Power Up With Knowledge

August 15, 2011 by Kevin Dady 18 Comments

The LM317 is a favorite for many people who want quick, cheap, reliable and ajustable power. It only takes a few parts to set up and it does its job rather well. Sometimes though, you just need a power supply.While there are a million tutorials out there, not many go as in depth as [Phil] does in his 2 newest videos.

Covering everything from the wall outlet to the final output, [Phil] explains each part step by step, stating what it does and the math and formulas behind it all to produce quality results. He then goes over to a working model and reviews each part showing its real output on a oscilloscope, which is very handy if you do not have one yourself.

In the second video he takes that knowledge and builds it all up into a professional looking bench top model with LCD meter readout and varnished paper to complete the front look. If you’re looking to build your first bench supply or want a better grasp on what exactly is happening in the one you have now, you should join us after the break for these 2 quality productions.

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Make Your Own Custom Hot Glue Sticks

August 14, 2011 by Kevin Dady 63 Comments

Hot glue guns can be very handy tools for bonding all sorts of surfaces, while getting you accustomed to plastic burns. The one thing they lack though is color, and while yes, you can on occasion find colored glue sticks, there is usually only a limited selection and they cost way more than the normal amber or clear sticks.

[Ken] solves the blandness problem of hot glue sticks in his kitchen, as shown in this cool slideshow. In a melt and recast process, glue sticks and crayons in a 3:1 ratio are slowly heated on an electric stove in a old can. Metal tubing is lined with silicone parchment paper to act as a release agent. The now vivid and scalding hot glue is poured into the tube and left to cool.

You might be wondering how mixing colored wax into ethylene-vinyl acetate effects the glue’s strength . According to the author if you need decrease the mix viscosity, you can add up to 10% paraffin wax by weight without effecting the bond strength. Color and viscosity control? Hot glue just keeps getting better!

Juice Bridge Powers Your Breadboard In A Snap

August 13, 2011 by Mike Nathan 28 Comments

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[Quinn Dunki] got tired of messing around with wires when connecting things to her benchtop power supply, so she built herself useful little power bridge that plugs directly into any standard breadboard.

The board is small and simple, but quite useful all the same. It was built to power both sides of the breadboard, and it can be easily switched between an unregulated power supply and a regulated 5v supply. An ammeter can be attached to the board via a pair of pins she set aside, allowing her to easily measure the current draw of the entire circuit.

We think her “Juice Bridge” would be very useful to anyone who frequently prototypes on breadboards. In fact, it would be a fantastic beginner project since it involves etching and developing PCBs as well as some simple soldering, while resulting in a handy takeaway tool at the same time.

If you want to build one of your own, [Quinn] has the schematics and Eagle PCB files available for download on her site.

DIY Smart Tweezers Make SMD Work A Cinch

August 10, 2011 by Mike Nathan 22 Comments

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[Noel] does a lot of SMD work and wanted a pair of “smart” tweezers that could be used to place components as well as for reading their capacitance and resistance values on the fly. As we have seen, these things can be somewhat costly, and not really necessary if you already have a good multimeter. With that in mind, he figured he could build his own for almost nothing.

He started off with a pair of kids’ “training” chopsticks which are durable, but more importantly, non-conductive. He took a second pair of tweezers, this time made of metal, and split them in two. He soldered wire to a set of ring terminals, mounting one on each leg of his broken tweezers. The final bit of assembly involved using zipties to mount everything on the plastic chopsticks along with the addition of banana plugs to the end of his probes.

[Noel] says that the tweezers work quite well, and with such a low price tag, we can’t argue.

An Introduction To DC Boost Converters

August 10, 2011 by Mike Nathan 17 Comments

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If you are planning on creating some sort of Nixie tube display, you will undoubtedly need to find yourself a high voltage DC power supply. If you don’t want to add a transformer to your project, you can always opt to build a boost converter instead. [Andrew Moser] shows us just how easy it is to build one, discussing the theory behind simple boost converters along the way.

Boost converters are often driven by dedicated ICs, but in this case the PWM signal from an Arduino does the job just fine. [Andrew] covers the process of choosing the proper components for the circuit, discussing duty cycles and components to avoid lest your boost converter die an untimely death.

He shows us how to implement a feedback system to get a more precise output voltage, but as Lady Ada has shown us, an open loop works pretty well too.

For the beginners that want to just get things up and running, his instructions and code should be sufficient, but [Andrew] provides plenty of reference links for those looking to delve deeper into the subject.

Ohm Sense Makes Sense Of Resistor Color Bands

August 6, 2011 by Brian Benchoff 59 Comments

[Alex Busman]’s first foray in iOS programming looks like a pretty useful tool. He came up with Ohm Sense, an iPhone app that will take a picture of a resistor and calculate the value based on the color bands. It’s a great tool that we wish we had when we were starting out. At 99 cents, the app is also much cheaper than the emotional cost of our relationship with Violet.

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How To Add Modular Tools To Your Soldering Platform

August 3, 2011 by Mike Szczys 19 Comments

[Patenomics] has had some trouble finding a suitable place to work on projects in his tiny apartment. Lately he’s taken to using the stove top as a soldering platform and was looking for ways to protect the stove while adding functionality. He built this soldering platform from a couple chunks of pegboard and some hardware store parts. He’s in for under $15 and has a really functional platform that may be worth adding to your solder station.

The two pegboard pieces are held in place by threaded rod and some nuts. This hardware also lends itself to adjustable feet so that you can make the platform level and stable. The holes in the top and bottom sheets line up to receive and securely position some additional tools. Here you can see that bendable copper pipe keeps some alligator clips right where they’re needed, but future plans include adding lights, clamps, and lasers.

This makes a nice work platform to go along with your other portable electronic bench tools. But if you’ve really got the itch, you’ll eventually outgrow all of this and then it might be time to find yourself a hackerspace to join.