Nikon didn’t build a light metering chip into the D40. That’s fine if you’re using one of their auto lenses with the on-board chip. [Matt] decided to add a sensor to his camera and try it out with his manual lenses. His writeup is a bit challenging to get through, but if you’re really into Nikons, you’ll make it. He had to tap into the ribbon cable inside the body, mount the extra hardware, and add an additional switch outside the body to allow the chip to be turned on and off. The extra sensor adds a bit of a step to taking the shot, but it’s the sort of thing that’ll become second nature pretty quickly.
Lego NXT Cnc Mill
[btopley] built his own micro mill out of Lego NXT parts. The construction details are a bit light, but it looks like a great way to try things out without all the actual machine work.
CNC Mini-lathe
Given my obsession of CNC projects, I’m surprised that we haven’t mentioned this project before. [Dave] put together an excellent site about his CNC converted mini-lathe. (The same on that I’ve got) He built a pretty simple stepper controller to drive it. Since the lathe only needed two axis motors, he drove the steppers with some mosfets that he triggered from a parallel port. The site has been around for a while, but I thought you guys would enjoy a classic hack like this one.
HackIt: New Uses For Old CRT Monitors
[atrain] wants to know if we’ve got any thoughts on things to do with old CRT displays instead of giving them away or recycling them. We’ve seen pic programmers and oscilloscope projects, but even I’m curious to see what you guys have to say.
So, got a better idea? Let’s hear it.
D200 Hotshoe GPS Redux (el Cheapo Version)
It’s been a while since we talked about putting a GPS on top of a D200. [Rick] sent in his latest version. He used a nice 20 channel sirf III gps from spark-fun, a cheap D200 remote cable and a few parts to send the NMEA sentences down the wire. The biggest improvements include taking the $100 Nikon cable out of the mix and swiping power from the camera for the GPS board. All the info is there, but I had to seriously stare at his wiring instructions for a while despite the low parts count. I like to see actual circuit diagrams!
Binary POV Watch
I probably won’t be replacing my giant G-shock watch just yet, but this binary POV watch is pretty sweet. Sure, the POV clock is old hat by now, but it’s also a nice example of adding a Li-ionbattery to an embedded project. It uses a MAX1555 li-ion charger and throws caution to the wind and doesn’t bother with any external capacitors. Battery life is several days or several hours if the watch is put into flashlight mode.
Cheap DIY Acoustic Guitar Pickup
I stumbled on this simple, but effective and cheap diy guitar pickup in my rounds for interesting hacks. Piezo elements haven’t failed to amaze me. They’re usable for electronic drum kit, underwater microphones, running shoes and musical greeting cards.
(I’ve only found an old, out of print book on hydrophones, so if you’ve got a good reference, send it in.)
