May 22, 2007

Pinewood Derby Finish Line Detector
Cool Gadgets

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If you need to judge some Pinwood Derby races this Pinewood Derby Finish Line Detector project will give you some unbiased results. Schematics and details are provided on the site. “A few years ago the finish line detector at my church’s AWANA Grand Prix track bit the dust. AWANA Grand Prix is the same thing as the Pinewood Derby to scouting folks. We did without for a couple years until

MERLIN Robot
Complex Hacks

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At first MERLIN may look like a normal remote control car, looking closer you will notice a host of sensors bolted to the frame. These sensors allow the car to learn about its surroundings and perform things such as obstacle avoidance. “MERLIN is controlled by 80C167 CR 16 bit-processor. The microprocessor is employed for interfacing sensor data acquisition, sensor data pre-processing, calculation of the control algorithms, and telecommunication with a