Altoid Tin Etching Tutorial

Eminent steampunker [Jake Von Slatt] wrote a small article on etching candy tins for The Steampunk Bible, but the limited space available in the book didn’t allow for a full exposition. To make amends for his incomplete tutorial, he posted this walk through to compliment the Bible’s article.

The process is very similar to the many tutorials we’ve seen on home-etching PCBs using the toner transfer method. Removing the paint from the Altoid tin, creating a mask, printing it on the Sunday circulars, and taking an iron to the tin is old hat for home fabbers.

Unlike PCB manufacturing, [Mr. Von Slatt] doesn’t bother with Ferric Chloride or other nasty chemicals – he does everything with electrolysis. After adding a few tablespoons of table salt to a bucket of water, [Jake] takes a DC power supply and connects the positive lead to the lid and the negative lead to the base. a bit of electrical tape around the corners of the lid keeps the metal from getting too thin.

A nice Copper finish can be applied to a finished tin by swabbing on a solution of Copper Sulfate – a common ingredient in “Root Kill” products. Of course that’s not a necessary step; you can easily enjoy and elegant Altoid tin bare metal.

LM386 Altoids Tin Amp

altoids_amp

Hacker [Dino Segovis] is back again with the fifth installment in his “Hack a Week” series. This time around he has put together a 1/2 watt audio amplifier that would make for a great weekend project. He’s a big fan of the LM386 amplifier chip because it does so much in such a small package. Since it is so versatile, he used it as the centerpiece of his Altoids tin amplifier.

Now an audio amp inside an Altoids tin isn’t exactly a new concept, but [Dino] takes the time to discuss the circuit in detail, which is great for any beginners out there who are looking for a fun and relatively easy project. After a high-speed video of the assembly process he walks us through the completed amp, then treats us to a couple of short demos.

One thing that makes his amp different than others we have seen in the past is the addition of a 1/4” guitar jack, which allows him to use his amplifier as a combo amp/distortion effect box.

It’s another job well done, so be sure to keep reading if you’d like to watch the latest Hack a Week episode in its entirety.

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Altoids Upstaged By Gift Card Tins

Nothing Earth-shattering here. Just, dare we say it, really cute!

The venerable Altoids mint tin has become an icon of the maker culture. Browsing through past articles on Hack a Day, Adafruit or Instructables, you’ll find project after project for which these pocket-sized enclosures provided just the right fit. Eminently practical, affordable, but the aesthetics have occasionally left something to be desired.

We recently stumbled upon these nifty gift card holders that resemble miniature versions of current-generation game consoles. They might be the perfect housing for your next microcontroller project…

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Battery Holder Reuses Blister Pack

In need of a portable power supply, [Alastair] threw some batteries into an Altoids tin. The problem was he didn’t have a holder for these size A23 cells. Inspiration struck and he realized the blister pack they came in fits them snuggly and just needs some conductors to complete the circuit. He pulled some battery contacts from a broken CD player. Using foam-based double-stick tape he added some spring to the contacts and came up with a perfectly sized holder that works wonderfully.

We’ve tried making battery packs by wrapping the entire thing in clods of duct tape. This looks like it works a lot better and there’s still room to fit the batteries and a switch inside of this minty enclosure.