Tool Hacks

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The Modular Bench Power Supply To Rule Them All

February 12, 2015 by 68 Comments

Right now, [The Big One] is using an ATX power supply as a bench power supply for all his electronics projects. It works, but it’s not ideal. The next step up from a power supply from an old computer is, in order, one of those Chinese deals on Amazon, a used HP supply, or for the very cool people among us, building your own. [The Big One] is very, very cool and he’s building the modular bench supply to rule them all.

This is not your $100 china special power supply that [The Big One] would have to buy again in a few months. Inside this massive power supply is a massive transformer and rectifier that fans out to multiple power supply modules. The modules themselves will be based on an OPA548 that will be able to supply up to 3A with current limiting.

Each of these channels will be controlled by an ATMega32u4, with all the fancy stuff you’d expect from the ultimate supply; USB for setting voltage, current, and logging data, a nice LCD character display, and it’s surprisingly cheap; just about $100 for the transformer, and about $50 for each module.

It’s shaping up to be a great build, and with all the features, a power supply that would also make a great kit. If you have any input you’d like [The Big One] to hear, let him know on the project page.

A wood router with automated height adjustment

A Router Table With Height Control

February 10, 2015 by 17 Comments

The wood router is a versatile power tool which can be picked up at a low price. Nicer router setups are mounted underneath a table, with the cutting head poking through. This makes it easier and safer to work with the tool.

[Paul] combined his interest in electronics and woodworking by making a router table with automated controls [translation]. The neat part of this build is the automated height control, which ensures accurate cutting depth.

The router is mounted to a threaded rod, which allows it to be moved up and down by a motor. A low cost L298 motor driver provides the power to the motor, which is controlled by an Arduino Uno. A VCNL4020 based sensor board is used to measure distance and accurately set the router height. This tiny proximity sensor looks like a nifty chip, providing distance measurements up to 200 mm and an ambient light sensor in one package.

The routing table has an LCD display and buttons, allowing the user to dial in their desired height. The entire thing was built using recycled bits and well under $100 in new parts.

Robo-Wire-Snips Clip 1k Segments

February 10, 2015 by 29 Comments

Quick, you need 1000 pieces of wire of the same length, what do you do? The disappointing answer is to put on the miniseries masterpiece Frank Herbert’s Dune and get to work snipping those bits by hand. We usually clamp a scrap piece of molding protruding perpendicular to the bench to use as a length guide in these cases.

The more exciting answer is to build a robot to do it for you. There’s no way you can build the robot faster than you could cut the wire… unless you have admirable rapid prototyping skills like [Eberhard]. He strapped together a barebones machine from two motors, and one switch in no time. Pretty amazing!

Wire coming off the spool feeds through two guides held by a third-hand. The outfeed length depends entirely on timing; two slices of wine cork drive the wire which passes through the open jaws of a wire snip. Those snips are hot-glued in place, with a motor winding up a strip connected to the other handle in order to make the cut. The only feedback is a limit switch when the snip is fully open.

It is entirely possible to get even less advanced. Here’s the same concept without the limiting switch. We appreciate the eloquence of the snipper squeeze method on that one. But for the most part we think you’ll be interested in one that goes about stripping the wire ends as well as cutting to length.

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Altoids Tin Network Analyzer

February 9, 2015 by 16 Comments

Network Analyzers are frequently used for measuring filters, making them extremely valuable for building radios and general mucking about with RF. They are, however, extremely expensive. You can, however, build one in an Altoids tin with an Arduino Nano, a small screen, and an AD9850 frequency synthesis module picked up on eBay.

The basic idea behind a network analyzer is to feed a frequency into a device, and measure the amplitude coming out of the device, and plot this relationship over a frequency. [Bill Meara] has been a human network analyzer before, changing frequencies and plotting the output of devices under test by hand. [DuWayne] (KV4QB) build a device to automate the entire process.

The block diagram is easy enough – an AD9850 sends a signal to the device, and this is measured by the Arduino with a small amplifier. The signal is measured again when it comes back from the device under test, and all this is plotted on a small display. Simple, and [DuWayne] is getting some very good readings with a lowpass filter and crystal filter made on a small solderless breadboard.

Watt Meter Build Walks You Through Power Measurement Basics

February 7, 2015 by 27 Comments

You almost never hear of a DC Watt Meter – one just does some mental math with Volts and Amps at the back of one’s head. An AC Watt Meter, on the other hand, can by pretty useful on any workbench. This handy DIY Digital AC Watt Meter not only has an impressive 30A current range, but is designed in a hand-held form factor, making it easy to carry around.

The design from Electro-Labs provides build instructions for the hardware, as well as the software for the PIC micro-controller at its heart. A detailed description walks you through the schematic’s various blocks, and there’s also some basics of AC power measurement thrown in for good measure. The schematic and board layout are done using SolaPCB – a Windows only free EDA tool which we haven’t heard about until now. A full BoM and the PIC code round off the build. On the hardware side, the unit uses MCP3202 12 bit ADC converters with SPI interface, making it easy to hook them up to the micro-controller. A simple resistive divider for voltage and an ACS-712  Hall Effect-Based Linear Current Sensor IC are the main sense elements. Phase calculations are done by the micro-controller. The importance of isolation is not overlooked, using opto-isolators to keep the digital section away from the analog. The board outline looks like it has been designed to fit some off-the-shelf hand-held plastic enclosure (if you can’t find one, whip one up from a 3D printer).

Although the design is for 230V~250V range, it can easily be modified for 110V use by changing a few parts. Swap the transformer, change the Resistive voltage divider values, maybe some DC level shifting, and you’re good to go. The one feature that would be a nice upgrade to this meter would be Energy measurements, besides just Power. For an inside look at how traditional energy meters work, head over to this video where [Ben Krasnow] explains KiloWatt Hour Meters

 

A DIY Pick And Place You Can Build Right Now

February 6, 2015 by 32 Comments

There have been quite a few DIY pick and place projects popping up recently, but most of them are limited to conceptual designs or just partially working prototypes. [Juha] wrote in to let us know about his project, LitePlacer, which is a fully functional DIY pick and place machine with working vision that can actually import BOMs and place parts as small as 0402 with pretty good accuracy.

LitePlacer UIWhile some other DIY pick and place setups we’ve featured use fairly exotic setups like delta bots, this machine is built around typical grooved bearings and extruded aluminum. The end effector includes a rotating vacuum tip and a camera mounted alongside the tip. The camera provides feedback for locating fiducials and for finding the position of parts. Instead of using feeders for his machine, [Juha] opted to pick parts directly from pieces of cut tape. While this might be inconvenient if you’re placing large quantities of a single part, it helps keep the design simple.

The software that runs the machine is pretty sophisticated. After a bit of configuration it’s able to import a BOM with X/Y information and start placing within seconds. It also uses the camera to calibrate the needle, measure the PCB  using the fiducials, and pinpoint the location of cut tape sections.

If you want to build your own machine, [Juha] published detailed instructions that walk you through the entire assembly process. He’s also selling a kit of parts if you don’t want to source everything yourself. Check out the video after the break to see the machine import a BOM and place some parts (all the way down to 0402).

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DIY SMD Twofer: Manual Pick-and-Place And The Beak

February 5, 2015 by 23 Comments

Populating a board with tiny SMT parts can be really tricky, and we’ll take all the help we can get. If you’re in the same boat, [vpapanik] has two devices you should check out.

First up is the manual pick-and-place machine. Wait, what? A manual pick-and-place? It’s essentially an un-driven 2-axis machine with a suction tip and USB inspection microscope on the stage. The picker apparatus is the “standard” needle-plus-aquarium-pump design, and the rails are made from angle aluminum and skateboard bearings.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It’s not a robot. But sometimes the right jig or tool makes all the difference between a manual procedure being fiddly and being graceful. And we couldn’t help but laugh at the part in the video where he demonstrates the “machine” moving in a circular pattern.

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