One of the problems I have when designing PCBs, or working in CAD with a view to 3D printing it is easy to loose sight of how big things on the screen are in real life. A lot of the time when you move away from working with through hole […]
Skippy
1446 posts
Like the bearing size code, resister values for LEDs is something that I keep needing to work out, or just go back to my nominal somewhere between 200 Ω and 1 kΩ rule of thumb. While I could work it out every time I need it using and then chose […]
Since I got Pycom working on my Mac, I can now update the firmware on my expansion board, the DFU updater is available in Brew, which we should have installed in the last post. From the Updating Firmware page we can download the correct firmware file; I have the Expansion […]
I have bought a Pycom makr WiPy to have a play with Micro Python, the recommended IDE is atom with Pymakr Atom Package, however it doesn’t work out the box as designed due to an issue with Atom and Pymakr. After you have installed Atom from atom.io, you can open […]
A mixture of random photos of nbKawartha: Photos from when she was last painted are here nbKawartha (bw# 50216) was built in 1992 by Jonathan Wilson, when we bought her she was called nbSteven. She is a 57ft (17.44 metres) Traditional Narrow-boat powered by a BMC 1.8 diesel engine, from […]
On Saturday Tamarisk, MiniBoyGeek, Thinkl33t and I went to The MAD Museum in Stoke-on-Trent with Emily and Glen. We also found a nice little vegan coffee shop called Plantarium. Emily made Tamarisk and I a Flappity Bat for Christmas: Go look at her shop!
tl;dr; I have not yet managed it… but if you read on you will see where I am currently up to, and where I think I can go. I am reading the University of Toronto’s “Self-Driving Cars Specialisation“, one of the tutors is Paul Newman from Oxbotica: Be at the […]
If you do any amount of design with 3D printers, sooner or later you will find your self using bearings between two bits to help them move; normally you will reach for a “skateboard bearing” or a 608ZZ, however if you need a size that is not a 608ZZ the […]
I just realised that in Part 1 and Part 2 that I didnt discuse how to go from Datasheet to Fusion 360, While I am not going to cover how to do the drawing in great detail, there are plenty of sites which tell you how to make drawings in […]
Following on from From Datasheet to KiCad Component – Part One, I had got as far as making the footprint in KiCad the Footprint Editor, The layers I have built it out of look like this: Now we have the footprint finished for Type C (I also did Type A […]
Recently the BBC wrote an article online with the headline “Does 5G pose health risks?”, the first section was: The 5G mobile network has been switched on in some UK cities and has led to questions about whether the new technology poses health risks. So what are the concerns, and […]
One of the simpler inputs to add to a microcontroller is a switch, I have chosen to use the ones I have added to KiCad for my Swarmbot. Most people who add microswitches normaly use something like the following circuit on a Digital in Pin. When the Switch is open […]
I found some cheap small microswitches on AliExpress, working backwards I found the same switch part numbers, and subsequently found a Switch Data sheet for the same size part. I use a mix of Fusion 360 and KiCAD for design, so I CADDed up the three flavours of microswitches, using […]
This is version one of a set of Left-hand Switches made for MiniBoyGeek’s Duplo Railway Yes there is already a version two waiting to print, with additional check rails and re-designed mechanism: You can find it on ThingiVerse here
I found the ‘Picktor’ Pick and Place head for retrofitting on a 3D printer on Thingiverse (GitHub) As designed it uses a Nema 17 stepper motor, however I suspect that will be too big for my design. I got 3 x Nema 14 stepper motors from an old RepRap Huxley, […]
I have started designing assembles in Fusion 360 using T-Slot, a lot of head scratching on how to make use of it at arbitrary lengths in my designs… I started by making a 20mm length of T-Slot as its own model in Fusion 360; This is model has all of […]
Using a LED and a 560 Ω in most breadboard projects means that you end up with four pins connected for two components, soldering them up like this makes them much easer to handle.
In the UK if you want to place some thing on the market you need to ensure that it has a CE mark and has a DoC (Declaration of Conformity), there are a number of things that need to be done. Looking through the list, we have CE, RoHS, WEEE, […]
…Are negligible! Following on from my last post; that seems to have got a wide readership, I got sent this link and asked to review it; the title of the article is “Scientists Appeal that 5G Wireless is as Hazardous as Asbestos”, which I think we can all agree contains […]
…and other lies adults who should know better spread! On Facebook a friend of mine has joined the crazy Electrosmog people; I was first made aware of it when she posted outrage at an article in a small paper with the headline “Glastonbury Festival 2019 to be first ever music […]
We went to Hack Green Secret Nuclear Bunker, to be fair it is badly named… its got far too well signposted; the entire place is a maze or exhibit rooms, and displays showing an over view of life during its time as a bunker.
This week we will be having a play with a 74HC595, the Data sheet lists it as an 8-bit serial-in, serial or parallel-out shift register with output latches; 3-state.” In other words, you can use it to control 8 outputs at a time while only taking up a few pins […]
Following on from last week where we drove a motor in one direction with the help of a simple amplifier, this week we are going to have a go at driving a servo. Those of you who read older posts in my blog will know I have done this before […]
A fair while ago Swindon Makerspace started a group project called LogoBot, a cheap, expendable and extendable easy to build robot for playing with. Even longer ago I bought a MiroBot from kick-starter, it had lived in a box, and parts of it had got damaged. Tamarisk showed me and […]
I have started putting these on Github so you can also follow along. In Weeks 2, and 3 we were driving LEDs directly from the Arduino, While the Arduino can drive a LED directly from a pin, if you want to power something that draws more power like a motor, […]
I picked up a 37 in 1 box sensor kit from china, it includes basic components and sensors, and is compatible with Arduino and Raspberry Pi The Package Included (their description): Small passive buzzer module KY-006 2-color LED module KY-011 Hit sensor module KY-031 Vibration switch module KY-002 Photo resistor […]
I have now been to Bletchley Park twice. In the gift shop they have a Build your own Enigma-E Kit: The Enigma machine was the German cipher machine used to encrypt their WW2 communications and systematically cracked by the Bletchley Park Codebreakers. This highly detailed replica design gives you the […]
Most of the stuff you will need to do the electronic projects I do on this site can be got by going to Amazon (I have affiliate links), I know I have mentioned the Oomlout Starter Kit for Arduino, However I fear that this is discontinued 🙁 The Oomlout Starter […]