This is a simple and very effective project idea that allows you to create a photo display very inexpensively.
“Hold a vivid photo or inkjet print in front of a bright light and you have a basic backlit image display. Notice how the colors become rich and the details come alive. Want to make a simple DIY version that will let you display your favorite image in the best light? Like to have your favorite art or photo glowing at you when you come home or while you count sheep at night? Here it is. You do not need a $200+ extra-large digital display to make this happen. Make your own (low-tech) backlit image column in less than an hour using common materials costing under $15. It is a simple, effective, and safe backlit image display and, if you don’t tell, no one will ever know it is built around a […]
Source
DIY Hacks |
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Here is an interesting home automation indication mod.
“Like almost all the currently available UK X10 modules, the LD11 does NOT support status response. This coupled with the fact that X10 commands can sometimes “go astray” and seemingly disappear into the electrical ether before reaching the chosen device, means that the tracking of the current status of a device is very error prone. Intelligent controllers like HomeVision and software like Homseer make a valiant effort to track the current status of devices by listening for the X10 signals on the wire but commands are sometimes not heard or can be misheard and any device that is locally controlled will have its state changed without the status change being announced on the wire. This last point was a real bug bear for me, I just didn’t know if someone had switched on a light by hand.”
Source
Electronic Hacks, DIY Hacks |
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Instead of taking pictures of circuit boards, why not scan them. The results are very good.
“An image scanner can make great pictures of circuit boards. Not only are the pictures clear, they are very high resolution and have nearly perfect scaling. Perfect scaling means that you can actual make measurements from the image. Try that with a digital camera!
I picked up the pictured Artec scanner for about $20 some time ago. It is close to useless and takes the worse scans I have seen. But even so, it can be used to make usable PCB images.”
Source
DIY Hacks |
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Philo has developed a new NTX LEGO sensor that is worth taking a look at.
“I built this proof of concept of a light barrier using NXT light sensor and an optic fiber. Any small object passing between the end of the fiber and light sensor phototransistor can be easily detected, even if they have different color or reflectivity.
The fiber I used comes from the RIS 2.0 kit, but similar ones can also be found in some ExoForce sets. The fiber is maintained in front of the LED and the other end is routed to face the sensor. You must take care to avoid any gap between the connector holding the fiber and the sensor to prevent direct light bleeding from LED to phototransistor. The fiber must be applied on the LED for best light coupling. The LED light is greatly attenuated by the fiber (the red glow proves that!). If […]
Source
DIY Hacks |
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Nuxie1 did a great job on this PIC based USB project board. I am very impressed by the Eagle 3D plugin that was used to create the image above.
“This design uses the Microchip PIC 18F2450 or 18F2550 USB enabled microcontroller. The total parts cost is around $15 including the microcontroller for a single board. The board features a USB port that can be used with a bootloader for easy programming. It is designed to use a 20MHz crystal. Two switches are included, for MCLR and RC0. Five analog inputs are brought out (AN0-AN4) which can be used to read analog sensors, as well as the two CCP ports which can be used to control servos or other devices. A user LED is built in, using RA4. The onboard USART ports are brought out to a three pin header which can be used to talk to other microcontrollers, or to an […]
Source
Electronic Hacks, DIY Hacks, Complex Hacks |
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Check out this disco ball, it is powered by a CD player motor. Similar to this one, but spins by itself.
“Here is my version of the LED Disco Ball. Its Completely portable can either be hung or screwed to the roof. It runs on 3AA batteries and has a group of gears from a CD player laser.
Parts List:
-3AAs
-Metal Fujicolor Negative Film Control Strips Container
-2 UV LEDs
-2 White LEDs
-2 Blue LEDs
-Motor + Gear system from a CD player
-Switch
-Wires ”
Source
Electronic Hacks, DIY Hacks |
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You probably remember the Shock Clock from a while ago. Well this Zedomax RGB LED Alarm Clock is the oposite of that concept, I think it would be soothing to wake up to this clock…
“Okay, we have seen some really cool Light Orbs while trying to make this Music Syncing Light Orb Alarm Clock. We started with Tod’s creation and soon realize that 1 LED will not be bright enough in slightest light conditions though his Light Orb is tight let us say. So we checked out RGB lights at Hackedgadgets.com. Which is cool and uses 4 Red, 3 Green, and 3 Blue LEDs. After we made the actual prototype and put the Orb on top, The 4 LEDs in series worked great even in lots of light. So best thing I think here is to test your LEDs on a breadboard first before soldering […]
Source
Electronic Hacks, DIY Hacks, Cool Gadgets |
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You might remember the article of the in progress 6 Axis PC Controller, well it is now complete. This thing is very impressive, doesn’t look like the standard weekend DIY because of the complexity.
“My microcontroller doesn’t have built-in I2C or SPI, so I needed to implement one of my own. I also didn’t have interrupt pins available, meaning my solution needed to be based on polling. When all was said and done and optimized, I couldn’t detect edges faster than 16Khz. This is about ten times slower than the shift output available from the CUBLOC controller, so I couldn’t use that. I ended up writing my own shift-out routine in BASIC to get the data to the HID Portal. This could be avoided by using a microcontroller that has SPI or I2C built in already, but the JB8 is what I had on hand.
I use three signals to communicate […]
Source
Electronic Hacks, DIY Hacks, Complex Hacks, Computer Hacks, Crazy Hacks |
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You can spend $50 on a store bought golf training aid, but Zedomax shows you how to make your own for about $5. There is also a video of the thing in action on his site.
“It’s getting near Christmas time and I needed to prepare some Christmas gifts for my parents. Since my Dad does not get much time on the golf course these days, I figured I could make a training aid he could use at home to keep his swing on path. Since I didn’t want to spend 50 bucks on the golf training aid, so I decided to make one real quick.”
Source
Electronic Hacks, DIY Hacks |
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Driving your Roomba around using your phone is so last month… Today the cool way to do it is by tilting your Apple MacBook. I wonder what Todd will come up with next?
“This project shows you how to use the built-in tilt sensors of the MacBook to control a Roomba. Since Perl hasn’t been used to program a Roomba yet, it seemed like a fun task to show that it could be done (and pretty easily too).
Apple MacBooks have integrated 3-axis accelerometer called the Sudden Motion Sensor (SMS, previously Apple Motion Sensor, AMS). Normally this is used to detect when the laptop is dropped so it can shut down the hard drive to prevent damage. But the SMS can be accessed programmatically and used to measure tilt.”
Source
What Were They Thinking, Electronic Hacks, Insane Equipment, DIY Hacks, Complex Hacks, Computer Hacks, Crazy Hacks |
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Doug Wilson has built a cool Altoids battery pack! Not sure what it is about the Altoids tins, but it seems that projects make great use out of them! This one seems to have all the bells and whistles. If you are looking for inspiration there are full build details on the site.
“I have a 10 cell ‘AA’ NiMH battery pack (12V @ 1.6AH) that I use for backpacking. It needed a home! I also wanted a voltmeter built-in so I could keep track of it’s condition and charging (I live in the woods, you have to keep chasing the sun with your solar panel..). Radio Shack didn’t have any cases / boxes that suited me so I got thinking about that Super-Sized Giant Altoids tin I had and thought it might work. Bingo! The battery pack, LED voltmeter ( www.rainbowkits.com ), switches and connectors all just fit!
Actually, I’m […]
Source
Electronic Hacks, DIY Hacks, Crazy Hacks |
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10. Microcontroller Christmas Music
This project will allow you to create your own music using a microcontroller.
“With Christmas fast drawing near, I thought it appropriate to create a project that has a festive theme and also shows what the humble PICmicro is capable of doing with a little imagination and the right tools. i.e. PROTON+ Compiler.
Everyone and their reindeer has created Christmas projects in the past but most of them revolve around multi-coloured flashing LEDs. Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with flashing LEDs, but let’s face it, they don’t exactly stimulate the imagination?
So what I’ve created for your perusal is a project to play several well known Christmas tunes using 3 channel (polyphonic) sound, with each channel having a pleasant chime effect. And all this using nothing more than a handful of common or garden components that you probably already have lying around. And yes, you can flash […]
Source
Electronic Hacks, DIY Hacks, Cool Gadgets, Toy Hacks, Complex Hacks, Top 5 |
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David from uC Hobby shows how to use a computer parallel port instead of a microcontroller when developing new projects. The article also includes the Microsoft C# code that he uses.
“Using the parallel port is often easier to work with then a microcontroller. I find that testing code on the PC can be much easier then going straight to the firmware as the developer tools for the PC platform are better. This is especially true when working with a new device such as a graphic LCD. Once you get your code working through the PC printer port, then you can easily port the code and what you have learned into the firmware.”
Source
Electronic Hacks, DIY Hacks |
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This looks like an interesting solar camping light project.
“The unit contains a solar controller board from the Electronics Goldmine that turns the light on at dusk and off at dawn. The batteries are two lithium 3.6 v cells in series, providing 7.2 v @ 1.1 amp hours. The two white LEDs are in series and draw 20ma. The only other parts used are a switch and power connector for the solar panel connection. I would have preferred a white box for the project since it is in the sun for charging.
The board contains a 358 dual op amp. One op amp is used to turn the light on at dusk and off at dawn and the second is used to turn off the light when the battery drops to about 5.5 volts. The CDS cell pokes through a hole drilled in the box. There are various ways to mount the […]
Source
Electronic Hacks, DIY Hacks |
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