Giant Analog CO2 Meter Sweeps Away Doubt

November 14, 2019 by 11 Comments

Most of us are aware that trees turn CO₂ into oxygen, but we’d venture to guess that many people’s knowledge of this gas ends there. Is it feast or famine out there for the trees? Who can say? We admire [rabbitcreek]’s commitment to citizen science because he’s so focused on making it easy for people to understand their environment. His latest offering, a giant analog CO₂ meter, might be our favorite so far.

The brains of the operation is an Adafruit Feather Adalogger. It reads the CO₂ sensor that’s mounted close to the business end of the nautilus, and becomes the quill that writes the CO₂ value to a FeatherWing e-ink screen. For the giant needle, this lovely meter uses one of those fiberglass poles you mark your driveway with so you can find it under a blanket of snow. The needle is counter-balanced with washers encased in printed plastic.

As you can see in the GIF, there’s a decent delay between the CO₂ blast and the needle response — we like to imagine the CO₂ spiraling slowly through the nautilus like a heavy, ill wind on its way to gravely move the needle.

Want a way to monitor air quality that’s a bit more discreet? Slip this portable meter into your pocket.

5 Kilowatts In A 3D Printed Jet Boat

November 14, 2019 by 10 Comments

Radio control projects used to be made of materials such as metal or wood, and involve lots of hand crafted parts. That’s still one way to go about things, but 3D printing has become a popular tool in recent years. [RCLifeOn] has been working on a 3D printed jet boat, which recently got a serious power upgrade.

The boat in question received a 5000W brushless motor – significant power for a vehicle weighing less than 2kg. Powered by a 12S lithium pack, and outfitted with a water jacket for cooling, it drives the boat through an off-the-shelf turbine after initial attempts to DIY the drivetrain were unsuccessful.

The biggest problem in the project came from coupling the motor to the turbine. A 3D printed coupler was unable to hold up to the strain, while attempts to make a metal part failed due to the lack of a lathe. Eventually the solution was found by daisy chaining two off-the-shelf parts together.

The boat proved itself ably on the water, with the large motor proving more than capable of shifting the boat at a strong clip. It’s an excellent shakedown for the parts that will eventually find themselves in a powered surfboard build. We’ve seen [RCLifeOn]’s work before, too, like these stylish 3D printed sneakers. Video after the break.

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Detecting Water Before It’s Too Late

November 14, 2019 by 25 Comments

[mcu_nerd] is like any engineer, which is why his problem of an occasionally leaky water heater sure looks like a research project with no end in sight. Sure there’s probably a commercial product out there that can be had for half the cost and a few clicks of the mouse, but what’s the point in actually solving the problem?

His log starts with research into detecting low battery voltages. Then it was a quick exploration in designing low-power circuits. When the Flexible PCB contest came along, he realized that there was a chance to design a better electrode, and he ended up winning one of the vouchers; which is where he’s at now.

It’s definitely a work in progress, and if anything it’s just a quick five minute read and an opportunity to commiserate with another wayward soul. We do like his clever use of a tealite candle tin as both the second electrode and case for his water detection circuit. There are also some KiCad files and code.

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Best Buy’s IoT Goes Dark, Leaving Some “Smart” Products Dumbfounded

November 14, 2019 by 95 Comments

Bad news if you bought several Insignia-branded smart devices from Best Buy. The company has decided to shut down the back end systems that make them work — or at least work as a smart device. On the chopping block are smart outlets, switches, a security camera, and an upright freezer. If you bought, say, the freezer, it will still keep things cold. But the security camera will apparently be of no use at all now that the backend systems have gone dark. The company is offering an unspecified partial refund to users of the affected devices.

Best Buy announced this in September, and the shutdown date was last week on November 6th. Not all Insignia products are impacted, just the ones that rely on their app.

Anytime we talk about cloud-based technology, there are always a few people who say something like, “I’ll never rely on anything in the cloud!” Perhaps they have a point — certainly in this case they were right. There are really two things to consider: hardware devices that rely on the cloud, and data that resides in the cloud. In some cases, one product — like a camera — might have both.

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Ethernet, Over DC Power

November 14, 2019 by 73 Comments

We’re used to extending our network connections and being no longer constrained in our use of Ethernet by proximity to a switch or hub. Our houses routinely contain wireless networks, and of course powerline-Ethernet units passing data over our mains wiring. [Peter Franck] had a similar problem but without the mains power, for a distributed sprinkler system he needed to send Ethernet over DC cables.

The solution is a surprisingly simple one, taking one of those powerline Ethernet units and converting it by removing its mains power section. These devices contain the Ethernet and powerline modem chip with its associated circuitry, and a small switch-mode power supply. He’s removed the power supply and put in a capacitive coupling to the DC cabling, resulting in a relatively inexpensive DC powerline network device.

Powerline Ethernet devices are not without their own issues, for instance they are not popular with radio amateurs due to their effect on the RF noise floor. We’d therefore be curious to see what the RF emissions are like for this hack, but we still think it’s a useful weapon in the armoury as well as something to do with all those surplus powerline Ethernet bricks.

Jubilee: A Toolchanging Homage To 3D Printer Hackers Everywhere

November 14, 2019 by 36 Comments

I admit that I’m late to the 3D printing game. While I just picked up my first printer in 2018, the rest of us have been oozing out beautiful prints for over a decade. And in that time we’ve seen many people reimagine the hardware for mischief besides just printing plastic. That decade of hacks got me thinking: what if the killer-app of 3D printing isn’t the printing? What if it’s programmable motion? With that, I wondered: what if we had a machine that just offered us motion capabilities? What if extending those motion capabilities was a first class feature? What if we had a machine that was meant to be hacked?

One year later, I am thrilled to release an open-source multitool motion platform I call Jubilee. For a world that’s hungry for toolchanging 3D printers, Jubilee might be the best toolchanging 3D printer you can build yourself–with nothing more than a set of hand tools and some patience. But it doesn’t stop there. With a standardized tool pattern established by E3D and a kinematically coupled hot-swappable bed, Jubilee is rigged to be extended by anyone looking to harness its programmable motion capabilities for some ad hoc automation.

Jubilee is my homage to you, the 3D printer hacker; but it’s meant to serve the open-source community at large. Around the world, scientists, artists, and hackers alike use the precision of automated machines for their own personal exploration and expression. But the tools we use now are either expensive or cumbersome–often coupled with a hefty learning curve but no up-front promise that they’ll meet our needs. To that end, Jubilee is meant to shortcut the knowledge needed to get things moving, literally. Jubilee wants to be an API for motion.

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Aging Alcohol In 30 Minutes

November 14, 2019 by 38 Comments

Many alcoholic beverages are aged in barrels for long periods of time. The aim is to impart flavors from the wood of the barrel into the liquid, and allow a whole host of chemical reactions to happen, changing the character of the taste. However, this takes time, and time is money. There’s potentially a faster way, however, and [The Thought Emporium] set out to investigate.

Inspired by several research papers, the goal was to examine whether using ultrasound to agitate these fluids could speed the aging process. Initial tests consisted of artificially aging milk, apple cider, and vodka in a small ultrasonic jewelry cleaner for 30 minutes, with cognac chips for flavor. Results were positive amongst the tasters, with the vodka in particular showing a marked color change from the process. A later test expanded the types of wood chip and beverages under test. Results were more mixed, but with a small sample size of tasters, it’s to be expected.

While taste is subjective, there were definite visible results from the aging process. It’s a technique that’s being explored by industry, too. We’ve seen hackers brew up plenty of tasty beverages before, too – often with a little automation thrown in Video after the break.

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