March 2010

DIY Soil Moisture Sensor

I recently bought some house plant seeds via a mail order seed company. I don’t seem to have the knack of caring for the seeds though. I followed the instructions on the packet but don’t seem to be having much luck in getting any of the seeds to sprout. I am thinking that next time I attempt this I will need some automation on my side. When I was looking

Worlds most Powerful Private Rocket

Jonathan from iTrends.dk gave us the heads up about a Denmark team who is building the Worlds most Powerful Private Rocket. Their goal is to send a person into space! Sounds like a blast, but I’m not sure I would want to be the first one to test it out. “This is a non-profit suborbital space endeavor, based entirely on sponsors and volunteers. Our mission is to launch a human

Olympic Interactive LED Globes

Tangible Interaction and Macetech (makers of the Shift Bright) were part of the Olympics! They had a hand in quite a few LED installations but the coolest are these Olympic Interactive LED Globes. Macetech talks about the hurdles they had designing and building these devices, due to time constrains and part shortages they had to make some quick decisions in order to meet the deadline. “The globes are about six

How Ball Bearings are Made

We use ball bearings all the time. They are used in everything from CNC machines to cars. After you see how much work goes into making one the price of a few dollars seems like such a deal! This article is brought to you by NMB Tech, makers of a quality ball bearing fan.

Name the Thing Contest - 122

The prize this week is a cable tester to help you with troubleshooting. This contest will run for one week (March 6 – 12, 2010) . Ending time is based on central standard time. To enter, identify the item pictured above and give an example of what can be done with it. Please do not give the answer in the comments. Send an email to contest @ hackedgadgets.com with “Name

Strobeshnik Hard Drive Clock

Svofski sent in a neat hard drive clock design he calls Strobeshnik. The clock looks wonderful and he has documented the entire build including how he etched through the aluminum hard drive platters to make the number cutouts. There is a full schematic and code for the microcontroller provided. “Strobeshnik uses stroboscopic effect to create the illusion of persistent numeric display. The hard drive platter has 10 digits, colon and

Time Delay Door Alarm Project

BlackCow from Homebrew Tech has a curious cat who likes to open the front door if it wasn’t properly latched. This Time Delay Door Alarm Project solves that problem by monitoring the door and producing a tone if it has been left open for more than around 30 seconds. This way it isn’t buzzing every time you use the door normally.  The schematic is available on his site if you