Winterizing: Keeping The Drafts Out Of Double-hung Windows

August 23, 2011 by Mike Szczys 22 Comments

[Rumplestiltskin] has had work done on his double-hung windows to help prevent drafts and keep them in good working order. But there are still a few that rattle, and let in the cold of winter. Not this year; he’s added a small feature to the jamb that will keep out the cold weather.

A pair of jointing blocks were added to each window. The small block seen above is attached to the window jam with a couple of all-purpose screws, and hosts a machine screw which points toward the window frame. Since there is weather stripping between the two window frames, and between the frame and the outer jamb, tightening this screw will snug the frames up to close any small gaps. This has the unintended consequence of prohibiting the window from being opened (unless you don’t mind scraping the paint as the machine screw slides across the wood). But if only used in the winter months this is a viable solution.

Setting It Straight About Science Fair Solar Energy Breakthrough

August 22, 2011 by Mike Szczys 58 Comments

There’s been a lot of stories about arranging solar panels to mimic leaves on a tree, thereby boosting their efficiency. But before reading that story you might want to check out this blog post correcting some flaws in that breakthrough (page is down, here’s a cached version).

Before we go any further, we’d like to point out that the original work was done by a seventh grader. He looked at leaves on trees and postulated that the Fibonacci sequence can be found in the layout of leaves, and that by laying out solar cells in the same way you can capture more sunlight. Comments can get negative fast around here, so remember that trashing his work may discourage other kids from participating in science fair events.

Anyway, long story short: there were some issues with original assumptions, and about what was actually being measured during testing. The article linked at the top covers the fact that the cells were not measured under load, and that simple calculations can show why the tree-mimicking-cell-placement can be proven sub-optimal to 45 degree, south-facing solar farms.

[Thanks Jeffery and Steve for the original article and Brian for the follow-up article and cached link]

Feel The Hum Of Electricity Between Your Legs

August 10, 2011 by Mike Szczys 21 Comments

Here’s a little eye candy for motorcycle enthusiasts everywhere. This is the newest iteration of [Julian’s] electric motorcycle. He obviously knows what he’s doing because everything fits into the frame in a way that is still very pleasing to the eye. But this is actually slimmed down from the original design. If you take a look a back at some of his older posts you’ll see that the four relatively small lithium batteries are a new addition.

The frame was designed to hold four lead-acid batteries. Those things really take up a lot of space and add considerable weight to the vehicle. His recent upgrade was also accompanied by a re-gearing that allows him to reach higher speeds (although he doesn’t say what the top speed actually is). You can’t really see it above, but [Julian] included a wooden insert where the tank on a gasoline motorcycle would have been. It houses control switches as well as a 48V voltmeter. It’s a fantastic finishing touch like the cherry on a sundae.

A Simple DIY Solar Tracker

June 17, 2011 by Jeremy Cook 40 Comments

The sun is a great source of energy, however, efficiently collecting this energy can be hard to do. One thing that can improve the results of solar use is to actually track the sun’s movement. [fanman1981] hooked up his own homebrew solar tracker using some pretty clever techniques.

For this hack he used two Harbor freight 45 Watt solar kits, some struts on the bottom, and a Dish Network satellite dish bracket hooked up to an “old school” antenna motor. Although one might think this device tracks the sun using some sort of sensor, it’s actually just a matter of hooking up the device to rotate at timed interval with a remote control. This interval is figured out with the benefit of some charts on livingonsolar.com.

To see it in use, check out the video after the break. He gives a good explanation about how everything was put together, but if you just want to see it move, fast forward to around 5:26, really quite impressive.

Continue reading “A Simple DIY Solar Tracker” →

RFID Shower Time Logger

June 9, 2011 by Jeremy Cook 17 Comments

Paul, as he describes himself, is “a student without a big budget,” which might have been part of the inspiration for this hack . Paul wanted to see how much time he was spending under the shower each day, so came up with this monitoring device using the ever-awesome Arduino processor and a RFID tag that many of you are certainly familiar with. One simply waves the tag in front of the reader to start the timer, and waves it again to stop it.

One may not, however, be familiar with “thingspeak” and “weatherspark“, two other important elements of this hack. Thingspeak is “an open application platform designed to enable meaningful connection between things and people,” and was used to interface the weather data on weatherspark with the shower monitor. This was to help figure out if there was a connection between outside temperature and the length of showers taken.

The results of this experiment should be interesting, so hopefully some will be published soon!

[via hackedgadgets]

Another Smarter Water Heater Timer

June 9, 2011 by Nick Schulze 28 Comments

When notes stuck to the water heater failed [Ryan] decided to whip up “the world’s most expensive 240V relay” using a servo, a real time clock and of course an Arduino. All in an attempt to save a buck or two thanks to LA’s “Time-of-Use program”.

Using a protoshield Ryan soldered up a RTC module using the DS1307 chip. On board he added some LED’s and switches including a holiday switch keep the heater off, a next cycle button when you need some hot water and to hell with the expense, and a pulsing blue LED.. for no reason at all. The board flips the mechanical switch using a servo and piano wire, simple but effective. We wonder how many days/weeks it will take for it to offset its expense?

DIY Earthquake Detector

June 8, 2011 by Jeremy Cook 20 Comments

Some animals seem to be able to detect earthquakes. Some animals also navigate using the earth’s magnetic field. From the idea that there may be some relationship with these two things, this experimental earthquake detector was born. [Bob Davis] built this device, which uses an Arduino and several Hall effect sensors to detect and record magnetic fields. Possibly after enough data is recorded, a correlation can be found between the two phenomena.

The sensors in this device are arranged to measure magnetism in four directions as well as in the vertical axis. Part of the idea behind this is that before an earthquake the quartz in the ground moves producing a magnetic field.

In the video after the break, Bob gives some background on the theory behind this device and talks about the first version (built way back in the year 2000) which uses a PC for control and recording. Really interesting stuff so be sure to listen to Bob’s explanation after the break. Continue reading “DIY Earthquake Detector” →