Today in the submersibles department our hacker [Rupin Chheda] wrote in to tell us about their submarine project. This sub is made from a few lengths of PVC piping of various diameters. There is an inflation system comprised of a solenoid and a pump, and a deflation system, also comprised of a solenoid and a […]
Over on his YouTube channel [Tom Stanton] shows us how to build a Stirling Engine for a bike. A Stirling Engine is a heat engine, powered by the expansion and contraction of a working fluid (such as air) which is heated and cooled in a cycle. In the video [Tom] begins by demonstrating the Stirling […]
USB-C has enabled a lot of great things, most notably removing the no less than three attempts to plug in the cable correctly, but gone are the days of just 5V over those lines. [Meticulous Technologies] sent in their project to help easily identify what voltage your USB-C line is running at, the USB VSense. […]
When buying used cars there are plenty of ways to check on their history. In many countries there are systems, like Carfax for parts of North America and Europe, that can provide crash history in some situations and alert a potential buyer of hidden damage. Not so for computers, where anyone can run an intensive […]
As part of his multi-year project to build a quantum computer, hacakday.io poster [skywo1f] has shared with us his most recent accomplishment — a Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectrometer, which he built for less than $100. The NMR spectrometer is designed to disturb protons, which naturally line up according to the Earth’s magnetic field, using an […]
It’s an unfortunate fact that when a scientist at MIT describes an exciting new piece of hardware as “low-cost,” it might not mean the same thing as if a hobbyist had said it. [Caden Kraft] encountered this disparity when he was building a SCARA arm and needed good actuators. An actuator like those on MIT’s […]
[Jackson Studner] wrote in to let us know about his ESP32-based media server: Jcorp Nomad. This project uses a ESP32-S3 to create a WiFi hotspot you can connect to from your devices. The hotspot is a captive portal which directs the user to a web-interface comprised of static HTML assets which are in situ with […]
Display technology has come a long way since the advent of the CRT in the late 1800s (yes, really!). Since then, we’ve enjoyed the Nixie tubes, flip dots, gas plasma, LCD, LED, ePaper, the list goes on. Now, there’s a new kid on the block — water. [Steve Mould] recently got his hands on an […]
Over on YouTube, [Technology Connections] has a new video: Induction lamps: fluorescent lighting’s final form. This video is about a wireless fluorescent light which uses induction to transfer power from the electrical system into the lamp. As this lamp doesn’t require wiring it is not prone to “sputtering” as typical fluorescent lights are, thus improving […]