While we’d love to have you all join us in Pasadena, the next best thing is to connect up to the festivities through the magic of the Internet. As always, the main stage talks will be streamed live to our YouTube channel, while the talks taking place in the DesignLab will be recorded and posted afterwards.
Though it’s not quite as immersive as being in the alleyway and listening to the dogs bark (if you know, you know), you can also join the #supercon-chat channel in the official Hackaday Discord server if you want to virtually rub shoulders with some of our favorite people in the world.
For our 2025 Component Abuse Challenge there have been a set of entries which merely use a component for a purpose it wasn’t quite intended, and another which push misuse of a part into definite abuse territory, which damages or fundamentally changes it. [Ken Yap]’s use of a transistor base-emitter junction as a voltage reference certainly fits into the latter category.
If you forward bias a base-emitter junction, it will behave as a diode, which could be used as a roughly 0.7 volt reference. But this project is far more fun than that, because it runs the junctions in reverse biased breakdown mode. Using one of those cheap grab bags of transistor seconds, he finds that devices of the same type maintain the same voltage, which for the NPN devices he has works out at 9.5 volts and the PNP at 6.5. We’re told it damages their operation as transistors, but with a grab bag, that’s not quite the issue.
Part of setting up a microcontroller when writing a piece of firmware usually involves configuring its connections to the outside world. You define a mapping of physical pins to intenral peripherals to decide which is an input, output, analogue, or whatever other are available. In some cases though that choice isn’t available, and when you’ve used all the available output pins you’re done. But wait – can you use an input as an output? With [SCART VADER]’s lateral thinking, you can.
The whole thing takes advantage of the internal pull-up resistor that a microcontroller has among its internal kit of parts. Driving a transistor from an output pin usually requires a base resistor, so would it be possible to use the pullup as a base resistor? If the microcontroller can enable or disable the resistor on an input pin then yes it can, a transistor can be turned off and on with nary an output to be seen. In this case the chip is from ATmega parts bin so we’re not sure if the trick is possible on other manufacturers’ devices.
As part of our 2025 Component Abuse Challenge, this one embodies the finest principles of using a part in a way it was never intended to be used, and we love it. You’ve still got a few days to make an entry yourself at the time of writing this, so bring out your own hacks!
There are still a few days before the doors open on this year’s Hackaday Supercon in Pasadena, but for the most dedicated attendees, the badge hacking has already begun…even if they don’t have a badge yet.
Metal hinge pin? Brass inserts? Scotty would be proud.
Although the layout of this year’s badge is about as far from the slim outline of the iconic flip-up Trek communicator as you can get, [Thomas] managed to perfectly capture its overall style. By using the “Fuzzy Skin” setting in the slicer, he was even able to replicate the leather-like texture seen on the original prop.
Between that and the “chrome” trim, the finished product really nails everything Jadzia Dax loved about classic 23rd century designs. It’s not hard to imagine this could be some companion device to the original communicator that we just never got to see on screen.
While there’s no denying that the print quality on the antenna lid is exceptional, we’d really like to see that part replaced with an actual piece of brass mesh at some point. Luckily, [Thomas] has connected it to the body of the communicator with a removable metal hinge pin, so it should be easy enough to swap it out.
Considering the incredible panel of Star Trek artists that have been assembled for the Supercon 2025 keynote, we imagine this won’t be the last bit of Trek-themed hacking that we see this weekend — which is fine by us.
There’s a part you’ll find in almost every mains powered switch mode power supply that might at first appear to have only one application. An optocoupler sits between the low voltage and the high voltage sides, providing a safely isolated feedback. Can it be used for anything else? [b.kainka] thinks so, and has proved it by making an optocoupler powered LED flasher.
If a part can be made to act as an amplifier with a gain greater than one, then it should also be possible to make it oscillate. We’re reminded of the old joke about it being very easy to make an oscillator except when you want to make one, but in this case when an optocoupler is wired up as an inverting amplifier with appropriate feedback, it will oscillate. In this case the rather large capacitor leading to a longish period, enough to flash an LED.
We like this circuit, combining as it does an unexpected use for a part, and a circuit in which the unusual choice might just be practical. It’s part of our 2025 Component Abuse Challenge, for which you just about still have time to make an entry yourself if you have one.
They say that, sometimes, less is more. That would certainly apply to photomicrography, where you want to take pictures of tiny things. Nikon agrees, and they sponsor the Small World contest every year. The 2025 winners are a big — or not so big, maybe — deal.
[You] is an entomologist from the Entomological Society of China. He says, “It pays to dive deep into entomology: understanding insects’ behaviors and mastering lighting, a standout work blends artistry with scientific rigor, capturing the very essence, energy, and spirit of these creatures.” We can’t argue with the results.
The flip-flop, in whichever of its several forms you encounter it, is a staple of logic design. Any time that you need to hold onto something, count, or shift bits, out it comes. We expect a flip-flop to be an integrated circuit if we use one, but most of us could knock one together with a couple of transistors.
The circuit is simplicity itself, a pair of incandescent bulbs in series, each in turn in parallel with a momentary action switch and a PTC fuse. On start-up both fuses are conducting, so one or other of them will do its job as a fuse and go high impedance. At that point its bulb will light and the other fuse will remain low impedance so its bulb will stay dark. Press the switch across the lit bulb for a few seconds however, and the circuit resets itself. The other fuse goes high impedance while the first fuse returns to low impedance, and the other bulb lights.
We’re not sure we can see much in the way of practical application for this circuit, but sometimes merely because you can is reason enough. It’s part of our 2025 Component Abuse Challenge, for which you just about still have time to make an entry yourself if you have one.
