Hackaday extra

posted Oct 2nd 2006 9:59am by Will O'Brien
filed under: misc hacks

I spent 14 hours at airports today, after staying up all night. My internet access at Toorcon was bandwith starved, so I wanted to catch up a bit. I’ll try to highlight more Toorcon stuff later in the week.

[Clinton] and [bart] both sent in Clinton’s electric shock alarm clock. (Don’t even think about building one of these things, it could kill someone if you’re not careful.)

[capagotks] sent in his USB refitted hand crank LED flashlight.

I got this a few times, so here’s a simple work surface made from an old PC case. (I use self healing cutting mats.)

[Ian] presents us with a bunch of cell phone repair (and upgrade?) information. Let me know if you actually rebuild a broken phone. The most likely scenario would be LCD replacement.

[Jim] sent in these candy(sugar) powered rockets. sweet!

Finally, [Leigh Norton] in Essex (Yes, Essex.) has an HP pen plotter like the one used to make a vinyl cutter. Post if you want it and maybe he’ll give it to you.

Comments [19]

Reader Comments

i’d love the plotter if it’s up for grabs, i’m also in essex. (uk).
cheers!

Posted at 11:13 pm on Oct 2nd, 2006 by jam

I’m just wondering if I read the volt meter right, does that say 189.8 volts? just wondering

Posted at 11:47 pm on Oct 2nd, 2006 by Dave

Wow weird. Today, I was thinking about the scene in October Sky where Homer leans over the rocket fuel and says “it smells like candy.”

Posted at 12:31 am on Oct 3rd, 2006 by TheBlunderbuss

I’d love the plotter, too. I can definately think of some uses for it. I will gladly pay shipping and give you a little something for your time as well.

Posted at 12:49 am on Oct 3rd, 2006 by RDaC

By the way, it’s my birthday today (Oct. 2)…so, hook a hacker up? :)

Posted at 12:50 am on Oct 3rd, 2006 by RDaC

I have built a few stunguns and electric shock devices, but none as dangerous as this (clock and other shockers on his site). A high voltage electrolytic capacitor can deliver dangerous amounts of current when used like this (the sparks aren’t the kind a stungun makes). By all means blow stuff up with this (low value resistors make an impressive bang – wear goggles)but dont go poking people with it, I dont think this guy has any idea how dangerous this is.
I will happily discharge stun guns into my arm as they produce harmless levels of current, but no way I would do the same with a 2-300V 300uF capacitor.

Posted at 1:00 am on Oct 3rd, 2006 by TarGit

is anyone else woried that two of these hacks have the potential to maim or kill one of the script kiddies that visit this site, or worse their little brother? some of the hakcs recently have been getting a little dangerous, perhaps the site needs to think of some ethical guidlines for the things that get posted.

Posted at 1:23 am on Oct 3rd, 2006 by giskard

I would love the plotter, i live in colchester, essex.

Posted at 1:55 am on Oct 3rd, 2006 by Luc van Helfteren

Hey, at least this stuff is accurate. If “script kiddies” have survived the anarchist’s cookbook, I doubt supered alarm clocks are going to increase the mortality rate much.

Also, this is not exactly a site targeted to the lowest denominator. Anybody who can put hackaday to good use is quite above par in the spectrum of intelligence. Is it really fair to treat the people who operate on this level like children? If they are intelligent enough to pull it off but not reasonable to be safe about it, do you honestly think that not mentioning things like this on hackaday is going to miraculously circumvent their inclination to do things like this?

If anything, I would be more worried about the people who just realized that the alarm-gizmo is the perfect detonator for their homebrew explosives.

Posted at 2:24 am on Oct 3rd, 2006 by Rodrigo Neske

The capacitor isnt all that strong. I have been shocked by similar ones (the flash unit out of disposible cameras have plenty of uses) quite a few times. Worse thing that happened from it was a light electrical burn that went away in a day. Unless the person who is getting shocked has a pacemaker or something similar i doubt it could cause any kind of serious harm. If it was one out of a microwave or something then I would get worried.

Posted at 4:58 pm on Oct 3rd, 2006 by Tecarius

Funny, I’m hacking the same flashlight (torch). I’m trying to get it to source power, so you can, say, recharge a cellphone in an emergency. I’ve got a few other hacks planned, but I like the USB recharge idea.

Posted at 5:45 pm on Oct 3rd, 2006 by Standard Mischief

I’ve also been shocked by a disposable camera flash… yes it hurts, yes my finger was numb for a minute or two, no I’m not dead ;)

@2 – ya, 189 ;) perfectly normal.

Posted at 5:52 pm on Oct 3rd, 2006 by trebuchet03

If people are stupid enough to go around shocking themselves, its natural selection

Posted at 6:46 pm on Oct 3rd, 2006 by tricon

I’ve rebuiltd a broken cell phone before, a bowling ball was dropped on it, but a simple LCD replacement; as you assumed. I had a couple of old kyocera phones and my friend had a new one which he had dropped a bowling ball on, so I simply swapped the screens and all was good, they used the same screen.

Posted at 6:53 pm on Oct 3rd, 2006 by Scott

My dad and I make these rockets all the time. All you need is some KNO3 and suger (I use sobatol)and there you go. If you want to see a video of my CATO (see yawns site for the term CATO if you dont know) Email me at cltreat(at)comcast.net

Posted at 6:17 am on Oct 4th, 2006 by Cassady

are there any new hacks for the sidekick 3

Posted at 12:09 am on Oct 6th, 2006 by fable

woo @ Luc and Jam – another Colchester, Essex (UK) dude here :D

Plotter sounds kool, shame i dont have a hp pen plotter ;)

Dug

Posted at 6:10 am on Oct 8th, 2006 by Dug Stokes

thee are a few things for the sidekick3 termanal :> ssh2 telnet and raw access i do a bit with that

Posted at 7:20 pm on Sep 16th, 2007 by dosghost

Got here by accident. Does someone know how to hack a generic Chinese mobile phone with 2 sims? One sim is cool but the second hasn’t got the right IMEI so I can’t use it. Couldn’t find the tool to hack the phone and get it right. Can someone help please?

Posted at 3:43 pm on Nov 22nd, 2008 by George

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