We ask, who wouldn’t want a rotating motion and distance tracking radar? Sure in today’s day and age anyone could purchase a wide-angle sonar or IR solution that achieves the same goal, but [LuckyLarry] took it old school and made his own rotating radar. He used an Arduino, servo, and ultrasonic sensor as a base to gather data, and the open source programming language Processing to draw the data on the screen. He says it’s a little inaccurate currently, but will try out some other sensors in the future.
During our daily rounds we stumbled upon Duino Tag. Sure it’s not as awesome as a coil gun but it really sparked our imagination. First the base: an Arduino is wired up with IR LEDs and placed inside of a plastic pistol. A second Arduino with an IR receiver is scanning for the first Arduinos signal. A ’shot’ of IR light is ‘fired’ and detected, you get a ‘kill’.
The base is nothing amazing, but it really gives us some ideas and we would like to see it expanded upon. [J44] has already put in a piezo and other LEDs to simulate muzzle flash and other effects. But we like to go further. Start off with multiple pistols and players. Include GPS to track players current position, and wireless to update each player of another player. A small wrist watch display could act much like a UAV. Add some expansions like IR ‘grenades’ and you’ve got a full-out war! What would you like to see?
We’re pretty sure Apple decided to implement an IR sensor in their Mac Mini line simply to mock the user. For those who are unaware, the built in sensor only works with the standard Apple Remote; unless you happen to have a programmable PDA or similar you’re SOL. An alternative solution would be to install a USB IR receiver. But then your beautiful Mac Mini is forced to sit alongside an ugly black box. Why not have the best of both worlds? [SqueeZe] wrote an (almost) entirely non invasive tutorial for placing a USB IR receiver inside his Mac Mini. Reminds us of a certain hack a while back, but the objective was to get the IR receiver outside of the unit rather than inside. Different people, different worlds.
[Computergeek] made an Arduino Shield in order to use it as an Apple remote. We like the construction technique that he used; taking perf-board and soldering the circuit and using stripped wire to interface with the pin sockets on the Arduino. He’s written the code needed to function as an Apple Remote but this shield has a lot more potential. This is an excellent opportunity to delve into the different IR protocols out there and create a universal remote for all of your random devices. We’d also want to give it a try as a TV-B-Gone.
The parts are easy to find or salvage without putting in an order. We’re not certain about his design, he should probably have invited a resistor to the party the two IR LEDs are having.
[Ross] put together a small package for use with time-lapse photography. The Nikon camera he’s using can snap a picture when it receives an IR command. [Ross'] solution connects an IR LED to an Arduino to generate this signal. The delay between frames is set with a potentiometer that is read in through the ADC. This is quite a bit less involved than the last solution we saw.
The unit consisting of an Arduino clone, a 9v battery, and the IR LED on a cable is easy to fit into a camera bag. He’s posted the code and we’ve embedded an example of his work after the break. An enclosure as well as time references around the potentiometer would complete this handy tool.
We’re not sure why [Roteno] prefers to have his TV and cable boxes not face him when he’s sitting on the couch, but to each their own. You may already see many problems with this setup: discoloration from LCD viewing angle, difficulty playing Wii, oh and most importantly – not being able to change the channel with his IR remote. [Roteno] was lucky enough, however, to have an IR remote input on the back of his cable box. All it took was a 3.5mm jack and a spare IR receiver and he was back in business. Sure it’s not as technical as some of our cable or IR hacks and we would like to see someone try this who doesn’t have as easily accessible IR input on the back of their cable box. But either way, here’s one more step to never having to leave that couch.
[Tom] has an office job in China. His office is cooled by a small single room air conditioner. In an effort to make his office a little more comfortable, he built this IR timer unit. It cools his office down before he gets there so he doesn’t have to wait for it in the morning. He started by decoding the IR signal from the remote for the unit. He then built this ATiny13 based remote. He notes that the internal clock of this thing isn’t that accurate. power cycling it every day seems to help. It is also pretty cool that he built the unit to not only send the cooling code, but he can switch it to the heating code for the winter.
TV-B-Gone: antisocial nuisance or harmless prank? Whatever your feelings, there’s no denying this device has become a staple of the DIY hacking crowd, as evidenced by the countless derivativessincehatched. This latest mutation crushes them all.
[manekinen] from the Polish electronics blog Elektroda (“Electrode”) wasn’t satisfied with high-power TV-B-Gone designs using multiple 5mm infrared LEDs, so he created his own using a single one-Watt monster. The device is concealed in an ordinary flashlight casing, making it somewhat inconspicuous. A custom PCB containing an ultra-minimalist version of the TV-B-Gone circuitry sits just behind the reflector. The choice of reflectors determined maximum distance vs. coverage…they opted for distance. Specific figures aren’t given, but we estimate this thing could shut off televisions on Mars.
The original article (Polish or Google-ized English) includes construction photos and an archive (.rar) of project files including Eagle schematics and C source code.
Would it be totally irresponsible to mention there’s now a 3-Watt version of this LED? We’re just sayin’.
[Linuxworks] has posted a writeup on how to build an IR module for the popcorn hour c-200. We weren’t familiar with the popcorn hour c-200, so we had to look it up. It seems to be a media center pc sort of thing. We’re not reviewing the unit itself, since we’ve never used one, so we’ll just get back to the mod. The device uses an RF remote, which some people didn’t like as much. Luckily it has an expansion port which can be utilized to get IR signals into the machine. [Linuxworks] has used a cheap IR sensor and a standard headphone plug. He notes that equipment passing power through these plugs should be turned off before plugging them in or removing them as they short momentarily during insertion.
We’ve seen automated grow boxes of all shapes and sizes, but all were for growing plants. [Jared] over at Inventgeek wanted to do something similar for his algae. He started off with an Arduino-based solution that allows the controlled pulse of LEDs connected to his standard bioreactor as a prototype. Once he determined his proof of concept worked, he began work on a design based on the Arduino Pro Mini that has more advanced features such as temperature monitoring and algae culture density monitoring via some fancy IR voodoo. The code is open source and the hardware is easily obtainable, all that remains is the desire to grow algae.
