I’d call this more of a video mixer with audio inputs, but it’s an interesting way to hack video signals. [brian] sent in the VS001 Analogue Video Mixer. He noted that it’s along the same idea as the Mac SE/30 visualizer, but outputs VGA and can route signal through audio gear for even more interesting permutations. It looks like all the information is there if you want to build your own.
Five Dollar Eprom Programmer
A couple years ago I spent a good week wiring up a fairly complex EPROM programmer so I could burn a prom for my jeeps EFI system. Today I ran across this $5 version. build built by Jay Kominek He uses shift registers to handle the addressing and IO lines, all driven directly by the parallel port. There’s no way to escape the number of pins that have to be wired up, but the schematic itself is pretty simple.
[By the way, arcade supply shops are a great source for cheap UV erase EPROMS.]
[Update: I’d forgotten about the voltage change (3 vs 5 if I remember) needed to write UV EPROMS vs EEPROMS. With a little mod, you can certainly use this for EPROMS as well.]
Siamese Electric Motors
I’ve been meaning to post something about these for a while. Jim builds motors for EV hobbiests on the side – one of his cooler creations is the siamese electric motor. Some others have used belt drives to combine motors, but Jim actually builds the motors into a single unit. He built this set of 8 inch twins for the White Zombie drag racer.
I pumped Jim for more details, but he’s not done tweaking his next set of siamese motors. So, why is this even a hack? It’s a nice piece of machine work, but it gets interesting if you consider some stock specs. Most EV cars get 9″ motors – these are rated at 19hp or so. They take some monster hardware just to drive – high amperage, high voltage. Running a pair of 8hp motors can produce similar power with significant cost savings – everything gets cheaper. To generalize, you need a $1500 motor and $1000 controller just to get in the game. Not to mention that rebuildable forklift motors can be had for a song.
Locksport International Visual Picking Guide
[Chronos] let me know that Locksport International released a new visual lock picking guide. The MIT guide is a classic, but not nearly as easy on the eyes. This one covers all the basics and it reads like a comic book.
Mac SE/30 Audio Visualizer
Sure, you could make it into a web server, but [markie] sent me his Mac SE/30 visualizer. It was inspired by another’s mac mod, but he was kind enough to write up an entire how-to. The audio signal was run directly into the deflection coils on the macs tubes. The mod is so simple, I might have to pick one up just for CRT experimentation.
[The next regular podcast cometh, but It’s delayed by my cold.]
Serial Controlled Power Outlet
[Alan] sent me his simple rs-232 controlled power outlet. He built it to turn on his laser printer when a print job appeares in the queue. The relay is directly controlled by the DTR line on the serial port. Lots of espresso machine PID conversions use them to run boilers, so he could have avoided the extra mechanical relay. [I can’t pick on him too much, my old laserwriter is on all the time.]
He tied it together with some perl to turn on the printer and get the print job going once it’s had enough time to initialize.
Ben Heckendorn Interview (Part 1)
Here’s part one of my interview with Ben Heckendorn. Because it’s so long, and I’ve got a cold, I’m breaking it up into a two parter. Check out part 1 here, add the RSS feed to your program of choice, or subscribe to the feed via iTunes.
Ben and I get into most of the questions you guys asked, along with a few tangents. Enjoy!
[The devs are working on the feeds for me, so they’re not quite perfect. yet.]
