Voice Controlled RGB LED Lamp

August 17, 2014 by Rick Osgood 2 Comments

Voice Controlled Lamp

[Saurabh] wanted a quick project to demonstrate how easy it can be to build devices that are voice controlled. His latest Instructable does just that using an Arduino and Visual Basic .Net.

[Saurabh] decided to build a voice controlled lamp. He knew he wanted it to change colors as well as be energy-efficient. It also had to be easy to control. The obvious choice was to use an RGB LED. The LED on its own wouldn’t be very interesting. He needed something to diffuse the light, like a lampshade. [Saurabh] decided to start with an empty glass jar. He filled the jar with gel wax, which provides a nice surface to diffuse the light.

The RGB LED was mounted underneath the jar’s screw-on cover. [Saurabh] soldered a 220 ohm current limiting resistor to each of the three anodes of the LED. A hole was drilled in the cap so he’d have a place to run the wires. The LED was then hooked up to an Arduino Leonardo.

The Arduino sketch has several built-in functions to set all of the colors, and also fade. [Saurabh] then wrote a control interface using Visual Basic .Net. The interface allows you to directly manipulate the lamp, but it also has built-in voice recognition functionality. This allows [Saurabh] to use his voice to change the color of the lamp, turn it off, or initiate a fading routing. You can watch a video demonstration of the voice controls below. Continue reading “Voice Controlled RGB LED Lamp” →

Hacking A Bee Hive

August 16, 2014 by Matt Terndrup 13 Comments

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[Marc] created a self-contained monitoring platform that enabled him to record the temperature and humidity of his bee hives.’

The health of colony can be determined based on a few factors. One is temperature which is an early indicator of whether or not the bees are about to swarm. Once temperature spikes are noticed, the bee wrangler can take the necessary steps to reduce the chance of losing the hive to a neighbor. Another indicator of bee health is humidity. If the area is too damp, it can damage the hive.

With that in mind, [Marc] developed a system to alert him via SMS or email if the sensor readings go beyond a certain range. In addition, he monitored the weight of the hive to see how much honey is inside. Frequency of the buzz was also recorded, and so was the activity of the entrance. He used an Arduino Duo and a DHT22 temperature/humidity sensor. A solar panel powered the bee monitoring system.

There were some challenges that needed to be overcome. Initially the Arduino wasn’t sending out data, but that was fixed with a simple debugging session. From there, he was able to broadcast the information creating graphs with the data. Battery levels, temperature, and humidity were all recorded. With the bee hive hacked and monitored, [Marc] was able to make progress on his system making great use of an Arduino.

NFC Ring Lock Box

August 10, 2014 by Rick Osgood 13 Comments

NFC Ring Lock Box

[Nairod785] wanted to build a lock box that would lock from the inside. He started with an inexpensive, plain wooden box. This kept the cost down but would also allow him to easily decorate the box later on using a wood burning tool.

To keep the box locked, he installed a simple latch on the inside. The latch is connected to a servo with string. When the servo rotates in one direction, it pulls the string and releases the latch. When the servo is rotated in the opposite direction, the latch closes and locks the box once again.

If you are going to have a locked box, then you are also going to need a key to open it. [Nairod785] used a ring with a built-in NFC tag, similar to the ring featured back in March. Inside of the box is a PN532 NFC module. The walls of the box were a little too thick for the reader to detect the ring, so [Nairod785] had to scratch the wall thickness down a bit. The NFC module is connected to an Arduino Nano. Communications are handled with I2C.

The NFC ring actually has two different NFC tags in it; one on each side. [Nairod785] had to program both of the tag ID’s into the Arduino to ensure that the ring would work no matter the orientation.

The system is powered by a small rechargeable 5V battery. [Nairod785] wired up a USB plug flush with the box wall so he can easily charge up the battery while the box is locked. It also allows him to reprogram the Arduino if he feels so inclined. There is also a power switch on the side to conserve energy.

Rolly Bot Puts A New Spin On Independent Wheel Control

August 7, 2014 by Kristina Panos 38 Comments

rolly bot

All of [Darcy]’s friends were making wheeled robots, so naturally, he had to make one too. His friends complicated theirs with h-bridges and casters for independent wheel maneuvering, but [Darcy] wanted something simpler. A couple of 9g servos later, the Rolly Bot was born.

Rolly Bot is self-balancing because of its low center of gravity. Should it hit a wall, the body will flip over, driving it back in the other direction. The BOM comes to a whopping $10, and that includes continuous rotation servos. It does not include the remote control capability he added later, or the cost of the CNC you would need to completely replicate this build. He even made a stand so he could test the wheels during programming.

[Darcy]’s code is on his site along with some pictures of another version someone else built. Watch Rolly Bot roll around after the jump.

How would you make this build even simpler? Tell us in the comments.

Continue reading “Rolly Bot Puts A New Spin On Independent Wheel Control” →

Sniffing NRF24L01+ Traffic With Wireshark

August 5, 2014 by Mathieu Stephan 6 Comments

We’re sure that some of our readers are familiar with the difficult task that debugging/sniffing nRF24L01+ communications can be. Well, [Ivo] developed a sniffing platform based on an Arduino Uno, a single nRF24L01+ module and a computer running the popular network protocol analyzer Wireshark (part1, part2, part3 of his write-up).

As these very cheap modules don’t include a promiscuous mode to listen to all frames being sent on a particular channel, [Ivo] uses for his application a variation of [Travis Goodspeed]’s technique to sniff Enhance Shockburst messages. In short, it consists in setting a shorter than usual address, setting a fix payload length and deactivating the CRC feature. The Arduino Uno connected to the nRF24L01+ is therefore in charge of forwarding the sniffed frames to the computer. An application that [Ivo] wrote parses the received data and forwards it to wireshark, on which can be set various filters to only display the information you’re interested in.

Automated Bathtub Prepares Your Bath Just The Way You Like It

August 4, 2014 by James Hobson 21 Comments

Automated Bathtub Controlled by Arduino

We live in the future don’t we? Is there a reason why only rich people have touchscreen controlled showers and temperature regulated bathtubs? [Raptor_Demon] shows us how to make our very own automated bathtub for cheap, using our favorite microprocessor — the Arduino.

The system controls the filling of the tub, monitors the temperature based on a user profile — and it even adds bubbles. Why do you need this? You probably don’t — but why not, wouldn’t it be nice to press a button and have a bath drawn for you? It uses an Arduino compatible board that controls 3 relays for the water system, a DS18b20 temperature sensor on the inlet and a second wireless (434mhz) Arduino compatible board for monitoring the tub temperature and adding bubble bath using a hacked automated soap dispenser.

[Raptor_Demon] showcased his prototype at the Maker Faire NC 2013 and 2014 where it was a huge hit. He even had a full size tub going, in which he would sit in during his explanation — check it out!

Continue reading “Automated Bathtub Prepares Your Bath Just The Way You Like It” →