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 […]
Arduino
53 posts
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 […]
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 […]
Following on from week 1 and week 2, we will be continuing our way through Oomlout’s Arduino Guide, at this point however we hit a snag with using iCircuit. Annoyingly iCircuit is unable to deal with arrays. An array is a cunning way of holding multiple variables inside a single […]
Following on from Week 1 and talking about faking it with an Arduino, we will use UnoArduSim.exe and iCircuit to model the first few circuits from the Oomlout.com’s “Experimenter’s Guide for Arduino” (Full kit was available from here). Oomlout have made the ARDX-circuit-sheets available separately to their guide PDF. Circuit […]
If you want to learn Arduino programming, but don’t always have access to a box of physical hardware, there are a number of Arduino Simulators available, however one of the best ones I have found to use, is also free. UnoArduSim Arduino is a great platform, but If you’re trying […]
A while ago I picked up these buttons for my Dr Who’s K-9 robot from AliExpress, Hobby Components have similar available online, The ones I purchased are SPDT with a 24 V DC incandescent bulb in them, regardless of the button colour they are all illuminated with a white incandescent […]
Well that is MiniBoyGeek up to three working electric Lego Duplo locomotives, only the Chinese one to go… I spoke to the seller: > Item died within 10 minutes of putting batteries into it. refund required. > I am still awaiting a response to my question re refund or replacement […]
Sometimes I feel that my geek credentials are lacking given the lack of code I write, yes I make cool things occasionally, I work as an EMC Engineer for a small Stockport Company, I am a Director of Squashed Fly a small independent Hosting and General Geeky company with Tas, […]
A lot of Chinese Arduinos come with the ch340 as the replacement for the FTDI or other serial bridge. I have nothing against the CH340 / CH340G however it is a PITA (BREAD – Pain In The Arse) to use under OS X as well there is a fuck ton […]
Normaly I would use a cheap chineese clone, but I had an official Arduino Uno available, The process should be the same no matter which you use. Now given that an Chineese clone of the Uno is about £3 you may wonder why you would want to use a £1.20 […]
Today like last year I went to Bristol for the mini maker Faire (unlike Manchester and Liverpool Makefest this one still pays the silly amount of money to use the make branding). Unlike last year @Bristol charged at the door (£3 pp which may not sound like a lot, but […]
I downloaded Random Nerd’s Build a Home Automation System for $100 and started testing it out, A while ago I aquired a Fish Dish (not sure where from), It’s a small PCB that fits on the GPIO header of the Raspberry Pi. I set up NodeRed and MQTT on the […]
A while ago I backed the kickstarter campaign for Particle (formerly Spark)’s Electron board, a IOT (internet of things) with a built in 3G modem (2G are available) with global data coverage, recently they shipped, Setup was as easy as getting it out the box, wiring it up and following […]
This is an update from a previous post, since there have been some changes to getting them to work under OSX. I found these Arduino Uno clones (link) on Ali Express for £2.16 each with free shipping from china, I can’t even get Diavolino for that little (Also a Diavolino […]
More than a few years ago, I bought myself a Remote Control boat, a Kyosho Wave Master: The WaveMaster is a semi scale model of an F-1 tunnel hull racing boat. Tunnel hulls work by trapping a cushion of air between the hull and water to reduce friction which allows […]
Following on from trying to program the LinkIt ONE on Mac, and Windows, I went looking for further information, I managed to find some information on the IDE GitHub page, I will compare how easy it is to program each of them with Blink.ino. My mac is set up as […]
Following on from the Mac instructions, I have also set up MediaTek’s LinkIt™ ONE on a Window Machine, Setup Download the MediaTek LinkIt SDK for Arduino Windows. Unzip the downloaded zip, right click on the installer “mediatek_linkit_sdk_(for_arduino)-1.1.05.exe” and “Run as administrator” Change the location on Screen two to the location […]
A few weekends ago, HACMan, Tas and I were at MakerFaire New Castle. One of the exhibitors there was MediaTek, showing off their range of LinkIt Wearables / IoT (Tnternet of Things) development boards. I have managed to snag myself a LinkIt One development board kit: Optimized performance and power […]
I have finally got round to trying to Automate the hot water pump on the boat, using what I found out about the DS18B20 one wire Waterproof Temperature sensors from the Arduino Data logger I wanted to try out controlling the pump, (the same PCB will be used for other automation […]
The Arduino IDE serial console sucks! (the entire Arduino IDE kind of sucks, but one fix at a time). I first tried to use the native Minicom package, the most up to date one I found was version 2.2 (compiled Mar 16 2007), it can be installed and set up […]
At work we had need for a multiple temperature logging device. Using one of my cheap Chinese Arduino Uno clones, some DS18B20 one wire Waterproof Temperature Transducers (like these ones), a cheap Ethernet / SD card shield (like this), and a DS1307 RTC (Real Time clock) (link). The DS1307 RTC […]
I found these Arduino Uno clones (link) on Ali Express for £2.16 each with free shipping from china, I can’t even get Diavolino for that little (Also a Diavolino needs a RS232 / FTDI or something as well). These clones come with something different, rather than the usual FTDI they […]
A Stevenson screen is an outdoor enclosure to shield meteorological instruments against precipitation and direct heat radiation (sometimes called a radiation screen) from outside sources, while still allowing air to circulate freely around them. The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) agreed standard for the height of the screen is between 1.25 […]
Similer to how I deal with keeping Eagle in sync between multiple machines, I try to do the same with the Arduino IDE and Processing. In my dropbox folder I store my projects in a sub folder called Projects, and in there I have a folder called “_Vitamins” (the _ […]