Etching Your Own PCBs

November 25, 2011 by Mike Szczys 34 Comments

When [Adr1an] wrote in to share a link to his PCB etching tutorial he mentioned that he knew we had already covered a ton of these guides. He’s absolutely right, not only have we featured a great number of them, but we also wrote our own quite a while ago. But that doesn’t mean we ignore them when they come in on the tips line. In fact, we read all of them that have something to offer and are pleased to feature the ones that are well presented… like this one!

[Adr1an] went all out with his writeup. He not only covers all of the elements that go into this, but discusses where to purchase them and his thoughts on how he arrived at the choice. He’s using the toner transfer method and prefers Brother branded toner for its coverage and resistance to over-etching. He prints on HP Everday Photopaper, then uses a laminator to transfer to the copper clad board. For this guide he used 2oz copper but prefers 1oz copper as it etches faster. His etchant of choice is Ferric Chloride, which can be ordered as a dry powder. He uses the direct etch method of loading etchant into a sponge an applying that to the board.

The board he makes in the guide looks great, and it only took him 28 minutes!

Beer Dispenser Talks To Customers, Announces Office Parties Via Twitter

November 25, 2011 by Mike Nathan 15 Comments

arnie-intelligent-beer-dispenser

Just about the only thing better than beer is free beer.

Staff at the Arnold Worldwide ad agency are free to imbibe in the office’s lounge area, but a few employees thought that it would be pretty awesome to have their beer stash offered up by a vending machine. Using a grant that the company sets aside for “creative projects”, they built [Arnie], the interactive beer dispensing machine.

The machine was stocked with company-branded brews, and each employee carries an RFID key fob pre-loaded with beer credits. When the urge hits, staff members swipe their fob in front of the machine and select their preferred drink from the large, front-mounted touch screen. [Arnie] speaks with his customers and also uses Twitter to announce parties in the making, when a handful of bottles have been vended over a short period of time.

The project was a great use of money if you ask us, and we think that every office should have one of these babies in-house.

Continue reading to see a short video of how [Arnie] came to be.

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A Trojan Horse Full Of Music

November 25, 2011 by Brian Benchoff 1 Comment

With a Sound + Vision exhibition coming up, the folks over at Seaweed Factory decided they needed something big. Somehow they landed on building a giant pinata that responds to being walloped with a stick by playing MIDI notes. The end result is called the Trojan Chorus. Instead of Greek soldiers, though, the pinata is filled with electronics and candy.

The pinata was constructed out of cardboard and more colored tissue paper than we care to imagine. The horse stands seven feet tall and was built with a little more structural integrity than a normal pinata. Check out the ‘making of’ video for the pinata here.

From what we can tell, the electronics are 24 contact microphones implanted all over the inside of the pinata. Impacts on these contact mics are recorded by a small dev board, transcribed to serial data, and sent to a computer. You can check out the electronics in action right here. A horse neighing MIDI notes may sound fairly weird, but similar setup could be added to make the Trojan Chorus cry out in pain.

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Making A Privacy Monitor From An Old LCD

November 25, 2011 by Mike Nathan 94 Comments

privacy-screen

[dimovi] had a spare LCD monitor sitting around and thought it would be great to convert it into a “privacy” monitor.

The process is simple enough for anyone comfortable with disassembling electronics. He took apart the monitor’s plastic frame, cutting out the polarized film with a utility knife. Once the film was removed, he spent some time removing the film adhesive from the glass panel using a combination of Oops cleaner and paint thinner.

He reassembled the monitor, which now shines a bright white regardless of what is actually being displayed on the screen. He removed the lenses from a pair of theater 3D glasses, replacing the plastic with the film he removed from the monitor.

Now, [dimovi] is the only one who can see what’s he is doing on his computer, which is just the way he likes it.

While there’s not a lot of magic going on behind the process, we think it’s a neat way to reuse an old monitor.

UberFridge Helps Keep Beer Production Going Through The Dog Days Of Summer

November 24, 2011 by Mike Nathan 6 Comments

uberfridge

[Elco Jacobs] used to let his beer ferment in the kitchen, but when things got too hot over the summer, he had to suspend his ale making for a few months. Not wanting to have to put production on hiatus again, he modified an old refrigerator into an awesome fermentation unit he calls the UberFridge.

The refrigerator features two temperature sensors, one that sits in the fermenting beer, and one that measures the temperature of the fridge. This dual probe setup offers him the ability to closely monitor the fermentation process, which he does via a sharp-looking web interface.

An Arduino serves as the PID controller, talking to a wireless router via a serial connection. The Arduino logs and relays data to the router where it can be viewed via a web browser. Not only can he keep tabs on what’s going on inside the fridge, he can reprogram the Arduino via the web interface as well.

Keep reading to see [Elco] explain the ins and outs of his UberFridge – we’re pretty sure you’ll want to build your own after you do.

[via BuildLounge]

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Toaster Oven Reflow Control Without Modifying The Oven

November 24, 2011 by Mike Szczys 34 Comments

[Eberhard] wanted his own reflow oven but didn’t really want to mess around with the internals that control the heating element. He put his microcontroller programming experience to work and came up with an add-on module that controls the oven by switching the mains power.

The image above shows a board in the midst of the reflow process. If you’re not familiar, solder paste usually comes with a recommended heat curve for properly melting the slurry. [Eberhard] managed to fit three of these temperature profiles into his firmware.

The ATtiny45 which makes up the controller samples oven temperature via the thermistor seen next to the board. A PID algorithm is used to calculate when to switch mains power on and off via a relay. One button and one LED make up the controller’s user interface for scrolling through the three preprogrammed temperature profiles.

It looks like it works great, see for yourself in the clip after the break.

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Internet Controlled Robotic Arm

November 24, 2011 by Brian Benchoff 7 Comments

The guys over at Rusty Nail Workshop have put up an Internet controlled robotic arm for your amusement. While you’re waiting for the turkey to be done (or, you know, working), try your hand at moving some LEGO pieces around with a remote-controlled robotic arm.

The build log goes through the parts needed for the build. The arm itself is a Lynxmotion AL-5D, a heavy-duty device that’s far more capable and looks a lot better than our old Armatron.

The arm is controlled by an Arduino Uno. The Arduino is connected to the arm’s servo controller. Movement commands are received by an Ethernet shield and translated into servo commands. The entire build runs independently of a computer just like this project’s inspiration, the Orbduino.

Of course you can imagine the mayhem that would ensue if multiple people tried to take control of the robot simultaneously. A bit of code on the project’s website makes sure only one person has control of the robot at any given time. Check out what somebody else is building out of LEGO blocks with a Waldo. If you’re lucky, you’ll be able to knock that work down.