project-list
Get flash to fully experience Pearltrees
kids
555
hydroelectric
bioplastic
Last night at fire spinning practice at the “City Museum”:http://www.citymuseum.org we got to test a new flamethrower. It was good, because like in any group, tensions can ocasionally get high, misunderstandings can cause hurt feelings, and a group feels growing pains as it trys to find out how it wants to handle the dangers (quite literal dangers, in this case) of having more people around. One of my fellow spinners was not very happy due to the tension, and the fact that his propane tank was empty. He had brought with him version 2 of a large recreational flame thrower that he wanted to test, but was out of gas. The flamethrower design is simple. A standard propane grill style tank is filled with liquid propane.
Flexistentialism » Recreational Flamethrowers
The Simple Dollar » Homemade Gift Series #1: Vanilla Extract
For the last few years, one of the most prized possessions in our pantry has been a gigantic bottle of imported Mexican vanilla extract. It’s not that imitation stuff that you get on sale at the store, with weak vanilla flavor and added sweetener. This stuff is pure unsweetened vanilla extract. It makes pies and cookies and homemade ice cream and sweetbreads and cakes and countless other things we make at home sublime .
The synpad
The SynPad is a position sensitive midi drum pad that you can build yourself using simple materials and tools for around 50 UK pounds (depending on what materials you already have, and how many pads you want to make.) The idea was to produce a pad which can detect where on the pad you have hit it as well as how hard, so that the synth it is driving can modulate the sound continuously according to the x and y coordinates of the strike. The design is pretty simple - you could easily build one over a weekend using basic wood and metalwork tools (i.e. for cutting and drilling). All the software I've written for it is open source, so as long as you have or can set up a linux based computer (or have the skills to adapt the software to another platform), you could get up and running pretty quickly.
Arduino-based talking & remote thermometer « adafruit industries blog
Fun Arduino-based talking & remote thermometer , Solder In The Veins writes - After recently getting my hands on an Arduino Duemilanove, I came across this Sketch on Arduino Playground that allowed an Arduino to function as a temperature measuring device with the addition of a few cheap and easily obtainable components. Deciding to take things a step further, I wrote a Python script to create a DIY temperature measuring device that could be used both locally, via the command line, as well as remotely, using a googlemail account to check the temperature of a room. You can grab a copy of this script, called “Ardthermo”, from the Software page. This article should give all the info you need to know to build this little project for yourself and make use of the Ardthermo script. Enjoy.
jarv.org
This project demonstrates using an Arduino , a LM386N opamp circuit and multiple BlinkM LED units to create an audio visualization device. The audio is not pass-through so it requires a dedicated mono input. In the video demo, the Arduino enclosure is connected to the tape-out of a DX052 mixer and powered by USB by my previous DX052 power hack .The amplifier circuit is set to provide 50dB of gain for the line-level mono input mixed from the right and left channel. This signal is fed to the Arduino ADC which approximates RMS voltage from signal. Vrms is converted to dBV which is mapped to an intensity value for blue, green and red LEDS belonging to four BlinkM units. The alternate two LEDs are scaled to be less intense than the single primary color.
Make: Online : $28 huge cheap whiteboards
Chris shows you how to make some large cheap white boards… …the same material that they make most commercial whiteboards out of is available at most big-box lumber stores like Home Depot for less than $15. “Showerboard”, which is basically cheap plywood with a waterproof white plastic coating on one side. Its the same stuff that they make cheap showers out of – four walls of showerboard plus a cheap plastic base makes a decent stall. It also makes a great whiteboard.Just spotted this cool project by the other Martin Taylor in the MAKE Flickr pool: $12 in hardware store bits & pieces, 1 old skate from the basement and a tripod head borrowed from an old tripod. My Labor-day, afternoon, quick, DIY project. It doesn’t look very pretty but it works well enough with anything from my tiny camcorder to my 5D. If, like myself, you don’t know what a skater dolly is used for, exactly, check the embedded vid Martin made to demonstrate. Impressive results for such an inexpensive tool.
Make: Online : PVC skater dolly
Make: Online : MIDI kit test-drive
MAKE contributor Michael Una posted a review of Highly Liquid’s MD24 kit which converts MIDI events over to an array of 24 +5V outputs - The new MD24 falls into the latter category. It takes a MIDI input and gives you 24 discrete +5V outputs that can be used to drive relays, transistors, or servo motors. Functionally, the MD24 is similar to HighlyLiquid’s MSA-T or MSA-R kits, except that you now have 24 outputs instead of just 8- a significant improvement.
So, how does it work? A GPS receiver normally works by measuring the delay between an internally generated signal and one received by a satellite. This specially crafted signal makes it possible for the GPS receiver to find and latch onto the satellites signal, however it’s wavelength limits the accuracy of the receiver. The real time kinematic system gets around this limitation by measuring the phase delay in the carrier signal . Because this signal has a much sorter wavelength, it is possible to make a system that is accurate to the centimeter.
Make: Online : Regular GPS not accurate enough? Try RTK-GPS!
MirlitronOne explains how to turn a Velleman MK107 LED Running Light kit into a simple 8-step sequencer for use with analog synthesizers. A handy kit hack, but it’s also not too much work to build one from scratch .
Make: Online : Synth sequencer from an LED kit
Dino sent us this vid demonstrating some potential audio effects resulting from landline-to-cellphone delay times. Strictly speaking “reverb” is usually considered as sound delays with no discernible separation – but hey, who’s counting? Good clean fun to try at home- would definitely be cool to see this effect taken advantage of in a live performance or art installation … but maybe only on nights & weekends?
Make: Online : Fun with cellphone feedback
This is very cool – Dann Green of 4ms Pedals has posted schematics, code, and parts list for the Autonomous Bassline project. The ATtiny84 based module is also available in kit form with an optional heavy-duty enclosure. And if this thing wasn’t awesome enough as is – an infrared clock signal can be used to drive the unit.
Make: Online : Build an autonomous bassline generator
(photo by Michael L. ) Though some of the fuller featured multimeters offer similar abilities, this ATMega8-based transistor tester project , identifies pins, measures gain, plus resistance and capacitance. Looks like a welcome addition to the workbench – schematic + source code can be found here [via Electronics-Lab ]
Make: Online : How-To: Transistor tester
Something I’m excited about these days is rhythmically interfacing incompatible musical components like my analog modular synthesizer with a Casio SK1 Keyboard and a Barbie Karaoke machine . One tool that has helped me do this is the 8 step, 4 channel sequencer pictured above. The sequencer is based on a 555 timer and the 4017 decade counter. It’s got a low part count and is easy to build. Mounting all of the switches was by far the most difficult/expensive part but beside that it’s easy/cheap.