Oil truck transforms into giant mobile grill

Oil-truck-transforms-into-mobile-grill

When the truck rolls up, everything seems normal enough. It's a generic oil tanker. But when the theme from "2001: A Space Odyssey" begins to play and the side of the tank starts to open, you suddenly realize things are not what they seem. This is no mere tanker truck, it's a massive meat cooking monster dubbed the "X Grill". [Ken Foster], owner and creator of this $40K+ beast, worked with … [Read more...]

RC car transforms into RC robot

Transformer

After nearly 30 years since the first episode of Transformers aired, someone has finally done it. A company named Brave Robotics out of Japan has created a true transformer robot that is half remote control car and half remote control bipedal robot. According to the Brave Robotics' site, this creation is the result of more than 10 years. In 2002, the first version of the Transform Robot was … [Read more...]

A huge microwave-powered bug zapper

microwave-powered-bug-zapper

This is the biggest bug zapper we've ever seen. It's called the Megazap as its zapping area is 1 square meter. [Eighdot] and [Sa007] combined their talents for the build in order to help reduce the insect population around the Eth0 2012 Summer festival. You may recall from our bug zapping light saber build that these devices work by providing two energized grids. When an insect flies between … [Read more...]

Building a sound reactive EL panel and learning something in the process

EL

We've seen a lot of builds using electroluminescent wire, usually in the realm of costumes and props. Unfortunately, most electrical engineers don't deal with blinking and dimming EL wire and panels and any tinkerer trying to control electroluminescence doesn't have a lot of resources on how to control EL stuff. [ch00f] wanted to fill this knowledge gap, so he build a sound reactive EL panel … [Read more...]

There’s more than meets the eye to this robot car

rc-autorobot-video

This is a robot that any Transformers enthusiast will love. Sure, the car looks just a bit boxy, but you'll forget all about that when you see it unfold into a bipedal robot (translated). [Zak Sawa] is responsible for the creation. He pull off the build using 22 servo motors which let the car transform, and provide the somewhat awkward ability to walk. Fold it back up again and the car can drive … [Read more...]

Burning plasma screen with breathtaking beauty

wpid-plasma-screen-destruction.png

At some point you've got to resign yourself to the fact that the TV you've been trying to resurrect is just not salvageable. But if you're knowlegable about working safely with high voltage, you might get quite a show out of it yet. Here [Aussie50] finds beauty in destruction when he fries a large plasma panel from a broken HDTV. The flyback transformer from a microwave oven drives the display. … [Read more...]

Tutorial series shows you everything you need to salvage transformers from microwaves

mot-salvaging

Transformers certainly have a tendency to increase the cost of any project, especially if you need a large transformer to get the job done. Microwave ovens are great sources of free transformers, though they are not always in the shape required for your next build. [Matt] put together three great tutorial videos covering the basics of salvaging Microwave Oven Transformers (MOTs), that anyone … [Read more...]