Lilypad Bicycle Computer Reads Back Distance In Beeps

March 7, 2011 by Mike Szczys 6 Comments

[Mark Fickett] finished his own interesting take on a bicycle computer. These wristwatch-sized devices normally mount to the handlebars and give feedback for current speed, trip distance, and many have options like cadence and heart rate. [Mark’s] has fewer features but it’s clean, simple, and does more than you’d think.

He used some denim to house the electronics which you can see mounted inside the frame of the bike. He’s chosen to use Lilypad components which are Arduino bits meant to be sewn into textiles. We’ve seen a Morse Code keyer using these components and this project is along the same lines. It reads wheel revolutions from a magnetic sensor mounted on the front fork. It has no LCD readout, but when you want to know how far you’ve traveled just press one button and the computer reads it back to in Morse Code played on a tiny piezo buzzer. This package hides one more nice option. Once you arrive home the trip data can be dumped onto a computer for easy graphing. Check out the video after the break to see these features in action.

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Forum Addition: Project Requests

March 7, 2011 by Mike Szczys 9 Comments

We’ve added a new section to our forums called Requests and Commissions. First, we can’t stress enough that this is NOT a place to ask for help with illegal or illicit actions. Hackaday has always been about hacking for good and that’s what motivated the creation of this forum. Time and again we’ve seen hackers helping out others by modifying gaming controllers for the those in need or bringing mobility to the disabled. The requests forum is a great place to ask for help with these types of projects, or just to team up with hackers that have skills in areas you don’t.

So swing by and check it out. The golden rule is keep it legal and keep it legit. And do remember that this is the Internet, so think about the decisions you are making. We’re not going to swoop in to save you if you end up getting scammed by a Nigerian prince to whom you sent a thousand dollars worth of parts to but didn’t receive a completed project in return. Any arrangements you make with another user are between you two, and do not involve us.

Inkscape Plugin For Engraving Fonts

March 6, 2011 by Mike Szczys 6 Comments

[Windell] developed an Inkscape extension called Hershey Text that helps you process fonts into vector representations. If you’ve tried to 3D print, plot, or mill text in the past you may have run across the problem of generating vector paths that deal with the outline and fill of the text appropriately. The problem stems from how fonts are defined; either by the area that they enclose, or by the path that is used to draw the outline. Check out [Windell’s] tutorial for this extension where he explains each of these issues and shows how to overcome them.

The image above illustrates the stroke options, which allow you to vector multiple paths to best fill in the correct parts of each character using path-based hardware. The package includes a wide variety of interesting font sets that are in the public domain, and includes tools such as a glyph map generator that make it very user friendly.

Hackaday Links: March 6, 2011

March 6, 2011 by Mike Szczys 31 Comments

Omnidirectional personal transport

[Dan] sent us a link to this Honda U3-X personal transport device. It’s kind of like a Segway that can move in any direction but our head already hurts from the thought of going over backward on one of these.

How light bulb filaments were developed

Now that incandescent light bulbs are about to be outlawed here in the US, we thought you might enjoy learning how the filaments were developed. This another video by [Bill Hammack], the engineer guy, and we’re big fans of his work.

Wooden stove reflow

Who needs a PID controlled skillet when you can reflow on this wooden stove? Well maybe not reflow, this is more of a salvage operation.

Javascript control

We’ve seen more than enough Arduino controlled outlets. But if you’re interested in using Javascript to control the Arduino this post may be just what you’re looking for.

Sledgehammer keyboard

[Taylor Hokanson] built a qwerty keyboard that you hit with a sledgehammer. Enough said. [Thanks Larry]

Autonomous Cars Already Drive The Roads Among Us

March 5, 2011 by Mike Szczys 40 Comments

Google’s showing off this autonomous car at the TED convention right now, but the hardware has already made automated trips from San Fransisco to Los Angeles. According to the commentary in the video after the break, the scene above shows the car “hauling Prius ass” on a closed course. The car learned this route while being driven by a person and now the vehicle is set to take riders through an aggressively driven loop in the cone-adorned parking ramp. But on the open road you do not need to teach it anything. It has no problem taking a GPS route and following the rules of the road while traveling from one waypoint to another.

The link above doesn’t include hardware information but they did point to a Times article which includes an infographic. The spinning box on the top of the car is 3D-mapping LIDAR with a 200 foot radius. There’s a rotary encoder on one of the wheels for precise movement data, radar sensors on the front and back bumpers, and a rear-view-mirror-mounted camera for image processing. It makes us wonder how the system performs when the car is coated in road-muck? Maybe you just add a dedicated wiper for each sensor.

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ICE Uses Wide Set Of Tools To Hunt For Media Pirates

March 5, 2011 by Mike Szczys 51 Comments

If you’re rebroadcasting copyrighted video streams how will the authorities ever track you down? Well it looks like you don’t even need to be the content originator, and they’ll track you down because you didn’t really cover your tracks in the first place. [Brian McCarthy] found this out the hard way when his domain name was seized by Immigrations and Customs Enforcement earlier this year.

So how did they find him? They started by getting the records from the domain name registrar. He had used an alias instead of his real name so the next step in the investigation was to get a name from Comcast to go with the IP which had logged into the name registrar’s interface. They matched the Comcast account holder’s home address with the one given during domain registration, then matched the Gmail account registration infor from the registrar to the same person. The final piece of the puzzle was to stake out his house (no kidding) to confirm that [Brian] lived at the address uncovered by investigators.

ICE really went the whole nine yards. Especially if consider that the website they seized provided links to copyrighted media but didn’t actually host any of it. Nonetheless, [Brian] could find himself spending five years in the clink… ouch.

Open Source 5-axis CNC Router

March 4, 2011 by Mike Szczys 44 Comments

This 5-axis CNC router could soon be an open source tool. [Mike Calvino] built it for the School of Architecture at the University of Arkansas. It can be used as a router or as a plasma cutter/welder. Now he’s trying to raise some money that will underwrite his time and effort to develop and release instructions, design files, and specifications to make it an open source hardware project.

It is extremely large, and in addition to the X, Y, and Z axes that you’d expect to find on CNC machinery, it can tilt and rotate the cutting tool. This is not something you’re likely to build at home. But the availability of plans would be a huge contribution toward making machine tools accessible at a relatively small price tag. It’s not hard to image universities building this as a class project. We also think it would be a perfect group project for you and your buddies over at the local Hackerspace to undertake. Check out some milling action in the clip after the break.

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