Capacitive discharge cutting
Capacitive discharge cutting provides more control than linear transformer versions. A very large capacitor is charged to a precise voltage and then discharged through the material to produce a controlled cut. The same device can also be used for spot and tab welding. A video of copper roof flashing being cut is embedded below. An [...] Read more...
Hack a Day, Today, 11:00am
Happy 4th of July, 2009, makers!
[Fireworks art by Rosemarie Fiore] Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Today, 7:30am
4th of July roundup-abration!
Any holiday that necessitates pyrotechnics and cookouts must be a good one, right? - right!
In honor of such an awesome holiday, enjoy a collection of 4th-related posts for your perusing pleasure - oh, and Happy Independence Day! Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Today, 7:00am
Fireworks animation by PES
Unexpected, delightful; I did enjoy this fireworks animation by PES.
Read more | Permalink | Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Today, 4:00am
Apply for an Awesome Grant!
That's not an adjective in the title, "Awesome Grant" is the actual name of the grant, from the Awesome Foundation, of Cambridge, MA. Each month, they give away $1,000 to someone who wants to do something... well awesome. Here's how they define what they're looking for:
Awesomeness is often overlooked by mainstream culture, which tends to rehash the same broadly appealing but mediocre creations. Thankfully, there is the web. Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Yesterday, 6:00pm
Lego modded antenna tuner
This antenna tuner is controlled remotely using geared motors and legos. The tuner needed to be closer to the antenna for performance reasons. This created a problem; most of the radio gear is inside while the tuner is outside. The gear motors and Legos combine to form a closed loop servo, operating two air core [...] Read more...
Hack a Day, Yesterday, 5:37pm
Japanese POW camp radio
On today's HacDC Blabber list, Trammell Hudson posted a link to this awesome account of British soldiers building a radio in a Japanese POW camp. Trammel writes:
Since they didn't have a local Digikey or Radioshack, everything had to be sourced from what was available. The caps were made from aluminum foil lining of tea-chests, the resistors were rusty barbed wire with burned tree bark, the rectifiers out of oxidised foil and salt water, they smuggled a tube ("valve") in the camps and bribed the local Chinese power station operator to slowly step the output voltage up to 130 from 110 volts. Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Yesterday, 4:00pm
Contests on Let's Make Robots
Let's Make Robots is a popular site for robot hobbyists. They've been running... Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Yesterday, 3:00pm
Last day to preorder your Bus Pirate
Today is the last day to pre-order a Bus Pirate. Get your own Bus Pirate, fully assembled and shipped worldwide, for only $30. We don’t plan to make more soon, this could be your last chance.
A special shout out to our partner, Seeed Studio, who handled the rush of orders like pros. The first pre-order [...] Read more...
Hack a Day, Yesterday, 2:13pm
Tiniest bot, sort of. CNC controlled
Here’s an interesting concept, the bot pictured above has no internal control mechanisms. His claims to have built the smallest bot are dubious, considering it requires a much larger control platform to function, so lets just set that aside and look at how it works. The bot itself is basically a hollow box with a [...] Read more...
Hack a Day, Yesterday, 11:31am
Compressed air rocket goes up, must come down … somewhere?
From the MAKE Flickr pool Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Yesterday, 10:30am
WTF-O-meter
Here’s something every office probably needs. Ours does at least. It’s a WTF counter. When the office gets just a little too weird, someone hits the button and it gets logged. It’s probably pretty easy to judge the day by the WTF chart. The button is connected to an Arduino that updates the status on [...] Read more...
Hack a Day, Yesterday, 10:19am
New in the Maker Shed: Fire Piston Kit
The Fire Piston Kit is a neat physics experiment based on the heat created when air is rapidly compressed. Bill Gurstelle, author of Backyard Ballistics and Barrage Garage, created this kit for us. If you were at Maker... Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Yesterday, 5:00am
Tilt sensor tutorial on adafruit
Limor has posted another installment of her exceedingly excellent sensor tutorials, this one on that most marvelous of switches, the tilt sensor. When you just have to know which end is up, you need to strap on one of these puppies. Here's how. Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Yesterday, 1:01am
Spinner synth
Matt Mets made a rotation-based MIDI controller using a motor, disc, webcam, and OpenCV. Source code included.
Read more | Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Jul 2, 10:00pm
LED Light Brick kits
Alden Hart, who wrote the LED Light Bricks project for MAKE, Volume 18, has put together a lovely little kit to make building the project much easier. And we're now offering them in the Maker Shed! The kit includes a printed circuit board, 20 bright LEDs, in red, green, blue, and yellow, a programmed PIC16F916 (which you can reprogram, if you like), a tilt switch, power supply, and everything else you need to complete the project (except the molding and casting components). The kit sells for $27.
Here's a link to the Digital Edition of the article in MAKE, Volume 18. Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Jul 2, 8:00pm
DIY fireworks kit
This is a moment that would have made 15 year old me very proud of present-day me: I've just received a DIY fireworks kit in the mail! I love the "Don't Send This Via Airplane" sticker. Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Jul 2, 7:00pm
SparkFun open-sources latest kits
SparkFun has started to release some of their kits as open-source hardware. Projects such as ClockIt, a simple alarm clock, have their schematics, board designs, and source code released under the CC-by-sa license. Although most of their widgets and projects already had example code and schematics available, they are now using an open-source license. They [...] Read more...
Hack a Day, Jul 2, 6:38pm
The Walnut Creek model railroad
Now this is a train layout, 1,800 sqaure feet of it.... Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Jul 2, 6:30pm
Self-portrait machine
[Jen Hui Liao] created a device that guides the user into drawing a portrait of themselves. Dubbed Self-Portrait Machine, it comments on how much in society is created by machines and we are dependent on them. Unlike previous drawing robots, the user is part of the sketching process. The machine holds the users hands and [...] Read more...
Hack a Day, Jul 2, 5:15pm
Crack WEP using BackTrack
Lifehacker wrote a guide for cracking a WiFi network’s WEP password using BackTrack. BackTrack is a Linux live CD used for security testing and comes with the tools needed to break WEP. Not just any wireless card will work for this; you need one that supports packet injection. The crack works by collecting legitimate packets [...] Read more...
Hack a Day, Jul 2, 4:30pm
A PAC for geeks?
Introducing Syn/Ack Pac, a Political Action Committee for "SysAdmins, Tinkerers, CodeMonkeys, Makers, Technologists, Warranty Voiders, and Geeks of all types."
Why Do Geeks Need a PAC?
Non-profit groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Public Knowledge and many others do a great job evangelizing, lobbying, and litigating on our behalf. But as non profits, they're unable to particpate in the political process. That political void is what SYN/ACK PAC seeks to fill, bolstering the efforts of our non profit friends with our participation in campaigns and elections, we'll make sure we elect members of Congress who will represent our beliefs.
Sign up for the announcement list here. Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Jul 2, 4:00pm
Scratchbot: Whiskers to the rescue
Scratchbot is designed as a rescue bot, going places where there is low visibility. It’s defining feature is the fact that it uses “whiskers” to feel for things. We feel like this is a little gimmicky. If it is a low visibility situation, wouldn’t IR or audio, possibly sonar be a more effective? How would [...] Read more...
Hack a Day, Jul 2, 3:50pm
How-to: Bus Pirate probe cable
A probe cable makes it easy to connect the Bus Pirate to a circuit and get hacking. Good test clips make quick connections on cramped PCBs without causing short circuits. We made two cables for the Bus Pirate v2, keep reading for an overview of our designs and list of part suppliers.
Friday, July [...] Read more...
Hack a Day, Jul 2, 3:08pm
Clever stair climbing robot
Stairs are one of the most commonly faced mobility challenges for a robot. This robot’s design eliminates the need for a complex drive train or computer, and instead uses a clever mechanical design to climb stairs. Version three of the robot uses five servos modified for continuous rotation, a Picaxe28, sharp IR sensors, and bump [...] Read more...
Hack a Day, Jul 2, 2:26pm
Metallurgical eye candy
An alloy of 1.3% copper, 0.3% magnesium, and 0.3% manganese in aluminum, etched with potassium permanganate and lye. Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Jul 2, 1:00pm
LEGO combination safe
Wow, a LEGO combination safe!
Read more | Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Jul 2, 11:16am
Brand new antique humanoids
According to a piece on BotJunkie (translating a piece on Japan's Robot Watch), a small army of vacuum tube robots from the 50s and 60s, built by Aizawa Zirou, have been unearthed in a warehouse, many of them apparently brand new. I love the Google translation:
"Were sleeping in a warehouse until it's released by the packaging. We look... Read more...
MAKE Magazine, Jul 2, 10:30am
T.G.I.M.B.O.E.J. turns one
The Great Internet Migratory Box of Electronics Junk, or T.G.I.M.B.O.E.J. has turned one. In the last year, they’ve learned a lot of things. They learned that lots of people are willing to contribute. Hundreds have signed up on the site to participate. Theyve also learned that laziness is the key road block on this project. [...] Read more...
Hack a Day, Jul 2, 9:55am