Android Tablet Finds New Home In Car Dash

February 10, 2015 by Rich Bremer 51 Comments

[Matt]’s 2008 Subaru’s stereo wasn’t really cutting the mustard for him anymore. He wanted to do something, something a little more custom than just an aftermarket stereo. After giving it some thought he decided he would try to mount an Android tablet in his car’s dash to act as a media player.

The HTC Evo View tablet appeared to be a great size to fit in the space left over from the stock radio, and it did fit nicely but there was a problem, the AC vent was in the way of the headphone and USB jacks! This was only a minor inconvenience for [Matt]. Instead of butchering the AC vents he decided to disassemble the tablet and see what the other options were. Luckily for him, both the USB and headphone jacks were on their own PCB boards. A quick slot cut in the rear tablet case allowed both connectors to now face towards the front of the car into the gaping crevasse the stock stereo once filled. Since the manipulated tablet case was facing inside the dash it wouldn’t create any unsightliness for the passengers.

With those connections out of the way it was time to focus on mounting the tablet in the dash. The stock trim panel that housed the old radio and two AC vents was modified with a hand-made fiberglass bezel to fit the tablet screen and make it look like the car came that way. The bezel was sanded smooth and painted to match the rest of the interior.

Originally, [Matt] had to turn the tablet both on and off when starting and stopping the car. He then stumbled upon a product called the IOIO. The IOIO allows an Android device to interact with the inputs and outputs; both digital and analog, I2C, SPI and UART. It even has a voltage regulator that can take the car’s 12v supply and knock it down to 5 for the tablet. [Matt] also connected the IOIO to the car’s ‘ignition on’ circuit to turn the unit on and off with the car.

[Matt] plans on doing more with the IOIO’s capabilities in the future, but until then, he still has a pretty nice looking and unique car stereo.

Wireless Helmet Speakers Receive A+ For Distracting Wearer

February 6, 2015 by Rich Bremer 27 Comments

What could be better than cruising around town on your fave scooter? Cruising around town on your fave scooter listening to some cool tunes, of course! [sswanton] was enrolled in an Industrial Design course and was tasked with creating a wireless radio project for a specific user (of his choice). He decided to add some wireless speakers to a motorcycle helmet and design a handlebar-mounted radio.

[sswanton] started out by disassembling the ultra-inexpensive, old-school, battery-powered Sony ICF-S22 radio specified by the class. The stock case was discarded as he would have to make a new one that fits onto the bike’s handlebars. Plywood makes up majority of the frame while the cover is black acrylic. Getting the acrylic bent required heating to 160 degrees so that it could be bent around a form [sswanton] created specifically for this project. A few cutouts in the case allows the rider to access the volume and tuning knobs.

The speakers added to the helmet were from wireless headphones and came with a matched transmitter. The transmitter was removed from it’s unnecessarily large case, installed in the radio’s newly created enclosure and connected to the radio’s headphone output. Situating the headphone components in the ideal locations of the helmet required that the headphones be disassembled. The speakers were placed in the helmets ear cups. Part of the original headphone case and some control buttons were mounted on the outside of the helmet for easy access. The wires connecting the components had to be extended to reconnect the now spread-out parts.

In order to hear that sweet music all the rider needs to do is turn on the headphones and radio. Check this out to see some more helmet speakers, this time a little more wacky.

BMW Remote Unlock Wasn’t Using Secure HTTP

February 1, 2015 by Mike Szczys 32 Comments

Ah, the old HTTP versus HTTPS. If you want to keep people out, that trailing ‘S’ should be the first thing you do, especially if you’re trying to keep people out of a luxury automobile. It turns out that BMW screwed up on that one.

BMW has an infotainment feature called ConnectedDrive which builds your favorite apps and services right into the dashboard. You can even unlock the vehicle using this system which is built around a piece of hardware that includes a GSM modem and permanent SIM card. A security research group recently discovered that the commands sent for this system were being pushed over HTTP, the unencrypted sibling of HTTPS. The firm, hired by German automobile club ADAC, disclosed the vulnerability and an over-the-air upgrade has already been pushed to patch the flaw. The patch is described to have “turned on” the HTTPS which makes us think that it was always meant to be used and just configured incorrectly in the roll-out. We’ll leave you to debate that point in the comments. Seriously, how does something like this happen? It certainly sheds a lot more light on thieves being able to magically unlock high-end cars. Was this how they were doing it?

[Thanks Fabian]

Autonomous Vehicle-Following Vehicle

February 1, 2015 by Bryan Cockfield 36 Comments

Humanity has taken one step closer to Skynet becoming fully aware. [Ahmed], [Muhammad], [Salman], and [Suleman] have created a vehicle that can “chase” another vehicle as part of their senior design project. Now it’s just a matter of time before the machines take over.

The project itself is based on a gasoline-powered quad bike that the students first converted to electric for the sake of their project. It uses a single webcam to get information about its surroundings. This is a plus because it frees the robot from needing a stereoscopic camera or any other complicated equipment like a radar or laser rangefinder. With this information, it can follow a lead vehicle without getting any other telemetry.

This project is interesting because it could potentially allow for large convoys with only one human operator at the front. Once self-driving cars become more mainstream, this could potentially save a lot of costs as well if only the vehicle in the front needs the self-driving equipment, while the vehicles behind would be able to operate with much less hardware. Either way, we love seeing senior design projects that have great real-world applications!

Continue reading “Autonomous Vehicle-Following Vehicle” →

A Cute Little 3D Printed Skateboard

January 19, 2015 by Brian Benchoff 23 Comments

[Julian] has been wanting a tiny little skateboard for a while now, and decided to make something useful on his 3D printer. A little more than twenty hours later a tiny and cute printed skateboard popped out.

[Julian] got the files for his 3D printed skateboard from Thingiverse and printed them off on a MakerGear M2. The parts printed easily, each part taking about six hours to print. The parts are bolted together with five threaded rods, the trucks were screwed on, and the wheels popped into place.

While a normal skateboard probably wouldn’t stand up to the 3D printed parts and threaded rod construction, this Pennyboard is tiny, and most of [Julian]’s weight is right over the trucks at all times. This is also not a board that’s going to see a lot of tricks; it’s basically a micro longboard for moving from one place to another, not something you’ll need to find an abandoned in-ground pool to use properly.

You can check out the video below.

Continue reading “A Cute Little 3D Printed Skateboard” →

BLDC Controller With The Teensy 3.1

January 13, 2015 by Brian Benchoff 18 Comments

[Will] is on the electric vehicle team at Duke, and this year they’re trying to finally beat a high school team. This year they’re going all out with a monocoque carbon fiber body, and since [Will] is on the electronics team, he’s trying his best by building a new brushless DC motor controller.

Last year, a rule change required the Duke team to build a custom controller, and this time around they’re refining their earlier controller by making it smaller and putting a more beginner-friendly microcontroller on board. Last years used an STM32, but this time around they’re using a Teensy 3.1. The driver itself is a TI DRV8301, a somewhat magical 3 phase 2A gate driver.

The most efficient strategy of driving a motor is to pulse the throttle a little bit and coast the rest of the time. It’s the strategy most of the other teams in the competition use, but this driver is over-engineered by a large margin. [Will] put up a video of the motor controller in action, you can check that out below.

Continue reading “BLDC Controller With The Teensy 3.1” →

Wood-Only Kart Race Inspires Fancy Wooden Bearings

January 12, 2015 by Matt Freund 47 Comments

The mountainous Italian town of Artena holds an annual soap box derby for wood vehicles – and they mean 100% wood, not a speck of anything else. Fierce competition led [Alessio] to engineering and CNC fabricating these gorgeous wooden roller bearings for the wheels to give him an edge.

Thousands in costume attend the renaissance faire known as “Palio delle contrade di Artena”, and the popular wood-only race is called “La Carettella.” The karts are operated by a two-man team: one in front who brakes, the other in the rear who hops on and off to push as needed throughout the course. There appears to be no steering from the wheels** so turning is also a two-man effort. The wooden levers dragging on the pavement provide some steering from the “driver”, and the push-man often manhandles the entire rear end, drifting where necessary.
The course also includes full-width obstacles like hay bales. Teams are divided by community or “contrada”, and it was [Alessio]’s team captain who came to him with the special request of roller bearings. Unable to find evidence of other wooden bearings, [Alessio] knew he would have to invent them himself – so he did.