Making Use Of The Trancend WiFi SD Card

October 17, 2013 by 14 Comments

had

[CNLohr] spends most of his time on the Internet, but sometimes real life drags him away from his keyboard. These “vacations”, as he calls them, don’t have a good Internet connection and forces him to rely on flaky cell phone connections that go up and down at the drop of a hat. Figuring this would be a great opportunity for some hardware hacking, [CNLohr] came up with an ‘Internet-o-mometer’ – a device powered by a Trancend WiFi SD card that uses an 8×8 LED display to show the current status of his phone’s Internet connection.

This build uses the Trancend WiFi SD card motherboard we’ve seen before. When the card boots, it tries to connect to his phone’s WiFi connection.  When it connects, a green smiley face is displayed on the LED matrix. When a whole lot of files are downloaded or, more specifically, the ping to google.com is more than 4 seconds, a red frowny face indicates the Internet connection is down.

In other Trancend WiFi SD card news, a whole lot of people including [Dan Krause] (thanks for the tip) have been working on a complete replacement OS for these neat little cards. Right now the OS is in very rough shape, but there is a pre-built system available should anyone want to experiment. [CNLohr] is also working on a compact, double-sided version of his SD card motherboard and we’ll be happy to feature a link to his Tindie store when he sends that in.

Artificial Leg Comes With A Normal Gait!

October 17, 2013 by 10 Comments

steppingouti

Did you know over 50% of amputees take at least one fall per year due to limited prosthetic mobility? That compares to only about a third of all elderly people over the age of 65!

[Professor Mo Rastgaar] and his PhD student [Evandro Ficanha] set out to fix that problem, and they have come up with a microprocessor controlled prosthetic foot capable of well, to put it bluntly, walking normally.

Working with a scientist from the Mayo Clinic, the pair have created a prosthesis that uses sensors to actively adjust the ankle to create a normal stride. Commercially available prosthetics can do this as well, but can only adjust the foot in an up-down motion, which is fine — if you only plan on walking in a straight line. In addition to having an ankle that can also roll side-to-side and front-to-back based on sensor feedback, they have also moved the control mechanism up the leg using a cable-driven system, which lightens the foot making it easier to use.

We find the test apparatus almost as interesting as the prosthesis itself. The researchers had to come up with a way to measure the performance of the prosthesis when used to walk in an arc. The solution was the turn-table treadmill seen above.

If you have time, check out the video demonstration on the main article’s page which covers the leg and the treadmill build.

[via Reddit]

Fail Of The Week: [Caleb’s] Phosphorescent CD Player

October 17, 2013 by 35 Comments

fotw-caleb-hackfail

When [Caleb Kraft] was in full production for Hackaday he pumped a pile of awesome videos. But not every project worked out. He’s been a fan of the Fail of the Week posts, and sent in his own recollection of a project gone wrong. Above you can see his phosphorescent CD player. He prototyped the project in May of last year but technical issues and looming deadlines meant it never saw the light of day. We’ll fill you in on his fail after the jump.

Editor’s note: We need more tips about your own failure! There are a handful of submissions left in our reserves, but to keep this topic as a weekly column we need help tracking down more failed projects. Please document your past failures and send us a link to the write-up. If you don’t have a blog to post it on you may do what [Caleb] has done and email us directly. Remember to include any images and links to video which you may have.

Continue reading “Fail Of The Week: [Caleb’s] Phosphorescent CD Player” →

Interactive Boozeshelf Is Its Own Dance Party

October 17, 2013 by 9 Comments

boozeshelf

[Jeremy] refused to settle on your typical alcohol storage options, and instead created the Boozeshelf. Like most furniture hacks, the Boozeshelf began as a basic IKEA product, which [Jeremy] modified by cutting strips of wood to serve as wine glass holders and affixing the front end of a wine rack at the base to store bottles.

In its standard operating mode the Boozeshelf lies dark and dormant. Approaching it triggers a cleverly recessed ultrasonic sensor that gently illuminates some LEDs, revealing the shelf’s contents. When you walk away, then lights fade out. An Arduino Mega running [Jeremy’s] custom LEDFader library drives the RGB LED strips, which he wired with some power MOSFETS to handle current demands.

[Jeremy] didn’t stop there, however, adding an additional IR receiver that allows him to select from three different RGB LED color modes: simple crossfading, individual shelf colors (saved to the on-board EEPROM), or the festive favorite: “Dance Party Mode.” Stick around after the break to see [Jeremy] in full aficionado attire demonstrating his Boozeshelf in a couple of videos. Considering blackouts are a likely result of enjoying this hack, we recommend these LED ice cubes for your safety.

Continue reading “Interactive Boozeshelf Is Its Own Dance Party” →

SparkFun Ponders Women In STEM Fields

October 17, 2013 by 86 Comments

sparkfun-ada-loveless-day

Tuesday was [Ada Lovelace] day and to recognize it SparkFun posted an article about women in their workforce and the STEM initiative. [Ada Lovelace] is credited with forging a path for women in mathematics and computing. The STEM acronym represents a movement to get more of America’s students into Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics fields in order to keep up with the rest of the developed world. But part of the issue includes drastically increasing the interest of young women in these fields and their access to it. The thing is, I feel the same way about the community at Hackaday.

Obviously some of the biggest names in the hobby electronics and engineering enthusiast industry are women. The name that seems to top lists is always [Limor Fried] who you may know better as [Lady Ada]. She founded Adafruit industries. But there are couple of other notables that stick out in our minds. [Jeri Ellsworth] has been huge name around here forever. Just this week Hackaday was celebrating the Kickstarter for her latest project. [Becky Stern] has had a ton of awesome project featured, mostly in conjunction with her work at Adafruit but her knitting machine hack when she was with MAKE has always stuck out in our minds. And of course, there’s [Quinn Dunki] who has long been building her own 6502 computer from the ground up (Incidentally we’re running a Guest Rant from her at midday on Friday).

What I’m missing is the grass-roots hacks from women. I know they’re out there because I see them at monthly meetings at the local hackerspace. We featured [Caroline’s] bathymetric book, and [Robin]’s collaboration that produced solar powered supercap jewelry. Both are members of Sector67.

So I call for all Hackaday readers to make this a friendly environment for anyone who wants to participate. If you’re a female reader who has been lurking around rather than sending in links to your gnarly hacks please take the plunge and send us a tip! If your female friends have awesome projects, offer to help them document it for a feature. You may not have thought of it, but sharing your projects makes you a role model for young readers.

By trade I’m an orchestra musician — a field that was completely closed off to women until well into the last century. While gender equality hasn’t been reached in all orchestras, the Regional Orchestras I have and do play with, show equal representation of gender throughout. Let’s make the same thing happen with STEM!

Unorthodox Home-made CNC Machine

October 17, 2013 by 61 Comments

Here’s a rather unorthodox home-made CNC machine we haven’t seen before!

[ModHappy] recently accepted a challenge to design and build a CNC machine out of cheap and readily available components from a hardware store.

Wandering around the store he noticed the plumbing isle and he started playing around with PVC pipes on the floor, greatly confusing the store employees. He had a frame constructed, but still needed a way to achieve linear movement. His calls were answered in the electrical isle, where he made use of conduit wall-mounts! They only required a minor modification to go from gripping the pipe, to sliding along it. A few fasteners later, some stepper motors from a broken scanner, a CD-ROM drive for the z-axis, some hacked together couplers using set screws, and the mechanical build was complete.

On the controls end, he made use of a cheap Chinese TB6560 CNC driver board off eBay, which he modified slightly to increase reliability. The whole thing runs off LinuxCNC (which is free) on his old laptop — good to note, it can also be run live if you aren’t yet enlightened with a Linux OS.

Stick around after the break to see it in action, drawing out an awesome site’s logo!

Continue reading “Unorthodox Home-made CNC Machine” →

POV Airsoft Turret On A RC Plane

October 16, 2013 by 28 Comments

To be honest, we’re surprised this hasn’t been tried before — then again, maybe it has! But what we do know is that the folks over at Flite Test have rigged up an electric Airsoft gun to a large RC airplane, aptly called The Kracken.

The planes are a scaled up version of their own FT Versa Wing, which feature two props, giving them the ability of differential thrust. Not only were they able to strap a semi-automatic Airsoft pistol on top, they also have two GoPros filming the action and giving the gunner a POV for shooting down the enemy plane! Don’t worry though, the enemy plane features its own weapon — A permanent marker! This hardly seems fair though, as the closer the marker gets, the easier shooting down the plane will be!

Don’t take our word for it though, check out the awesome video for yourself, after the break.

Continue reading “POV Airsoft Turret On A RC Plane” →