Launching a glider from space

launching-a-glider-from-space

We get a ton of tips about weather balloon launches taking hobby electronics into space. But every once in a while one of them stands out from the rest. This project does send an electronic payload into space, but it also lets [David] fly his hardware back from near-space using an RC airplane.

The return vehicle is unpowered, but … Read the rest

Makerbot shows off 3D scanner

scan

We’ve said our piece over Makerbot and their interpretation of what Open Source means, but the fact remains if you’re sourcing a 3D printer for a high school shop class or a hackerspace, you really can’t do much better than a Makerbot Replicator. Apparently Makerbot is looking to expand their 3D design and fabrication portfolio; they just announced an upcoming … Read the rest

Another salvo in the PIC vs. AVR holy war

holy war

Ah, PIC vs. AVR, the never-ending battle of electronic design supremacy. Some people swear by Atmel’s AVR microcontrollers, while others are wrong. [majenko] is firmly planted in Microchip’s PIC camp, so he wrote up a nice comparison of Atmel’s AVR versus Microchip’s PIC family of microcontrollers. The results aren’t that surprising; PIC microcontrollers come out as a better product … Read the rest

DIY Lighting Solutions

pvc-lights

With daylight savings time starting up, you might not have quite as much need for lighting, but this pair of hacks should keep everything well lit whether outside or indoors.  Check out the videos of both in action after the break.

The first lighting solution comes to us from [Ben]‘s Youtube channel. It’s a simple solution, press-fitting a clamp … Read the rest

Tracking a car like it were a computer mouse

optical-mouse-sensor-tracks-vehicle-motion

This is [Paul Mandel's] Ground-truth velocity sensor. That’s a fancy name for a device which tracks the movement of a vehicle by actually monitoring the ground its travelling over. This differs from simply measuring wheel rotation (which is how traditional odometers work) in that those systems are an indirect measurement of motion. For us the interesting part is the … Read the rest