Hate Blue M&M’s? Sort Them Using The Power Of An IPhone!

December 23, 2014 by James Hobson 31 Comments

Some people really like eating specific M&M colors… You could spend hours sorting your packs of M&M’s into color specific piles, or you could build a machine to do it for you.

That’s exactly what [ReviewMyLife] decided to do, and it’s quite impressive! He’s using a rotating hopper to release M&M’s into a chute one-by-one, and then an iPhone to perform color recognition as the M&M falls past it. That information is then communicated over Bluetooth to the Arduino which actuates a high-speed electromagnetic gate to force the M&M down the right chute for sorting.

The machine works surprisingly well for a prototype that was hot glued together out of foam board, but fear not, he plans to upgrade it now that the proof of concept has been confirmed. He’s hoping to get rid of the iPhone and replace it with a Raspberry Pi for starters, 3D print some of the parts, and consolidate its power supply. Currently he’s using three separate supplies to power the Arduino, electromagnets, and the hopper motor — not very efficient!

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Smart CPR Dummy Makes Sure You Do It Right

December 22, 2014 by James Hobson 14 Comments

Have you ever taken a First Aid & CPR training course? Don’t you just love the realism of the dummy mannequins you get to practice on? [Park, Qurashi, & Chen], who are students of Cornell University, thought the dummies could use an intelligent upgrade.

It’s the final project for their electrical and computer engineering course ECE 4760. And what they’ve done is successfully created a budget friendly CPR not-so-dumb dummy using the venerable ATmega1284 microcontroller.

The dummy can sense when chest compressions are given, if the nose is plugged properly when breaths are given, if the head is tilted back properly to open the airway, and it even makes use of a microphone to detect if breaths are given properly! While it does this, it uses LED eyes and an LCD screen to provide training feedback to the student. Once the students are sufficiently practiced, it also has a “real” mode that doesn’t give you any feedback to make sure the students truly learned the technique. Continue reading “Smart CPR Dummy Makes Sure You Do It Right” →

Micro Tesla Coil Makes A Perfect Stocking Stuffer

December 22, 2014 by James Hobson 39 Comments

Tesla coils are always a hit around here at the office. Giant ones that play music with modern-day chain mail wearing DJ’s, ones thrown together in garages by self-proclaimed mad scientists… But have you ever seen one that can fit in the palm of your hand?

[Ludic Science] just released this tutorial video on how to make it. It’s a miniature solid state Tesla coil that’s based on the ever popular Slayer Exciter circuit that was first developed by [GBluer]. The beauty is it’s a very simple circuit to build. It consists of one power transistor, a few diodes, some resistors, and the coil. That’s it!

He even repurposes the magnet wire from a small relay, it’s literally a project you can build from scrap parts around the shop. Awesome.

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IRobot Releases Hackable Roomba — Without The Vacuum

December 21, 2014 by James Hobson 32 Comments

We love forward thinking companies that take a risk and do something different. iRobot, the company behind the iconic Roomba, just released the newest version of their Roomba Create — a programmable Roomba (minus the vacuum) that can be hacked and programmed to do all sorts of things.

The company developed the Create with STEM students in mind — a robotics learning platform. It came out originally back in 2007, and we’ve covered many hacks that have made use of it. Many. Like, a lot. One of our favorites has got to be this data center monitoring robot that makes use of the platform!

Anyway, the newest version of the Create features the typical hardware upgrades you’d expect, and with some special emphasis on 3D printing. In fact, the CEO of iRobot [Colin Angle] thinks that 3D printing is going to make a big difference in a few years:

“Your Roomba could be a software file that you print at home,” he says. He says the Create’s new features are a way for the company to get ready for that day, while also providing a platform that educators and hobbyists can use to tinker.

Kudos to you guys, iRobot! We just wish people would stop giving Roomba’s knives…

[Thanks PSUbj21!]

Making A Paintball Gun From Scratch

December 15, 2014 by James Hobson 5 Comments

[Ben’s] big brother [Brian] has been slowly building up a respectable mini-machine shop in his garage over the past few years, collecting odds and ends off of Craigslist for cheap. Looking for a fun project to do together, they decided to try their hand at building a paintball gun — completely from scratch.

They have a Spyder paintball gun that they have taken apart many times — but it uses a stacked tube configuration for the firing mechanism — a bit too complex for a first project. After discovering ZDSPB.com (which is an awesome site that has animations of all the different styles of paintball guns) they settled on making a Tippman clone.

Trying to keep the budget as small as possible, [Brian] found a free 3D CAD program from the makers of Pro/E — it’s called Creo Elements/Direct Modeling Express 6.0, and with that they began designing the gun…

Once they had the mechanism down pat they just had to start machining. Here’s the highly anticipated first test fire — can you hear the joy in the success?

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3D Printed Lenses Open Up Possibilities

December 13, 2014 by James Hobson 35 Comments

Now this is some seriously cool stuff. The folks over at FormLabs decided to try a little experiment to test the optical clarity of their clear resin. It’s pretty damn clear.

Using their own slicing software, PreForm, [Craig Broady] printed the lens piece in an orientation that would maximize resin flow around the lens to help prevent defects, keeping it as smooth as possible. While the printed part looks quite clear, all lenses require some form of polishing to become optically clear. It was printed with a 50 micron resolution, and [Craig] used a power drill to sand the lens down from 220 grit to 2000 grit sand paper.

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A Simple Hoverboard Everyone Can Understand

December 12, 2014 by James Hobson 31 Comments

To be honest, we were wondering when we would see someone try this…

[Ryan Craven] has successfully built a working hovercraft that looks like a skateboard. It floats on two pockets of air generated by four Black and Decker leaf blowers — and by golly, it certainly looks like it works!

Ever since the HUVr hoax earlier this year, [Ryan] has had the goal to make a real, working hoverboard. Hendo may have beaten him to the punch with their $10,000 eddy current inducing halbach array board, but alas, it only works on copper or aluminum floors. [Ryan’s] can be used anywhere a normal skateboard can be. It’s far from sleek, but it’s only just the prototype — though we’re curious to see how far this could actually go.

Which is precisely why he’s shared it over on Hackaday.io and is hoping to draw some support and ideas from our wonderful community here.

What do you guys think? Is it worth continuing the pursuit of a hovercraft style hoverboard? Can we shrink the technology enough to make it feasible? It’s come a long way from the classic hover craft using a giant shop vac…

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