Update: Androcade 2.0

June 7, 2012 by Mike Szczys 1 Comment

[Chris] has been going about his business, letting his interest guide him as it will. But always in the back of his mind is his Androcade project, and he’s spent the last year making improvements. It’s an arcade controller for playing games on an Android tablet. It connects to the device via Bluetooth, and includes a built-in stand.

His original version was featured here last year. It was made from wood (with a nice Android green finish) and included three buttons and a joystick. This time around he moved to some black laser-cut acrylic for the case, and has doubled up on the buttons. It also now enumerates as an HID Bluetooth device, whereas before it was pushing serial data over the BT connection.

He’s had enough interest from his friends to also create an iPad version all in white. It connects and works just the same as the Android flavor. Check out a bit of Donkey Kong gameplay after the break.

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Seeing The Venus Transit; This Is Why You Should Visit Your Local Hackerspace

June 6, 2012 by Mike Szczys 23 Comments

So I thought about getting a pair of protective glasses so that I could safely stare at the sun during yesterday’s Venus transit. But then it was forecast to be cloudy in the afternoon (the event didn’t start until 5pm here) so I forgot about it and figured I’d try to catch it next time around (which is 105 years from now).

I went about life, ate some dinner, then grabbed my latest project and headed off to the monthly meeting at Sector67, the local Hackerspace in Madison, WI. Lo and behold I arrived to find this sight in the parking lot:

Sure, my priorities may have pushed the viewing to the side. But others made it their mission to see the once or twice in a lifetime event and I got to see it just for being in the same place as them. This is the meat and potatoes of Hackerspaces…. collaboration. A source of new ideas, motivations, and inspirations.

One of the members brought a telescope and went online to figure out how to safely use it for viewing. For about $2.50 he rigged up a funnel covered with a piece of acetate which interfaced with the eyepiece of the scope. The image at the top shows the entire sun, and even though some of the cloud cover can clearly be seen, there’s Venus, plain as day. The cardboard box is just providing a shaded viewing area around the funnel. As with most cosmic experiences, it surprised me by being way cooler than described. See a few extra pictures in the gallery after the break.

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Bossy Calendar Tells Visitors When To Go Away

June 6, 2012 by Mike Szczys 10 Comments

So here’s the scenario. You’re the boss and everyone needs to ~~kiss up to you~~ speak with you about important project details. You need a receptionist, or a creative employee who will build a calendar display the lets people check if you’re free to chat. It works by querying a Microsoft Exchange server for the guy’s calendar. The hardware within doesn’t deal directly with the full Exchange API, but relies on a server-side script that feeds it info on request. This is a nice touch since you can do a lot of filtering on the server and keep it simple with the embedded electronics

Speaking of embedded hardware, this uses Gadgeteer modules. You probably don’t remember, but these are Microsoft’s electronic modules aimed at C# and .NET programmers. It uses the main board, and LCD, USB host, and Wifi modules. This is the first project we remember seeing since the hardware was announced.

We wonder if this will change the boss’ behavior? Will he start scheduling creatively so that he gets more time without interruption?

Visual Rain Sensor — So You Never Have To Look Outside

June 6, 2012 by Mike Szczys 21 Comments

Now you can find out how hard it is raining outside without leaving the confines of your mancave/womancave. Pictured above is the sensor portion of what [Frapedia] calls his visual rain sensor.

Most rain gauges just use a graduated cylinder to capture water as it falls from the sky. That will give you a reasonably accurate measure of how much it rained, but it tells you nothing about how hard it rained. The measurement made here is based on sound. The harder it rains, the lounder the sound will be from water hitting an up-turned metal bowl. The unit above turns the system on when water bridges the traces, then a microphone is used to monitor the sound from the bowl. This is visualized by a VU-meter chip on a column of LEDs mounted inside the house.

After the break you can see the project box that houses the status display. We say it’s too small an needs to be replaced with a much larger LED meter.

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Pneumatic Car Launcher Is Actually More Than Just A Hacker’s Fantasy

June 6, 2012 by Mike Szczys 11 Comments

So if you had to launch a car through these goal posts how would you do it? Certainly not with a slingshot (although we might have gone with a steam-powered catapult a-la an aircraft carrier). That maroon car with the white stripe is about to make the flight thanks to a very powerful pneumatic launcher.

We don’t usually attend the demolition derby, so this sort of thing is new to us. And we were even more surprised to find that this isn’t strictly a novelty act. The system is actually how some of the more dangerous automotive stunts are done for the movies. This launch sends the car in a graceful arc that is right on target and reminds us of the cliffhanger stunts from The Dukes of Hazzard (TV, not the recent movie). But if you’re a director looking for a horrific car accident, the rig can be altered to send the car spiraling through the air. Sounds like the record is nearly eight turns while airborne.

We don’t have any extra cars to launch, so we’ll stick to making the confetti fly.

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Outdoor Stereo Helps Your Neighbors Learn To Issue Noise Complaints

June 6, 2012 by Mike Szczys 23 Comments

Backyard parties are going to rock over at [Effin_dead_again’s] house. That’s because he just finished building this outdoor stereo. It carries its own power supply so you can take it on the road with you, and we don’t think you’ll have trouble hearing it with the 240 Watt amplifier hidden inside.

He shared the equipment details in his Reddit conversation. A 12V lawn mower battery sits in the base of the wooden enclosure. One of the commenters mentioned the dangers of hydrogen off-gassing from that power source, but [Effin_dead_again] thought of that and included venting around the lid. The subwoofer is an 8″ Alpine, and speakers are out of a Hyundai car. The head unit has Bluetooth built in for easy connection to your smart phone. It of course has the ability to play CDs and MP3s too, and we’d bet you can tune the radio if there’s an antenna connected.

Need similar power but a bit more portability? Check out this stereo built into a cooler.

Arduino Rover Doubles Up On Obstacle Avoidance

June 6, 2012 by Mike Szczys 6 Comments

[Eduard Ros] wrote in show off his first attempt at building an autonomous rover (translated). As with many of these projects, he started with the base of a remote control toy truck. This solves so many mechanical issues, like steering, locomotion, and power source.

He just needed a way to control the vehicle. The recent LayerOne badge hacks either did this through the wireless controller protocol or by adding an Arduino directly to the vehicle. [Eduard] chose the latter, and also included obstacle avoidance sensors in the process. We’ve seen quite a few that use these ultrasonic rangefinders. He decided to go a different route by adding two of them rather than scanning by mounting one on a servo motor.

The video after the break shows the vehicle successfully navigating through a tight space. This makes us wonder how much data can be processed from the stationary sensors? We’re not familiar with how wide the horizontal sensitivity is on the devices. If you have some insight, please share you knowledge in the comments section.

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