“This program was written so i could control a tiny $10 remote control car (and to procrastinate homework). The lpt port pins (6,7,8,9) are used to control Forward, Reverse, Left and Right in the controller. In addition to this program, I had to build a simple circuit to bypass the buttons on the remote control.”
those r/c cars are just chock full of hackability.
it’s officialy monday again. another week of mindless drudgery and stolen red staplers. if going postal with a nerf gun isn’t your bag, perhaps something more subtle such as this mini claymore mine would be more appropriate. you can make one from common materials found in your desk drawer and a strech of scotch tape provides a functional and decorative trip wire. yeah, probably a really bad idea
thanks to everyone’s great feedback, i’ve now got a usb battery that’s much more efficient and capable of delivering more current to a portable device. like i promised, i put together a slick little case to finish this hack off right. read on for some tips on building your own.
apparently, greg miller is a class ‘a’ dumpster diver and high voltage hacker. aside from the image intensifier tube found on ebay, this night vision scope is made almost entirely from other people’s junk. something like this would add the perfect touch for creeping out friends with your silence of the lambs impersonations.
microwave oven + metal = fun
our pal barb dybwad from the unofficial apple weblog sent us this link. (Editor from the far future: try the Wayback Machine). david reid discusses a cheap and easy method for melting and casting metals in a common microwave. apparently, this method requires only very minor modifications to the oven and is able to reach temperatures of around 1000 degrees celcius, thereby melting small amounts of cast iron. i find this amazing since i still can’t figure out how to thaw the center of a frozen burrito of similar external temperature. it looks like there is still some hacking to be done to find a process capable of melting steel, so i’ll leave that as an exercise for the reader.
when you are done making pewter army men, you may also want to check out the detailed photos of barb’s new mac mini. lucky!
hackaday reader dan really made my day by sending us a great hack that shows you how to turn a microsizer/bitchar-g/zipzap micro r/c car into a 2 channel airplane for a total cost of $35.
those cars cost about $10, are incredibly tiny, and you can find them everywhere. that’s definitely worth considering next time you want some sort of r/c functionality in your own hack.
update: page has moved to a new url. i’ve linked to it below.
Continue reading “Radio Controlled Airplane From A Micro R/c Car”
found out yesterday that there’s a shuffle shortage and gadget battery life can only be expected to get worse. bummer. at least you can make the most of your waiting-for-shuffle blues and solder yourself a ‘usb battery’. this little gizmo runs off a 9 volt battery and supplies your favorite little device with the proper 5 volts of mobile power.
in lieu of running an ipod off of it, i tested it with an mpx220 smartphone and it should work fine with any low power mobile device that can charge via usb cable. read more for instructions on how to make your own.
