Prototype This premiers tomorrow

Discovery Channel’s new show Prototype This premiers tomorrow night at 10e/p. Every week the team will construct a new piece of unique machinery. The schedule for the first six episodes has already been published.

  • Mind Controlled Car, October 15
  • Boxing Robots, October 22
  • Traffic Busting Truck, October 29
  • Get Up and Go, November 5
  • Waterslide Simulator, November 12
  • Six-Legged All

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Microcontroller-powered missile launch controller

[Josef Jahn] has posted a detailed guide on building a microcontroller-based launch box. Constructed from an Atmel ATMega168 and powered by a 12V rechargable lead gel battery, the launch box is fully portable and includes a number of safety features. Going the extra mile on what could essentially be a simple push button launcher, he added three safety switches, … Read the rest

How-to: Make an e-paper clock from Esquire magazine

If you’ve never heard about electronic paper, crawl out from under that rock and read up on the Sony Reader and the Amazon Kindle. E-paper is a flexible display made of color-changing beads that mimic ink-on-paper for easy daylight reading. The revolutionary thing about e-paper is that after it’s set, it stays that way without additional power.

This sounds … Read the rest

Wiimote guitar effects control

[Rob Morris] sent us this video of his Wiimote based guitar effects. Similar to our post yesterday about using the Wiimote to control a synth, he is using changes in orientation to effect the sound. He starts off with simple pitch modulation, but later in the video he’s doing, uh, we’re not sure but its kind of cool.… Read the rest

FM stereo transmitter

Reader [Mike Y] responded to our “What are you working on?” post  with his stereo FM transmitter project. If you’ve ever used an FM transmitter for your portable audio, you know that even the best consumer level ones can be difficult to make sound decent.

He obtained an NS73M FM Transmitter module from Niigata Seimitsu Company, but … Read the rest