Hacklet 26 – Arduino Projects

December 12, 2014 by Adam Fabio 8 Comments

Arduino is one of those boards that has become synonymous with hacking and making. Since its introduction in 2005, over 700,000 official Arduino boards have been sold, along with untold millions of compatible and clone boards. Hackers and makers around the world have found the Arduino platform a cheap and simple way to get their projects off the ground. This weeks Hacket focuses on some of the best Arduino based projects we’ve found on Hackday.io!

[Niazangels] gets the ball – or ballpoint pen – rolling with Roboartist, a robot which creates line drawings. Roboartist is more than just a plotter though. [Niazangels] created a custom PC program which creates line drawings from images captured by a webcam. The line drawings are converted to coordinates, and sent to an Arduino, which controls all the motors that move the pen. [Niazangels] went with Dynamixel closed loop servo motors rather than the stepper motors we often see in 3D printers.

[Peter Edwards] is preserving the past with Tapuino, the $20 C64 Tape Emulator. Plenty of programs for the Commodore 64, 128, and compatibles were only distributed on tape. Those tapes are slowly degrading, though the classic Commodore herdware is still going strong. Tapuino preserves those tapes by using an Arduino nano to play the files from an SD card into the original Datasette interface. [Peter] also plans to add recording functionality to the Tapuino, which will make it the total package for preserving your data. All that’s missing is that satisfying clunk when pressing the mechanical Play button!

[Dushyant Ahuja] knows what time it is, thanks to his Infinity Mirror Clock. This clock tells time with the help of some WS2812B RGB LED. [Dushyant] debugged the clock with a regular Arduino, but when it came time to finish the project, he used an ATmega328 to create an Arduino compatible board from scratch. Programming is easy with an on-board Bluetooth module. [Dushyant] plans to add a TFT lcd which will show weather and other information when those power-hungry LEDs are switched off.

[IngGaro] built an entire home alarm system with his project Arduino anti-theft alarm shield. [IngGaro] needed an alarm system for his home. That’s a lot to ask of a standard ATmega328p powered Arduino Uno. However, the extra I/O lines available on an Arduino Mega2560 were just what the doctor ordered. [IngGaro] performed some amazing point-to-point perfboard wiring to produce a custom shield that looks and works great! The alarm can interface with just about any sensor, and can be controlled via the internet. You can even disarm the system through an RFID keycard.

Want MORE Arduino in your life? Check out our curated Arduino List!

That’s about all the millis() we have for this weeks Hacklet. As always, see you next week. Same hack time, same hack channel, bringing you the best of Hackaday.io!

Reverse Engineering The Proto X Quadcopter Radio

December 10, 2014 by Adam Fabio 10 Comments

Just a few years ago, palm sized radio controlled toys were nothing more than a dream. Today, you can find them at every mall, toy store, and hobby shop. [Alvaro] couldn’t resist the tiny Estes Proto X quadcopter. While he enjoyed flying the Proto X, he found that the tiny controller left quite a bit to be desired. Not a problem for [Alvaro], as he embarked on a project to reverse engineer the little quad.

Inside the quadcopter and its lilliputian radio, [Alvaro] found a STM8 based processor and an Amiccom A7105 2.4G FSK/GFSK Transceiver radio. The A7105 is well documented, with datasheets easily obtained on the internet. The interface between the processor and the radio chip was the perfect place to start a reverse engineering effort.

With the help of his Saleae logic analyzer, [Alvaro] was able to capture SPI data from both the quadcopter and the transmitter as the two negotiated a connection. The resulting hex files weren’t very useful, so [Alvaro] wrote a couple of Python scripts to decode the data. By operating each control during his captures, [Alvaro] was able to reverse engineer the Proto X’s control protocol. He tested this by removing the microcontroller from the remote control unit and wiring the A7105 to a STM32F4 dev board. Connecting the STM32 to his computer via USB, [Alvaro] was able to command the quad to take off. It wasn’t a very graceful flight, but it did prove that his grafted control system worked. With basic controls covered, [Alvaro] knocked up a quick user interface on his computer. He’s now able to fly the quadcopter around using keyboard and mouse. Not only did this prove the control system worked, it also showed how hard it is to fly a real aircraft (even a tiny model) with FPS controls.

The Estes Proto X is actually manufactured by Hubsan, a China based manufacturer best known for the x4 series of mini quadcopters. Since the Proto X and the x4 share the same communication protocol, [Alvaro’s] work can be applied to both. With fully computer controlled quads available for under $30 USD, we’re only a few cameras (and a heck of a lot of coding) away from cooperative drone swarms akin to those found in the University of Pennsylvania GRASP Lab.

Continue reading “Reverse Engineering The Proto X Quadcopter Radio” →

Trinket Everyday Carry Contest Drawing #2 Results

December 9, 2014 by Adam Fabio 6 Comments

We’ve held our second drawing for the Trinket Everyday Carry Contest. This week we used a Pro Trinket to pick the random winner. The winner is [mikeneiderhauser] with his project WorkoutAid!

[Mike] loves hitting the gym, but hates pulling out his phone or fumbling with his headphones to change songs during his routine. WorkoutAid is designed to fix this problem. It’s essentially a Bluetooth media display and remote. Track metadata will be displayed on a 128×64 OLED. 6 buttons will allow the user to change tracks, volume, or perform other functions. The whole device will communicate with a custom Android application through an RN42X Bluetooth radio.

We hope [Mike] enjoys his new Cordwood Puzzle from The Hackaday Store. No jigsaws here, cordwood is a puzzle that involves solder! It’s built using the cordwood assembly technique which was popular in the 1950’s and 1960s. We’re not kidding about it being a puzzle either – there are no instructions for this kit! [Mike] will know he’s got it right when all 3 LEDs light up.

If you didn’t win this week, don’t worry, there are still three more chances to win a random drawing! Our next drawing will be on 12/16/2014 at 9pm EST. The prize will be the ever handy Bus Pirate V3.6. To be eligible you need to submit your project as an official entry and publish at least one project log during the week.

The deadline for the big contest is January 2, 2014! More than 60 projects are entered so far, but only the top 50 will receive custom t-shirts. The top three projects will win some seriously awesome prizes, including a Rigol DS1054Z Oscilloscope, a Fluke 179 meter, and a Hakko/Panavise soldering bundle.

So what are you waiting for? Get off the couch and get hacking!

EDC CONTEST ROUNDUP: Musician’s Assistant AND BitMasher!

December 8, 2014 by Adam Fabio 3 Comments

We’re getting all sorts of entries in the Trinket Everyday Carry Contest! Today we’re featuring just a couple of the awesome entries dedicated to creating music!

[johnowhitaker] is hard at work on A Musician’s Assistant. [John] is creating a device that does anything a practicing musician might need on the go. The Musician’s Assistant will include a metronome, tap/temp counter, and tuner. He’s hoping to also give it the ability to play back arbitrary notes using the Pro Trinket’s on-board ATmega328. [John] is trying to do all this with just LEDs and buttons as a user interface, though he is willing to go to an LCD or OLED if he needs to.

[Michele Perla] is working on BitMasher, portable lo-fi music sequencer. The BitMasher will allow a musician on the go to create music anywhere. [Michele] began with a SID based sequencer in mind, but he’s currently trying to do it all on the Pro Trinket. He’s already got [Roman’s] BTc Sound Compression Algorithm working on an Arduino Leonardo. Lo-Fi for sure, but that’s what makes BitMasher fun! [Michele] envisions the song entry to be similar to that of the classic Roland TR-808. The primary user interface will be an Adafruit Trellis 4×4 button+LED driver board.

Don’t forget that our second random drawing will be held on Tuesday, December 9th, at 9pm EST. To be eligible you need to submit your project as an official entry and publish at least one project log during the week. This week’s prize is a Cordwood Puzzle from The Hackaday Store. Check out the contest page for the full details!

Hacklet 25 – ESP8266 WiFi Module Projects

December 5, 2014 by Adam Fabio 6 Comments

Few devices have hit the hacker/maker word with quite as large a bang as the ESP8266. [Brian] first reported a new $5 WiFi module back in August. Since then there have been an explosion of awesome projects utilizing the low-cost serial to WiFi module that is the ESP8266. This week’s Hacklet is all about some of the great ESP8266 projects we’ve found on Hackaday.io!

We start with [TM] and the ESP8266 Retro Browser. [TM] has a great tutorial on combining the ESP8266 with an Arduino Mega2560. [TM’s] goal was a simple one: create a WiFi “browser” to access Hackaday’s Retro Site. This is a bit more complex than one would first think, as the Arduino Mega2560 is a 5V board, and the ESP8266 are 3.3V parts. Level shifters to the rescue! [TM] was able to bring up the retro site in a terminal, but found that even “simple” websites like google send enough data back to swap the poor ESP8266!

Next up is [Thomas] with the Simple Native ESP8266 Smartmeter. [Thomas] has created a device to measure run time on his oil heating system. He implemented this with some native programming on the ESP8266’s onboard Diamond Standard L106 Controller. When he was done, the ‘8266 had two new AT commands, one to start measurement and one to stop. A bit of web magic with some help from openweathermap.org allows [Thomas] to plot oil burner run time against outside temperature.

[Matt Callow] is also checking out native programming using the EspressIf sdk with his project ESP8266 Native. ExpressIf made a great choice when they released the SDK for the ESP8266 back in October. [Matt] has logged his work on building and extending the demo apps from EspressIf. [Matt] has seven demo programs which do everything from blinking an LED to connecting to thingspeak via WiFi. While the demos aren’t all working yet, [Matt] is making great progress. The best part is he has all his code linked in from his Github repo. Nice work [Matt!]

[Michael O’Toole] is working on ESP8266 Development PCBs. The devboards have headers for the ESP8266, an on-board ATmega328 for Arduino Uno compatibility, and a USB to serial converter to make interfacing easy. [Michael] also provides all the important components you need to keep an ESp8266 happy, such as programming buttons, and a 3.3V regulator. We really like that [Michael] has included a header for a graphical LCD based local console.

Want to see more ESP8266 goodness? Check out our curated ESP8266 list on Hackaday.io!

Hackaday.io Update!

Hackaday.io gets better and better every day. We’ve just pushed out a new revision which includes some great updates. Search is now much improved. Try out a search, and you’ll find you can now search by project, project log, hacker, or any combination of 11 different fields. Our text editor has been revamped as well. Update a project log to give the new look a try!
We know everyone on .io is awesome, but just in case a spammer slips in, we’ve added “report as inappropriate” buttons to projects and comments. Once a few people hit those report buttons, projects or comments get sent to the admins for moderation.

That’s all the time we have for this week’s Hacklet! As always, see you next week. Same hack time, same hack channel, bringing you the best of Hackaday.io!

Trinket Everyday Carry Contest Drawing #1 Results

December 2, 2014 by Adam Fabio 6 Comments

We just had our first drawing for the Trinket Everyday Carry Contest. Thanks to a little help from random.org, the winner is [Korishev] with his project Trinket Timer!

[Korishev] finds that family life calls for a lot of timed events, from how long the kids spend on their homework to keeping the peace by sharing toys. The plan is to build at least a one timer for each child that they will be able to carry around and use as needed. We hope he gets them in on the build to help sow the seeds of hardware development at a young age.

As the winner of the first drawing [Korishev] will receive this beautiful BLINK(1) MK2 from The Hackaday Store. The USB dongle houses a programmable RGB LED. We wonder if this will also be applied as an additional timer for the household?

If you didn’t win this week, don’t worry, there are still four more chances to win a random drawing! Our next drawing will be on 12/9/2014 at 9pm EST with the Cordwood Puzzle as a prize. To be eligible you need to submit your project as an official entry and publish at least one project log during the week.

The deadline for the main contest is January 2, 2014! There are just over 40 entries right now, and the top 50 will receive custom t-shirts. Of course the three top prizes are the real juicy ones. Let’s get those pocketable projects going!

Trinket Everyday Carry Contest Roundup: Sniffing Trinket And Portable Trollmaster 3000!

December 2, 2014 by Adam Fabio 16 Comments

Hackaday’s Trinket Everyday Carry Contest is heating up. In just one week we’ve already got over 30 entries! Many of the contenders are completely new open source projects based on the Pro Trinket. Our first drawing will be tonight, at 9pm EST. The first giveaway prize is a BLINK(1) MK2 from the Hackaday store. Make sure you have at least one project log and a photo up to be eligible for this week’s giveaway!

We can’t help but mention how awesome some of the entries are. [Georg Krocker] is taking on the problem of indoor air quality – not with a central sensor, but with a personal sensor that goes where you do. Sniffing Trinket is designed to monitor the air around the user. If the air quality drops, it will alert the user to open a window – or get the heck out. [Georg] has a few sensors in mind, but he’s starting with the MQ135 gas sensor and a DHT11 temperature/humidity sensor. If air quality starts to drop, 3 WS2812b LEDs will alert the user that there is a problem. The system can also be connected to a PC with USB for more accurate readings and logging.

[Georg] has an aggressive schedule planned, with a custom “Trinket Shield” PCB being laid out and ordered next week. January 2 is fast approaching, so hurry up and get those boards designed!

[Dr Salica] is taking a more humorous approach to personal space. The Portable Trollmaster 3000 is designed to surround its wearer in a bubble of “I Am Glad, ‘Cause I’m Finally Returning Back Home” aka “The Trololol song” as sung by Eduard Khil. [Dr Salica] plans to pair the Pro Trinket with the popular Sony MMR-70 FM transmitter. The Trinket is capable of playing back short audio clips, so with a bit of I2C magic, [Dr. Salica] will be able to hijack any nearby FM receiver, creating his own personal trollbox.