A Gambler’s Bottle Opener

April 9, 2020 by Moritz v. Sivers 11 Comments

People can certainly become creative when it comes to completing simple tasks like that of removing a bottle cap. Woodworker [Matt Thompson] has come up with a next-level bottle opener that not only does the job but also functions as a game of chance. (Video, embedded below.)

The process usually starts with a spin of his chore wheel that will surprisingly often advise you to drink a beer. While the bottle cap is removed by a standard wall-mounted opener, the fun starts when the cap falls through a wooden labyrinth of various mechanisms reminiscent of a Rube Goldberg machine. Finally, the cap goes through an arrangement of nails, known as a Galton Board which is also found in some pinball and historic gaming machines, before landing in one of two containers marked “winner” and “try again”. The former will trigger the rotating wheel of a self-built peanut dispenser to provide the thirsty person with some tasty snacks. While we would love to see a making-of video with more technical details of this project, we still appreciate the exquisite woodworking and fine craftsmanship that went into building it.

By the way, if you are ever in need of an Arduino board that can also serve as a bottle opener then have a look at HaDuino.

[Thanks to Emanuel for pointing out the proper name of the Galton Board]

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Hackaday Links: January 4, 2015

January 4, 2015 by Brian Benchoff 17 Comments

Chips as furniture is now a thing. It started off with a 555 footstool from Evil Mad Scientist and moved on to an EPROM coffee table. Now [msvm] over on the War Thunder forums has constructed a Nixie tube driver table. It’s based on the K155, and as a neat little addition, he’s included a real vintage chip under glass in the table.

Have some tongs, an anvil, and a blowtorch? Make some bottle openers out of framing nails. There’s a lot of variety here in the shapes of the bottle openers.

[Stephen] used a solid state relay he found on eBay to drive some Christmas lights. The SSR failed. That meant it was time to see inside of this relay looked like. The short answer is, ‘a lot of goop and epoxy’, but the traces look big enough to support the current it’s rated for.

Imagine a part of your 3D printer breaks. That’s alright, just print another…. oh, yeah. Well, I guess it’s time to make a bearing bracket out of wood.

The Electronica MK-54 and MK-61 (actually the Электроника МК-54) were incredibly popular Soviet programmable calculators. Now there’s an emulator for them.

[Rue Mohr] found a very cheap TFT display on an Arduino shield. The chip for the display was an SPF5408, a chip that isn’t supported by the most common libraries. He eventually got it to work after emailing the seller, getting some libraries, and renaming and moving a bunch of stuff. If you have one of these displays, [Rue] just saved you a bunch of time.

Fail Of The Week: This Inanimate Titanium Rod

September 11, 2014 by Kristina Panos 69 Comments

You saw [Chris] cast aluminium on the cheap using Kinetic Sand a few weeks ago, didn’t you? He recently got his meaty hands on some titanium through the magic of modern transactional methods and was bowled over by its strength, hardness, and poor heat transfer.

He thought he would cast it into a nice, strong bottle opener. As you can probably guess, that didn’t go so well. First off, it wasn’t easy to saw through the thin rod. Once he did get it split in twain, it was surprisingly cool to the touch except at the tip. This is nasty foreshadowing, no?

[Chris] takes a moment to help us absorb the gravity of what he’s about to do, which of course is to send several hundred amps through that poor rod using a DC arc welder. Special precautions are necessary due to the reaction between oxygen and heated titanium. His trusty graphite crucible is grounded to the bottom of a big aluminium tub, and a cozy blanket of argon from a TIG welder will shield the titanium from burnination.

Well . . . the titanium didn’t melt. Furthermore, the crucible is toast. On the up side, vise-enabled cross-sectional examination of the crucible proved that there was still gold in them there walls.

Do you have any (constructive, on-topic) suggestions for [Chris]? Let him know below.

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Hackaday Links: November 17, 2013

November 17, 2013 by Mike Szczys 5 Comments

If you purchased a knock-off FM transmitter and were unhappy with its broadcast range [Thiagohersan] shows how to double the range with a simple transistor amplifier circuit. He also hacked it for used without the 12V car socket.

[Patrick Herd] had a project that required him to strip about twenty Mindstorm batteries from their plastic enclosures. It’s not too tough getting into them but it does require drilling out the plastic rivets. He made a jig and used a CNC mill to automate the process.

Speaking of CNC, [Bertho] added some abstraction to distance himself from what he calls the “50+ years archaic syntax and grammar that G-code programs have”. The project is a meta-compiler for G-Code.

If you need a cold one and don’t have a HaDuino on hand you’ll thank yourself for hacking together this five-cent workbench bottle opener.

Just make sure you do all the lathe work for a custom speaker enclosure before you start pounding back those brewskis. Not only does [Shaun’s] creation look modern and stylish, but it boasts more than enough power to bump some tunes.

Here’s a project that adds LED feedback to your XBMC installation. It uses a Raspberry Pi to run the media center software, and a script to monitor it and actuate the lights on an Adafruit add-on board. At first glance you may not think much of it, but this is all the logic control you need to automate your viewing room. Who doesn’t want a home theater that automatically dims once you’ve made your viewing selection?

And finally, [08milluz] snagged some reactive electronics in the form of Disney’s Mickey Mouse ears. Apparently they glow different colors at live shows and based on where they are worn within the park. He did a complete teardown to show off the hardware within. It turns out to be controlled by an MSP430 which are known for their low power consumption. [Thanks Spikeo55]

HaDuino: Open Your Beer Using Arduino

October 11, 2013 by Mike Szczys 57 Comments

Frankly we’re tired of Arduino having a bad name here at Hackaday. So [Brian Benchoff] came up with a way to make it useful to a wider audience. His creation, which we call the HaDuino, lets you use the Arduino clone to open a tasty bottle of beer.