled to purchase an iclicker to use in some of his college courses. It’s similar in size to a television remote control except it only has six buttons and it communicates via radio frequency instead of infrared light. The idea is that classrooms have a base station that the instructor uses, and he or she can ask questions of the class and have instant feedback. Results are often projected on a screen for all to see but only the instructor can get at the breakdown of who answered in what way. In [Arko’s] case, the class awards participation points that you can only get by using this device. He decided to actually
learn something from the expenditure by reverse engineering the device
.
Preliminary hardware inspection told him that it uses an ATmega8 microcontroller and there’s a standard 6-pin ISP footprint just waiting to be populated with a surface mount pin header. Once he soldered on that header, he tried to read out the firmware but the iClicker reset itself. He guessed that there was something going on with the power and ground lines so he soldered directly to them and was able to dump the data–the security fuses are not set. He goes on to snoop in the EEPROM to find where the device ID is stored, and then to watch some of the SPI communications to see what the microcontroller is sending to the radio chip. But there’s a lot left to discover and he’s planning at least two follow-up post to share what he finds.
Just looking to repair your dead device? Check out
this tip on battery problems with the iclicker
. | 26 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "488331",
"author": "phisrow",
"timestamp": "2011-10-23T21:54:18",
"content": "Does anybody else get the sneaking suspicion that $40(the manufacturer’s asking price) seems pretty optimistic, given the circuitry provided?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
... | 1,760,377,049.034298 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/23/beating-the-wrong-amateur-balloon-record/ | Beating The Wrong Amateur Balloon Record | Brian Benchoff | [
"hardware"
] | [
"amateur radio",
"balloon",
"ham radio",
"high altitude balloon"
] | Friday, we covered a
little project
that attempted to beat the UK altitude record for an amateur balloon launch. Things don’t always go as planned, but the APEX team did manage to
beat the several other UK records
, including ones for the longest distance and flight duration for a latex balloon.
The APEX team was originally trying to beat the altitude record set by [Darkside] and his
Horus 15.5
payload that made it to 40,575 meters. The APEX balloon was launched and
slowly climbed
over the North Sea to the expected burst point. Unfortunately for the trackers, the balloon leveled off at about 36km and
just kept going
.
The total Great Circle distance of the APEX Alpha flight was 1347km, with a total flight time of 12 hours, 20 minutes. The balloon eventually drifted out the radio range of anyone aware of the project. Despite the valiant efforts of HAMs across Europe, APEX Alpha was lost in the “HAM wastelands of Eastern Europe,” somewhere over Poland.
Even though the APEX team lost contact with their balloon, Alpha was still transmitting at the time. The balloon surely burst at this point, so it could have landed anywhere from Poland to Ukraine to Russia. The APEX team is offering a reward for finding Alpha, so if you see a
small styrofoam box
in Eastern Europe, drop the APEX boys
a line
.
Of course this flight couldn’t have taken place without the efforts of HAMs across Europe. [Darkside], [
2E0UPU
], and so many others helped out with the tracking as Alpha passed over the Netherlands and continued towards Berlin. The last contact was made by the awesome [
OZ1SKY
], who was very gracious to stay up until the wee hours of Sunday morning.
Not a bad flight for something that was supposed to take a swim in the North Sea. If you’d like to see the raw data from the flight, the APEX team posted
everything they pulled down
. | 17 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "488260",
"author": "Kyle Hotchkiss",
"timestamp": "2011-10-23T20:14:14",
"content": "Incredible. I love APEX.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "488303",
"author": "pod",
"timestamp": "2011-10-23T21:08:19",
"content": "... | 1,760,377,048.972844 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/23/toy-car-fitted-with-lights-and-sirens-is-a-childrens-delight/ | Toy Car Fitted With Lights And Sirens Is A Children’s Delight | Mike Nathan | [
"contests",
"Toy Hacks"
] | [
"7400",
"leds",
"police",
"toys"
] | [Nathan], a member of the DangerousPrototypes forums, was looking for a project he could use to enter the 7400 logic competition they are holding. His kids had a small ride on police car, but the light bar on top contained no lights, and the car made no sounds when his children were in pursuit of baddies around the house. [Nathan] had all the inspiration he needed, and took to his workshop in order to
fix this glaring oversight by the toys’ creators.
He designed a circuit based loosely around a Cylon-style light that he saw a while back at the Evil Mad Scientist Labs, which employed an oscillator and a 4107 decade counter to control the lights. His design uses a 74HC04 hex inverter as the oscillator, while the decade counter is used to modulate the siren’s frequency and control the rotating LED beacons.
The final result is great if you ask us. An “unnamed adult female” in the house was not nearly as impressed by the additions based upon how much time [Nathan] spent on the project, but his children were absolutely thrilled.
Continue reading to see a quick video of the revamped police car in action.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMlVK92Vrgw&w=470] | 17 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "488195",
"author": "Jeffery MacEachern",
"timestamp": "2011-10-23T18:19:38",
"content": "That’s a slick build. Lucky kids! :)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "488201",
"author": "anguish",
"timestamp": "2011-10-23T18:32:0... | 1,760,377,049.135758 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/23/how-to-record-3d-video-in-3d/ | How To Record 3D Video In 3D | Jeremy Cook | [
"Cellphone Hacks",
"home entertainment hacks"
] | [
"3d movie",
"3d video",
"htc evo 3d"
] | Legalities of doing something like this aside,
this concept
by [MadSci labs] gives some insight into how one would go about recording a 3D movie in 3D. Probably many of you have wondered if this could be done, but they took it one step further and actually made a device capable of doing just that.
[MadSci labs] solution involved taking some 3D glasses home from a theater, cutting them to size, and taping them to a HTC EVO 3D phone. Each lens piece was taped over a different camera lens to separate out the two 3D elements needed to produce a stereoscopic image. Their experiment was successful, however some loss of quality was experienced. Because of this, we’re not expecting to see a lot of in-theater movies pirated this way, but given a more professional-quality build, you never know what will happen.
You can see the “results” of their experiment after the break. As it’s not in 3D, it should give you an idea of what is going on.
[youtube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aN6hHKxYvXs&w=470&h=315%5D | 17 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "488151",
"author": "ejonesss",
"timestamp": "2011-10-23T17:09:39",
"content": "it wont be long before the movie industry sues over that.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "488152",
"author": "Ditto",
"timestamp": "2011-10-2... | 1,760,377,049.191466 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/23/all-about-the-google-autonomous-vehicle-project/ | All About The Google Autonomous Vehicle Project | Jeremy Cook | [
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"autonomous vehicle",
"google",
"gps",
"prius"
] | There have been many self-driving cars made with different levels of success, but probably the most well-known project is the Google car. What you may not have heard of, though is the autonomous Google cart, or golf cart to be exact.
The first video
after the break explains the motivation behind the cart and the autonomous vehicle project. As with another
autonomous vehicle
we’ve featured before, they didn’t forget to include an E-stop button (at 1:03)!
In the
second video
(also after the break) Google’s Sebastian Thrun and Chris Urmson get into more of the details of how Google’s more famous autonomous Prius vehicles work and their travels around different towns in California. A safety driver is still used at this point, but the sensor package includes a roof-mounted 64-beam laser sensor, wheel encoder, radars, and a GPS sensor. With Google’s vast resources as well as their work with Streetview and Google maps, it’ll be interesting to see what comes of this technology. I, for one, welcome our new robotic overlords.
[youtube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rOWhu_aa9kM&w=470&h=315%5D
[youtube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXylqtEQ0tk&w=470&h=315%5D
Via
[ieee Spectrum] | 32 | 17 | [
{
"comment_id": "488110",
"author": "Hene193",
"timestamp": "2011-10-23T16:27:27",
"content": "I will get one.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "488113",
"author": "Andy",
"timestamp": "2011-10-23T16:31:28",
"content": "Looks extremely... | 1,760,377,049.26074 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/23/medusa-a-proximity-aware-tabletop/ | Medusa: A Proximity-aware Tabletop | Brian Benchoff | [
"hardware"
] | [
"microsoft surface",
"multitouch",
"proximity sensor"
] | Finally [Michelle Annett] can talk about her
super secret project
she did at Autodesk Research.
Medusa, as [Michelle]’s project is called, is a Microsoft Surface that has been fitted with 138 proximity sensors. This allows the Surface to sense users walking up to it, and detect users hands and arms above the table top. Multiple users can be detected at the same time, and the left and right hands of two users can be mapped to specific users.
The proximity sensors [Michelle] used are inexpensive, so we’re wondering when someone with a
crazy multitouch setup
will add proximity sensors to their build. We’d like to play with Medusa, even if just for a virtual game of Settlers of Catan. It seems like the perfect setup…
[Michelle] built Medusa last January during her internship at
Autodesk
. Now that
UIST 2011
is over, she can finally talk about it. There’s also a video demonstrating the possibilities of Medusa, check it out after the break.
Thanks [Fraser] for sending this one in.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=rjbKmyxCuEw&w=470] | 20 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "488086",
"author": "Tex©",
"timestamp": "2011-10-23T15:33:32",
"content": "neat",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "488092",
"author": "Ikearat",
"timestamp": "2011-10-23T15:40:28",
"content": "I think that video strippe... | 1,760,377,049.454124 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/23/halloween-hacks-flickering-jack-o-lantern/ | Halloween Hacks: Flickering Jack-o’-lantern | Brian Benchoff | [
"contests",
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"74xx",
"Halloween hacks",
"led"
] | The dollar store is always a great place to find some weird stuff, so when [jethomson] found a flickering Jack-o’-lantern, he thought it would make a great project for the
74xx logic competition
.
Instead of using the flickering incandescent lightbulb that came with the blinking pumpkin, [jethomson] decided to rebuild a blinking circuit around a 74HC14 Hex inverting Schmitt trigger IC. The chip was used as a relaxation oscillator by adding a resistor and cap from the input to the ground. After a bit of component selection and some calculation, he had a red and blue LED blinking at 2,6,9, and 15 Hz.
The result is a seemingly random pattern of light that looks like a ghostly blue after image of the handheld Jack-o’-lantern. While it may not be one of the
most
complex
builds for the 74xx competition, it gets points in our book for originality.
Although [jethomson] says his camera doesn’t pick up his project very well, he did post a video of the Jack-o’-Lantern in action. Check it out after the break.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=r1-Sb6F46RQ&w=470] | 2 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "488263",
"author": "jethomson",
"timestamp": "2011-10-23T20:15:20",
"content": "I wouldn’t say using that relaxation oscillator circuit is very original because it’s in the datasheet. However, using just the 74HC14 and mixing several frequencies to get a flicker effect might be. The... | 1,760,377,049.553453 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/22/hacking-in-cameroon-for-profit-and-entertainment/ | Hacking In Cameroon For Profit And Entertainment | Mike Szczys | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"africa",
"blacksmith",
"cameroon",
"metalwork"
] | [Bill Zimmerman] is in Cameroon and has been posting some really interesting articles about life in the central African nation. It comes as no surprise that imported goods can be prohibitively expensive for many of the country’s residents, so building tools and goods is way to improve life and save money. The image above is
a metalworking cooperative where any number of products are manufactured
from recycled materials, often using tools that the craftsmen made themselves. Their wares are amazingly wide-ranging; crow bars, motorcycle seats, buckets, plows, hammers, knives, cold chisels, and much more. The video after the break shows the tradesmen hard at work. See some video of the cooperative after the break.
But adults aren’t the only ones getting in on the action. Remember [William Kamkwamba] who
built a wind generator for his villiage
? It seems the tinkering spirit runs deep in the children of Cameroon as well. [Bill] came across some kids who grabbed leftovers like the soles of sandals, scraps of rope, and empty sardine tins
to build a steerable toy car
.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kttgo_jW-_4&=470]
[Thanks Rob] | 24 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "487318",
"author": "stunmonkey",
"timestamp": "2011-10-22T19:08:02",
"content": "very nice. i have seen places exactly like this in se asia and pacific rim countries. a surprising amount of good can actually get done in even the most rudimentary co-op like this.appropriate technolog... | 1,760,377,049.511257 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/22/7400-drum-machine-is-a-delight/ | 7400 Drum Machine Is A Delight | Mike Szczys | [
"Musical Hacks"
] | [
"7400",
"drum machine",
"logic",
"synthesizer"
] | [74hc595] just finished his entry in the 7400 logic contest. It’s
a drum machine built entirely from 7400-series logic chips
. He hasn’t quite reached full completion of the project yet. The hardware works just fine, and he’s built a foam core face plate with many more controls than you see here but much of the circuit is still on a breadboard at this point and only two of the channels have been complete thus far.
Jump to the video clip after the break to get the details of how the system works and to hear it in action. This demonstration is one of the best we’ve seen for a synthesizer project as he actually talks about what each control does, and how that is accomplished with the hardware. We’re not going to go into detail about the circuitry he’s designed. As we said before, it uses 7400 logic but also sources a 555 timer to keep the beat. The page linked above has a PDF of the schematic available and you could really lose a lot of time studying how he did this. We might even try to build it in a simulator to see what we can learn.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsSKh7Z2EVs&w=470] | 24 | 21 | [
{
"comment_id": "487233",
"author": "Ragnar",
"timestamp": "2011-10-22T17:21:53",
"content": "Impressive already, and with 4 channels will sound so even more.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "487234",
"author": "oodain",
"timestamp": "201... | 1,760,377,050.257861 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/22/going-rgb-with-7-segment-displays/ | Going RGB With 7 Segment Displays | Brian Benchoff | [
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"7 segment",
"RGB LED",
"seven segment"
] | We can order seven segment displays in red, green, yellow, or blue all day long. One thing we haven’t seen is an RGB segmented display, so [Markus]’ project is really interesting. He took a stock seven segment display and modded it into an
RGB display
.
After taking a Dremel to the back of the stock display, [Markus] was left with a seven segment light mask. A few SMD LEDs were purchased through the usual channels. The RGB LEDs were epoxied into place on the back of the light mask one at a time. Thankfully, the LEDs came with magnet wire already attached – helpful, since these LEDs are only 1.6mm x 1.2mm big.
With 32 pieces of magnet wire, [Markus] needed some sort of socket. A small piece of perfboard and some .100″ headers handled the job very nicely. [Markus] still has to work on some way to drive the 24 cathode lines his LED display. He’d like an I2C interface, but with something like an individual seven segment display, the footprint of the circuit should be pretty small. If you’ve got any tips, drop them in the comments section. [Markus] is sure to catch them there. | 22 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "487089",
"author": "karl",
"timestamp": "2011-10-22T14:07:46",
"content": "What about the MAX6955 or other chips in that series?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "487099",
"author": "Volfram",
"timestamp": "2011-10-22T14:1... | 1,760,377,049.835929 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/22/weekly-roundup-102211/ | Weekly Roundup 10/22/11 | Jack Buffington | [
"Weekly Roundup"
] | [
"weekly roundup"
] | In case you missed them the first time, here are our most popular posts from the past week.
Our most popular post of the week was about
a ball that has a matrix of 256 LEDs
encrusted onto its surface, allowing all sorts of patterns to be displayed.
Next up is a post about the
vibrator shield for the Arduino
. If you must mix sex and nerdy things, this is one route to happiness. This post is safe for work but the links may not be.
After that we had a post about a novel way to take panoramic pictures. In this post, you will see a
ball that has an array of 36 cameras embedded into it
. If you throw it into the air, it will take a picture at the apex of its travel.
In fourth place, we have a post describing how you can
add an external GPU to your laptop
. If you only have a laptop and are looking to play with the latest and greatest graphics, this is one route that you could take.
Finally, if you like things that glow, this one is for you. This post links to a video showing you
how to make luminol using household chemicals
. | 0 | 0 | [] | 1,760,377,050.144445 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/21/light-bulb-diode-and-capacitor-step-mains-down-to-12v-dc/ | Light Bulb, Diode, And Capacitor Step Mains Down To 12V DC | Mike Szczys | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"ac",
"light bulb",
"mains",
"rectifier",
"voltage"
] | [Todd Harrison] needed a way to run a 12 volt PC fan from mains voltage. Well, we think he really just needed something to keep him occupied on a Sunday, but that’s beside the point. He shows us how he did this in a non-traditional way by using the resistive load of
an incandescent light bulb, a diode, and a capacitor to convert voltage
to what he needed. You can read his article, or settle in for the thirty-five minute video after the break where he explains his circuit.
The concept here is fairly simple. The diode acts as a half-wave rectifier by preventing the negative trough of the alternating current from passing into his circuit. The positive peaks of the electricity travel through the light bulb, which knocks down the voltage to a usable level. Finally, the capacitor fills the gaps where the negative current of the AC used to be, providing direct current to the fan. It’s easy to follow but the we needed some help with the math for calculating the correct lightbulb to use to get our desired output current.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OnHWZ-gL7Q&w=470] | 64 | 47 | [
{
"comment_id": "486357",
"author": "Mike",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T23:13:19",
"content": "He sure does talk a lot… even for a tutorial.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "486371",
"author": "Mike",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T23:21:04",
... | 1,760,377,050.108435 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/21/hydrocrystallophone-probably-wont-make-you-insane/ | Hydrocrystallophone Probably Won’t Make You Insane | Brian Benchoff | [
"Musical Hacks"
] | [
"glass armonica",
"musical instrument",
"wine glass"
] | [Fish] is really proud of his newest creation, the
Hydrocrystallophone
. This new instrument reminds us of an
even more
steampunk version of [Benny Franklin]’s
glass armonica
– an instrument that reportedly plunged the player into a, “
dark and melancholy mood
.”
The build is based around a 1920s hand-cranked phonograph motor. The phonograph motor spins a wine glass filled with water. The water level (and thus tone produced by the wine glass) is varied by a brass tube inside the glass connected to a hydraulic cylinder. Pushing and pushing on the handle of the hydraulic cylinder causes the water level in the glass to change.
We’ve all seen
wine glass music
before, but this is the first time we’ve seen it with just one glass. [Fish] is working on modifying the phonograph’s governor to get rid of the effects of 78 RPM on the water. He hasn’t quite mastered his new musical invention yet, but we can’t wait to see what [Fish] is able to play with some practice.
In case you’re keeping track of the musical instruments featured on Hack A Day that fall into the “why didn’t I think of that” bin, The Hydrocrystallophone would be the second such instrument in
as many months
. It’s a very simple but really ingenious device. Check out the video of the Hydrocrystallophone after the break.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=rQVlPl2-mmw&w=470] | 27 | 18 | [
{
"comment_id": "486289",
"author": "RunnerPack",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T22:12:29",
"content": "Hydrocrystallophone probablywillmake you insaneFTFYNeat idea, nice implementation, but I don’t see any actual music ever coming out of it… Since the water is just changing the amount of crystal allowed ... | 1,760,377,050.009588 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/21/going-for-the-amateur-balloon-altitude-record/ | Going For The Amateur Balloon Altitude Record | Brian Benchoff | [
"hardware"
] | [
"balloon",
"high altitude balloon"
] | At 11 AM London time, October 22, the Sutton grammar school for boys is going to be launching
Apex Alpha
, a high altitude amateur balloon for an attempt at the UK altitude record. Unlike a few
other balloons
we’ve seen, the Apex team is doing it right and giving everyone the
downlink details
for the balloon.
The payload for the balloon was built entirely by student of the Sutton grammar school and weighs less than 300 grams. While it’s not carrying a camera for the all-important pretty pictures, the payload does have a GPS module and a transmitter; it’s just enough to do the required testing on the lead up to Apex III.
Right now, the UK amateur balloon record stands shy of 130,000 feet. The team gained a lot of experience with their
Apex I
and
Apex II
launches, and they’re pretty confident they have the experience to pull this one off. You can check out the progress of the Apex Alpha flight on the
spacenear.us tracker
. For us Yanks, the launch should start October 22nd at 6:00 am Eastern time and 3:00 in the morning for the West coast. The team says they’ll be updating that throughout the flight.
UPDATE: Apex Alpha
just won’t burst
. Any HAMs
near Berlin
in Eastern Europe are sorely needed. Head over to the
IRC chat
if you can help. | 24 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "486241",
"author": "asheets",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T21:30:09",
"content": "I’d be interested in reading more about the balloon itself, since this team is going for an altitude record. Most of the pilot/met/sounding balloons I’ve worked with have a burst-height rating of 80000 fe... | 1,760,377,049.776192 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/21/14-part-reprap-saga-draws-to-a-close/ | 14-part RepRap Saga Draws To A Close | Mike Szczys | [
"cnc hacks"
] | [
"3d printer",
"build log",
"reprap"
] | Behold, another RepRap springs into existence! Well, springs might not be the best choice of words, it took a while and there were many bumps in the road. But [NBitWonder’s] self-built RepRap is now finished and
you can read his 14-part build log
to see all that went into the process.
We checked in on the project at
one of the early stages
. At that point he was just beginning to assemble the hardware and we mused that the calibration stage is where we thought things would get exciting. The project didn’t disappoint, as he had many follies getting the extruder heads to work. At first some issues popped up when figuring out what diameter filament would work for the print head he was using. Once that was worked out, a less-than-precise PID controller led to the clogging and eventual destruction of the extruder tip. He goes on to assemble and test a heated build platform only to discover that the resistors shipped with the hardware are shockingly underrated for the task. We could go on and on, but that would ruin the fun for you. Bookmark this one for the weekend and enjoy! | 17 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "486186",
"author": "Pete Prodoehl",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T20:14:12",
"content": "I’m about to embark on building a RepRap Prusa Mendel… I’m not sure if I enjoyed reading his exploits or found them frightening.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
... | 1,760,377,050.198472 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/20/grab-your-own-images-from-noaa-weather-satellites/ | Grab Your Own Images From NOAA Weather Satellites | Mike Szczys | [
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"noaa",
"satellite",
"software-defined radio",
"weather"
] | Can you believe that [hpux735] pulled this satellite weather image down from one of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s weather satellites using home equipment? It turns out that they’ve got three weather satellites in low earth orbit that pass overhead a few times a day. If you’ve got some homebrew hardware and post processing chops
you can grab your own images from these weather satellites
.
The first step is data acquisition. [hpux735] used a software defined radio receiver that he built from a kit. This makes us think back to
the software-radio project
that [Jeri Ellsworth] built using an FPGA–could that be adapted for this purpose? But we digress. To record the incoming data a Mac program called
DSP Radio
was used. Once you do capture an audio sample, you’ll need something to turn it into an image. It just so happens there’s a program specifically for weather image decoding called
WXtoImg
, and another which runs under Linux called
WXAPT
. Throw in a little post processing, Robert’s your mother’s brother, and you’ve got the image seen above.
[Hpux735] mentioned that he’s working on a post about the antenna he built for the project and has future plans for an automated system where he’ll have a webpage that always shows the most current image. We’re looking forward hearing about that. | 55 | 28 | [
{
"comment_id": "485272",
"author": "Doc Oct",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T00:38:56",
"content": "Okay, who is the one that hangs out on the softrock40 mail list and submitted this?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "485279",
"author": "gnomad",
... | 1,760,377,050.470822 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/20/taser-gloves-are-a-bad-idea/ | Taser Gloves Are A Bad Idea | Mike Szczys | [
"Wearable Hacks"
] | [
"disposable camera",
"gloves",
"taser"
] | In a project that you’re sure to read about in police blotter someday, [Jair2k4] built
a pair of Taser gloves
that will shock your victim with they laying-on of hands.
Not surprisingly, this project was spawned from a conversation at work about what tech would best suit a vigilante crime fighter. [Jair2k4] suggested taser gloves, which drew a laugh, but also stuck in his mind. His prototype takes advantage of the flash circuitry from a disposable camera to step up battery voltage all the way up to 300 volts.
The gloves he’s using are rubberized fishing gloves which help ensure that he doesn’t shock himself. Wire travels from the capacitor to conductors sewn into the fingers and thumb of the gloves He’s got video embedded on his post that shows the bright spark and loud zap of a discharge when the conductors get close to one another. Altoids tins lined with electrical tape house the hardware, with a momentary push button used to charge the devices.
Hopefully criminals will not mind waiting for you to charge your weapons before they attack. But then again, [Jack Buffington’s]
own version of a taser glove
had the same issue. That one used conductors on the knuckle side of the glove, and involved long wires tethering the glove to a belt pack. Locating that back as a bracelet is a nice improvement on the idea. | 56 | 26 | [
{
"comment_id": "485245",
"author": "giacomo",
"timestamp": "2011-10-20T23:40:13",
"content": "Wow, this is such a bad idea. Setting aside the issues of vigilantism, this thing just delivers a DC pulse, which will cause pain, but not really affect muscle control (speaking from experience, heh). You ... | 1,760,377,050.383306 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/20/ram-upgrade-for-wrt300n-router/ | RAM Upgrade For WRT300N Router | Mike Szczys | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"kernel",
"openwrt",
"ram",
"router",
"upgrade",
"wrt300n"
] | [Heli] had a WRT300N wireless router sitting around collecting dust. He decided to squeeze at bit more entertainment value out of it by seeing if he could pull off a RAM upgrade. He managed to
double the router’s RAM and posted a walk through
(
translated
) to help you do the same.
Swapping out surface mount RAM chips isn’t the easiest thing in the world and you must wondering what prompted this. It seems he wanted to run
the LuCI package
on the router but it was slow (or even incapable) of booting with the stock hardware’s 16 Mb. He first sourced some pin-compatible replacement chips from an old Pentium III computer. While his soldering iron was hot, he also wired up a JTAG header, which connects via the red wires just visible to the left. When he first fired up the unit he was happy that it was able to boot, but it still only detected 16 Mb.
It turns out you’re going to need to roll your own kernel to get it to take advantage of the upgrade. Source code for OpenWRT is easy to find and there’s plenty of guides for compiling it. If you try this, make sure to read [Heli’s] post carefully as he’s got some important configuration information that will help you to avoid bricking your router. | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "485925",
"author": "Skeltorr",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T14:49:04",
"content": "Microscope is really useful for the soldering. Easy to have one pin not connect and “brick” the router.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
}
] | 1,760,377,050.296734 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/20/animatronics-in-a-box/ | Animatronics In A Box | Mike Szczys | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"animatronic",
"RAPU",
"servo"
] | [Knife141] built
an impressive animatronic head
. He uses it mostly for volunteer activities, like getting school children excited about technology. He built a carrying trunk that fits the puppet just right, making it easy to store and to transport.
He started by making the parts for the head out of cardboard to make sure they would fit together and operate properly. These were then used as templates to cut the pieces out of half-inch plywood. A series of servos, connected either directly or with linking rods, move the mouth, eyes, eyelids, eyebrows and neck via a servo controller board.
Sound is played by a single-board computer called a RAPU via a pair of computer speakers. This board is also what sends commands to the servo controller. When [Knife141] wants to create a new act for the animatronics, he starts by writing the dialog and having a text-to-speech program turn it into an MP3. He then goes through the tedious process of choreographing the puppet to the dialog, a process that generally takes him an hour for each minute of run-time. It’s worth it though, see for yourself by watching one of his acts in the video after the break.
Looking for something a little bit more your speed? Check out this
animatronic head which you can build in no time
.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhPnrvdMArM&w=470] | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "485951",
"author": "Keith",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T15:33:25",
"content": "Well done, very smooth and realistic movements!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
}
] | 1,760,377,050.508091 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/20/robotic-farming-means-more-corn-for-everyone/ | Robotic Farming Means More Corn For Everyone | Brian Benchoff | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"autonomous",
"farming",
"hexapod",
"robot"
] | You know we’re all going to starve, right? If the world’s population keeps growing exponentially and food production grows linearly, we’re eventually going to find out what Soylent Green is made of. This is where [David Dorhout]’s
Prospero robot farmer
comes in. [David] has come up with the idea of using small autonomous robots to plant, tend and harvest fields. Right now, he’s working on stage 1: planting seeds.
A swarm of six-legged Prospero robots are dispatched to a field. There, each member of the swarm plants seeds one at a time. The robots keep in contact with each other over a wireless connection to ensure the optimal planting pattern for an entire field.
The Prospero prototype is based on the Parallax Propeller with a Ping ultrasonic sensor used to avoid obstacles. Each hexapod is equipped with a bunch of seeds, a small auger, and a supply of fertilizer for the future corn plant. The next step in the plan is to build a ‘tending’ robot that will monitor and apply nutrients if needed. Check out the Prospero video after the break.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CReaedEF41w&w=470] | 82 | 45 | [
{
"comment_id": "485176",
"author": "Sir Mouse",
"timestamp": "2011-10-20T20:45:10",
"content": "While interesting from a robotics perspective, this In no way addresses the problems of food availability in the face of rampant population growth. The manpower necessary for modern commercial scale farm... | 1,760,377,051.012323 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/20/halloween-hacks-diorama-rama/ | Halloween Hacks: Diorama-rama | Brian Benchoff | [
"Holiday Hacks"
] | [
"diorama",
"el wire",
"Halloween hacks",
"plasma",
"xenon"
] | The folks down at LVL1, the Louisville hackerspace, are throwing a Halloween party. To showcase his building skills, LVL1 member [JAC_101] put together a
Halloween diorama
featuring the inner workings of Doctor Frankenstein’s laboratory.
There’s a bunch of really neat pieces that make this build great. First up is the
LVL1 plasma sign
. This sign is four circuits pumping a high voltage charge through Xenon flash tubes. Instead of a bright flash, a very Halloweeny Xenon plasma shoots though the tubes. The sign is constructed from four disposable camera flash circuits.
A few flickering-LED torches light Dr. Franenstein’s lair while
the monster
is a McDonalds happy meal toy wrapped in surgical tape and painted with UV reactive paint.
In the interests of repurposing existing materials, a
plasma disc belt buckle
was taken from
[Seven of Nine]’s regeneration chamber
LVL1’s rave supply cabinet and provides a suitable ‘mad scientist’ aesthetic. A bit of EL wire was thrown in for good measure along with some black lights to activate the UV paint.
While Frankenstein’s lab is missing a hilariously oversize knife switch on the wall, [JAC_101] still pulled off a great build. | 4 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "485199",
"author": "CameronSS",
"timestamp": "2011-10-20T21:28:42",
"content": "Do xenon flash tubes have duty cycles to be concerned about? Obviously it seems to be working fine here, but does a tube designed for very quick pulses run into problems if it’s constantly powered on for... | 1,760,377,050.853651 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/20/detecting-dtmf-tones-from-scratch/ | Detecting DTMF Tones From Scratch | Brian Benchoff | [
"classic hacks"
] | [
"dtmf",
"Goertzel",
"PIC18F4520",
"telephone"
] | If you’ve ever wondered about the best way to
detect dial and DTMF tones
from a phone line, [Debraj] is your man.
[Debraj] built a DTMF detector using the
Goertzel algorithm
. Normally, when we think about detecting tones, we pull
FFT
out of our bag of tricks. The Goertzel algorithm isn’t as computationally complex as FFT and can be implemented on even the smallest microcontrollers.
For the build, the first thing to solder is a nice audio transformer and some protection diodes. The ring tone from a phone line goes from +35 V to -35 V – a bit more than a microcontroller could handle. A PIC18F4520 dev board was used as the brain of the system with all the
code
is available on [Debraj]’s site.
Although implementations of the Goertzel algorithm are a little uncommon, [Debraj] has seen a few interesting projects using this technique. [Debraj]’s build could easily be modified into a guitar tuner with a few changes in the code, for example.
This project was built as the command and control for a home automation system and from the video after the break, we can’t wait for [Debraj] to get annoyed at the phrase, “
To turn on the kitchen lights, please press 1…”
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=xr_V1AEROMI&w=470] | 9 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "485151",
"author": "gpb",
"timestamp": "2011-10-20T19:50:23",
"content": "The Goertzel algorithm isn’t as computationally complex as FFTWell, not exactly. If you need all the frequency bins, the FFT is the most efficient implementation. However, if you only need a small number of fr... | 1,760,377,051.056662 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/21/extend-your-personal-weather-stations-reporting-capabilities/ | Extend Your Personal Weather Station’s Reporting Capabilities | Mike Szczys | [
"home hacks"
] | [
"carambola",
"openwrt",
"pachube",
"weather station",
"wireless router"
] | This Nexus wireless weather station has an array of weather sensors that you mount outside and monitor on the LCD screen. It also has the ability to stream the data over USB, but that feature is only supported in Windows and the companion software leaves a lot to be desired. Here’s a technique that will let you unlock the potential of the data by
streaming it to your Linux box or directly to the Internet
.
It turns out that grabbing the data via Linux has been made quite easy thanks to
a package called TE923
(
translated
). With the base unit connected via USB, the software will pull down a string of colon-separated data which will be easy to parse using your favorite scripting language. But what if you don’t want to tether this to a computer?
The project goes one step further by using
a Carambola board
. This is a WiFi board with a USB port on it. It runs OpenWRT so getting TE923 going is as simple as building the package. The best part is, any wireless router that runs OpenWRT (or DD-WRT, etc.) and has a USB port can substitute for this board. With the module connected to the station, data is pushed to the Pachube website to serve as
a custom web readout
.
[Thanks Saulius] | 3 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "486250",
"author": "az1324",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T21:39:21",
"content": "$30, 802.11n, openWRT, 8MB/32MB, FCC … this module kills all the other embedded wifi modules.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "486617",
"author": "T... | 1,760,377,050.891653 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/21/building-optical-flex-sensors/ | Building Optical Flex Sensors | Mike Szczys | [
"Microcontrollers",
"Peripherals Hacks"
] | [
"flex sensor",
"glove",
"infrared",
"power glove"
] | [Joel] dug up this hack that he pulled off over ten years ago. It’s inspired by the Nintendo PowerGlove, and uses flex sensors to react to movements of your fingers. The interesting thing is,
he built these optical flex sensors himself
.
He likes to say that this is a ghetto fiber-optic setup. The inlaid diagram above gives you an idea of how the sensors work. An IR LED and infrared diode are positioned at either end of a piece of clear aquarium tubing. When the tube is flexed, the amount of light that makes it to the diode is diminished, a change that can be measured by a microcontroller. [Joel] found that he could increase the resolution of the sensor by adding something to the center of the tube, blocking the light when not straight. In this case he used pieces of scrap wire. The outside of the sensor was also wrapped in shrink tubing to keep ambient light from interfering with measurements.
He uses a trimpot to tune the sensors but we wonder how hard it would be to add a calibration algorithm to the firmware? | 12 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "486104",
"author": "Jan",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T18:27:22",
"content": "this is a genius idea!i absolutely have to try that.nice one had!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "486255",
"author": "Stendall",
"timestamp": "201... | 1,760,377,051.535759 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/21/illogical-voltage-double-uses-logic/ | Illogical Voltage Double Uses Logic | Mike Szczys | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"7400",
"charge pump",
"dixon doubler"
] | [Jonathan Thomson] just finished writing up his entry for the 7400 logic contest. It’s a voltage doubler that uses a 74HC14 logic chip. Because this is not at all what the chip was meant for–and he’s a sucker for puns–he’s calling it
the Illogical Dickson Doubler
.
What he’s got here is basically
a charge pump
built from a set of diodes and capacitors. On the breadboard you see two chips, one is used as a clock signal generator for the other which is acting as part of the charge pump. We’ve seen a string of hacks that
mis
use the protection diodes on the inputs of logic chips. In fact, [Jonathan’s] setup uses the same back power concept that
barebones PIC RFID tag did
. You may remember in that project the chip was being powered from one of the I/O pins, with the VCC pin not connected to anything.
We’ve embedded a video after the break with shows some voltage measurements, as well as an LED being powered from the doubling circuit.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8lNV-ntBpU&w=470] | 5 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "486042",
"author": "Edward",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T17:15:31",
"content": "Heathkit Analog Trainer ETS-3600",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "486260",
"author": "jethomson",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T21:47:42",
... | 1,760,377,051.474171 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/21/light-painting-nyan-cat-with-an-arduino/ | Light Painting Nyan Cat With An Arduino | Mike Szczys | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"digital cameras hacks",
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"light painting",
"m5450",
"rgb"
] | You too can paint your favorite meme in light with just a few tools. [Skywodd] brought together a couple of different projects to make this happen. He had already built a large POV display and now
uses a DSLR with long exposure to create light paintings
(
translated
).
The Arduino-powered display is built from a strip of 35 RGB LEDs. Now, that’s four pins per LED but one of is ground, leaving just 105 pins that need to be addressable. A couple of things make this manageable. First, he etched his own circuit boards for the LED strips. This breaks out the contacts to the edge of the boards and simplifies the soldering a bit by taking care of the ground bus. Secondly, he’s using M5450 LED display drivers for addressing. After the break you can see the video of the prototype hardware (in French but blinky action starts at about 2:30).
If you’re looking for an easier way to do this, check out the
light painting that uses manufactured LED strips
.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8mazjpXHzI&w=470] | 5 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "486134",
"author": "j0z0r",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T19:09:17",
"content": "I noticed every time it sweeps, right after is a small burst of red from a few (about five) of the LEDs. Is this is an error, artifact, or the intended function? I would use something like that to help me pl... | 1,760,377,051.365038 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/21/cheap-acoustic-panel-diy/ | Cheap Acoustic Panel DIY | Jesse Congdon | [
"home entertainment hacks",
"how-to",
"Musical Hacks"
] | [
"acoustic",
"soundproofing"
] | [Eric Wolfram] wrote in to let us know about a simple and cheap
acoustic panel
DIY he put together. When installing a home theater acoustics are often neglected (especially if you spend so much on the TV you cannot afford any furniture for the room) resulting in reduced listening quality and poor spacial sound imaging from your surround system (also responsible for the furniture problem). The addition of sound absorbing panels helps control the acoustics of the room and may even class up the place a bit. These are also come in handy for home studio usage where a low level of reverberation is preferred.
The panels are relatively simple to produce on a budget, just a sheet of 2″ thick dense fiberglass board glued into a wooden frame and covered in a sound-transparent fabric. [Eric] goes into a lot of the material selection process to help you along your way. The best part about the project (aside from its obvious utility) is that all of the materials can be found cheaply at your average home improvement store, with the exception of the fabric. [Eric] mentions that you can substitute colored burlap if need be. Once the panel is assembled and glued it just has to be hung on the wall of your choice like a large heavy picture frame. This could certainly help the acoustics and reduce some slap-back echo in your warehouse/shop. We might have to try this one over the weekend.
Thanks [Eric]! | 37 | 16 | [
{
"comment_id": "485936",
"author": "lasershark",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T15:13:55",
"content": "will be more effective at low frequency absorption if hung in such a way to allow a 1″ – 2″ air gap between wall and panel.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"com... | 1,760,377,051.273152 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/21/a-very-simple-android-recon-vehicle/ | A Very Simple Android Recon Vehicle | Brian Benchoff | [
"Android Hacks",
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"recon",
"remote control"
] | Desperately in need of a graduation paper, [Andrei] decided to build a few
computer controlled recon vehicles
(PDF warning), and we’re really impressed with the minimalist approach [Andrei] took.
The Computer Operated Recon Entity (C.O.R.E.) mk. I is based around a laptop. Instead of an Arduino, [Andrei] used a
car stereo amp
to control the motors. The two channel amp [Andrei] picked out has four outputs. Tying a motor to each output gives a four-wheel drive robot that’s really clever in its simplicity. With an onboard webcam, [Andrei] can do live video streaming from his remote vehicle. Outputting a specific tone with the sound card allows for full control of the robot.
The C.O.R.E. mk. II uses a Samsung Galaxy I5500 phone – the cheapest Android phone [Andrei] could find. The setup is similar to the mk. I C.O.R.E. with a WiFi connection sending video back to a base station. Control of the two motors is still handled by playing sound files and sending that to a stereo amp connected to the motors.
Check out the C.O.R.E. mk. II going Bach and forth after the break.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdokHKRAtXQ&w=470] | 13 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "485890",
"author": "j_jwalrus",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T14:20:10",
"content": "to quote darth vader- “Impressive – Most Impressive”.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLeOSOe4GmQ",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "485922",
"author... | 1,760,377,051.198348 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/21/extending-battery-life-while-taking-time-lapse-photos/ | Extending Battery Life While Taking Time Lapse Photos | Mike Nathan | [
"digital cameras hacks"
] | [
"camera",
"GoPro HD",
"intervalometer",
"msp430",
"time-lapse"
] | [Peter] loved using his GoPro HD camera, but he found the time lapse functionality a bit lacking. It wasn’t that there were not enough settings to satiate his needs, but that
the camera would run through its batteries in just a few short hours.
He found that the camera did not turn off or enter any sort of sleep mode between shots, wasting precious battery life. He could have simply added a bigger external battery pack to the camera, but for the sake of portability, he had a far better idea in mind.
The GoPro has a pretty well documented interface called the “Hero Bus”, so all it took was
a little bit of online research
before [Peter] had all the information he needed. The camera has a neat feature that immediately snaps a picture when it is powered on, so he decided that he would use a microcontroller to turn the camera on and off at specific intervals, rather than using its built-in time lapse function. He chose a Texas Instruments MSP430 for the job, since it is very well known for being a power miser.
Once he had his code up and running, he connected it to his camera and found that it worked perfectly right off the bat. Now, he can take anywhere between 1,500 and 2,000 shots before the batteries run out, instead of the measly 200 he was getting without the modifications – quite an improvement! | 11 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "485846",
"author": "Elnono",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T13:31:40",
"content": "This is HACK A DAY Worthy.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "485870",
"author": "ejonesss",
"timestamp": "2011-10-21T14:01:02",
"content": "i... | 1,760,377,051.325004 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/20/rear-window-led-display-gives-other-drivers-a-piece-of-your-mind/ | Rear Window LED Display Gives Other Drivers A Piece Of Your Mind | Mike Nathan | [
"LED Hacks",
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"7400",
"atmega",
"car",
"display",
"led matrix"
] | [Gagandeep] was sick and tired of discourteous drivers on the highway, so he decided that he would put together
a display to let them know what he thought of their poor driving skills.
He planned on putting the display up in the rear window of his car, so he had to ensure that it did not obstruct his view while driving.
He decided that an LED matrix would be the best way for displaying images and text while on the go, so he got busy constructing a 40×16 mesh grid for his rear window. Using a wooden template to get the spacing and positioning just right, he spent several days soldering the 600+ LEDs to one another. He used 74HC595 shift registers to manage the LEDs in groups of 5 columns, while an ATmega AT89C51 was tasked with generating the text and images to be displayed. All of the ICs were deadbugged in place, helping achieve [Gagandeep’s] desire of keeping his view unobstructed.
While we’re not well-versed on the legality of such a display, it looks great when animated. There are plenty of pictures of the grid in various stages of construction as well as videos of it in action
in his Picasa album
, so be sure to check them out. If you are looking for code or Eagle files, you can
find those here. | 72 | 35 | [
{
"comment_id": "485096",
"author": "samadam",
"timestamp": "2011-10-20T18:13:28",
"content": "Could someone look up the legality of car decorations? I’ve wondered why more people don’t put things on their cars. It seems like an area ripe for hacking, but maybe there is a law about what you can ligh... | 1,760,377,051.681715 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/20/analog-test-interface-for-your-computer/ | Analog Test Interface For Your Computer | Mike Szczys | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"analog",
"curves",
"graph",
"octave",
"processing",
"scilab"
] | Wanting to test the response curves on some analog parts, [Don Sauer] devised a way of
using simple tools to graph analog tests on a computer
. Here you can see the results of testing NPN, PNP, NMOS and PMOS transistors, but modifying the input circuitry would let you test just about anything you want.
[Don] is using an Arduino as the hardware interface. He needed some additional parts, like an op-amp and some passives. Instead of building this on a breadboard, he printed the circuit out on a piece of cardboard, hot glued the components in place, then wired them up. This will let him reuse the interface in the future, but is quicker than designing and etching a PCB.
He uses a Processing sketch to capture the test data streaming in from the Arduino. Once recorded, he uses
SciLab
to create the graphs. He also covers a method of sifting through the data using
Octave
, another open source program that feels somewhat like MATLAB. | 6 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "485078",
"author": "Frank Cohen",
"timestamp": "2011-10-20T17:39:00",
"content": "You’ve done C, do you think you can do MATLAB???",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "485087",
"author": "Tweeks",
"timestamp": "2011-10-20T18:... | 1,760,377,051.424413 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/20/video-performing-io-with-the-atmega328p/ | Video: Performing I/O With The ATmega328p | Jack Buffington | [
"Video Hacks"
] | [
"atmega328p",
"video"
] | Today we continue on with part 2 of our series where [Jack] shows how to program for the ATmega328p processor using the Pololu 3pi robot. In this video, he starts to dig deeper than last week’s video by showing you how to program in C so that you are directly reading inputs and directly sending data to outputs. Specifically, this video shows how to set up your I/O pins and then how to interface with LEDs, buttons, and a beeper.
There were a few comments on last week’s video about not wanting to buy a 3pi robot to learn on. That’s fine. For this series there really is no reason that you need to use the 3pi robot. We picked it because it is a great device to learn about the ATmega processors since it has so many things that you can play around with to get your feet wet but there really is no reason that you couldn’t wire up a DIP version on a perfboard and still follow along with these videos. In fact, if you have a good writeup about the cheapest possible way to get started with the ATmega series of processors, we’d love to hear about it.
Looking for part 1 of this series?
[Click Here]
Video is after the break. | 2 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "485047",
"author": "Dorian",
"timestamp": "2011-10-20T16:26:54",
"content": "This is just what I needed. I got the atmega328p a bit ago in an effort to become more hardcore. It’s a big step from arduino to avr and none of the other tutorials are very good.",
"parent_id": null,... | 1,760,377,051.578309 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/20/creepy-delta-bot-follows-your-every-move/ | Creepy Delta Bot Follows Your Every Move | Mike Nathan | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"art",
"delta bot",
"open cv",
"robot"
] | The creation you see above is the work of art student [Daniel Bertner] who is wrapping up his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He calls
the incredibly intriguing, yet somewhat disturbing device “TIM”
, which is short for Tracking Interactive Mechanism.
A culmination of different projects he has tinkered with over the last year or so, TIM is an interactive delta bot with an attitude. Mounted on the wall of the Art Institute’s Sullivan Galleries, TIM is as interested in you as you are in it. While passers by investigate the curious device, it watches them back, following their every movement.
The robot’s motors are controlled using an Arduino, and its ability to track people standing nearby is provided via a video stream processed with Open CV.
It really is a cool project, and we think it would make for an awesome prop in some sci-fi horror flick. Check out the video below to see TIM’s personality in action – he doesn’t like it when people stand too close!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=-nO5cowkg4M&w=470] | 13 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "484988",
"author": "elektrophreak",
"timestamp": "2011-10-20T14:23:42",
"content": "cool idea, but I can’t see it perform like deltas usually do.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "484993",
"author": "improprietary",
"times... | 1,760,377,051.892836 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2011/10/20/a-wooden-computer-case-monitor-stand-and-keyboard/ | A Wooden Computer Case, Monitor Stand, And Keyboard | Jeremy Cook | [
"Peripherals Hacks"
] | [
"case",
"computer",
"keyboard",
"monitor",
"woodworking"
] | Wood and electronics don’t generally mix nowadays, but if you yearn back to a time when radios and the like had a nice wooden finish,
this wooden computer case
may be for you. Combine that with a
Wooden keyboard enclosure
, and maybe even
a LCD monitor stand
and you’ll have a setup that should fit in with any wood-themed decor!
The wooden computer case is actually more of a cover in that it uses most of the stock case to house all of the components. It would definitely be a pain, and possibly a fire-hazard, to make a back mounting plate for all the components out of wood. To go along with this, the LCD monitor stand was engineered for a 21″ monitor when the owner of it wasn’t satisfied with the stability of the stock stand. In the end, he ended up building something quite sturdy and nice looking to replace it.
The highlight for many for the keyboard would be that it was made, in part at least, out of a desire for a Commodore-64 keyboard. It appears to function well andlooks great, so be sure to check out the other pictures after the break! | 25 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "484952",
"author": "brad",
"timestamp": "2011-10-20T13:21:43",
"content": "what?! no cover for the cd drive? for shame.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "484955",
"author": "jaqen",
"timestamp": "2011-10-20T13:23:47",
... | 1,760,377,051.955162 |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.