When placing parts into a laser machine the first step is normally to set the height of the work so that the laser dot can focus on the exact spot that the cutting laser will hit. The dot lasers are mounted off to the side at an angle, it would be ideal if the aiming laser could be mounted directly above the work but of course this is where the
Most of us work with connectors quite often. Slap a junction box on the wall, run some wires into it and make some wire nut connections. What if you need it to be water resistant? No problem, put it in a plastic box and use water tight connectors right? Well that might work just fine if this electrical connection is to be mounted to the back of your house but
Hacked Gadgets was at the recent All Energy Conference in Aberdeen Scotland. There was lots of wind generation companies demonstrating their systems and components but I thought that Windspot is going after an interesting market. Their wind generators have automatic pitch compensation which makes them very quiet so they can be used in residential applications and they are also DIY friendly since as you can see everything you need is
Nicholas Skinner shares how he developed his DIY Central Heating and Hot Water Control System with us. “Features: Two channel (heating and hot water) support. Temporary Override (ignore schedule for 30 min – 1 day), both overriding on, but also off. Permanent Override (ignore schedule). Web based interface for changing schedule / override settings. Schedule support for any combination of weekdays. Schedule support for one off custom schedules on specific
The prize this week is a mini tripod to help you get some great pictures of your next project. This contest will run for one week (June 11 – 17, 2011). Ending time is based on central standard time. To enter, identify the item pictured above. Please do not give the answer in the comments. Send an email to contest @ hackedgadgets.com with “Name the Thing Contest” as the subject,
RC cars are tons of fun but driving a RC car using your Android Phone would be even better! Antoine Monmarché used an OpenPicus module mounted in the car to get the job done. There is documentation and source code available here. “The RC car (battery powered) is completely controlled by Flyport. The module manages Wi-Fi link to an Android Smartphone and it drives the servo motors (PWM signal). On
There are lots of cool instruments that can be played but normally you are limited to enjoying one at a time. Patrick Flanagan has that concept licked with his Jazari Musical Instrument. He is able to control an entire room full of instruments by creating loops on them using his unusual looking hand interface. It uses accelerometers to detect the position of his hand and adjusts the instruments sound accordingly.
