[eric] has found that he can build a pretty nice 2 axis joystick out of some VCR parts. Specifically, he’s using the idler wheel. When you disassemble the idler wheel, you’ll find that it has a bevelled washer in the perfect location to help with smooth joystick operation. Add a spring and a hole in some wood and you’ve got the basics. All you need to add now are the switches. This is a fantastic example of recycling parts, you never would have guessed that it was made from trash.
This digital thermometer won’t win any awards for being something innovative and new, but we really like how it looks. The bar graph style display adds something to the project that a normal character display just wouldn’t. You can download source code and schematics on the site.
[via YourITronics]
[moris_zen] found himself with a hand full of Li-Ion batteries and no good way to see what their capacities were. He built a this unique tester really quick to get the job done. He’s using off the shelf components and a cheap pocket watch which he bought in Taiwan for $1. You hook the circuit up to your battery, click the button and the watch starts working. When it stops, you multiply that number by .38 to get your amp/hour results. Sure, he could have just used a counter, but this is an interesting approach. All he needs to do now is make a nice container to hide all of the circuitry. How could he change the circuit to make the end multiplication unnecessary?
Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories has put out this nice tool. It’s a Zif socket for Arduino. If you’re doing a lot of flashing, this could be a nice addition to keep from having to pry your chip out every time. Plus, it looks cool in a soviet era technology kind of way.
[Rhys Jones] has been working with the RepRap team to develop a way to print circuit boards. The machine first prints the plastic substrate with channels for the metal to be deposited into. They adapted their pinch wheel feeder to work with solid core solder (flux creates a mess). The extruded solder’s specific heat isn’t hot enough to melt the plastic. They made a video (embedded below) of their test piece: an optical endstop. The team has also been experimenting with decoupling the feed mechanism from the extruder.
[vimeo http://vimeo.com/3983501%5D
[Jed] from Toronto’s hackerspace HackLab.TO coded the theme from Super Mario Bros. for their laser cutter. He’s posted the ruby code that generates the g-code from a simple tablature.
Related: CNC music factory Still Alive
[via Waxy]
We might have to add a category of “stuff made to twitter”. The latest installment is an office chair that twitters whenever it gets farted on. The author has a smart sounding description as to why he decided to make this, and he has a pretty good point about twittering interrupting the things you’re twittering about, but it all boils down to the fact that he wants to twitter his farts. We can’t say that we didn’t expect something along these lines. He has mounted a natural gas sensor in his chair, along with a squidbee wireless transceiver. You can download all the code as well as see the construction in the instructable. You can also follow his flatulent adventures on the twitter account of the office chair.
