Arduino robot

RobotIsoView
The Arduino crew introduces the Arduino Robot. “The Arduino Robot is the first official Arduino on wheels. The robot has two processors, one on each of its two boards. The Motor Board controls the motors, and the Control Board reads sensors and decides how to operate. Each of the boards is a full Arduino board programmable using the Arduino IDE.

Both Motor and Control boards are microcontroller boards based on the ATmega32u4. The Robot has many of its pins mapped to on-board sensors and actuators.

Programming the robot is similar to the process with the Arduino Leonardo. Both processors have built-in USB communication, eliminating the need for a secondary processor. This allows the Robot to appear to a connected computer as a virtual (CDC) serial / COM port.”

More details, including links to tutorials and EAGLE design files can be found at Arduino.cc .

Digital/Analog clock – Arduino + PaperCraft

FI5PMTFHJUWSDVR.LARGE

alstroemeria wrote this Instructable detailing the build of his Digital/Analog clock:

In this instructable we will be recreating a clock inspired by Alvin Aronson’s original design. When I first saw this clock I was very impressed by how clean an elegant the design was I immediately wanted to recreate this effect. I hope some of you feel the same and use this as a guide to be one-step closer to having one of your own

Hard Disk Drive Midi scratch controller

Hard-Disk-Drive-Midi-Scratch-Controller_2

DoktorAndy built this scratch controller made from parts of an old harddisk and an optical mouse:

Check out this cool Hard Disk Drive Midi Scratch Table. It uses the sensor from an optical mouse to look at the movement of a hard drive platter. There are a number of buttons that can change the midi output of the device to allow it to adapt to your DJ needs. The optical sensor is used to read a pattern on the underside of the platter to determine when the user is spinning it.

Via Hacked Gadgets.

ATX Bench power supply

DSC02884[2]

Nick Carter blogged about his DIY bench power supply with the ATX breakout board:

There are tons of such projects out there on the internet but most involve hacking open the power supply and I didn’t think that was the way to go. I considered getting a cheap ATX adapter from Monoprice and breaking out the voltages onto a PCB but then I came across the Dangerous Prototypes ATX Breakout Board.
It was only $13.80 plus $3.80 shipping from Hong Kong (via Seeed Studio) which was reasonable and quite a time saver. I happened to have an old used project enclosure laying around in my junk pile (I have no idea where I got it from) that would fit an ATX supply so I set to work.

You can get one for $14 at Seeed Studio.

Debugging the WM8731 ADC/DAC with the Bus Pirate

IMG_25623

Pasdesignal tweeted, “I solved i2s/i2c issues on my raspberry pi with the help of Bus Pirate”:

I have been experimenting with the WM8731 ADC/DAC chip (datasheet)  and the raspberry pi using i2s and the aSOC drivers.
I chose this CODEC because it already had an aSOC driver written, and Koalo had already written the other driver file required which was based on his experience with the Mikroe audio CODEC proto board. The WM8731 happens to be a Wolfson chip and I have had good experience in the past with another Wolfson DAC – the WM8740 which I used in my DIY USB DAC.
This particular CODEC has both stereo headphone and line level outputs, a line level input plus a separate simple mic input with integrated mic bias. At this stage I am using it with a simple crystal at 12.288MHz. So a decent chip to play around with, and hopefully not much fuss setting it up.

Get an assembled Bus Pirate for $30, including world-wide shipping. Also available from our friendly distributors.

Tracking low earth satellites using RTL-SDR

staellite traker

Travis Goodspeed has been experimenting with remote satellite tracking over the internet. His setup uses a satellite dish originally used with a mobile earth station on maritime vessels. Movement of the dish is accomplished with servos and an EiBotBoard” wired into a BeagleBone. Travis describes further, “My initial build using an RTL-SDR dongle. Data processing is done on my server, with the BeagleBone forwarding data from rtl_tcp. To avoid offending the FCC and ham radio operators everywhere, I disabled the dish’s 1.5GHz transmitter and use only the 1.6GHz downlink antenna. If I can justify the extra weight, I’d like to drop the RTL-SDR in favor of a USRP2 over Gigabit Ethernet in order to get greater bandwidth and sensitivity.

Recordings are stored either as raw I/Q data or as a simple signal strength indicator from the Power Spectral Density (PSD) function. In the near future, I hope to automatically adjust the aim of the dish in realtime based upon the signal quality feedback.”

You can find project details and more photos on Travis’ blog.

DIY Bus Blaster case

busblaster_preview_featured

Ado designed this case for the Bus Blaster version 2.5.  Bus Blaster is an experimental, high-speed JTAG debugger for ARM processors, FPGAs, CPLDs, flash, and more:

I made this case for the Bus Blaster version 2.5.
It’s a JTAG debugger from Dangerous Prototypes.
The license for the case is CC0 and the ViaCad file (ViaCad Pro 7) is in the attachments as well

More cool DIY cases here.

You can get a Bus Blaster v3 for $34.95.

74HC4067 16-Channel analog multiplexer demultiplexer

74HC4067_SMD

Here’s another tutorial by John Boxall of Tronixstuff:  74HC4067 16-channel analog multiplexer demultiplexer 

Now and again there’s a need to expand the I/O capabilities of your chosen micorocontroller, and instead of upgrading you can often use external parts to help solve the problem. One example of this is the 74HC4067 16-channel analog multiplexer demultiplexer. That’s a mouthful – however in simple form it’s an IC that can direct a flow of current in either direction from one pin  to any one of sixteen pins. Another way to think abou it is that you can consider the 74HC4067 to be a digital replacement to those rotary switches that allow you to select one of sixteen positions.

Via the contact form.

Making wine in Shenzhen: Double row IDC cable kit

cover

Often it’s not clear exactly what connector, button, switch, or part is the best choice for a project. We end up making a last minute order of 1 or 2 of any likely candidate from Mouser or Digikey. That sets the project off by about a week while we dig through datasheets and websites, make CAD footprints, and wait for the order to be delivered.

To banish this annoying time sink we’re working with Oomlout to release complete kits of parts. Each set will be nicely labeled, well organized, and have open source datasheets, renderings, and CAD footprints for Eagle and KiCAD. We call it wine making because Ian hand plucks each part from Huaqiangbei in Shenzhen. We’re posting now to get your feedback, the final kit will be available in a couple weeks.

Previously we presented the Single row cable kit and the Keyed connectors kit . Today we release our idea for the Double row IDC cable kit. We use IDC cables and connectors all the time with our projects. They provide for a high number of connections while not taking up too much PCB real estate. Due to a notch in the PCB headers, and a extrusion on the cable connector there is only one way to make a connection, eliminating ambiguity.

Head below to check out the contents, then please let us know what we forgot or what you find useless!

Continue reading “Making wine in Shenzhen: Double row IDC cable kit”

#FreePCB via Twitter to 2 random RTs

ddso-pcb-scan

Every Tuesday we give away two coupons for the free PCB drawer via Twitter. This post was announced on Twitter, and in 24 hours we’ll send coupon codes to two random retweeters.

Don’t forget there’s free PCBs three times a every week:

  • Hate Twitter and Facebook? Free PCB Sunday is the classic PCB giveaway. Catch it every Sunday, right here on the blog
  • Tweet-a-PCB Tuesday. Follow us and get boards in 144 characters or less
  • Facebook PCB Friday. Free PCBs will be your friend for the weekend

Some stuff:

  • Yes, we’ll mail it anywhere in the world!
  • Check out how we mail PCBs worldwide video.
  • We’ll contact you via Twitter with a coupon code for the PCB drawer.
  • Limit one PCB per address per month please.
  • Like everything else on this site, PCBs are offered without warranty.

We try to stagger free PCB posts so every time zone has a chance to participate, but the best way to see it first is to subscribe to the RSS feed, follow us on Twitter, or like us on Facebook.

Mini 7-segment clock project update

mini7seg_v1.1

Kevin Rye posted an update on his Mini 7-segment clock we covered previously:

UPDATE: I finally got in my rev 1.1 PCBs from OSH Park. While working on these revisions, I came across some discussions about 슈퍼벳 and its innovative approach to user experience, which inspired me to rethink how I designed the interface for this project. I fixed the pin-swap problem with the display as well as rerouted Vcc to the Atmega a little better than before. Rev 1.0 was a little convoluted.
I also got in my custom laser-cut acrylic from Ponoko.
I put everything together and it works great! So glad to finally see this guy assembled and complete!
The image doesn’t do it justice. The display is super bright!
All the source files are available on my hobby site: Mini 7-Segment Clock

Via the project log forum.

Parallel virtual stack machine firmware for Arduino

ArduinoMega2560_R3_Front_450px

Nakul Rao has been working on a virtual machine for the Arduino. He notes, ‘Why a virtual machine? Firstly, I had a lot of time. Secondly, because it can be done. Also, it is fascinating to me that a device can keep its actual hardware hidden and project an entirely different hardware to the user. I have to say that I have not had any formal education on virtual machine. So I don’t know for sure if this fits into the ‘definition’ of a virtual machine but I’m certain that it can at least be called a quasi-virtual machine.

I have designed this for Arduino Mega and so had no memory issues. The basic firmware running on the Arduino is about 10kb. So Uno is out of the picture. But you can try to optimize the code and fit it into a Uno.”

You can read more on this project on Nakul’s blog. The source code is also available on GitHub.

Breadboard version Bus Pirate and ST7920

WP_20130805_001

BrianGriffin posted his Breadboard version Bus Pirate and ST7920 in the project log forum:

Over this weekend I cobbled up a breadboard version of Bus Pirate with the extra stuff I have from the drawer (the main chip PIC24FJ64GA002 is there too), dumped the bootloader and dumped the rest of the firmware with a dirt cheap USB->UART converter I have. It looked ghetto, but it worked on a Serial HD44780 LCD.

So, I have an idea. I have the ST7920 GLCD which I have a grudge on. It’s a fussy thing and it is pretty slow. Wrong command, you see garbled mess and garbage on screen. The serial was the worst – it couldn’t catch commands properly if you are unsure of its serial specifications. Since I have that franken-Bus Pirate, why not experiment on it?

Giveaway: Three prebuilt LEDger Led (polarity) tester

Ledger-Built

Mats has amazed us with his board a week projects, and now one of them could be yours!  Today Mats is giving away three prebuilt LEDger.  It’s a simple but useful LED tester:

He’ll give these away to 3 random commenters, just leave a comment on this post.

For more information visit the project’s Tindie site.

PCB a Week 20: LEDger Led (polarity) tester

Ledger-Built

Mats continues his challenge of designing one PCB every week. In week 20 he came up with LEDger Led (polarity) tester:

Everytime I solder a SMD LED on a pcb I have to turn on one of my multimeters and flip it over to diode-test mode and then probe the SMD LED to see which connector is the anode and which is the cathode. The LEDger is a small PCB with a button cell battery and smd footprints that allows me to, while still holding the LED in my tweezers. just hold it onto one of the footprints and see if it lights up or not.

LED tester giveaway coming up soon! Stay tuned!!

Simple 3D gerber viewer

grbv-teaser

Jérôme Vuarand  developed an application to visualize Gerber data, a simple 3D viewer for Gerber files.  This tool helps to review Gerber files before sending them to a PCB fab house:

Over the course of the last 5 months I developped an application to visualize Gerber data. The goal was primarily to review Gerber files before sending them to a PCB fabrication house. It is very similar to the Mayhew Labs online Gerber viewer, except it’s offline (and has a few different features).

My tool is program for Windows (32bits or 64bits) that use OpenGL for visualization (you will need a decent/recent video card). You can simply drag and drop Gerber files on it, or use the command line to configure it more deeply. I set up a page explaining most of that and giving download links

Video: Massimo Banzi’s Arduino tutorial series


Arduino co-creator Massimo Banzi has produced a series of video tutorials covering all aspects of the Arduino platform and IDE. These videos were produced in cooperation with RS Components and feature their Arduino Starter Kit (though any compatible Arduino board should work as well.)

The introductory video appears above, with the remainder available on their Arduino playlist. They are released under the Creative Commons License.

Learn from the Master!

Free PCB Sunday: Pick your PCB

xQFP50 plus65 Protoboard-W800

We go through a lot of prototype PCBs, and end up with lots of extras that we’ll never use. Every Sunday we give away a few PCBs from one of our past or future projects, or a related prototype. Our PCBs are made through Seeed Studio’s Fusion board service.

This week two random commenters will get a coupon code for the free PCB drawer tomorrow morning. Pick your own PCB.

You get unlimited free PCBs now – finish one and we’ll send you another!

Don’t forget there’s free PCBs three times every week:

Continue reading “Free PCB Sunday: Pick your PCB”