Category: DIY

Okay, so it looks like kludged-together crap, but this servo-controlled webcam project shows you how to turn any webcam into one o’ them expensive Orbit cams. Besides a cam, it requires two hobby servos and a Microchip pic16f628(a) microcontroller chip and a Pic Programmer and a perfboard and some misc electronic parts and a lot of patience. What you end up with is not likely to be the easiest or most elegant solution, but it’ll be a cool whirring little computer-controlled desktop machine that you built and programmed.

Amal Graafstra, author of the ExtremeTech guide RFID Toys, has posted a free bonus chapter on his website. The PDF document describes, step-by-step, how to install a deadbolt lock that can be controlled by an RFID (radio frequency ID) tag. While some of the other RFID-controlled home automation projects use a home computer, this one uses a door-mounted BASIC Stamp 2 microcontroller.

[Via hackAday]

Make Vol. 6 is on its way. This issue’s theme is robots and I have three pieces in it, including the cover story on BEAM, with an intro to BEAM robotics and two BEAMbot projects. Those are my little critters on the cover! Frankendaddy’s so proud! Here’s a link to the full Table of Contents.

Today’s Make Podcast features Andrew Filo’s tour of his in-progress rocket belt that he was showing off at the Maker’s Faire.

Here’s a link to the Rocketbelt website which has tons of history, tech, links to builders’ pages, etc.

Just when digital photography had finally gotten decent on just about anybody’s budget, some dude decided it was time to start dumbing them down. This quick n’ dirty project uses an old lens cap, a film canister, and some Dremeling to turn a digital camera into a faux-Holga film camera.

The Holga is an el cheapo comrade camera from China, which was a favorite in communist countries before catching on among the low-fi set in the West who liked its funky effects, light leaks, distortions, and other proletarian charms.

Oh, BTW, you need a Holga for this project, too. You can get them online for a whopping US$20.

[Via hackAday]

When good drives go bad, it breaks your heart, doesn’t it? Especially since few of us back up as methodically or religiously as we tell our children and coworkers to do. There is a growing repository of tech tricks and folk hacks for breathing life into a seemingly dead drive, from doing a platter transplant to giving your drive a few meaningful whacks with your hand. But freezing the ol’ 1s and 0s? That was a new one on me.

Apparently, if your drive is not spinning up, you can try putting it in a zip-loc bag, freeze it overnight, and then, reconnect it and try it again. The trick has been posted to Tech Republic and numerous techies have chimed in to verify that it does work, in more than a few cases. Cool (literally).

[Via Lifehacker]

There’s What to Do with an Old CPU, and then there’s what to do with a bunch o’ dead HDs. How about: making them into speakers? Or a clock? Or an oscilloscope? Believe it or not, these are all doable, and detailed on HackedGadgets, in their Top 5 Dead Hard Drive Projects piece. For the less technically-minded, there’s always hard drive wind chimes (pictured).

[Via hackAday]

Phillip Torrone, Senior Editor of Makezine, sings the praises of the Third Hand tool in the recent edition of Kevin Kelly’s Cool Tools e-list, because: “It’s pretty tough to find someone to help you at 3am when most of the important work seems to happen. Two adjustable metal clips hold in your circuit boards (or whatever else) and a magnifying glass gives you a little zoom in action for the really tricky constructions. Perhaps I anthropomorphize useful things, but on an otherwise cold work bench, the Third Hand looks like a little robot pal with claws raised, always eager to help.”

He has the same one I do, the US$6 jobby from Jameco. The only thing he didn’t say is that you really want at least two of these, because for many projects, even an extra set of robo-hands just ain’t enough.

Make Your Own Third Hands: While $6 is plenty cheap for a tool as indispensable as this one, you can make several pairs of these helpers for nothing, if you have some thick-gauge copper wire and alligator clips hanging around. All you have to do is attach the clips to both ends of a length of wire, and then, using carpet tacks, attach the wire to a piece of wood (such as a short length of 1 x 4). Instant Third Hand.

Chris J. over at GRYNX was so chuffed by all of the attention he got from his Tic-Tac flashlight, that he’s posted a new project, a 3-bulb LED light made from a 9v batt, three bright white LEDs, and a battery snap made from a dead 9v. One cool thing about this project is that, by using three LEDs on 9volts, you don’t have to use a resistor in the circuit, so the parts count is only five. You can also add a magnet to it to create an attachable light, or maybe to use in some electronic graffiti.

If you have a 360 or have been reading up on them, you know that there are numerous complaints about how hot they are. They’re hot. One hacker has joked that he’s going to do an E-Z Bake Oven/360 mash-up mod. Hey d00d, it’s been done (sorta). Rather than cook bit-sized snack treats on their boxes, most gamers would like to cool things down. It’s doable, but as this tutorial shows, it’s rather involved, requires you to do some serious hacking up of your hardware, and it ain’t cheap. This cooling system, centered on the Thermaltake home theater cooling unit, costs some US$300. And what you’re left with is a very Frankensteinian looking game console with a big silver box next to it. So much for J. Allard’s elegant gesture of the iconic in-breath.