AI + LEGO = A Brickton Of Ideas

April 22, 2024 by Kristina Panos 37 Comments

What if there was some magic device that could somehow scan all your LEGO and tell you what you can make with it? It’s a childhood dream come true, right? Well, that device is in your pocket. Just dump out your LEGO stash on the carpet, spread it out so there’s only one layer, scan it with your phone, and after a short wait, you get a list of all the the fun things you can make. With building instructions. And oh yeah, it shows you where each brick is in the pile.

We are talking about the BrickIt app, which is available for Android and Apple. Check it out in the short demo after the break. Having personally tried the app, we can say it does what it says it does and is in fact quite cool.

As much as it may pain you to have to pick up all those bricks when you’re finished, it really does work better against a neutral background like light-colored carpet. In an attempt to keep the bricks corralled, we tried a wooden tray, and it didn’t seem to be working as well as it probably could have — it didn’t hold that many bricks, and they couldn’t be spread out that far.

And the only real downside is that results are limited because there’s a paid version. And the app is kind of constantly reminding you of what you’re missing out on. But it’s still really, really cool, so check it out.

We don’t have to tell you how versatile LEGO is. But have you seen this keyboard stand, or this PCB vise?

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A Kyria split keyboard and wrist rests on a stand made of LEGO.

LEGO Keyboard Stand Fits Just Right

March 12, 2024 by Kristina Panos 3 Comments

Split keyboards are great for many reasons, but mostly because you can place the halves as far apart as you want and really give your arms and shoulders the room they need. [Jason Cox] hit the nail on the head, though: add in a couple of palm rests, and you now have four things that will potentially shift and drift out of place on your desk or keyboard tray. It was such a problem that [Jason] hardly ever used his Kyria. That is, until he built a stand out of LEGO to hold everything.

[Jason] was using a pair of Manfrotto pocket tripods to tent the keyboard, and those held their position surprisingly well, even though he tweaked them here and there over time. Ultimately, [Jason] knew he wanted the answer to be something customizable. And what’s more customizable than LEGO?

About $60 worth of new white bricks and plates later, [Jason] got to work, spending an evening building the thing. He ended up using a few bricks to hold the keyboard in place on the plate, and it worked perfectly.

Of course, he didn’t get the whole contraption exactly how he wanted it the first time, but tweaking builds is half the fun, right? After a while, [Jason] figured out he could rebuild the part that connects the two keyboard halves to go around a plastic piece at the back of the keyboard tray, which holds the whole thing in place. The end result? Wonderful. The Kyria stays in place, and now [Jason] is using it way more than before.

You know LEGO is versatile, but did you know you can use it to build a hydroelectric dam?

Via reddit

Harbor Freight And LEGO PCB Vise Is Cheap And Effective

February 7, 2024 by Dan Maloney 6 Comments

It doesn’t take much chasing things around the bench with a soldering iron to appreciate the value of good work holding. And don’t get us started on those cheap “helping hands” alligator clip thingies; they’re somehow worse than no work holding. Isn’t there a better way?

Maybe, judging by [Paul Bryson]’s idea for a dirt cheap PCB vise. It’s a pretty clever design that’ll have you heading to Harbor Freight, or whatever the moral equivalent is in your location, where you’ll pick up a small ratcheting bar clamp. [Paul] used a 4″ (10 cm) clamp; that which looks fine for a wide range of boards, but we suppose you could go bigger if you like. You could also stop there and just clamp your PCBs in the plastic jaws, but [Paul] adorned the jaws with swiveling arms made from LEGO Technic pieces, of all things. Rubber grommets slipped onto Technic pegs go into the holes on the beam to hold the PCB edges firmly, while the swiveling action adapts to odd-shaped boards.

To our mind, the biggest advantage to this design other than cost is how low it holds the PCB — a decided advantage while working under the microscope. Don’t have any Technics parts close to hand? No worries, 3D printed parts could easily stand in, and maybe even improve the design. [Paul] also shows off a substitute for the Technics beam rendered in PCB material, which would reduce the height of the workpiece over the bench even more.

We’ve seen a lot of PCB vises come and go, using everything from scrap wood to 3D printed compliant mechanisms. But we doubt you’ll find anything more cost-effective than [Paul]’s design.

LEGO Coin Sorter Is So Money

February 5, 2024 by Kristina Panos 4 Comments

When it comes to LEGO and sorting, the idea is usually to sort bricks by color, which is a great way to help keep your sanity. And if you want to buy more, you may need to save your pennies and so on. What better way for worlds to collide than to build a working LEGO coin sorter?

[brickstudios]’ sorter does it all — pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters, half-dollars, and dollars. As with most coin sorters, the idea is to differentiate by size. This brings up challenge number one — the fact that a penny is ever-so-slightly bigger than a dime.

[brickstudios] was able to solve this by leveraging the difference between a headlight brick and a regular modified 1X1 with a stud on the side. Later, the same two coins reveal challenge two, which is that if you want to sort the coins in order by value, you have to somehow get the dimes past the pennies and nickels after each has fallen through the chute. Same deal with the giant half-dollar and smaller dollar coins.

The basic sub-build is a pair of tile rails on which the coins slide and either fall into the hole or keep going based on value. Once [brickstudios] had all the coins falling just right, it was time to address the value vs. size issue. Essentially, they solved this by building a ramp that turns the dimes and dollars and gets them to the right spots. Be sure to check out the build video after the break.

We are constantly amazed by the things people can make out of LEGO, like this hydroelectric dam or this hydraulic excavator. Have you made something amazing? Let us know!

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A Hydroelectric Dam, Built Out Of LEGO

January 27, 2024 by Lewin Day 10 Comments

Hydroelectric dams are usually major infrastructure projects that costs tens of millions of dollars to construct. But they don’t have to be — you can build your own at home, using LEGO, as [Build it with Bricks] demonstrates!

The build is set up in an aquarium with a pump, which serves to simulate flow through a river system. The LEGO dam is installed in the middle of the aquarium, blocking the flow. It has a sluice gate in the lower section to feed water to a turbine for power generation. The gate is moved via a rack and pinion. It’s driven by a LEGO motor on a long shaft to keep it a safe distance from the wet stuff. The dam also gets a spillway to allow for overflow to be handled elegantly. Meanwhile, a second motor acts as a generator, fitted with a fairly basic turbine.

Hilariously, the first build fails spectacularly as the hydrostatic pressure of the water destroys the LEGO wall. A wider base and some reinforcements help solve the problem. There’s a better turbine, too. It’s all pretty leaky, but LEGO was never designed to be water tight. As you might imagine, it doesn’t generate a lot of power, but it’s enough to just barely light some LEDs.

It’s a fun way to learn about hydroelectric power, even if it’s not making major amounts of electricity. Video after the break.

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The Giant LEGO You Always Wanted To Play With

January 20, 2024 by Jenny List 18 Comments

The interlocking LEGO bricks are probably one of the most versatile toys to come out of the 20th century, but aside from the Duplo larger-sized version for smaller kids, they don’t come in what you might term grown-up sizes. This has not deterred [Veranda Vikings] though, who have come up with the fantastic idea of giant LEGO bricks made from snow.

Making them is simplicity itself given enough depth of the white stuff, simply press the lid of one of those plastic LEGO storage bins into some fresh snowfall hard enough to compact your brick, and then lift clear a perfect icy 2 by 2 brick. Most of the post is devoted to the building escapades of some very happy kids, and we can’t help envying them the opportunity. It appears that like the LEGO fries in the cafe at Legoland in Bilund, these bricks don’t quite interlock. We think that it would be possible to press the LEGO storage lid into the bottom of them though, perhaps some readers would like to experiment.

Either way, this is a hack to warm the hearts of readers worldwide, whether they live in a country with snow or not. We’re surprised Lego themselves haven’t caught on to the idea, and sold giant snow-brick moulds.

Illustrated Kristina with an IBM Model M keyboard floating between her hands.

Keebin’ With Kristina: The One With All The LEGO

December 20, 2023 by Kristina Panos 3 Comments

It seems like mechanical keyboard enthusiasts are more spoiled for choice with each passing day. But as broad as the open source pool has become, there’s still no perfect keyboard for everyone. So, as people innovate toward their own personal endgame peripherals and make them open source, the pool just grows and grows.

This beautiful addition to the glittering pool — [Bo Yao]’s Carpenter Tau keyboard — is meant to provide an elegant option at a particular intersection where no keyboards currently exist — the holy trinity of open source, programmable, and tri-mode connectivity: wired, Bluetooth, and 2.4 GHz.

Come for the lovely wooden everything, and stay for the in-depth logs as [Bo Yao] introduces the project and its roots, reviews various options for the controller, discusses the manufacture of the wooden parts, and creates the schematic for the 61-key version. Don’t want to build one yourself? It’ll be on Crowd Supply soon enough.

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