Columbus Day: What are you working on?

posted Oct 13th 2008 4:47pm by Eliot Phillips
filed under: misc hacks, news

Wow, Caribbean Conquest Day is such a dull holiday. If it’s a holiday at all: we’re at work today and you probably are too. We decided to post what we’re working on in hopes of breaking out of our holiday slump. Pictured above are two IR illuminator boards we assembled this weekend. We bought the kits from BG Micro. We’re planning on testing their camera blocking ability once we come up with a ~13V portable power source.

That’s what we’re doing. What have you been working on lately?

(If anyone can find a source for the welding goggles in the picture, we’d love to hear it.)

Comments [50]

tagged: columbus day, holiday, ir, ir camera, irilluminator, welding, welding goggles

Reader Comments

http://www.harborfreight.com will probably have some goggles like that, but I don’t see why a pair of cheap, dollar store swim goggles would work too. You’d just have to modify them so you get a little airflow.

Posted at 5:04 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by Sp`ange

http://www.massprices.com/gp200sck.html

Eleven of those in a bandolier would look pretty good with the goggles.

Posted at 5:09 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by blackspyder

what about a little 12 remote battery?

Or a 14 v drill battery, not as portable as the remote battery.

Posted at 5:10 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by P

This weekend I built an air pressure ratio switch. I’ll be using this to generate a signal when the pressure in a tank falls to less than a certain fraction of the supply — which can vary from 20 to 100 PSI — so that the pump it is driving can cycle. It’s heavy metal with 3/16 by 1.25 inch steel straps, and 1 inch OD fiberglass reinforced vinyl tubing doing the pressing. This is a part of a much bigger project of course, which I’m gonna be coy about for now :-)

Posted at 5:12 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by localroger

http://www.cryoflesh.com/shop/index.php?cPath=3_29

Posted at 5:22 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by Charles

I purchased a set of goggle like that from Restoration Hardware a couple of years ago. Don’t know if they still carry them.

Posted at 5:32 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by El Payo

I went to harborfreight but got distracted by this http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=55734

The goggle choice is purely aesthetic; looking for steel goggles exactly like the ones pictured, which were gifted.

Posted at 5:33 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by Eliot Phillips

Found ‘em:
$24 bucks – http://www.restorationhardware.com/rh/catalog/product/product.jsp?productId=prod120019

Posted at 5:33 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by El Payo

@El Payo yes, those are the exact goggles (ours had colored lenses though)

This appears to be the manufacturer:
http://www.georg-schmerler.de/produkte.php?aktion=2&cat=1&ucatid=5&modellid=34

Posted at 5:35 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by Eliot Phillips

look for cutting goggles, not welding goggles. I can source some identical ones at the welding supply right down the street with a #3 lens for $10

Posted at 5:40 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by john

I’m setting up a Sun server in my living room.

Posted at 5:48 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by Dean

im setting up a fedora server i installed a stereo on two cars i fixed the cable on my laptop i re soldered the pci slot back onto the board i fixed my jeep i ordered some parts for the guitar im building and wrote some plans up for a noise canceling attachment i could use with ear buds on my i-pod, oh and why not use a scooter battery.

Posted at 6:08 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by drew wilson

The easiest way to prevent a security camera from working is to saturate the CCD with a laser pointer. Most of these cameras seem to have a small enough aperture that even a cheap keychain pointer will completely blind the camera. With a little bit of putty on the back end and some tape around the switch the thing should be able to be stuck to a wall and aimed at the camera. As for infrared cameras. I don’t know how much light from the visible spectrum they use, so an ordinary HeNe may still work on them. If not, an infrared laser diode at the same intensity would probably suffice

Some cheap optics to widen the beam may be necessary for some cameras, but a laser is really the way to go. Laser light is coherent, meaning all the photons are traveling in the same direction. This is what causes a laser beam to be so intense.

It would take a bunch of LEDs to match the intensity of a flood lamp to pull this off, requring a decent battery to run it.

Posted at 6:14 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by Sam

if you want to get creative, you could go to instructables & make your own.

Posted at 6:15 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by coleslaw

Trying to make my robot balance with only an accelerometer, and not a gyro. Getting ready for my senior project, a DIY segway.

Posted at 6:20 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by kersny

http://cordellsfootwear.com/cordells/product_info.php?products_id=65&osCsid=49ea0310428bbdf6c458d2cd7f1fe037

These look to be rather close. If the lens rings are removable you probably couldn’t tell a difference.

Posted at 6:22 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by wadragunov

I’m working on a toilet paper dispenser odometer. its gonna be sweet. Nice goggles!!!

Posted at 6:58 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by adam

this weekend i was going to find the vehicle speed sensor on my car and see if i could fix what ever’s wrong (it sometimes stays at 20 mph and doesn’t record on the odometer), and if its not fixable (or if i can’t fix it) replace it…i didn’t get around to that though, too busy with school and trying to make a real coke and mentos bomb.

Posted at 7:45 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by sean

Heh I played with legos.. I’m a bit immature.

Posted at 8:09 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by Markyb86

I just started to rebuild my 1982 Dixie Craft ski/fishing boat

Posted at 8:19 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by Buland

NES breakout box and cd drive for my PC and yes the power button on the nes turns on the pc.

Posted at 8:20 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by Edward Nardella

Working on a gravimetric mixer for plastic extrusion using load cells, an arduino and the AD7705 16 bit ADC. I basically need to mix 4 ingredients to +/- 0.5%, 3,000 lbs at a time. I’m hoping to get a howto written on interfacing the arduino to a load cell / thermocouple when I finish.

The AD7705 is a pretty sweet part for load cells, thermocouples and such. It has a 1-128 gain preamp and has two inputs per channel allowing differential measurement in bipolar or unipolar modes. For $8 it’s pretty jam packed with crap.

Digi-Key has it as AD7705BNZ-ND (sorry, I bought the last two, more in a week or two):
http://search.digikey.com/scripts/DkSearch/dksus.dll?Detail?name=AD7705BNZ-ND

Posted at 8:30 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by Dan Fekete

hung garage door opener, worked on my 64 ghia, started running conduit from house to garage for cameras and data

Posted at 8:37 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by pk

I am circuit bending a 1980 educational toy, Computron into a funky fresh instrument.

Posted at 9:20 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by trogdor

Working on a serial PIC programmer (making the PCB right now). I’ll be ordering it from BatchPCB along with another PCB in hopes of cutting the cost of each project.

Posted at 10:12 pm on Oct 13th, 2008 by Fahhem

retailmenot.com has a 10% discount for restorationhardware.com:”HNM08FS8″
Expires on Oct. 15th; but they tend to keep popping up.

Thanks for the source, I think I’ve been looking for goggles like these all my life!

Posted at 12:29 am on Oct 14th, 2008 by paul

An AI agent to control a submarine entity in multiplayer/multi-agent scenario.

Posted at 4:26 am on Oct 14th, 2008 by Keith Brawner

I didn’t have the day off but after work I dipped into my spare video game console parts box and and managed to construct 3 full working Xbox 1 consoles… modded them all for good measure too.

Posted at 5:14 am on Oct 14th, 2008 by twistedsymphony

i’m working on a windmill to charge a 12v light system in a bathroom i’m renovating. i’m using a 90 degree drill chuck to send the energy down the shaft, instead of having the motor on top, which saves alot of weight. also, those are some awesome goggles.

Posted at 5:37 am on Oct 14th, 2008 by cyc4015

I have bought them at Airgas for $12.99 and also at McMaster-Carr for about the same. Both were made in the U.S.A if that matters to anyone.

Posted at 6:29 am on Oct 14th, 2008 by JB

I’m finishing an FM Stereo transmitter, finishing as in packaging the layout from breadboard into a nice Hammond aluminum enclosure.

I’ve found all of the over-the-counter iPod transmitters to be awful – either poor audio or limited distance. But I used SparkFun’s FM transmitter IC, along with an Arduino to control it, and an LCD display. Here’s my writeup: http://mikeyancey.com/FM-Stereo-Broadcaster.php

Mike Y
Dallas, Texas

Posted at 9:00 am on Oct 14th, 2008 by Mike Y

I found ‘em cheaper! $8 bux on the hasn’t-failed-me-yet McMaster.com
part number:
5444T2
Though there are different darkness’s available, so you might just wanna search for welding goggles, they’re right there. :)
-Taylor

Posted at 9:13 am on Oct 14th, 2008 by Taylor Alexander

You could either re-wire the IR illuminators so they run off a lower voltage (this is hack-a-day!), or get an AnyVolt Mini that can boost lower voltages up to what you need: http://www.dimensionengineering.com/AnyVoltMicro.htm

Posted at 9:49 am on Oct 14th, 2008 by Haku

I got a pair of these a while back for making a pair of Infra-Red Vision goggles by changing the filters.

I went to a local welding supply shop and found a pair for about $5, and no shipping charges.

google product search for “cup style welding goggles” and set the price to less than $7 or so. I found a couple pages of results in that range.

Posted at 10:11 am on Oct 14th, 2008 by Aud1073cH

I’m building a hydroponic grow box so I can grow some, umm…strawberries. In my closet.

Posted at 10:18 am on Oct 14th, 2008 by tobikow

36 LED times 2 = 72 LED times at least 20mA per LED (more for IR) = 1440mA, that had better be rechargeable batteries there then, in a shoulder or belt-attached bag or something.
I don’t think those 12v remote batteries would last more than a few minutes, assuming you combined several of them of course else they’d lack the capability to source such amperage.

Posted at 11:49 am on Oct 14th, 2008 by Wwhat

Hacking my Crestron AES to allow simpl control instead of systembuilder.

I love this real home automation gear compared to the Toy stuff sold at smarthome.

Posted at 11:56 am on Oct 14th, 2008 by fartface

You can get one of those Cellboost for Camcorders. The Cam1 is a bit bulky, but has screws, and inside is 6 aa sized batteries. Replace the batteries with rechargeables, and you have a nice self regulating battery pack with camera mounting screw.

Posted at 12:44 pm on Oct 14th, 2008 by cde

I’m working on mounting a MMIC frequency multiplier in a surplus Philips 39 GHz downconverter for a 47 GHz radio that I’m building. I’m going to see if the crappy Arctic Silver epoxy will suffice for MMIC use. The real good silver epoxy has to be ordered, costs more and requires refrigeration. I also ordered some 1 mil gold bonding wire to try and do some wire bonding.

Posted at 12:59 pm on Oct 14th, 2008 by Tony

I’m working on a simple project, putting a cheap bluetooth headset inside of an old car phone just for kicks. I can resolder the speaker and mic to work with the old phone’s original components, but I’m having trouble figuring out a way to mount it so that i could push the sync button and change the battery inside easily. What would you use?

Posted at 2:40 pm on Oct 14th, 2008 by Derwin

Refurbing a Mortal Kombat 2 machine. Currently waiting on some parts for the monitor to come it. Going to turn it into a mame machine, but add a switch to revert back to the original game.

Posted at 2:47 pm on Oct 14th, 2008 by bill

Heheheheheheheh. im working on lots of things. this is the next one i am publishing.

http://www.inventgeek.com/images/turret.jpg

Posted at 3:04 pm on Oct 14th, 2008 by Jared

@jared:
That’s a thing of beauty. I’ve been intending to build one for years, so I look forward to your writeup.

Posted at 3:21 pm on Oct 14th, 2008 by nathangray

Its fully RC. Live video feed, audio feed. heads up display in the paintball helm or on a transmitter. night vision. 1/2 mile range tested so far. when it fires…. its amazing! lol! our next model will have 4 barrels. and we are looking into a 4X4 version also soon.

jared

Posted at 3:26 pm on Oct 14th, 2008 by Jared

built a 5volt 3a power supply for my car’s instrument panel. (** Mercury Cougar)It used to use a bi-metal strip to regulate power.(??) Good old LM323K and a few caps.
Also worked on my Steampunk’d computer monitor.

Posted at 3:35 pm on Oct 14th, 2008 by Stephen

I did not know this was a holiday…
…anyway!
I am working on a Backpack that carries 4 sound systems and runs off of 4 12v DeWalt battery packs and with a standard headphone jack for input. The idea is to make sounds that influence those around the backpack with out them knowing that the sounds are influencing them so much.
Peace!

Posted at 3:04 pm on Oct 17th, 2008 by Louis II

I’m working on so much right now… pleh my whole work area is a mess from it. I’m trying to get a set of decent hard drive speakers working, I’m building an amp for them, also building a portable amp for my electric guitar, I’m modding my other real amplifier to have a talkbox, and I’m trying to build a radio jammer. Also trying to get my computer to run at a little lower temperature. And I’m having fun trying to do all this with stuff I already have, haha.

Posted at 10:49 am on Oct 20th, 2008 by Ryan

The goggles can be found by typing “cyber goggles”, I had a pair of spikey ones myself :p

http://www.clubwear.co.uk/acatalog/CY-X_GOGGLES.html

Posted at 7:41 am on Oct 22nd, 2008 by edge

Great post, thanks for the info

Posted at 2:03 pm on Mar 1st, 2009 by Raffaele

Can you actually see through the cyber goggles?

Posted at 4:52 pm on Apr 6th, 2009 by hotdog

Columbus Day: What are you working on?

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