Making A Car Key From A Ratcheting Wrench

September 12, 2021 by 45 Comments

Car keys these days are remarkably complex beasts. Covered in buttons and loaded with security transponders, they often cost hundreds of dollars to replace if you’re unlucky enough to lose them. However, back in the day, keys used to just be keys — a hunk of metal in a mechanical pattern to move some levers and open a door. Thus, you could reshape a wrench into a key for an old car if that was something you really wanted to do.

The concept is simple. Take a 12mm ratcheting wrench, and shape the flat section into a profile matching that of a key for an older car without any electronic security features. The first step is to cut down the shaft, before grinding it down to match the thickness and width of the original key.

The profile of the key is then drawn onto the surface, and a Dremel used with a cutting disc to create the requisite shape.  Finally, calipers are used to mark out the channels to allow the key to slide into the keyway, before these are also machined with the rotary tool.

Filing and polishing cleans up the final result to create a shiny, attractive ratchet wrench key. Even better, it does a great job of opening the car, too.

Similar machining techniques can be used to duplicate a key from just a photo (something I did back in 2019 to prank my friend). Alternatively, 3D printing can be great for reproducing even high-security keys. Video after the break.

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Measuring current draw of home shop tools

Using Homebrew Coils To Measure Mains Current, And Taking The Circuit Breaker Challenge

September 12, 2021 by 21 Comments

Like many hackers, [Matthias Wandel] has a penchant for measuring the world around him, and quantifying the goings-on in his home is a bit of a hobby. And so when it came time to sense the current flowing in the wires of his house, he did what any of us would do: he built his own current sensing system.

What’s that you say? Any sane hacker would buy something like a Kill-a-Watt meter, or even perhaps use commercially available current transformers? Perhaps, but then one wouldn’t exactly be hacking, would one? [Matthias] opted to roll his own sensors for quite practical reasons: commercial meters don’t quite have the response time to catch the start-up spikes he was interested in seeing, and clamp-on current transformers require splitting the jacket on the nonmetallic cabling used in most residential wiring — doing so tends to run afoul of building codes. So his sensors were simply coils of wire shaped to fit the outside of the NM cable, with a bit of filtering to provide a cleaner signal in the high-noise environment of a lot of switch-mode power supplies.

Fed through an ADC board into a Raspberry Pi, [Matthias]’ sensor system did a surprisingly good job of catching the start-up surge of some tools around the shop. That led to the entertaining “Circuit Breaker Challenge” part of the video below, wherein we learn just what it really takes to pop the breaker on a 15-Amp branch circuit. Spoiler alert: it’s a lot.

Speaking of staying safe with mains current, we’ve covered a little bit about how circuit protection works before. If you need a deeper dive into circuit breakers, we’ve got that too.

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Hey, MiSTer Emulator, Gimme Almost Any Classic Platform!

September 12, 2021 by 20 Comments

I’m back with another of the talks from Hackerspace Gent’s NewLine conference, fresh from my weekend of indulgence quaffing fine Belgian food and beers while mixing with that country’s hacker community. This time it’s an overview from [Michael Smith] of the MiSTer project, a multi-emulator using an FPGA to swap out implementations of everything from an early PDP minicomputer to an 80486SX PC.

At its heart is a dev board containing an Intel Cyclone SoC/FPGA, to which a USB hub must be added, and then a memory upgrade to run all but the simplest of cores. Once the hardware has been taken care of it almost seems as though there are no classic platforms for which there isn’t a core, as a quick browse of the MiSTer forum attests. We are treated to seamless switching between SNES and NED platforms, and even switching different SID chip versions during a running Commodore 64 demo.

There are many different routes to a decent emulator set-up be they using hardware, software, or a combination of both. It’s unlikely that there are any as versatile as this one though, and we’re guessing that as it further evolves it will become a fixture below the monitor or TV of any gamer.  It’s a step up from single-platform FPGA emulators, that’s for certain!

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3D Printed Hat Blasts The Rain Away

September 11, 2021 by 32 Comments

Some ideas are so bad that we just try them anyway, at least that seems to be [Ivan Miranda]’s philosophy. No stranger to just totally ignoring the general consensus on what you can (or at least should) or can’t make with a 3D printer, and just getting on with it, [Ivan] may have gone a little too far this time. Since umbrellas are, well, boring, why not try to keep dry with an air-curtain hat?

As you’ll see from the video, attempting to 3D print an impeller to run from a BLDC motor didn’t exactly go well. The imbalance due to imperfections in the printing process (and lack of an easy way balance it post-print) caused incredibly unpleasant (and possibly damaging) vibrations directly into his skull, not to mention the thing self-disassembling in a short time.

Not to be discouraged, he presses on regardless, substituting an electrical ducted fan (EDF), increasing the silliness-factor oh-so-little, after all as he says “I think I have a solution for all the issues — more power!”

EDFs and other kinds of ducted fans are used in many applications nowadays. Thanks to advances in rare-earth magnets enabling more powerful brushless motors, combined with cheap and accessible control systems, there has never been a better time to drop an EDF into your latest madcap idea. We have covered many ducted fan projects over the years, including this great video about how ducted fans work, which we think is well worth a watch if you’ve not already done so.

The “rain in spain, stays mainly in the plain” doesn’t actually reflect reality, as most rainfall is actually recorded in the mountainous north, rather than the central ‘plain’, But regardless, it never rains when you want it to, certainly in the Basque country where [Ivan] is based. Initial testing was done with a hose pipe, in the shop, which shows a certain dedication to the task in hand to say the least.

He does demonstrate it appearing to actually work, but we’re pretty sure there is still plenty of room for improvement. Although, maybe it’s safer to just shelve it and move on the next mad-cap idea?

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You Can 3D Print Your Own RC Motorbikes

September 11, 2021 by 4 Comments

Radio control cars have been a popular toy for decades, but their motorcycle counterparts have always lagged behind due to balance issues and compromised agility. At the same time, a little toy motorbike can be mesmerizing in action. [brettt3] built a few of his own design that look remarkably fun to play with.

Modeled after the Ducati Draxter and Suzuki GSX-RR, the 3D printed bodies do a great job of aping their full-size counterparts. With a lick of paint and some finer touches, these could be absolutely exquisite, but they look awesome in the bare plastic nonetheless. The bikes use a belt drive to deliver power from a motor in the body to the rear wheel. To keep them upright, a weighted front wheel is used as a passive gyroscope for stabilization.

But the finest touch is arguably the rider which sits atop each motorcycle. Articulated and with hands resting on the handlebars, the rider moves with the steering of the bike, creating an eerie realism that we can’t get enough of. There’s even a tiny micro-servo in the head which allows the rider to swivel and look in the direction of motion as you’d expect.

Files are available for those wishing to recreate these designs at home. Alternatively, dive deeper into gyro-stabilised designs to learn more about how it all works. Video after the break.

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EM-Glitching For Nintendo DSi Boot ROMs

September 11, 2021 by 2 Comments

Some hacker events are muddy and dusty affairs in distant fields, others take place in darkened halls, but I went to one that can be experienced as a luxury break in a European city steeped in culture and history. Newline takes place at Hackerspace Gent, in the Belgian city of that name, and I was there last weekend to catch the atmosphere as well as the programme of talks and workshops. And of those a good start was made by [PoroCYon], whose fascinating introduction to the glitching techniques involved in recovering the boot ROMs from a Nintendo DSi taught us plenty of things we hadn’t seen before.

The talk which you’ll find below the break starts by describing the process of glitching — using power supply interference to interrupt the operation of a microprocessor and avoid certain instructions — to bypass security code. It then moves on to some of the protection mechanisms used in the various generations of Nintendo consoles and handhelds, before moving on to the work on the DSi at which point the talk moved onto a field which may be old hat in glitching circles but was new to me; that of EM glitching.

EM glitching involves using a small coil to generate precisely timed electromagnetic pulses which induce the glitch voltages in the chip. The fascinating part is that the EM probe can be made small enough to target individual areas of the chip, so using it involves a brute-force technique trying all combinations of timing and position with the probe held in a computer-controlled X-Y mount.

The DSi has two processors on board, this achieves success with the ARM7 but leaves its companion ARM9 as yet untapped. There are a promising set of attack vectors left to try, of which the ARM7 placing the ARM9 into a state from which it can be glitched seems to be the most promising. It’s fairly obvious that there’s plenty more to come from this quarter.

More details of the talk can be found in this repository, and for those interested in EM glitching you can find out more in this video and in this project using it to attack a Gecko microcontroller.

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THICC GBA SP Mod Gets Easy Install Ahead Of Release

September 11, 2021 by 4 Comments

Back in August we covered a unique modification for the Nintendo Game Boy Advance SP which replaced the handheld’s rear panel with an expanded version that had enough internal volume for an upgraded battery, a Bluetooth audio transmitter, and support for both Qi wireless and USB-C charging. The downside was that getting the 10 mm 3D printed “backpack” installed wasn’t exactly the most user-friendly operation.

But today we’re happy to report that the dream team behind the so-called THICC BOI SP have not only made some huge improvements to the mod, but that they intend to release it as a commercial kit in the next few months. The trick to making this considerable upgrade a bit more forgiving is the use of a bespoke flat flex cable that easily allows the user to solder up all the necessary test points and connections, as well as a custom PCB that pulls together all the hardware required.

In the video below, [Tito] of Macho Nacho Productions goes over the latest version of the mod he’s been working on with [Kyle] and [Helder], and provides a complete step-by-step installation tutorial to give viewers an idea of what they’ll be in for once the kit goes on sale. While it’s still a fairly involved modification, the new design is surprisingly approachable. As we’ve seen with previous console modifications, the use of flat flex technology means the installation shouldn’t pose much of a challenge for anyone with soldering experience.

The flat flex cable allows for an exceptionally clean install.

Some may be put off by the fact that the replacement rear panel is even thicker this time around, but hopefully the unprecedented runtime made possible by the monstrous 4,500 mAh LiPo battery pack hiding inside the retrofit unit will help ease any discomfort (physical or otherwise) you may have from carrying around the chunkier case. Even with power-hungry accouterments like an aftermarket IPS display and a flash cart, the new battery can keep your SP running for nearly 20 hours. If you still haven’t beaten Metroid: Zero Mission by then, it’s time to take a break and reflect on your life anyway.

According to [Tito], the logistical challenges and considerable upfront costs involved in getting the new rear panels injection molded in ABS is the major roadblock holding the release of the kit back right now. The current prototypes, which appear to have been 3D printed in resin, simply don’t match the look and feel of the GBA SP’s original case well enough to be a viable option. A crowd funding campaign should get them over that initial hump, and we’ll be keeping an eye out for more updates as things move along towards production.

The previous version of this mod was impressive enough as a one-off project, but we’re excited to see the team taking the next steps towards making this compelling evolution of the GBA more widely available. It’s a fantastic example of what’s possible for small teams, or even individuals, when you leverage all the tools in the modern hardware hacking arsenal.

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