This week, Editor-in-Chief Elliot Williams and Assignments Editor Kristina Panos gushed about NASA’s live obliteration of minor planet Dimorphos using a probe outfitted with a camera. Spoiler alert: the probe reaches its rock-dappled rocky target just fine, and the final transmitted image has a decidedly human tinge.

Kristina brought the mystery sound again this week, much to Elliot’s sonic delight. Did he get it? Did he figure it out? Well, no. The important thing is one of you is bound to get it.

We kick off the hacks with a really neat 3D printed linkage that acts as an elevator for a marble run, and then we discuss a mid-century hack that helps you decide whether it’s time to emerge from the fallout shelter using the contents of your typical 1950s pockets. We spent a few minutes comparing our recent radiation exposure levels  — Kristina wins with about a dozen x-rays so far this year, but no full-body CT scans. Then we talk guitars for a bit, remember a forgotten CPU from TI, and spend a few cycles talking about a tone-wheel organ that sounds like a chorus of gleeful gerbils.

Finally, we talk toner transfer for 3D prints, argue in defense of small teams versus large committees, and get all tangled up in cursive.

Direct download.

Check out the links below if you want to follow along, and as always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!

Continue reading “Hackaday Podcast 187: The Sound Of Gleeful Gerbils, The Song Of The Hard Drive, And A Lipstick Pickup Lullaby” →

This week, Editor-in-Chief Elliot Williams and Assignments Editor Kristina Panos had a lot of fun discussing the best of the previous week’s hacks in spite of Elliot’s microphone connectivity troubles. News-wise, we busted out the wine and cheese to briefly debate whether a Colorado man should have won an art competition by entering an image created by AI. Afterward, we went around a bit about floppies, which are being outlawed in Japan.

Then it’s on to the What’s That Sound Results Show, but since Elliot can’t find a 14-sided die, he pulled on the Internet for our random number needs. Congratulations to our big winner [D Rex], who will receive one our coveted Hackaday Podcast t-shirts (Ed. note: Heck, I don’t even have one! That’s how special these babies are).

Afterlife for dead floppies.

Make shoes out of this.

Kristina’s Cyberdeck Thoughts

Is the food-safety-of-3D-printing debate over once and for all? It is as far as Elliot’s concerned. You know what else is over? The era of distributed, independent email servers. Bah! We’re not kidding about that last one — and we discuss a lie-detecting app that may or may not prove our innocence.

Finally, we talk active foot cooling, heat barriers for hot shops, and big, strong magnets. What are they for? Fixing floppies, fool!

Direct download.

Check out the links below if you want to follow along, and as always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!

Continue reading “Hackaday Podcast 184: What Is Art, Bulk Tape Eraser Go Brr, And The Death Of Email” →

This week, Editor-in-Chief Elliot Williams and Assignments Editor Kristina Panos met up on a secret server to discuss the cream of this week’s crop of hacks. After gushing about the first-ever Kansas City Keyboard Meetup coming up tomorrow — Saturday the 27th, we start off by considering the considerable engineering challenge of building a knife-throwing machine, the logistics of live-streaming on the go, and the thermodynamics of split-level homes.

This week, Kristina came up with the What’s-That-Sound and managed to stump Elliot for a while, though he did eventually guess correctly after the tape stopped rolling. Think you know what it is? Then fill out the form and you’ll earn the chance to win a genuine Hackaday Podcast t-shirt!

Later in the show, we look at a macro pad that breaks the mold, an ASCII terminal like it’s 1974, and a Z80 that never was (but definitely could have been). Stick around as we root for the CubeSats hitching a ride aboard Artemis I, and at last call on the ‘cast, it’s lagers vs. ales (vs. ciders).

Direct download.

Check out the links below if you want to follow along, and as always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!

Continue reading “Hackaday Podcast 183: Stowaway Science, Cold Basements, And Warm Beers” →

This week, Editor-in-Chief Elliot Williams and Assignments Editor Kristina Panos convened in a secret location to say what we will about the choicest hacks of the past week. We kick things off by discussing the brand new Cyberdeck contest, which is the first of it’s type, but certainly won’t be the last. In other contest news, we recently announced the winners of the Hack it Back Challenge of the Hackaday Prize, which ran the gamut from bodysnatching builds to rad resto-mods and resto-recreations.

Taking top honors in wow factor this week is [Stuff Made Here]’s jigsaw puzzle-solving robot. This monster can currently tackle small laser-cut puzzles, but is destined to solve an all-white 5000-piece nightmare once all the engineering pieces have come together.

Then we took a field trip to Zip Tie City, where the plastic’s green ♻ and the wiring’s pretty, admired volcano nuts from afar, and briefly considered the idea of a 3D printer with a heating zone of programmable length.

Finally, we take a look at a creatively destructive robot that’s akin to a useless machine, bloviate about books you should read, and dance around the topic of learning by playing.

Direct download.

Check out the links below if you want to follow along, and as always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!

Continue reading “Hackaday Podcast 181: 3D Printing With Volcano Nuts, The Hackaday Bookshelf, And A Puzzlebot” →