Monthly Archives: February 2014

Opensource Tools

I stumbled on this site by accident.  Its pretty interesting where it is attempting to build designs for machine tools (lathes for example) with common materials.  I like the concrete lathe they are working on. http://opensourcemachinetools.org/

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A review of the Handibot

I remember when the kickstarter project came out last summer.  I so wanted to buy one of these.  Well those that could afford to fund it are getting them and are starting to play/review them.  The author below does a … Continue reading

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Build your own blog

Nice article on how to take a VM from the cloud and build up a website pretty quickly. Oh and cheaply (linux, bitnami, wordpress, etc etc are all opensource projects). http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/signed-ssh-web-hosting-dont-worry-easily-install-web-software-si/

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Fixing up a cheap CNC

I have been eyeing the Chinese CNC 3020 for some time now,  Runs between $550 and 800 bucks.  But never pulled the trigger since its still allot of cash, and I have been leery of reliability.  But this author has a … Continue reading

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Nice candle powered fan

I like this build.  The only thing I can’t figure out is what the author replaced the existing fan with.  Its a metal fan but I can’t tell from what.  Maybe one of those mini fans?  Reason I mention this … Continue reading

Posted in Tinkering | Comments Off on Nice candle powered fan

A $200 decent 3D printer?

This looks interesting, a cheap (2-3 hundred in kickstarter when it comes out) 3D printer that looks pretty robust.  Its suppose to sell for $3-400 after kickstarter.  Which puts it in the printrbot range.  But it looks like it might … Continue reading

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Reverse Engineering a bank security token

OK I am not sure if this is cool or scary.  Cool that the author reverse engineered the android app to get how the token was generated, and build code to use a cheap TI Stellaris to generate its own. … Continue reading

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Random numbers with AVR

Interesting article where the author created a library to run on an AVR Tiny for random number generation. http://hackaday.com/2014/02/10/the-two-component-random-number-generator/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+hackaday%2FLgoM+%28Hack+a+Day%29

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Serial port motor controller

Neat little hack to control motors via a serial port (without a board in-between).  Could be useful for robot projects in the future. http://hackaday.com/2014/02/10/controlling-motors-without-a-microcontroller/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+hackaday%2FLgoM+%28Hack+a+Day%29

Posted in robots, Tinkering | Comments Off on Serial port motor controller

Xerox PARC gets spy grant

Well a grant to do research for the military.  Sounds like some interesting tech.  Odd thing is its PARC that got the grant.  Not so much Xerox (PARC is a spin off from Xerox now, I think Xerox just owns … Continue reading

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