Print Your Own Wireless 2.1 Speaker System

April 29, 2021 by Zoe Skyforest 18 Comments

Buying a set of stylish bookshelf speakers is a perfectly reasonable thing to do, and remains legal in most free countries around the world. However, if you really want to impress with a pretty pair to crank out your tunes, you might consider designing and printing your own. [EH_Design] did just that with a stylish 2.1 Bluetooth audio system.

The 2.1 designation refers to the use of two stereo channels plus a subwoofer. It’s a popular setup as human perception means it’s not as necessary to have stereo imaging for low frequency content. The build uses a Texas Instruments TPA3116D2 Class D amplifier with a Bluetooth input, with the efficient design allowing the build to be more compact without the need for as much heat sinking. A 24 V supply delivering up to 3 A is specified, providing plenty of volume when needed. The speakers themselves consist of 3″ drivers mounted in attractive 3D-printed shells, with the “subwoofer” consisting of a pair of 5″ woofers paired up in a special isobaric enclosure that enables a smaller volume to acoustically act like one double the size.

The result is a futuristic-looking set of bookshelf speakers that remind us of some of the fancier high-end sets often seen in hi-fi magazines. Of course, if 3D printing enclosures isn’t enough for you, you could always consider 3D printing the actual speaker driver itself. When you do, let us know how it goes!

RC Ekranoplan Uses LIDAR To Fly In Ground Effect

April 29, 2021 by Zoe Skyforest 33 Comments

Ekranoplans are a curious class of vehicle; most well known for several Soviet craft designed to operate at sea, flying just above the waves in ground effect. [rctestflight] had accidentally come across the ground effect flight regime himself years ago, and decided it was time to build an ekranoplan of his own.

I want to see little ekranoplans in at least three top 10 pop film clips by summer’s end. Please and thank you.

While ground-effect flight can be quite stable for a heavy, human-scale craft, the smaller RC version suffered more from minor perturbations from the wind and such. Thus, a Pixracer autopilot was installed, and combined with a small LIDAR device to accurately measure altitude above the ground. With some custom tweaks to the Ardupilot firmware, the craft was able to cleanly fly along barely a foot off the ground.

The final effect is almost mesmerizing; it appears as if the craft is hovering via some heretofore unknown technology rather than just flying in the usual sense. It’s still sensitive to breezes and sudden drops in the terrain lead to a temporary escape from the ground effect region, but the effect is nonetheless impressive. It’s a nerve wracking video at times, though, with quite a few near misses with traffic and children. Regardless of the nature of your experimental craft, be cognisant of your surroundings. We’ve seen [rctestflight]’s Ardupilot experiments before, too. Video after the break.

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How Best To Get Your Project On Hackaday

April 27, 2021 by Zoe Skyforest 34 Comments

We’re blessed to have such a great community at Hackaday. Our tipline often overfloweth with all manner of projects and builds of all stripes. We see it all here, from beginners just starting out with their first Arduino to diehard hackers executing daringly complex builds in their downtime, and everything in between.

If you’re sitting there in the grandstands, watching in awe, you might wonder what it takes to grace these hallowed black pages. In life, nothing is guaranteed, but I’ve been specially authorised to share with you a few tips that can maximise your chances of seeing your project on Hackaday.

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Blocking Out The Sun: Viable Climate Countermeasure Or Absolute Madness?

April 26, 2021 by Zoe Skyforest 155 Comments

If there’s one thing humans hate, it’s exercising willpower. Whether its abstaining from unhealthy foods, going to bed early, or using less energy and reducing greenhouse gas emissions, we’re famously bad at it. Conversely, if there’s one thing humans love, it’s a workaround. Something that lets us live our lives as the carefree hedonists we are, and deals with the sticky consequences so we don’t have to.

One such workaround for the issue of climate change is a doozy, though — blocking out the sun’s rays in order to cool our warming planet.

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Clay Pot MP3 Player Whipped Up With The Freedom-K64F

April 24, 2021 by Zoe Skyforest 13 Comments

In the streaming era, few of us think about MP3s on a day to day basis anymore. Our music collection is managed by warring executives in streaming companies from far-off lands. However, for [vinod], they’re still useful — seeing as he just built himself an MP3 player that fits in a clay pot.

The build is based on the FRDMK64F development board, packing a powerful 120 MHz ARM chip. This has enough grunt to decode MP3s on the fly, using the Helix MP3 decoder library. The MP3s themselves are streamed off an SD card, using the faster SDIO access method rather than relying on slower SPI. Once decoded, the resulting PCM audio data is shifted out via a DAC using the chip’s DMA hardware, allowing for smooth, glitch-free playback. Output to a big woofer is via a 15 W class D amplifier, with the whole rig powered from a USB powerbank.

With all the electronics piled on the back of a big woofer speaker with lashings of hot glue, the final result is quite imposing; all the more so when installed neatly inside a clay pot acting as a bass reflex enclosure. We’ve seen some concrete cast speakers before, but not nearly enough hacker projects in clay. Please rectify this, and inform us once you’ve done so. Thanks in advance — video after the break!

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Building A Gas-Powered Pressure Washer

April 23, 2021 by Zoe Skyforest 23 Comments

While you can always buy the tools you need, there’s something to be said for the satisfaction gained when you pick up a tool you built yourself. [Workshop From Scratch] has built a following out of building his own gear, the latest of which involved putting together a gas-powered pressure washer.

The key to the build was to keep things completely self-contained. All the consumables – water, soap, and wax – are kept onboard the washer to avoid having to run hoses and so on. A small gas engine is the heart of the build, hooked up to a high-pressure water pump. It even comes complete with a starter motor, making it a certified luxury garden tool. It’s also hooked up to two tanks holding cleaning solutions for car washing purposes, which feed into the pump via an auxiliary port for mixing. It’s all assembled on a custom steel frame welded together from rectangular hollow sections.

It’s a build that demonstrates how you can use your skills to build tools that suit your workflow, rather than just putting up with whatever is available off-the-shelf. We’ve seen his work before, too – building other tools like this motorised plasma cutter. Video after the break.

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Modding A Hot Wheels Car Into A Radio Controlled Drift Weapon

April 23, 2021 by Zoe Skyforest 14 Comments

Hot Wheels are some of the most popular diecast toy cars worldwide. The car bodies are faithful recreations of the real thing, though the models are mere stationary playthings. That wasn’t good enough for [Jakarta Diecast Project], who set about modifying a little BMW E30 M3 into an awesome radio-controlled drift car.

The build starts by disassembling the original car, and pulling out the original wheels. The baseplate is then modified to accept a new rear suspension and axle assembly. A small DC motor is mounted to the assembly to drive the rear wheels. A set of front steering knuckles are then installed up front, with their own suspension and hooked up to a tiny servo for steering. Everything’s controlled by a compact off-the-shelf RC receiver, which even features a gyro to help keep the tiny car straight under acceleration. The bodyshell is then stripped of paint, and given a sweet bodykit, before receiving a lurid orange paint job and decals. It’s reattached to the car’s baseplate via magnets, which make taking the car apart easy when service or modifications are required.

While the build doesn’t go into the nitty gritty on some of the harder parts, like the construction of the incredibly complex front knuckles, it’s nonetheless a great guide to building such a tiny and well-presented RC car. In looks and performance, the result trounces typical commercial offerings in the same scale, as you’d expect from such a hand-crafted masterpiece. It may not be the smallest RC car we’ve featured, but it is one of the coolest. Video after the break.

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