Easy, Modular Alphanumeric Displays Are Full Of Flappy Goodness

February 20, 2018 by Dan Maloney 18 Comments

There are plenty of ways to make large alphanumeric displays that are readable at great distances. LED signboards come to mind, as do big flat-screen LCD displays. But such displays feel a little soulless, and nothing captures the atmosphere of a busy train station like an arrivals and departures board composed of hundreds of split-flap displays.

In a bid to make these noisy but intriguing displays practical for the home-gamer, [Scott Bezek] has spent the last couple of years on a simple, modular split-flap display unit, and from the look of the video below, it’s pretty close to ready. The build log details the design process, which started with OpenSCAD and took advantage of the parametric nature of the scripting language to support any number of characters, within reason. Costs are kept low with laser-cut MDF frames and running gear, and cheap steppers provide the motion. Character cards are just PVC ID badges with vinyl letters, and a simple opto-sensor prevents missed steps and incorrect characters. The modules can be chained together into multi-character displays, and the sound is satisfyingly flappy.

[Scott] has put a lot of thought into these displays, and even if it’s not the simplest split-flap display we’ve seen, it’s really worth checking out.

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Digital Clock Goes With The Grain

May 29, 2017 by Al Williams 28 Comments

This good-looking clock appears to be made out of a block of wood with LED digits floating underneath. In reality, it is a block of PLA plastic covered with wood veneer (well, [androkavo] calls it veneer, but we think it might just be a contact paper or vinyl with a wood pattern). It makes for a striking effect, and we can think of other projects that might make use of the technique, especially since the wood surface looks much more finished than the usual 3D-printed part.

You can see a video of the clock in operation below. The clock circuit itself is nothing exceptional. Just a MAX7218 LED driver and a display along with an STM32 ARM processor. The clock has a DHT22 temperature and humidity sensor, as well as a speaker for an alarm.

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Scratchy Brings Digital Clarity To The Vinyl World

April 1, 2017 by Jenny List 18 Comments

If you walk the halls of audiophilia, you may be aware that there has been a huge amount of work put in to software designed to clean up older audio recordings without compromising the quality of the recording itself. Sometimes the results can be amazing, such as when a stereo image is created from parallel mono recordings made before stereo was even a glint in the eye of a 1930s EMI engineer.

Bob Widlar on analogue versus digital. Original: EDN — [Bob Widlar] on analogue versus digital. Original: EDN.

But what if you are at home, without the benefit of a state-of-the-art studio or high-end digital signal processing? How can you then have pop and crackle free sound from your hi-fi when you put on a piece of vinyl? [Paul Wallace] may just have the answer, he’s made a smartphone app called Scratchy which listens to the output of a turntable, identifies the track being played, and plays the appropriate MP3 file for a digital experience from vinyl. It uses the algorithm published by Shazam to recognize tunes. The software also has a learn mode during which it can be taught about new records in the collection. The app itself is written using the Xamarin framework and has its source code in his GitHup repository, so it’s possible it could be produced for other platforms as well as Android.

Now vinyl purists will be speechless with horror at this wanton desecration of their format while audiophiles will be fuming at the smeary-in-the-midrange MP3s, but we can see its appeal if your vinyl is on the grubby side. It’s fair to say though that the stereo here won’t be sporting it, you’ll tear our analogue signal path from our cold dead hands. Take a look for yourselves, he’s put up a video showing it in operation.

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Record Players Explained For The Streaming Generation

March 3, 2017 by Jenny List 68 Comments

How do you consume your music, these days? Aside from on the radio, that is. Do you play MP3 or other files on your phone and computer, or perhaps do you stream from an online service? If you’re really at the cutting edge though you’ll do none of those things, because you’ll be playing it on vinyl.

The legendary Technics SL1200 direct-drive turntable, as used by countless DJs. Dydric [CC BY-SA 2.5)], via Wikimedia Commons. — The legendary Technics SL1200 direct-drive turntable, as used by countless DJs. Photo by Dydric CC-BY-SA 2.5

A few years ago reporting on a resurgence of sales of vinyl records was something you would never have expected to see, but consumer tastes are unpredictable. Our red-trousered and extravagantly bearded hipster friends have rediscovered the glories of the format, and as a result it’s popping up everywhere. For those of us who are old enough to have genuinely been into the format before it was cool again, the sight of Sergeant Pepper and Led Zeppelin II on 12″ at outrageous prices on a stand at the local supermarket is a source of amusement. It’s good to see your first love back in vogue again, but is it really the £20($25) per album kind of good?

With the turntable having disappeared as an integral part of the typical hi-fi setup the new vinyl enthusiast is faced with a poor choice of equipment. Often the best available without spending serious money at an audiophile store is a USB device with the cheapest possible manufacture, from which the playback will be mediocre at best. We’ve lost the body of collective knowledge about what makes a good turntable to almost thirty years of CDs and MP3s, so perhaps it’s time for a quick primer.

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Help Decipher The DEFCON Badge

August 6, 2015 by Mike Szczys 25 Comments

The 23rd DEFCON — the Western Hemisphere’s largest hacker conference — doesn’t start until tomorrow but Thursday has become the de facto start for regulars. [Brian] and I rolled into town this afternoon and are working on gathering as much information as possible about the badge challenge.

This year the badge is a 7″ vinyl record. Traditionally the badge alternates years of electronic badges and ones that aren’t. Spend your weekend pulling your hair our trying to solve the puzzles. Check out all the pictures and information (updated as we gather it) and work together collaboratively for a solution by requesting to join the crew on the Badge Hacking page.

Hackaday Breakfast on Sunday

If you’re in town Sunday morning, come nurse your hangover with [Brian], [Eric], and me. We’re headed to Va Bene Caffè at 10:30am on 8/9/15. It’s just across the street in the Cosmopolitan. Request to join this event and I’ll send you a reminder so you don’t forget. You can also hit me up on Twitter for a reminder. See you then (and don’t forget to bring hardware to show off if you have some!).

PS- The Hackaday WiFi Hat is in play. Anyone have the chops to hack it this year?

Glowing Super Bowl Helmets

February 2, 2013 by Mike Szczys 8 Comments

glowing-football-helmets-adafruit

These geeky Superbowl decorations glow thanks to the EL panel hack which [Becky Stern] created. It’s almost impossible to make out in this image, but the EL panels have been applied to the surface of the helmet. On the San Francisco helmet you can just make out the black connector and cord at the bottom of the F.

El panels are a lot like EL wire (but they’re flat) in that the phosphors are excited when connected to a high voltage AC supply. You can cut the panels into shapes without a problem. The technique used here is to create a black vinyl mask to go over the top of the panel. This makes cutting the panel a lot easier.

The mask sticker is made on a vinyl cutter. [Becky] is a master at using the vector tool as you can see in the video after the break. She outlined each team logo with paths to create a file which the cutter can use. From there it took several tries to get the sticker just right as the curve of the helmet distorts the logos just a bit. Once it was dialed in she stuck the vinyl on the El panel and cut around the perimeter.

The Adafruit team sure loves to use electroluminescent accents.

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Ice Record Single Needs Six Hours In The Deep Freeze Before You Can Listen

December 31, 2012 by Mike Szczys 36 Comments

ice-record

This delightful marketing ploy requires the listener to fabricate their own record out of ice. The band Shout Out Louds wanted to make a splash with their newest single. So they figured out how to make a playable record out of ice. The main problem with this is the grooves start to degrade immediately when the ice begins to melt. So they shipped a mold of the record and a bottle of water to a select few listeners (just ten in all). Hear the result in the video after the break.

Now if you want to make something like this for yourself we can help you out just a bit. The mold is made of silicone and it wasn’t so long ago that we saw a guide for those new to mold making. The raw material isn’t that hard to find either. The project above tried several different approaches and found the best results can be attained with plain old distilled water. No, the one hard part is figuring out how to make your own master. If you’ve got a way of doing this in the home lab, please tells us about it!

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