Disposable Camera Flash Slave

March 16, 2006 by 5 Comments

flash slave

[Greg Lipscomb] was working on this disposable camera based slave flash when he stumbled into his macro photography project. Slave flashes are used as fill lighting and can be triggered by several different methods. Greg’s project uses a photocell and a microcontroller for trigger and timing. It also makes sure the flash stays charged. He concedes that this design is a bit complicated, but he went with it because he didn’t have any silicon controlled rectifiers available. The microcontroller would be too slow, but his Canon 10D uses a pre-flash before the actual photo, so the slave has a built in delay from that first flash.

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Damonv’s Wind Turbine

March 15, 2006 by 7 Comments

wind turbine

Super Soda! has been posting a lot of projects, but this is one of my favorites. We covered otherpower’s wind turbine a while ago, but Damon Vander Lind’s turbine features hand-laid fiberglass blades. The core of each blade is hot wire cut out of pink foam by following a wooden airfoil pattern. The fiberglass is laid all at once with five layers at the base and two at the tip. Each layer is slightly offset to handle torque. The entire assembly is mounted to a permanent magnet generator contained inside an alternator case.

[thanks Ryan Bavetta]

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How-To: Real Controls For R/C Flight Simulation

March 14, 2006 by 7 Comments

r/c controls

I’m sure many of you remember me recruiting a new writer to work with me on how-tos for Engadget. Will O’Brien was one of the many who answered the call and has been cranking out quality projects. Today’s is modifying a standard R/C transmitter for use as a computer joystick. This “trainer” can be used with flight simulation software so you can practice flying without risking your plane. This is the first step in a future project.

Check out Will’s previous posts: Surface mount soldering iron, Popcorn popper coffee roaster, and Scaling video for better HDTV viewing.

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VW CD Audio Interface Adatpter

March 13, 2006 by 13 Comments

vwcdpic

I had been meaning to post K9spud’s VWCDPIC audio interface adapter ever since our first auxiliary input hack… and today I finally remembered to. It really is one of the best out there. Normally the the Volkswagen OEM head unit has the CD changer channels muted unless you’ve got a factory changer. The VWCDPIC interfaces with the already present CD changer plug and fools the head unit to connect any audio device you want. It also provides remote control of your audio device using the head units buttons. It’s very clever and can work with any audio device.

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Build An RF Connected Project

March 12, 2006 by 10 Comments

rf pair

[Refik Hadzialic] has updated is site with a how-to that could be rolled into many different projects. Using a receiver and transmitter pair from Laipac he demonstrates how to communicate wirelessly between two microcontrollers. The pair costs about $12 and operates at 315MHz. He’s got a chunk of commented code in the article to give you an idea of how it works.

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