Author Archives: James Hobson

Secret Book Light Switch

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You enter a study and see a lightbulb hanging on the bookshelf. You try all the switches in the room — nothing is turning it on. Remembering you’re in [lonesoulsurfer]’s home, you realize that you’re going to have to start yanking on every book in sight.

While often associated with the likes of Bat-caves and other complicated hidden passageways, turning a shelved book into a secret switch isn’t complex in its own right. [lonesoulsurfer] is basing their build on one by B.Light Design revolving around a fan switch, some aluminium strips, a block terminal, fishing line, a hinge, and — …read more

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The M1 NerfBot: When Prototypes Evolve

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What do you get when you cross a self-taught maker with an enthusiasm for all things Nerf? A mobile nerf gun platform capable of 15 darts per second. Obviously.

The M1 NerfBot built by [GrimSkippy] — posting in the ‘Let’s Make Robots’ community — is meant to be a constantly updating prototype as he progresses in his education. That being the case, the progress is evident; featuring two cameras — a webcam on the turret’s barrel, and another facing forward on the chassis, a trio of ultrasonic sensors, controlled by an Xbox 360 controller, and streaming video to a webpage …read more

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Building A Bioactive Vivarium From An IKEA Shelf

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Pets are often worth a labour of love. [leftthegan] — in want of a corn snake — found that Sweeden’s laws governing terrarium sizes made all the commercial options to too small for a fully-grown snake. So they took matters into their own hands, building a bioactive vivarium for their pet!

[leftthegan] found an IKEA Kallax 4×4 shelving unit for a fair price, and after a few design iterations — some due to the aforementioned regulations — it was modified by adding a shelf extension onto the front and cutting interior channels for cabling. For the vivarium’s window, they settled …read more

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Shoot-And-Forget Digital Photo Frame

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Digital photo frames these days require you to manage the photos stored on it or the cloud-based service tied to the frame’s manufacturer. [Henric Andersson] realized that he and his wife take a lot of photos but find little time to go through them — like photo albums of days past — and add them to any photo frame-like appliance or service. Since Google photos can do a lot of the sorting for them, he decided to incorporate that into a digital photo frame.

Using his wife’s old Viewsonic 24” 1080p monitor, he cracked it open and incorporated the screen …read more

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No, Cat, This Is Not The Litter Box

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Hackaday.io user [peterquinn] has encountered a problem with his recently unruly cat peeing under the dining table. Recognizing that the household cat’s natural enemy is the spray bottle, he built an automatic cat sprayer to deter her antics.

The build is clear-cut: an Arduino Uno clone for a brain, an MG995 servo, PIR sensor, spray bottle, and assorted electronics components. [peterquinn] attached the servo to the spray bottle with a hose clamp — ensuring that the zero position is pointing at the trigger — and running a piece of cabling around the trigger that the servo will tug on. Adding …read more

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Look Out Nest — Here Comes the WIoT-2

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[Dave] is an avid hacker and no stranger to Hackaday. When he decided to give his IoT weather display an upgrade, he pulled out all the stops.

The WIoT-2 is less of a weather station and more of an info center for their house — conveniently located by their front door — for just about anything [Dave] or his partner need to know when entering or exiting their home. It displays indoor temperature and humidity, date, time, garbage collection schedule, currency exchange rates, whether the garage door is open or closed, the hot tub’s temperature, a check in for his …read more

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Solar Power In A Can!

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When spending time camping, people often bring lanterns, flashlights, and the like — you might even bring along a solar charger. Instructables user [bennelson] is combining all your electrical powered needs by cramming solar power into a can.

Already designed to resist the elements, [bennelson] is using a 50cal. ammo can for a portable enclosure. Inside, he’s siliconed a 15AH, 12V lead-acid battery in the centre to maintain balance and to leave room for the wiring and storage. One cardboard mockup later, he laser-cut the top panel from 1/8″ plywood and secured a 20A solar charge controller, a four-in-one socket …read more

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Old Modem, New Internet.

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Do you remember the screeching of a dial-up modem as it connected to the internet? Do you miss it? Probably not, but [Erick Truter] — inspired by a forum post and a few suggestions later — turned a classic modem into a 3G Wi-Fi hotspot with the ubiquitous Raspberry Pi Zero.

Sourcing an old USRobotics USB modem — allegedly in ‘working’ condition — he proceeded to strip the modem board of many of its components to make room for the new electronic guts. [Truter] found that for him the Raspberry Pi Zero W struggled to maintain a reliable network, and …read more

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This Radio Gets Pour Reception

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When was the last time you poured water onto your radio to turn it on?

Designed collaboratively by [Tore Knudsen], [Simone Okholm Hansen] and [Victor Permild], Pour Reception seeks to challenge what constitutes an interface, and how elements of play can create a new experience for a relatively everyday object.

Lacking buttons or knobs of any kind, Pour Reception appears an inert acrylic box with two glasses resting on top. A detachable instruction card cues the need for water, and pouring some into the glasses wakes the radio.

Inside, two aluminium plates —  acting as capacitive touch sensors — are …read more

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Dungeons and Dragons TV Tabletop!

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With little more than pen, paper, dice, and imagination, a group of friends can transport themselves to another plane for shenanigans involving dungeons and/or dragons. An avid fan of D&D and a budding woodworker, Imgurian [CapnJackHarkness] decided to build gaming table with an inlaid TV for their inaugural project.

The tabletop is a 4’x4′ sheet of plywood, reinforced from underneath and cut out to accommodate a support box for the TV. Each leg ended up being four pieces of 1’x4′ wood, laminated together with a channel cut into one for the table’s power cable. An outer ledge has dice trays …read more

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