[Will] enjoys giving hacked items as Secret Santa gifts and this year he decided to augment a Billy Bass. These gag items have become a popular hack to use as a prop or to read your Twitter updates to you. Right of the bat he scrapped the original PCB and sent it to the gift’s future recipient as if he were a kidnapper extorting a family. He then set to work replacing the guts with a pair of PIC 18F452 microcontrollers. One uses power transistors to control the movement, the other controls an MP3 that handles the sound clips. The interface has some LEDs for added effect and uses a dial to select each sound clip which is displayed on a 4×20 character LCD.
The project has several voltage headaches as the motors operate at 6v and 4v, the microcontrollers and LCD display at 5v, and the MP3 is looking for 1.5v. That’s for voltages supplying this Frankenstein’d schematic. But he pulled it off, as you can see in the video after the break.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZXQrOQ1In0]
“That’s for voltages” Or as we like to say “Four” Interesting post and deff a headache with all those voltages.
the novelty of hacking one of these wore off TEN YEARS AGO
One of the clips should be, “The internet is a series of tubes.” =)
Maybe the next hack will be an audio amp so you can actually HEAR what the BMBB is saying.
Isn’t it a bit overkill to use not one but TWO high end 18F452 ?
Nevertheless I prefer this hack than every arduino hack.
I would still like to see one of these that you can plug in to your ipod. it would have phonetic recognition and move the mouth accordingly. id pay 150 for one….
but dreams are rarely realized
how come the description is all like Will and ‘HE’, but the narrator of the video is obviously neither a HE, nor a Will? unless he just likes wearing a ring..
but nice hack. although my attention span is too short for me to stick around to hear the fish after pressing a button.
too short to write all that code as well. but i would lessen some ‘delay_ms’ values
oNo- yeah between “for voltages” and “right of the bat”, the article was almost as painful as an un-hacked Billy Bass.
These bass hacks are not truly complete until they are installed in a real bass and released into the wild. Still a good hack, though.
I want one that plays “I’m a Fish!” sung to the tune of “I’m on a Boat!” and it better have some T-Pain in it.
@M4CGYV3R
Add in voice modulation to make it sound like Snoop Dog and you’d have the next greatest viral video.
wow isn’t this an overkill :)
very cool nevertheless!
I’ve just noticed the “Artificial Intelligence Indicator”… WOW :-)
I really despise those things. Every time I come across one I want to rip it off the wall and smash it.
Nothing is more annoying than being somewhere, and having some child playing it non-stop the whole time I am there.
Yes, I really have an issue with the stupid fake talking fish.
awesome. the fish farting at the end is the best
The lady on that video has a really sexy voice. Rawr! I bet she’s hot.
Considering that the original PCB was completely scrapped, isn’t this closer to a case mod than a hack?
Impressive none the less, though.
OMFG when I first read the article something caught my eye “, the other controls an MP3 that handles the sound clips” but I decided to give the writer the benefit of the doubt, however I see that they have done it again further on “display at 5v, and the MP3 is looking for 1.5v”. Do you see that?? Referring to a piece of hardware with the name of a piece of software!!!
It’s the same as when retards call thumb drives / flash drives / memory sticks… USB’s!!! A frigging USB is a Universal Serial Bus… It’s not a storage medium…. I think I am a little tired tonight but this kind of stuff gets on my nerve any time… I can’t believe it’s happening on a technical site such as this!…. I don’t call my TV a HDMI do I?… or my mobile phone a GSM…. so what gives?
ok Glad I’ve got that out the way….
Nice mod :)
Can you make one for Ebay?
I’d like to be able to mount a BMBB on the beach boardwalk and from a safe distance (~40-50′) be able to send rude remarks from a head-set mic, accompanied by suggestive head and tail movements (IR hand-held controller?) to passing babes in bikinis. Who’s in?