Alarm clock wakes you like [Lawrence Welk]

bubble-blowing-alarm-clock

That awful buzzing/beeping beside the bed in the morning might not seem so bad if it were a cascade of bubbles instead. At least that's what [Will] is hoping for. He took a child's toy and turned it into a bubble blowing alarm clock. We're guessing you're not going to be too happy with the alarm settings feature. This isn't using a real-time clock, or any clock at all really. [Will] rolled his … [Read more...]

Light programming for a clock

light-programming-a-clock

+ So at first glance we were thinking there wasn't much special about this clock. It's based on an Arduino and displays the time using a character LCD screen. But then we realized that there's no battery-backed RTC and no buttons. How the heck do you set the time on this thing? [Mossblaser] is using a light programmer to set the time using a computer screen. We've tried nearly the same data … [Read more...]

Sun-powered Stirling engine with automatic tracking

sun-tracking-stirling-engine

Check out this solar-powered Stirling engineĀ (translated). The build is part of a high school class and they packed in some really nice features. The first is the parabolic mirror which focuses the sun's rays on the chamber of the engine. The heat is what makes it go, and the video after the breaks shows it doing just that. But the concept behind the mirror makes for an interesting challenge. … [Read more...]

Automatic flashlight tag damage sensor

Flashlight-tag

You're out at night and playing a boisterous game of flashlight tag. But how can you tell if you've been mortally wounded by your opponents light beam? [Kenyer] solved this problem by building a flashlight tag damage sensor which is worn by each participant. It adds a bit of the high-tech equipment used with laser tag while keeping a low-tech price tag. The sensor relies on a light dependent … [Read more...]

Light sensitive MIDI glove

light-sensitive-midi-glove

The latest offering in glove-based noisemakers forsakes commonly used flex sensors in favor or photoresistors. [Bruno Ratnieks] is responsible for this musical glove and his methods will be very easy to recreate. He used an Arduino to interface with it while providing a USB connection to your audio software. The sensors themselves couldn't be easier to throw together, with each photoresistor … [Read more...]