You know how it is. You’re all cozy in bed but not quite ready to doze off. You’re reading Hackaday (Hackaday is your go-to bedtime reading material, right?) or you’re binge-watching your latest reality TV obsession on your tablet. You feel the tablet growing heavier and heavier as your arms fatigue from holding it inches above your face. You consider the embarrassment you’ll endure from explaining how you injured your nose as the danger of dropping the tablet gradually increases. The struggle is real.
[Will Dana] has been engineering his way out of this predicament for a few years now, and with the recent upgrade to his iPad suspension system he is maximizing his laziness, but not without putting in a fair amount of hard work first.
The first iteration of the device worked on a manual pulley system whereby an iPad was suspended from the ceiling over his bed on three cords. Pulling on a cord beside the bed would raise the bracket used for holding the iPad out of the way while not in use. This new iteration takes that pesky cord pulling out of the user’s hands, replacing it with a motorized winch. A spot of dark ink on one of the cords in combination with a light sensor helps to calibrate the system so that the ESP32 which controls it always knows the proper limits of operation.
Of course, if, like [Will], you’re using an ESP32, and your room is already fully controlled by a voice interface, you may as well integrate the two. After all, there is no sense in wasting precious energy by pressing buttons. Utter a simple command to Alexa once you’re tucked in, and it’s time for hands-free entertainment.
We’ve covered several of [Will]’s previous creations, such as his Motorized Relay Computer and Harry Potter-inspired Sorting Hat.
No screen in the bedroom !
Only books and condoms…
Absolutely!
Should be titled “How to make sure you can’t sleep for s–t”.
Or … “How to stay single forever.”
fairly sure i saw an indian guy doing this in the 90s with a laptop and a roll of duct tape
Cool project, bad habit. Pivot focus to help people in hospital etc.
Always counterbalance the device to neutral. Then if drive fails it won’t fall.
Always counterweight, then it can’t fall on your face if the drive system fails.
….an idea for a wake-up clock rears its ugly head….
There’s a mechanical version of this already used in hospitals, costs around $500:
Cuzzi DW630W
Some years back I had a treatment regimen for something where I was supposed to lay immobile (excepting my limbs) on my back in bed for three days. Anticipating the absolute boredom, and lacking in a decent mobile device to use like this, I got a projector mount and attached a monitor to it (after properly reinforcing the ceiling).
Since then, as poor health has confined me to bed on numerous occasions, I have found it to be invaluable. When I moved, I made sure to set it up again in the new place.
To compliment it, I have a wireless keyboard and mouse, but I also took one of those 433MHz wireless buttons and attached it to an RP2040 board running the KMK keyboard firmware. I use the button to advance pages when I’m reading books on the PC via the overhead monitor. It’s much more comfortable than the mouse for long term use.
Presentation remotes are $10 and have 3 buttons and volume buttons.
The ones I buy are configurable with the software, including long press functions.
I read with ADD, so I need a back button :)
As others have pointed out, this is fundamentally a bad idea. A Pavlovian response to this is your mind being awake while you lie in bed. These kind of things have been found to decrease the amount of sleep people get and this appears to maximize the effect.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/90/Ted_Kaczynski_2_%28cropped%29.jpg/800px-Ted_Kaczynski_2_%28cropped%29.jpg