In-button Display For Your Car’s Dashboard

November 15, 2010 by Mike Szczys 17 Comments

Here’s an interesting take on augmenting a car’s dashboard. [Daniel] is using a button blank to house a 1″ OLED display in his Jetta. It shows auxiliary data such as boost pressure and several sets of temperature readings. The display itself has a tiny little circuit board with a PIC 24 to drive it. A larger board, seen above, collects the temperature data from some sensors that [Daniel] added as part of the hack. There are some pictures of the installed display inside of the dark car and it looks really easy to read. It also sounds like there’s some dimming functionality built into the firmware. This is the easiest way we’ve seen to add a display to your dashboard as it just requires you to pop out a button blank, rather than disassembling the entire console or patching into what’s already there.

Chest Freezer Temperature Controller

November 5, 2010 by Mike Szczys 11 Comments

[Mikey Sklar] finds himself in need of a temperature regulated refrigerator for fermenting foods like yogurt, kimchi, bread, and beer. After some testing he found that by building his own controller he can get a chest freezer to outperform an upright refrigerator at this task by 2-to-1.

The controller is based around an ATmega48. It includes a remote temperature sensors which you can see connected to the lower left header in the image above. On the back of the board there’s a relay used to switch the freezer’s power on and off. [Mikey] is selling a kit but the hardware and software for the project are both open source so build it yourself if you have the know-how.

A chest freezer is a great place to store Cornelius kegs… we’ll keep our eyes open for one.

Shiny Motorcycle Computer

October 16, 2010 by Mike Szczys 19 Comments

We’re rather surprised at how popular it has become to build your own motorcycle computer. [Mario Mauerer] tipped us off about his shiny motorcycle computer (translated) for his Yamaha XTZ 750. It uses an ATmega644 microcontroller to pull a variety of data together and display it on this white LED backlit display. He connected a flow meter to the fuel line to monitor gas consumption. Oil temperature is captured by inserting a brass tube (containing the sensor) through a hole in the oil cap and soldering it in place. Water temperature is gathered by measuring the external temperature of one of the cooling lines. [Mario] uses a rotary encode with a click function as the control interface device, and a battery backed real time clock keeps time.

A quick look at the PCBs tells the tale of good circuit design. But we do wonder about catching the reflection of the sun in that shiny bezel.

In-dash Motorcycle Display

August 24, 2010 by Mike Szczys 26 Comments

[Muth] added an auxiliary display to his motorcycle instrument panel. He started out prototyping with a PIC 16F877A which he used to access information through the ECM diagnostic connection. Once he had that working he found this tiny display which fits perfectly between the speedometer and tachometer. There’s a short demo after the break where you can see a past-30-minute history of the Adaptive Fuel Value and the engine temperature as well as a secondary information screen.

This is another nice addition to our collection of vehicle displays, scooter controllers, gear indicators, and motorcycle computers.

Continue reading “In-dash Motorcycle Display” →

Wine Cask Sensor Suite

August 4, 2010 by Mike Szczys 15 Comments

As part of his Master’s dissertation [Salvador Faria] built a sensor suite for wine monitoring. He needed to develop a method of tracking data inside the wine cask during the vinification process. What he came up with eclipses the wine cellar temperature monitors we’ve seen before.

He picked up pH, temperature, carbon dioxide, alcohol, and relative humidity sensors from familiar vendors like Seeed, Parallax, and SparkFun. His original idea was to develop a floating probe that housed the entire package but he had quite a bit of trouble getting everything inside and maintaining buoyancy. The solution was a two-part probe; the stationary portion seen mounted on top of the cask houses the microcontroller, RF 433 MHz transmitter, and the gas sensors. Tethered to that is a floating probe that measures pH and temperature. Data is sent over radio frequency to an HTTP POST server every minute.

Save A Baby, Nursery Temperature Monitor

August 1, 2010 by Jakob Griffith 36 Comments

Yes, you could argue this Nursery Room Temperature Monitor is simply an LED and an Arduino with a temperature sensor, but [Jay] really did put more thought into the process. For instance he stuck with AVR, built a wooden base and sanded globe, and even included schematics and source code. Plus, SIDS is no laughing matter and the more you know, the more it can be prevented. Back on point, one thing we would add is PWM for a more gradual change in color. What would you add?

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Lolo’s (perfect Moment) Alarm Clock

July 17, 2010 by Jakob Griffith 20 Comments

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CphsgESZGcE&feature=player_embedded%5D

It seems everybody has a different interpretation of the perfect alarm clock. [Loic Royer’s] alarm clock is not the loudest, or the smartest, but does have some interesting features. By monitoring several environmental factors like temperature, air quality, humidity, dew point, and your own sleep patterns, this alarm clock can determine the best moment in the morning to wake you up.

The main sensor is a wireless accelerometer with the theory being: the more you move in your sleep, the closer you are to a conscious state. The other sensors assist in picking the perfect moment, and awaken you with the sound of birds chirping.

For now all we have is the source code and the list of hardware, but for anyone wanting to try, a circuit diagram wouldn’t be too hard to figure out on your own. Check after the rift for some more videos. Continue reading “Lolo’s (perfect Moment) Alarm Clock” →