It’s not the most involved hack we’ve seen this week, but it’s definitely creative and made us laugh. [Grant] and some friends were joking around about how cool it would be to have sitcom-style entry music fire off every time someone came in through a door, but in real life. You know, like everyone wants to have their own theme music? This is the same idea, but the Seinfeld equivalent. (Video embedded below the break.)
A few simple parts later (Arduino, MP3 shield, magnetic door reed switch) and a tiny bit of code to randomize which bass riff plays, and it’s a done deal. Like we said, it’s not rocket science, but it’s a humorous addition to what looks like a well-stocked game room. (Is that a Joust console we see?)
For even greater comic effect, why not add Seinfeld bass riffs to your skateboard ramps?
Looking at the “before” pictures on [John]’s blog, we can see why he’d want to invest the effort – not exactly an attractive way to greet guests at the front door. A simple wooden box to replace the previous cover would have sufficed, but why pass up the opportunity to add value? [John] opted for a Nixie tube display to complement the glass of the electric meter. The Nixie modules were a bit on the pricey side, though, so with only a pair of tubes to work with, [John] came up with a clever system to indicate the scale of the display. We doubt he’ll ever see megawatt-level instantaneous power draw, but the meter is also capable of totalling energy use, and as a bonus an ESP-8266 gives lets him stream data to the web.
Disco Floor’s are passé. [dennis1a4] turned them upside down and built an awesome 
The hard part was wiring up all of the 160 LED pixels. Instead of mounting the 5050 SMD LED’s on PCBs, [dennis1a4] wired them all up “dead bug” style. Each pixel has one LED, a 100nF decoupling capacitor, and 91 ohm resistors in series with the Data In and Data Out pins – these apparently help prevent ‘ringing’ on the data bus. Check the video for his radical soldering method. Each SMD LED was clamped in a machine shop vice, and the other three parts with their leads preformed were soldered directly to the LED pins.
[Vince]’s livestock appears to consist of chickens and sheep at this point, and the fact that they share housing helped him to deploy some tech for both species. The chickens got an automated door that lets them out in the morning and shuts them in safely once they’ve returned to roost for the night – important protection against predators. The door is hoisted by a 
