Colored Pyrotechnics

August 16, 2009 by 20 Comments

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCDVypW_zB0&feature=player_embedded]

Regular submitter [Jared Bouck] from Inventgeek.com has sent us this cool project. He wanted to make a fireball cannon, but didn’t want to settle for plain old fireballs.Instead of using a common  propane system, he built an alcohol based one so he had a “blank slate” to start with. He then applied some copper chloride to get the desired greens and blues. With all of the fire displays we see, how come we don’t see more colored flames? Check out the overview video after the break.

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EEVblog: The Electronics Engineering Video Blog

August 16, 2009 by 42 Comments

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1YrANSmOGY&fmt=18]
Have you ever wanted to see what it’s like inside of a PCB assembly factory? Have you ever wondered how digital storage oscilloscopes work? If so, be sure to check out the EEVblog podcast. The Electronics Engineering video blog podcast, hosted by [Dave Jones], was created for anyone interested in learning more about electrical engineering. While some knowledge of electronics definitely helps, [Dave]’s thorough explanations and firsthand knowledge in the field of electrical engineering make the video blog easily accessible to beginners in the field. The EEVblog covers a wide range of electronics related topics, offering everything from multimeter reviews to GSM mobile phone audio design advice. In the latest episode (shown above), [Dave] discusses and demonstrates how to solve the infinite resistor problem, involving measuring the resistance at different points of an infinite grid of resistors that all have the same resistance. In addition to giving a detailed explanation, [Dave] created a 14 x 14 grid of 420 10ohm resistors to demonstrate how to solve the problem. While we’ve only mentioned a few episodes here, be sure to check out all 25 episodes of the EEVblog podcast and subscribe to the RSS feed so you’ll never miss an episode.

Robert Crumb Ghetto Hacks

August 15, 2009 by 36 Comments

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[Robert Crumb], the celebrated artist who created the commonly recognized keep on truckin, Fritz the cat, and mr natural can be seen here doing a ghetto hack. His record was warped, so he had to melt it in the oven to flatten it out. While [R. Crumb] may not be the epitome of celebrity and wealth, he got us wondering, what celebrities do ghetto hacks? More importantly, what ghetto hacks do you continue to do, even though you could afford to just simply replace the item? In case you missed the ghetto hacks thread, here it is.

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Etching Agitator

August 15, 2009 by 22 Comments

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDA16dfqgeg]

It might be a little bit of overkill, but this etching container agitator sure looks convenient. There’s not much to it technically, a small circuit with an ATtiny45. For those beginning with this stuff, he has written a pretty good tutorial on working with basic microcontrollers. If you are more interested in a tutorial on etching, we did a  guide on how to etch a single sided PCB.

Building An Apple 1

August 14, 2009 by 22 Comments

replica1 (Custom)

With all the recent talk of hackintoshes going around, we thought we should post this oldie. It is a writeup on how to build your own Apple 1 called Replica 1. If you’ve got the $149 laying around and think you can handle the construction of a mere 88 components, you can make one yourself. Not only can you order kits or complete units, they even have a download page with applications and games. It might be fun to have one of these sitting on the desk right next to our minimac. If you really don’t want to buy one, but maybe want to just play a little bit, there’s always virtual apple.

[via DVICE]

Solid State Tesla Coil

August 14, 2009 by 9 Comments

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While researching solid state Tesla coils we stumbled across this old project. As you have probably guessed from the pictures, this coil is meant to actually play music. Knowing how to add eye catching flare, the coiler uses a Plexiglas frame turned light pipe; only to be complimented by an audio amplifier complete with graphic equalizer. There is a video of the coil in action on YouTube. We have covered singing tesla coils in the past. Other twists on the classics include the tesla coil guitar amp and a hand held plasm gun.