the e-unit project blog

Learning to surf in Barbados

2011-12-20T10:08:00.000-05:00

Surfing has always been an activity I've wanted to try in my adult life. A major stumbling block in this endeavor, up to now, has been opportunity. Unlike skiing, surfing isn't something the novice generally designs a vacation around. At least I've never thought about it. I live reasonably close to the Delaware and Maryland Beaches but body surfing and sun soaking has always been the name of the game out there. That and I have yet to witness people getting any sort of instruction on the beach. Trust me, a good lesson is key.

Deb and I took a trip out to Barbados recently to visit a friend and stumbled upon a little free time during our last day there. Actually we had the whole day to ourselves and I pushed for surfing lessons pretty hard. My wife was quite nervous about the idea partly because she didn't know whether she could do it or not. I'll give you one guess who the better surfer turned out to be. It must be because she's shorter. By the way, this video is pretty much all you need to know about Barbados. Remember what I told you about a good lesson. Well, the instructor is a big part of that. I can't imagine a better guide than Jonathan (Jona) from Barry's Surf Barbados Surf School. He had us up on the board almost immediately. It was apparent after watching other instructors on the beach that we lucked out.

I picked this video because I think it best captures the proper technique to successfully stand up on a long board. That and it's the only video I had. The hardest part for me was remembering to look up toward the beach. Your tendency is the check out your feet placement after standing up but that will almost assuredly put you in the ocean. I'm a little wobbly there at the end but to my defense, it was my third time out that day and the sea was rough my friends. Well, rough for a land lover. Definitely something everyone should try at least once.

My first foray into the modern cooking movement

2011-10-19T12:34:00.003-05:00

Holding steady at 140° F

I started cooking a lot more when I met my wife. And by that I mean I helped her when she cooked. I was still a relative novice but wanted to learn. The really tricky part was figuring out where to start. We realized early on that our styles where quite different which led to a few clashes in the kitchen. Mostly because I asked way too many questions. Deb cooks more on taste and feel and I want to know what's going on under the hood. I discovered a book called Cooking for Geeks which, as you can probably tell, spoke to me immediately. It dives into the chemistry and physics of cooking right away and delivers it in an easily understood manner. I was particularly enthralled with the chapter on Sous Vide cooking. Not only was the science noteworthy but the hardware involved was also of particular interest to me. Unfortunately the cheapest commercially available unit costs in the range of $400. Okay, I was gonna build one before I even knew the price tag.

Sous Vide, pronounced "Sue Veed", is a way of cooking food by submerging it in a very accurate temperature controlled water bath. The food is vacuum sealed in a plastic bag to keep the water out and keep the moisture and aromas in. This method eliminates any chance of overcooking the meal and ensures that it is heated evenly throughout. You get a perfectly done steak or piece of fish every time. More about that later though.

With pretty much all of my projects, I like to start off by scouring the internet to get a good idea of what's already out there. I found this little gem on Make and figured it was a great place to begin. The design revolves around a PID controller which continually reads in the water bath temperature with a k type thermocouple and cycles three heating elements either on or off based on the current temperature, rate of temperature change and distance from desired temperature. Normally it would be a lot cooler if I made my own controller but for $30, it was hard to beat the off the shelf unit they spec'd.

Sheet Metal Work

I was't a fan of the enclosure they used so I leveraged my meager metal working skills and made my own. Making cut outs in 1/8" aluminum is not fun. After cutting a series of smaller holes on the drill press, I filed down the inner edges to make them flat and smooth. To make the box, I bent all the side walls toward each other and used epoxy where they met on the inside to secure them in place. More grinding was necessary to round off the joints. This was the most time consuming portion of the project. Took a few iterations of sanding and priming to get the edges just right. I was quite please with how they turned out. Like the paint job? Gotta thank my pal Tommy S. for the inspiration. How better to paint a slow cooker than with racing stripes. Check out the nod to the French racing blue Renault Clio 182.

I think it's time to talk performance and results. The controller and associated thermocouple kept the water bath temperature within two tenths of a degree of the set temp. That's more than accurate enough for the purpose of this machine. And when heating up room temp water, it can add enough energy to increase the temp of about two gallons of water approximately 2°F per minute. That's not great but considering the water coming out of the tap can reach about 130°F, you really don't have to wait too long.

Perfect medium rare steak

I decided to start the real testing with something easy, a couple of 5oz filet mignon steaks. Flanked the meal with some roasted yukon golds and sauteed broccoli. I set the immersion cooker at 140°F, vacuum sealed up the meat (covered in a little garlic, thyme, olive oil, salt and pepper) and let it cook for an hour and fifteen minutes. As a result of cooking at a relatively low temperature, the browning reactions normally associated with a steak will not take place. This is easily overcome with some quick searing action on a smoking hot cast iron skillet. Around 45 seconds a side should do it. As you can see in the picture above, the steak is cooked evenly throughout. I also verified with a thermometer that the meat was a perfect 140°F. A little moisture was left over in the bag but not enough to really matter. The resultant steak was extremely tender and juicy.

The obvious drawback to this style of cooking is the long cook times necessary to neutralize any bacteria present in the food. Bacteria will die within minutes at 160°F but it takes considerable longer at lower temperatures. There are many guides available to aide you with these calculations. I don't mind the long lead. My thinking is, where's the fire baby? Life is to be simmered and enjoyed. Sous Vide isn't for every meal but it does add another interesting preparation option in the kitchen and a good one at that. I'm looking forward to further experimentation and more delicious food.

Watermelon Gin Jalapeno Limeade Spritzer

2011-08-30T09:54:00.002-05:00

On a trip out to Cosi a little while back, I sampled their Watermelon Habanero Lemonade and was thoroughly impressed. Sweet, spicy and very refreshing. I really needed to make this into a cocktail. On a recent sunny Sunday afternoon I sequestered myself in the kitchen endeavoring to do just that. I was going to start with store bought lemonade but my wife suggested that I take a look at Emeril's Watermelon Limeade recipe before I do. Always with a good idea up her sleeve, I listened and whipped up a batch. Start with 8 cups of loosely packed watermelon (seeds removed) and blend until liquefied. Strain until all the pulp is removed. You should be left with about a quart (4 cups) of juice. Add one cup of fresh lime juice along with a half cup of sugar and you're done. This in itself is very tasty but it's not a cocktail just yet. Cosi used Habanero peppers in it's drink but I'm a huge fan of Jalapenos so I went that route. Cut the peppers in half lengthwise and scrape all the seeds and pulp out with a spoon. That's where most of the heat is and I'm looking for taste not bite. Slice the pepper into 1/8" pieces and set aside. A little pepper goes a long way so when building your drink, start with about 4 half moon slices and add to taste. I associate Gin with summertime cocktails so that was a no brainer. I prefer Hendricks but that can be a bit pricey so Beefeater is just fine. To finish things off I added an equal amount of Club Soda for that carbonated kick. Tasty drink and fun to make. Though I think I need a better name. Suggestions?

Watermelon Gin Jalapeno Limeade Spritzer

- 1 oz. Gin
- 1 oz. Club Soda
- 5 oz. Watermelon Limeade
- 4 slices Jalapeno halves (1/8" thick, seeds and pulp removed)

Add Gin, Club Soda and Jalapeno to rocks glass, let sit for about a minute. Add ice till about 3/4 full. Top with Watermelon Limeade and stir. Enjoy!

Undercounter iPad dock

2011-08-15T09:28:00.003-05:00

My wife and I own many cookbooks but more often than not we look to the interwebs for recipes. I got my wife an iPad for her birthday when I finally got tired of scrolling through verbose assembly instructions on an iPhone. Prior to purchasing the wonder tablet I knew that our lack of counter space left few options for placing the iPad out of the way yet accessible at the same time. I would have to go vertical.

At first I thought about modifying a COTS (consumer off the shelf) iPad case and mounting it to the face of a cabinet but I didn't feel comfortable swinging the thing around every time we wanted to get a plate. After hitting a slight creative block, I was inspired by a couple drawer slides I found whilst fumbling around my spare parts box. I could mount the dock to the underside of a cabinet and slide it out and over the sink when it's needed. However, in this configuration, I would only have 1 and 1/8 inches of clearance to work with. Subtracting the width of the iPad (1/2"), the iPad holder (1/4") and the logically minimal width of a sturdy base (1/4")... I was running out of room quickly. I would have to lay the iPad holder flat against the base and somehow conjure up enough space to fashion some sort of kickstand mechanism.

Knowing that I had no height to work with, I envisioned an opening in the base where the hinged portion of the dock would reside. I also thought up notches in that opening that would later accept a couple of saw tooth sections to act as adjustable stops for a kickstand. Luckily I have access to a laser cutting table. Otherwise, cutting out the design below would have been impossible with a Dremel.

Figure 1: CAD drawing for laser cutting table

The kickstand affixes to the underside of the hinged section with a couple of brackets that were also cut out using the drawing in Figure 1. Love that laser. I made the kickstand by bending up a piece of 1/8" tubular aluminum on a vice. There was as little trial and error involved here. I had to get the leg sections the exact same length or else they wouldn't sit on the stops properly. I wouldn't want the iPad to wobble around now would I.

I made the iPad holder out of 1/16" sheet aluminum which I painted a shiny black with a couple coats of clear acrylic for protection. This is also the case where having the right tools really makes the job easy. Having a good sheet metal cutter and bender makes all the difference. I left a little slack around the iPad to put a thin felt pad to minimize scratching but turns out the current finish is soft enough and any additional material may not be necessary.

There are a couple things I would have done differently had I owned the house. First off, building the drawer slides into the cabinet so it's totally hidden when not in use would have been really neat. I'll shelf that idea until I put up some custom cabinets of my own. Next, having the whole thing motorized would bring this to the next level. Completely unnecessary but cool none the less. I had that notion from the very beginning so I designed it with that potential upgrade in mind. Though I have many more projects in mind so that will have to wait for another day.

Fun with sensors

2011-06-27T11:33:00.000-05:00

A couple years ago I put together a kegerator and while draft beer at home is great, the project never felt complete. The system performed well but there were a couple of issues that would crop up from time to time. Mainly, figuring out how much beer was left in the fridge consisted of opening the door and pawing at the keg. Besides this being unscientific, the act of opening the door would let all the cold air out and the compressor would have to crank to keep up. And speaking of temperature, it would be nice to have a good idea of how cold the keg is getting.

Scale for Fuel Gauge Measurement

Incorporating a temperature sensor was obvious. Though there are many different types so choosing wasn't easy. We'll get to that later. To make a beer fuel gauge I decided to tag team a couple different sensors to make as accurate a reading as possible. First I constructed a crude scale to house a couple force sensors I got from Sparkfun. To supplement the weight measurement, I added a Swiss Flow SF800 flow rate meter to the mix. You can never have too many sensors. I ended up not needing the flow meter for the fuel gauge but it got used when I wanted to know when beer was flowing or not. You'll see why that's important in the video below. I was reluctant to include the flow meter initially because I thought there was a chance if would disrupt the flow of beer and create more foam than usual. While this is the case, it wasn't significant enough to remove it.

I thought the temp sensor was a no-brainer but it turned out to be a little tricky. Idealy, I'd like to know the actual temp of the beer but since the keg is a sealed container, that is impossible. The next best thing would have been to simulate the keg with an approximate thermal mass and sense the temperature of that but I didn't have the space. That and I had already decided to be lazy and use a board mounted digital temperature sensor instead. Couple drawbacks with that idea though. Since it is soldered to the sensor control board, thermal coupling to said board is an issue and placement in the fridge cavity is somewhat limited. And to get a reading that actually means something, placement is critical. Turns out that placing the board right under the fridge chill plate gave me some pretty accurate results when compared to a mercury thermometer. And it was a good indication of what the fridge's themocouple was reading since the compressor cycle and my temperature readings tracked almost exactly in phase. That's important because one day I may want to take over control of that cycle for tighter temperature regulation.

So now I want to display all the good data I'm getting. I used cast iron pipe for my keg riser so I felt it was necessary to stick to that theme and go a little industrial with my display options. After an exhaustive search online, I finally came across the perfect meter housing from an early model Chevy. On ebay of course. It was pretty beat up when I first got it with splotchy paint and some pretty rough edges. I was originally going to sand and paint the thing but ended up trying my hand at paint stripping instead. Peep the before and after.

Meter Housing Before and After

I'm gonna have to give credit to CitriStrip on this one. It made short work of that old paint. A little grinding here and polishing there and... well, I still had an empty shell. That is until I modified up a couple analog meters to stick in there.

Modified 0-5 Volt Analog Meter

They were a little small but hey, when life gives you a little space fill it up with light from an RGB LED I say. What would one of my projects be if I didn't throw some lumens at it. You'll want to check out the video for full effect.

I made four boards for this project. They are mostly unpopulated in the picture to the left because I like to test out the micro first before I finish them up. I'm weird that way. The board at the bottom went in the keg fridge and has circuitry to read all the sensors. It also manipulates the data into an easily read format for the display control board in the middle. That board drives the Tri-Color LED drivers and does a couple D/A conversion to drive the analog meters. The board on the upper left will eventually house a relay to control the compressor cycle and the board right next to that is a RS232 level shifter so I can divert the TTL level UART signal intended for the display board to a PC for debug purposes. Being able to save the sensor data off to a PC was also helpful when developing my display averaging algorithms.

I never thought my kegerator was stupid before but it sure is smart now. If only if would help me brew beer too. I guess that's the next step.

Custom picture frames are expensive

2011-05-25T15:08:00.001-05:00

I bought a 20 dollar world map a while ago and never got around to framing it until recently. The map is approximately 45" by 30" so it's safe to say that an off the shelf frame isn't going to do the trick. There are a couple custom framing shops around town but I knew Michaels had an extensive framing department and with my 55% off custom framing coupon firmly in hand I rolled out to one of my favorite stores confident I could grab up a sweet frame and not break the bank. And since the map was already laminated with it's own border I could forgo the matting and glass/plexi to save some dough. I truly thought I could step out of the store minus somewhere in the vicinity of 75 to 100 dollars. And yikes! I was way off. Even after the coupon, the least expensive option was about $250. I think it's safe to say I didn't buy a frame that day. And $250 was pretty bare bones. You're not getting a fancy wood stain or two tone metal frame for that. Michaels, I still love ya but I'd have to pursue other options for my framing needs. What was I going to do?

Let me start by saying that my wood working skills are minimal at best. I am aware of the necessary tools but own few of them. I had the cordless drill and screwdriver, needed to borrow the miter saw and router from a neighbor and had to buy a couple right angle clamps. The clamps were only a few bucks at home depot and totally critical if you want to properly align the segments as seen in the picture to the left. I also borrowed a router bit (1/2" rabbet) from work which was key because those suckers can be expensive.

You can find all the materials necessary to build this frame at Home Depot. I went with a 1x3" maple board for it's attractive grain pattern and light color. The color makes a difference when deciding on the stain color that suits you. I chose Minwax Red Mahogany 225 because it looked great and would be a close match to the furniture already in the room. You'll want to test the stain on a scrap piece of wood to make sure the color is what you want. For the protective coating, I went with a Minwax Semi-Gloss Polyurethane. I thought the gloss poly was a bit too reflective for my taste. I already had the wood glue, filler, sandpaper and assorted screws from a previous project but all can be purchased for under 10 dollars.

Before you start cutting, identify the portions of wood you want to face the outside world. And kids, remember the golden rule in woodwork...well, construction in general. Measure twice, cut once. Getting the measurements right when cutting and matching up 45 degree angles can be tricky so take your time. Don't worry if they aren't perfect, mine weren't. This is where the wood filler comes in. A little goes a long way. Check out the picture, looks dead on doesn't it. After you have glued screwed and clamped the four corners, apply the filler where needed and let dry. The frame actually looks pretty good at this point but looks even better when you hit the whole thing with some 220 grit sandpaper. Be sure to go with the grain and be careful around the joints. At this point the initial plan was to just tack the backer board to the rear of the frame but I decided to route out an 8th inch deep half inch rabbet instead to inlay the backer. Looks more professional from the front this way. BTW, had one of the guys at the Depot cut the backer for me. Saved me a bunch of time and trouble. If I ever make a frame again, doing the routing before assembling the parts is totally the way to go. I ended up having to freehand it. The result was far from perfect but it's the back of the frame so no one will see it.

When it comes to applying the stain, follow the instructions on the can and you'll be just fine. I do have a couple tips though. I prefer foam brushes over rags. They are cheep, you can use them for multiple coats and they do a better job of getting into corners. And mineral spirits between coats of stain and polyurethane are essential. Dust is not your friend in this situation. Use a sandpaper in the high 200 grit between coats of stain and something like 320 before the last coat of poly. That will give you the nice glass like finish you're lookin for. All that's left after that is to glue on the backer and tack on some wall mounting hardware and you're done.

We have some other picture frames in the room from Crate and Barrel that have a similar style so this fits right in. I could have used the router to round off the edges or cut some sort of decoration into the wood but thought something simple and understated was appropriate considering the look of the map it was framing.

The basement smelled like stain for a few days but that was worth it when I think about the couple hundred dollars I saved in the process. The overall cost came in at a little under $40. Take that Michaels!

Always drink to world peace

2011-03-24T15:56:00.011-05:00

I've been gearing up to brew some beer at home for some time now, so when Maz and White Noise asked if I wanted to make a batch at Shenandoah Brewing Company I decided to join in figuring it'd be a good place to ask some questions. Indeed it was. SBC provides everything you need and takes you through the whole process from deciding on a recipe to bottling. They must have a few dozen different varieties to choose from. They range from ales to lagers to hefeweizens and they'll gladly work with ya if there's something you'd like to experiment with. We decided on a India Pale Ale (IPA) made primarily with Centennial Hops. I don't have much information about that particular strain of hops other than it hails from the pacific NW and it's popular as well as tasty. As you can probably infer from our label, we brewed this IPA on Groundhogs Day. Boy, that hog sure is dramatic. Took a bit of photoshopping, but I think the labels came together nicely. I Lifted the "Gobbler's Knob" right off a picture of the actual Punxsy Phil sign.

The brewing was pretty straight forward. The only part of the process that was prepared for us was the wort. Wort contains the sugars that will later be fermented to make the all important alcohol content of the beer. As I understand it, wort is made by steeping a mixture of ground up malted barley and grain adjuncts. The steeping creates an environment favorable for enzymes to convert starches into sugars. Apparently to make home brewing easier, malted barley extracts can be added to the grain tea mixture in lue of embarking on the malting process yourself. Good to know.

We started off by precisely weighing each stage of hops and gathering them into bowls. We took the bowls over to the kettle where the next hour or so of boiling would take place. The wort is added to the boiling water first followed by the various stages of hops at predetermined intervals. Boiling the wort accomplishes a few things. It sterilizes the mixture, coagulates proteins and stop enzyme action. Basically kills all the stuff living in the wort while extracting the desired color and flavor. The hops are added in intervals to balance out the taste and aromas. Resins in the hops are broken down slowly and add bitterness to the taste while the oils from the hops evaporate quickly and add aromas. Adding the hops had to be done slowly because they threatened to boil over if done without care. A little bit of kettle tech came in very handy here. Instead of having a single heating element at the bottom, steam is funneled into jackets surrounding the kettle to add energy more evenly which gives you fine control over the temp of the kettle contents. There was no problem backing off the heat at any point because you can regain your previous temp very quickly. After the boiling is complete, the liquid is filtered and run through a heat exchanger where the temp is lowered to a point that is not hazardous to yeast cultures. We added a packet of yeast and rolled the plastic keg around on the floor for a bit to oxygenate the mixture. Around 6 weeks later, we came back to bottle up our creation and take a taste test. The yeast gobbling up all the sugar will create a little carbon dioxide but a little more was added to give it that extra carbonated kick. It was recommended that we store the beer in a dark place for at least two weeks before cracking one open. This gives the beer a chance to settle down and balance out after being carbonated.

Turned out to be a pretty typical IPA. Crisp and hoppy but not overly bitter. It's gonna be nice to drink on a warm spring day. The one major takeaway from this experience is that the world of beer brewing is immense. There are just about a million factors that go into the taste, smell, alcohol content and look of a beer. The hardness of the water, temp of brewing, species of yeast, type of hops, variety of grain adjuncts, process of malting, and a host of other factors all really matter. Kind of intimidating at first glance. Don't think that's gonna stop me though. I'll most likely try to recreate the Knob at home with my own equipment and see how that goes. Can't wait to blog about that.

Monkeying Around

2011-02-24T15:18:00.001-05:00

My neighbor throws a pretty mean jungle themed party every year and I like to participate whenever possible. Which is pretty much every year since this party is not to be missed. I've wanted to go ape for a couple years now but didn't have the tools til recently. I could have bought or rented but it's kinda of expensive and what would I have learned?

Having a sewing machine is key when putting together a large costume. It made short work of the long seams necessary in what turned out to be a basic jumpsuit made out of fake fur. I got a vintage '70s pattern from ebay for around 3 bucks and the fabric from Jo-Ann Fabrics for less than $30. Where would my hobbies be without ebay? The picture on the left is a part realization of the initial concept which involved the ape suit and my wife dressing as Jane Goodall. The trucker hat would have said something like "I'm with Goodall". We scrapped the Goodall portion but I made the trucker hat anyway. I went with something slightly vulgar for the hat epigram to fit the anticipated party atmosphere. I borrowed the mask from my friend Otto for the few minutes during the party. Good thing too, the costume/mask combo got quite hot. I could never be a real gorilla.

I learned a few things about following patterns and judging size and fit but I still have a way to go if I want to put together a more form fitting ensemble. I'll just have to keep on practicing. It's a good thing I have plenty of time before the next Santa suit bar crawl. The wheels have already begun turning on that getup.

Collaboration

2011-01-05T21:12:00.003-05:00

Making fun little lighting projects is just one of my hobbies. Interjecting my unsolicited opinion on the design of other people's projects is another. My neighbors embarked on a basement remodel a while back and, like a moth to a light bulb, I fluttered about living vicariously through their ambitions. I'm pretty sure doing something similar or anything more than hanging a well framed painting on the wall of my rented townhouse is some sort of lease violation. I said, "those are some nice shelves". They said, "thanks". I said, "you know what would look cool". They said, "do it". They have obviously read my blog.

The shelves are 16" cubed, built into the wall, made out of sheet rock and painted white. I wanted to light'em up and I knew just what to do. The trick was finding a RGB LED worthy of the job. DealExtreme is a tad sketchy and based out of China but pretty much my only bet for 3W RGB's at anything close to a reasonable price.

The construction of the circuit board was pretty straight forward with only one notable addition. Along with the 3.3V power supply, LED driver chips (CAT4103), and obligatory PIC micro-controller (PIC18F2510), I used a Lantronix XPORT Ethernet to Serial module to accept commands from any network attached device. It was agreed that I would leave all the software design up to the neighbors. After all, they are the professionals. My board reads in a command packet, writes the LED intensity registers and creates a pulse width modulated (PWM) signal to update the RGB LED drivers. When I design any board, I like to make it as versatile as possible in the event I decide to add any features after the fact. There are only 7 shelves but I built the board with 12 drivers just in case. Two boards can also be stacked to drive a total of 24 RGB LED's as you can see in the picture below. Turns out we'd need all 24 but I'll tell you more about that later.

So I finished the hardware, installed my custom firmware and performed the least amount of testing it took to convince myself that there was a chance it could work. My neighbor Mark was designing his visualization software in parallel with only a loose discussion of what the command packet should look like to go by. The idea was to get together once each part was done and spend way too much time debugging the inevitable problems. That is until it worked right out of the gate. Sometimes the lighting of a single indicator LED can stir up a bevy of emotions in the average geek... imagine the lighting of an entire bank of shelves. I'll have to admit, Mark's software is pretty impressive. My favorite part is the connection with iTunes. While a song is playing, it gathers frequency information on the fly and displays it on the shelves in a variety of ways. Check out the video at the bottom to get a better idea of what I'm talking about.

If working solo, I may have called it a project and moved on. However, the neighbors had a vision and a suspicion that I wouldn't leave them hanging. They installed 20 overhead can lights in the drop ceiling and four wall sconces in the theater section. 24 extra LED's huh, yikes!

The hardware wasn't a big deal cause it was pretty much done already. LED installation and firmware development... Now that was a bit tricky. The room lighting was already wired up for 120Vac so the LED's had to be installed in such a way that proper light diffusion was achieved within the housing and the housing itself wasn't altered in a severe way. The blue socket protection cap provided as close to a perfect solution as we were going to get. The cap was meant to fit snugly into the existing light socket so I just mounted the LED to that and attached a strain relief on the side. Neat and tidy.

So for the ceiling and walls, that is 24 RGB LED's which makes 72 (24x3) discrete sources of light. To drive each LED at different intensity levels, I switch them on an off at a set frequency and vary the percent at which each LED is on during a cycle period. If it's on half the time, it appears to be half as bright as a LED that is continually shining. For this project I chose a refresh frequency of 60Hz with 32 levels of intensity. Therefore, I have to update each of the 72 LED's 32 times every 1/60th of a second. In other words, I have 520 microseconds to update 72 LED's. With a 16MHz oscillator, the instruction cycle on my micro-controller is 250nS. So, the update period divided by the instruction cycle time divided by the number of LEDs gives me a total of 26 instructions to preform everything needed to decide whether a given LED needs to be on or off. I ended up needing 22. Just squeaked it in there after a bunch of tweaking and a little luck.

The shelves and ceiling have a refresh rate of 30Hz and can generate over 30 thousand colors per pixel. A pixel is a single shelf or can light in this case. Not bad for a few bucks and hours of spare time. Best part, Both the shelves and ceiling consume less than 50 Watts when fully lit. And less than 10 on average when in visualization mode. That's around the power draw of an incandescent night light. Saving the planet one disco basement at a time.

I'm pretty psyched about this install. I mean, it's what I'm really passionate about and, if I could toot my own horn for second, I may actually be getting kind of good at it. What do you think?

Here are more videos for your viewing pleasure. Thanks Mark.

SCUBA Evan

2010-11-17T13:05:00.003-05:00

Thought I'd share an actual adventure with you for a change. Deb and I went to Sandals Montego Bay for our honeymoon a few months back agreeing to find some much needed relaxation there. That lasted all of about one day. I've always been a big fan of snorkeling and decided before the trip that I wanted to try scuba diving while down in the Caribbean. Deb, always up for an adventure, was in as well. The only prior knowledge of the different accreditation levels I have before sauntering up to the dive shack was "resort training" and probably something more involved than that. Apparently you can get learned up to three ascending recreational classifications while at the resort. They are: resort, supervised, and open water. They made a pretty good case for taking the open water course and we, after some deliberation, anxiously signed up. The open water certification allows you to rent equipment, request air fills, and dive without any higher supervision, provided ya do so with a buddy. Now, it did cost a little coin and it did involve four certification dives over three days with a decent amount of coursework and studying but afterward we totally agreed it was worth it for a bunch of reasons. Most notably, our life long certification allows us to dive where ever we want without an instructor and we got to do our dives in 85 degree crystal clear Caribbean water. Beats a freezing flooded rock quarry in Pennsylvania any day.

If you're thinking about doing something like this, there are a few things you may want to be aware of before hand. Our swim test was 400 meters in the pool. Probably a good idea to warm up first or make sure you didn't imbibe too extravagantly the night before prior to embarking on this non-trivial task. Moving on to coursework, be prepared to invest a few hours reading and taking practice tests during your down time. We were given a video with a non-functional dvd player. The book would have to do. When it comes to the actually diving, don't psych yourself out. Breathing while submerged under 40 feet of water is not a natural environment for humans but the equipment is safe and thanks to your redundant regulator and your buddy's redundant regulator, you are never without air.

Now for the fun stuff. Diving is truly a unique and exhilarating experience. You get to witness the beauty of the underwater kingdom firsthand and observe the colorful and interesting creatures within it living and playing in their natural habitat. I think I'm hooked.

This card box runs firmware...

2010-07-27T15:29:00.001-05:00

And lights up of course. One minor detail in the vast expanse of wedding preparation is the acquisition of some sort of receptacle to house cards or envelopes that may get lost in the shuffle of larger items on the gift table. I suggested to my soon to be wife that I could handle the task of building such a thing and she happily accepted knowing full well what the outcome would be. I appreciate her willingness to support my hobbies and obsessions. And so it began. Don't forget to watch the video at the end, not bad for iPhone video huh.

Among the design considerations I mulled over, I felt color scheme and an interactive element took precedence over the rest. Sure, the box contains a few old tricks but incorporates enough new (to me) tech to satisfy my desire for an original product. Most of the time my designs are influenced greatly by the available materials and tools at my disposal. This project was no exception. How hard is it to find a lightweight and inexpensive yet sturdy cylindrical box big enough to hold approximately 70 large envelopes? Too hard, I basically had to make my own out of two hat boxes, tape, some brown utility paper and a lot of glue.

Let's start with the new stuff. Our wedding colors were purple and green so the box had to match the particular shades we selected as close as possible. Probably could have done it with paint but decided fabric was better for a few reasons. On the top of that list, Deb got me a sewing machine for my birthday so I was itching to do more than hems and patch jobs with it. Plus, fabric does a great job of hiding blemishes and rough edges. Turns out there were plenty from the aforementioned hat box mod. And the fabric store had plenty of colors and patterns to pick from. A little too many perhaps, it was hard to decide.

Since people were going to be interacting with the box by putting cards into it, I thought it would be a good idea to provide some feedback. Oddly, I've never worked with photointerruptors before but it was obviously the perfect way of sensing something entering the box. When a card blocks the infrared light between transmitter and receiver, a signal is send to the microcontroller. I thought it appropriate that the micro respond by flashing some green lights.

The focal point of the card box is of course the etched plexi with our logo on it. As you can see from the previous posts, we kind of liked it. I etched the plastic in the same manner as I have in the past but finished it in a different way by bending it to match the contour of the round box. I think it ties in quite nicely.

This was a fun project. I learned a few things in the process and everyone at the wedding seemed to get a kick out of it. I guess it's my silly way of saying thank you for all the gifts.

Just Married!

2010-06-23T13:38:00.002-05:00

Ok, so this project is a big one. A happy and healthy marriage for the rest of my life. Totally doable.

Deb and I got married in Virginia Beach over the weekend and I couldn't be more jazzed about it. And the first thing that I was ever early to happened to be my own wedding... bonus! Check out the gobo and the lighting. Nice huh. Props to Mary and Rhett for the picture. There were a few missteps along the way but that just added to the charm of the event. Deb was beautiful, our guests were a blast and Blue Steel Lighting rocked the reception out. I have a feeling these memories are gonna stick around a while. Now we're off to Jamaica. Can't wait to post about that.

I'll call you Stampie

2010-06-08T12:27:00.002-05:00

So, they are chairs that you take to your chairs. Cute huh? These fun little wedding favors kill two birds with one stone. Hmm, maybe not the best saying for a "love birds" themed wedding. While they are a great way of distributing the favors (inside the chair) and alerting guests of their seating arrangements, the best part was how we customized it with a handy little stamp from Simon's Stamps. We have a nifty little logo that will be making a few different appearances at our wedding already and thought that it would be great if we could get it on the front of the paper chair somehow. The original idea was to print it on a sticker but experimented with the stamp method cause there was a good chance the outcome would look much better. And we were right. It wasn't so much the idea as it was the stamp. It's good. And surprisingly good at that. Some of the text is pretty darn close together. I was impressed. Though it took a bit of practice to get the pressure and alignment just right, only a few chairs made the ultimate sacrifice in the name of personalized decoration. A little candy here and some calligraphy there and we have ourselves quite the unique wedding favor. Special thanks to Rhett for help with the logo. The man has the Photoshop skilz to pay the bilz.

One Touch Disco Room

2010-04-16T15:54:00.002-05:00

The concept of instantly transforming any seemingly pedestrian space into a disco or romantic enclave isn't new but the manner in which you accomplish this task can vary greatly depending on available infrastructure, technical knowledge, resources, space, mood, style and timing. If you're looking for an example, you may remember Eric (Otter) Stratton's bedroom from National Lampoon's Animal House. Or possibly the scene in Accepted when Justin Long's character uses the Clapper to turn on a disco ball and mood lighting. Same basic idea.

The genesis of this idea actually grew out of a few smaller projects that I was working on concurrently. Since I had already proven out designs for my RC-5 IR receiver circuit, iPod communication code, and common collector peripheral switching circuit, it seemed natural to combine them all in a single housing.

It's basically a custom iPod/iPhone dock with the ability to remotely switch a variety of external devices. to begin with, I knew that I wanted to control my disco ball spot light, disco ball motor, flux capacitor, knight rider belt, and silly fiber optic lamp I got from Ikea. I included three extra ports for expansion. The desired effect would be reached if, by pressing a specific number on my IR remote, the lights in the room would dim, my lighting projects would turn on and a pre-selected song would start playing. I think I captured that quite nicely in the video below.

This box works better than my previous dock for a few reasons. Foremost, it adds an LCD on the front that can display artist and song title information which you can't see on the iPod unless you're right next to it. And the old dock has a very limited remote. Sure it's small and cute but I don't mind the bigger universal remote when considering the added functionality like mute and iPod menu navigation.

You may be wondering why I went with IR control over cooler technologies like wifi or bluetooth. Good question. I'll eventually incorporate that stuff into future projects but for now it just made sense to go with a short range solution considering that the person initiating the disco room will most likely be in the room when they do it. That and I thought it would be a neat exercise to learn the proper way to create a program capable of receiving a Manchester encoded bit stream.

You know what I wanna do now.... Strut.

Fly pumpkin fly, on the road to victory...

2009-10-05T13:27:00.004-05:00

When carving a pumpkin, what shape or form could you leave upon it that would be more ghoulishly frightening then the Philadelphia Eagles football team? The answer is none. None more frightening. Opposing teams...neh, ALL... shutter with fear in their presence.

Not quite sure why I did this but the idea popped into my head last week to put the "Eagles" logo on a pumpkin so I went for it. It's actually a fake pumpkin and the logo is more etched than carved but the effect is the same and this one won't end up a rotten mess in a couple weeks. Check out the second picture with the 'kin lighted from the inside.

If you want to make something similar, here's what you do. First ya gotta find a pattern that strikes your fancy. Obviously a black and white picture with moderate detail would work best. You'll be etching out the white parts so make sure it has a black border. Next comes finding a fumpkin (fake pumpkin) that is the appropriate size. AC Moore or Michaels has a decent selection. Even though my logo is more wide than tall I went with a tall fumpkin cause it felt more traditional to me. Print out your picture, scaled to your liking, and tape it on securely. Starting from the inside out, use an exacto knife or pin to cut through the paper into the fumpkin where black meets white. After the image is thoroughly traced, remove the paper and clean it up a little. Now comes the fun part. Ideally, you'd use a dremel with a small engraving bit to clear away the orange skin but any sharp cutting tool will work. To top it off, cut a softball sized hole in the bottom and apply some light. A candle would be a very BAD idea since the foam fumpkin is most likely flammable.

Happy Halloween campers!

Proposal

2009-08-16T20:39:00.004-05:00

There are many things to consider when proposing to your girlfriend. Some of more importance than others. I'd guess the ring delivery system is probably pretty low on most people's priority lists. But apparently not on mine. I wanted to find a way to make this proposal unique, make it personal and memorable. Short of implanting a light source in the ring, making an over the top jewelry box to house the ring seemed like the right thing to do. You'll want to check out the video for full effect. Oh BTW, she said yes!

Draft Beer at the Homestead.

2009-06-03T10:00:00.011-05:00

If you want, you can purchase a kegerator from any number of locations. However, if you haven't figured it out by now, that's just not my way. I endeavored to give my beer dispensing refrigerator a bit of home brew style much like the beverage I hope to create for it one day. Turns out, the hardest part of the process was finding a suitable chiller. Most mini fridges these days are designed with the cooling element at the top and the compressor at the rear-bottom of the inner compartment. This arrangement is not conducive to the measurements of a 1/4 barrel keg. Fortunately, I found just the right model at Walmart online. (Danby Mini Fridge Model# DAR440BL). You'll need it shipped to a store near you. It had a flat cooling plate oriented along the backside of the interior. However, a bit of modification was still needed to ensure the proper opening.

I began by removing the plastic injection molded panel from the inside of the door. An electric screwdriver made short work of this. Needing to maintain the suddenly absent vapor barrier, I cut a sheet of 1/8" lexan to size and drilled the appropriate holes. Looking back, I really should have done something to cover the visually exposed insulation in the door. But it's on the inside so it really doesn't matter that much to me. Now that I had the required interior dimensions, it was time to create an opening for the liquid hose and design up a riser/keg tower to house the tap and shank. I like the industrial look of cast iron pipe and thought it appropriate given the nature of what I was building. And the flanges were convenient because they terminated the pipe nicely as well as provided a great connection point to the fridge and shank adapter. At 3/4", the pipe was wide enough to snugly fit both the 1/4" clear plastic tubing and 1/4" foam insulation. Gotta keep that beer cool.

I had the round white shank adapter machined as more a placeholder than permanent design element. Though I've come to like it. It's clean and makes a good transition between the pipe and faucet. My original thought was to create an electronic display using that space. It would house readouts for temperature and remaining beer. I'll make that one day but not until I finish a couple other projects on the drawing board. At the moment, having ice cold beer on tap is good enough for me.

I'm crazy bout those cupcakes cousin.

2009-04-20T09:49:00.006-05:00

There are many places to find out about local/popular eateries around town... weekend insert, internet, word of mouth, doorknob hangers, etc. Personally, I prefer Lonely Island SNL Digital Shorts for all my foody info. Check out "Lazy Sunday" to see what I'm talking about. Deb and I hit up NYC recently to see some friends and do some exploring. While there are many cultural and historic sights to see, Magnolia was definitely on the top of my short list of things to do. If you ever find yourself in the city, do me a favor. Get yourself some cupcakes and a carton of milk. Pick a cushy swaft of grass and chow down. You can't go wrong, I promise you. But be prepared to stand in line. The place can only fit like eight people, six if they really like cupcakes. Wasn't too bad though, well worth the wait.

Framed on V-Day

2009-02-23T14:47:00.016-05:00

So I sort of took the easy way out this Christmas and bought my girlfriend a TV. She subsequently upgraded to an HD signal in her apartment and it looks great but I can't help but feel the gift lacked a little heart. I wanted to make up for that a little this Valentine's Day. We have accumulated a lot of silly pictures of us over the last couple years and I've had the idea of putting them all on a digital picture frame for some time now. Alone, that would have been a step in the right direction but I knew I could do better. While perusing the capabilities of some online machine shops, I came up with the idea of combining said digital picture frame with a custom front bezel. And why not throw a few tri-color LED's in there for good measure. Check out the video for some cool multicolor animation action.

This project took me way more time than I initially imagined. Good thing I started it more than a month before Valentines Day. Choosing the digiframe was not a trivial task. Most of the frames I found where either undersized for my taste or large, expensive and wide screen. I guess the wide aspect screen is good for HD video resolutions but I'd wager most people are going to go primarily with digitized photos which are almost entirely produced with a 4:3 resolution aspect ratio. After a pretty good search, I found an adequate candidate in an 8" Matsunichi model. I took a bit of a gamble with a non name brand selection but that ended up working in my favor since the flimsy construction made ripping it apart pretty easy. And the screen turned out to be just as bright as the reviews said it would... Bonus.

Check this out, I used a friggin laser to cut the letters out of the front bezel. Would have been a lot cooler if not for the smell of burnt plastic. A friggin laser! The rest of the outer casing came together with some high strength plastic glue and screws. And then came the programming. I hacked together some of the ugliest code you can imagine. I really need some training in proper coding techniques. Yikes. But the end result looks pretty good so I'm happy. Though I think during "Randy Jackson presents America's Best Dance Crew" she likes the TV just a little bit more.

Hardly Breck a Sweat

2009-01-16T10:52:00.009-05:00

Headed out to hit the slopes in Colorado a few weeks ago. Breckenridge to be exact. I had been there a few years back with my sister but it was during the summer and I was curious about what the town and mountain would be like during ski season. Back then, my sister and I stayed at a hostel a few blocks from the center of town and it turned out to be more of a bed and breakfast than the simple accommodations I was looking forward to. I had formed this idea of a hostel in my head and wanted to realize it by arriving to a young crowd of travelers sharing stories and experiences. A community of strangers you could say. I guess that sort of thing appeals to me. Instead, the place was very comfortable, very spacious and the party sized jacuzzi was very hot. It was a good consolation prize and a clue to the kind of clientele the town catered to. Although the aesthetic is very upscale, Breckenridge still manages to keep that old town mountain village feel mostly because it was built over an old town mountain village. I remembered checking out the people on the restaurant and coffee shop lined streets thinking it was yuppie central. Totally not my crowd, but where there are yuppies there is ease and comfort. Prefect for a no hassle ski weekend out west. And the snow usually brings out the adventurous types anyway so problem solved. Neat town, cool people, big ol hill, close to Denver International... choosing Breck was easy.

The conditions on the mountain weren't optimal and not all the runs were open the first couple days we were there but I still had a grand ol time on my skis. It's hard to say what ability of skier I am. Sometimes I feel like I'm in the advanced category and sometimes, like on the diamond glade runs up on Lift 6, it's like I'm putting skis on for the first time. Breck goes from intermediate to expert in a flash with little in between. Not all that bad for families or those into cruisers I suppose. Though I would have preferred something a bit more challenging without having to negotiate mogals and pine trees on near vertical descents. My ego is still bruised. But I'm nitpicking, there was a lot of variety and when peak 10 opened up we had our fill of great views and great all around skiing.

Breckenridge has way more upside than any downs I can think of. I'd recommend it to anyone. I wish I could go into detail about all the wonderful places to go and eat but we had fun finding them on our own so I wouldn't take that experience from you. Just talk to all the friendly people on the street and in the hotel and you'll have an easy time. I'm already looking forward to my next ski trip our west... whatever that may be.

Santa with style

2009-01-08T16:19:00.009-05:00

A popular event during the holiday season around the DC Metro area is a Santa bar crawl, though I'm sure this sort of thing happens all over the place. The premise is simple, dress up like Santa, an elf, Christmas tree or maybe even Rudolph and head on out to your favorite bars. Since the elements of the Santa myth are a hosh posh of traditions from various religions, this outing can appeal to persons of any religious background.

I chose to class up the tired ol Santa shirt a little and reconfigure it into a Santa suit jacket. But this is still a pretty low key event so I accessorized with the Santa ball cap I made for last year's crawl. Although time intensive, the hat was pretty easy to put together. I took an old baseball hat I had laying around and covered it with the fabric from two Santa hats. An Exacto Knife with a very sharp blade made short work of the de-stitching duties. Totally necessary to maximize fabric coverage. And of course, attaching the fabric to the hat was a breeze with hot glue... what else. Now, the jacket was a completely different story. First, I bought a generic Santa costume from Party City and a swath of white fuzzy fabric along with a few buttons and some thread from Jo-Anne Crafts. I proceeded to de-stitch the whole Santa coat so I could adjust the measurements. I used one of my sport jackets for size comparison. After a little scissor work and a ton of hand sewing (and hot glue), the jacket was born. Originally I didn't attach the bottom trim thinking that it would look more like a coat than a suit jacket, but the red felt from the Santa suit is too thin to create an adequate border even when doubled over so I opted for it. I think that was the right decision.

DFL !

2008-09-14T12:11:00.005-05:00

There's nothing wrong with being dead last if you're doing it for a good cause. Headed out a little while back for the annual SMASHED DC Scavenger Hunt. Now, with a little cross team teamwork and possibly a bit of dishonesty, we actually managed to win the thing last year. Sometimes you have to play above the rules. And winning is all well and good but we needed more of a challenge this year. That and we felt like fraternizing a little more along the course. Contrary to what you may think, coming in last is kind of hard to do. We needed to actively try to get rid of points both real and fabricated. We got a kick out of making people sing Def Leopard songs for fake points. It's the little things.

Our Team theme was "isn't it obvious". In a nutshell, we all dressed to a rhyme scheme. For instance, Cuckoo Hebrew, Haiku Guru, Blue Crew, Voodoo. You get the point. We made people guess the theme and no one did. I guess it wasn't that obvious.

Turbo Boost

2008-08-26T10:58:00.001-05:00

I recently recreated my Knight Rider Belt for a trip out to the State Theater to see the Legwarmers. The original belt died after the party for which is was built. Not too surprising really, it was sort of a last minute thing and the construction wasn't that solid. Normally I would have called it a project and moved on but I was never really happy with the way the light diffusion worked in the original so I instituted a few new tricks and put together a far superior product.

Club 1139 Excellent Adventure

2008-08-07T14:01:00.003-05:00

So here's what we built for our latest 80's party. If you try hard enough, I think you can guess the theme. The idea first came to me when my roommate Rhett and I were studying for our high school history final. I was kind of stressed cause if I didn't pass, my father was going to send me to a military academy. And that was a real possibility since I know nothing about most pop culture historic figures. I thought, if only there was a way to travel back in time and accidentally gather up said figures due to situationally comedic events that necessitate their coming back to the present with me just in time to help us give our history final oral presentation. Then I thought, wait... this was kinda already done in a movie and besides, everyone knows that you totally need a flux capacitor for time travel. So we axed the time travel idea and decided to build the phone booth anyway. I painted the whole inside black and mounted a couple black lights to its ceiling so party goers could write anything they wanted on the inside walls with a highlighter pen. Indecent verbiage and caricature was kept to a minimum. Best thing about the booth... it was still standing when the party was over. I don't know if that's saying more about the quality of the party or the construction of the booth. Nah, it was all booth baby!

Whitewater in West Virginia

2008-07-12T12:07:00.006-05:00

Met my sister in West Virginia a little while back (July '08) for a little camping and white water rafting trip. Never to miss an opportunity for adventure, Debbie decided to accompany me. While it was her first time out, I had already gone once in Colorado a few years ago. A good time was had by all. However, I can say with certainty that I will be seeking a bigger class of rapids on my next outing. The 4's on the Lower New River still provided a good amount of energy but the time to really go is on the Upper Gauley River in late September when the annual fall releases from Summersville Dam create some really great drops... or so I hear. I'll have to try it for myself. Probably not this year though. It took about 5 hours to get there from DC. It's time to think about saving those road trips for ski season. It can't get here fast enough.

SMASHED Idiotarod!

2008-07-12T12:04:00.004-05:00

Ok, the 2008 SMASHED Idiotarod was a few months back but totally worth a late post. for those who may not know, SMASHED is a DC philanthropic organization dedicated to enabling the childish side of any who wish to participate in their charitable outings. For instance, why else would we race shopping carts through the streets of downtown DC if not to let loose a little and help out a worthwhile charity like Miriam's Kitchen.

We ended up finishing somewhere in the middle of the pack but that's Ok cause it really isn't about winning for me. I just like decorating the cart and the afterparty... which was a total blast. And I think the cart turned out really well too. Thanks to Debbie Lee for thinking up a great theme. I wanted to give the cart that "puffy" look of the unmistakable 70's style TPIR sets. It was actually pretty easy to pull together with some semi-stretchy lime green fabric, medium density cotton batting and a few pieces of rigid cardboard. And of course no project is complete without hot glue and duct tape.

One Point Twenty One Jiggawatts!

2008-07-08T20:57:00.005-05:00

Ok, so i had way too much time on my hands so I decided to recreate the Flux Capacitor from Back To The Future. Actually I needed a costume for our annual 80's party so put one Flux Capacitor on top of some shiny silver clothing and wham! You've got yourself a Delorian costume. In theory at least. I had some last second power issues so I couldn't pull it together. Stupid regulator not running at 4.6Vdc. But it works now so it makes a pretty interesting decoration when I'm not using it to travel in time. And if you're wondering, we still don't have rocket packs or flying cars in 20 years. So so lame.

This thing really wasn't too hard to pull together. The casing is just a outdoor panel box which I chopped to decrease it's overall depth to about 3 inches. I made the front window with some plexi and rubber molding. I really like how that turned out. The rest is a bunch of amber LED's, a role of clear tubing, some paint, three right-angle RCA housings, some yellow wire and a few 1" PVC caps. Personally I think it looks better than the real thing. But I'm a proud geek so that's not too surprising.

The Best Boards In Life Are Free

2008-07-08T20:52:00.006-05:00

Many of the projects I embark on or ponder constructing need some sort of electronic control. Mostly it's driving LED's but I still do a lot with motor control, servo interface, IR receiver, and PC comms. In the past, when in need, I'd throw together a perf-board circuit a little something like this. While an inefficient use of my time, it did provide a good learning platform and I didn't have the tools to do anything better. However, that has changed. Now, I will be using the e-unit PIC18F6622 breakout board. Thanks to the good people at Mentor Graphics, laying out this little gem was a breeze. I wanted to make a board that could serve as a stepping off point for any project I wanted to build. It's basically a bare bones design with pretty much all of the general I/O ported out to the header on the near side. Though I did include a few things that would make life easier like a RS232 level shifter, IR receiver and status LED's. Best thing about this board... it was free. Many printed circuit board manufacturers have first time buyer deals but Advaced Circuits has just about the best I've seen.

There are many types and makes of micro controllers out on the market but I like the Microchip PIC controllers because... well there are many reasons: good development tools, inexpensive, high performance, good community, etc. The PIC18F6622 is a good all around chip. It's got plenty of I/O, a couple of UART's, an I2C interface, on-chip A/D converters and it runs up to 40MHz. You're not going to do fancy signal processing on this but it does have enough smarts to handle a control system or two.

You may be asking yourself what I'm going to do with this board now that I have it. Funny you should ask, I already have something in mind. I have a few audio sources in my bedroom that run into the same amp and speaker setup. Currently I switch between them by manually depressing the appropriate button on an audio mixer. I'd love something that would autodetect what source is active and switch to that. A preamp volume control would be nice too. But that's another posting altogether.

Arcade Displaya Hater

2007-02-05T23:07:00.004-05:00

Ok, can you really have a multi-functional arcade machine / Jukebox without a display. Didn't think so. Since the whole machine is pretty much scratch built I didn't think it appropriate to throw some off the shelf LED matrix display up there so I decided to whip up something on my own. Here's how it began. Since the overall theme for the box is old school meets modern, I needed to figure out a way to introduce a dash of late model style to some outdated tech. As luck would have it, I already had just the thing in my parts box. Maxim's multi-segment LED character driver IC (MAX6954) would do just the trick. The only thing better than some retro alpha-numeric action would be rockin a few Nixie tubes. And don't think I wasn't considering it. I still beam like a proud father at the wiring job. Though, bet your bottom dollar that I'll be makin some printed circuit boards if I ever decide to wire up 84 LED's again.
At the moment, the display only cycles through a pre-determined sequence of words and symbols but it's connected to the arcade's PC via the serial port so it'll eventually (sooner than later) display high scores and game titles. Neat huh? I dropped off some design elements halfway through construction so I think I would have approached this differently had they not been there at the beginning. Being that I was initially constrained by size requirements, the character spacing is a little closer than general standard practice and I didn't utilize all of the LED driver chip's available characters. But I'm still pretty happy with the way it turned out so I can't complain too much. Wanna see a video?

Pandomination!

2007-01-26T10:51:00.001-05:00

Mighty Giant Panda, your day is almost afoot! Can you see the shadows that mark the twilight of humanity? Our numbers have never been as high but our collective eye has been led astray for many ages. What arrogance are we that call you "Bear" and fawn over your fuzzy fur. I've been watching you. Listening... I feel your power, I prostrate myself before it in awe.

I know these humans, I have gained their trust. I walk among them freely but not without prejudice for I am one of them but my spirit is Panda. However, trust not. But allow me the opportunity to earn it in this our upcoming battle for freedom. I am allied with the Giraffe and they call me Battlesnake, sachem of justice, holder of wiffle, usurper of that which needs usurption. They are not the most eloquent of species but they are strong and together, we can not be stopped. Upon the backs of our long necked brethren we shall ride. The bi-peds will be stunned by the paralyzingly adorable spectacle before them. Dark sulky eyes and fluffy white tails will be replaced with tooth and claw and just as they realize what is happening, victory will be ours. San Diego... sacked. Antwerp... sacked. The Bronx... sacked. Sydney... sacked. Berlin... Sacked!

We'll see how much they like chewing on bamboo. Are you with me?

Le signe est fait. Translation... "sure took me long enough."

2007-01-23T09:30:00.001-05:00

The "Bar Sign" project is finally complete. I think my sister liked it although I did see some gaps in her enthusiasm during the unveiling. I believe they were failed attempts at comprehending my fascination with LED's. She was right to be confused, a tiny blinking light can only giddify the most stout of geeks. I hope she enjoys looking at it as much as I enjoyed building it.

Speaking of construction, allow me to front you some details. The black wooden shadow box frame measures in at around 20"x8" and holds two pieces of hand etched Plexiglas panes illuminated by six tri-colored (RGB) high intensity LED's. Quite a mouthful huh? That's not the fun part. To drive all the the color combinations possible, I used a Microchip PIC16F676 microcontroller and a Maxim MAX6957 LED driver to do all my dirty work. I'm still trying to decide why I wrote the firmware in assembly. Sometimes those things harder to do aren't always worth doing.

This is what the guts of the project look like. Not the prettiest of designs out there but it could have looked worse if not for using plain ol phone wire to hook up the lights. Its four conductors were perfect for each four-lead LED.

Want some theory? I'll let Wikipedia handle the bulk of the work for me. In a nutshell, I vary the intensity of red, green, and blue light to create any color I want. I direct that light through the side of each pane of Plexiglas and it escapes only where I have etched it. I didn't go too crazy with the lighting programs. I only wrote five and they can be cycled through by pushing a button on the side of the frame. I also included a control knob so you can pick your own color if the appropriate program is selected. But enough of this talk, here are some pictures and a video.

Where have the 00's gone?

2006-12-22T14:39:00.000-05:00

"To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, Creeps in this petty pace from day to day To the last syllable of recorded time, and all our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle! Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more: it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." - William Shakespeare

Oh such empty words of dispare and defeat upon the furrowed face of Macbeth during his most troubling of times. He saw an end with little meaning or recourse, devoid of hope and direction. But we shall endeavor where he failed. Rebirth brings new life. A new year washes away the burdens of the past. Let us celebrate this awakening and revel knee keep in the fountain of innocence. Sound and fury, with a primal yalp! I believe Walt Whitman said it best, "I went to the woods because I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life! And not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived." Exactly!

With that said, Happy New Year battlesnakes.... start sucking the marrow!

Gotta support my gadget habit somehow.

2006-11-30T16:47:00.000-05:00

After a slight hiatus from the working world, e-unit is back in the saddle... or ergonomic office chair as it were. Here's an interesting statistic, general street crime rates fell 20% during the time of my non-employed status. Coincidence? I can't substantiate those numbers nor can speak on any correlation you may or may not draw from them but I can say this... I'm still out there suckas, just not between the hours of 8 an 5. Petty theft, that's a'beatin.

So I'm workin for Commonwealth Technology now. I pretty much get to design and build stuff like all day long. Big stretch huh? And they've got some pretty nice tools here. It's a little different mindset from working on projects with only an exacto knife and a hammer at home. Hmmm, maybe the stuff I make at CTI may actually work. I'm not holding my breath though.

Speaking of hobbies, I have a couple projects nearing completion so they'll be posted here in the next couple of weeks. I've got my sister's etched bar sign almost done and the communication code for the e-unit arcade display is nearly bug free. Will this thing ever be done?

Plexiglas, the other clear synthetic polymer of methyl methacrylate.

2006-11-03T14:29:00.001-05:00

I wouldn't consider myself a controlling, type "A" personality, but I do push plexi around quite a bit. I've cooked it, bent it, drilled through it, sanded it, polished it, cut it, cracked it, and scowled in its general direction quite a few times. And I'm not done yet. I have the technology, means, time, and minimal artistic ability to etch me some plexi so that's what I'm gonna do.

My sister has a shelving unit with a few select spirits adorning it so I thought I'd etch her a nice sign so no one confuses it as anything less than a full fledged drink barn.

After a few internet searches, I determined a good plan of attack for the project. First thing I did was throw together some fontage and a couple clipart images. When I was pleased with the design, I flipped it and printed it. Oddly enough, that turned out the be the hardest part of the project. The etching was a breeze. It wasn't so much me as it was the Dremel tool. It's good. The trick is to hold the rotary tool firmly enough so as to avoid marking outside of the lines but gentle enough to allow for finer details. Not so easy when you're working at 5000 rpm's. There is more work to be done though. To make the etching really pop, I'm gonna light the thing up with some RGB LED's. 12,000 mcd's is a little overkill don't you think. Yeah me too... 12K it is then. I already have the color code drivers written for my fav PIC micro so all I have to do is solder up some components and make a cool frame. Don't know how the frame should look just yet but I'm sure I'll think of something. Updates to follow.

Cheeseburgers!

2006-10-17T15:52:00.001-05:00

The bomb and I made our usual grocery run before entering Shenandoah where we decided upon a supper of burgers for what could be the last camping trip of the season.

"Sir, I can't help but notice this particular meat is prominently displayed within your viewable cooler unit. It isn't the leanest I've seen, but it might service our needs quite well. Your expression suggests that you agree with our decision. What's that? You say that we won't be able to surpass your sirloin selection no matter where we go. Bravado indeed. So it is in your opinion that you are the only person capable of besting the ground chuck that lay before us. Ha, that may be true but I am willing to bet that I could find one person willing an attempt at beating your meat... er...maybe not. We'll take two ready made patties to go. H, let's get outta here"

"It's so choice... if you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up"

2006-10-11T21:45:00.000-05:00

2003 Lexus RX300, 32 large on the O, nice scratch on the tag, nav on the dash, wood on the wheel... I couldn't say no.

I don't know what to call this thing. I like saying truck but it's more a car than anything else. Same car wheelbase, same car HP, same car feel; but then there's the always on AWD and SUVish interior space. Speaking of interior...

Love that spruce! Car, tuck, whatever... it's my new ride. Prior to purchase time, I really couldn't have envisioned myself in a sport ute but this machine is a great mix of comfort, utility, fun, efficiency, price and style. To put it another way, it's what I wanted but didn't think I was going to find. Sumo!

K, let's find some balance here with some of the minor drawbacks. The nav unit is slightly out of date and the update is a little pricey. Don't get me started with that. And when did I start complaining about havin a GPS in the vehicle? Moving on. Is an auxiliary audio input so hard? You're a Japanese car maker for gosh darn sake.... guys, you're better than that. I'm on the case though. My factory wire harnesses are in the mail and should be here soon. All I have to do is hack the head unit comms, spoof the satellite radio as a second cd player and I'm golden. Plug and play is the only way to go, no tape player adapter for this cat. 220 ponies from V6 aint bad. It's a little sluggish up steep hills but at least it doesn't guzzle the petrol like its older brothers. And I can still dart around downtown DC with the best of them. Alright, back to the good. When I first sat in this car I felt like I'd been driving it for years. Thanks Lexus. The Battlesnake has your back too.

Master of Disguise

2006-09-18T16:24:00.001-05:00

Here's some advice for all those little battlesnakes in training out there. You come across a human sized fluorescent green pipe sticking out of the ground with a huge man-eating plant sticking out of it... Don't jump on in when the plant disappears out of sight unless you really need the coins. Those plants don't stay hidden for long. There aint an ointment for that.

So we had a pretty successful 80's party a couple of weeks ago. Check out the link for some pictures. Going as Mario was pretty easy to bring together. A little fake stash here and a little iron-on transfer there and whalah. I wish I had enough energy to take a picture of the post party aftermath. I'm not sure anyone would want to see that. And I won't tell ya where I found the mustache the next morning. Well, behind the keg... Not really that weird but how'd it get there? Geekpad had their party the same night. I love the combo party, but I think this'll be the last time it happens here at club 1139.

There was some talk of a noise violation fine from the neighborhood homeowners ASSociation so I wrote an email to preemptively contest it. It's been a couple of weeks and no fine. Maybe a well thought out argument and kind words in search of a mutually beneficial resolution can go a long way. Who knew?

If anyone wants to go as Mario for All Hollow's Eve, let me know. Beside some scratchy facial hair, the getup is pretty comfortable.

Jetta-ta

2006-09-07T14:23:00.000-05:00

I'd really hate to see the ol girl go but alas my lease is due in about a month (October '06) and the time has come to move on.

This was a good car though. Two benders, a freak Texas hail storm, countless speedbumps, DC traffic, Two cross country road trips... And this tank of a mid-sized sedan kept askin for more. It had a good mix of turbo induced power and 4 cylinder efficiency that made me appreciate this car's engineering at every turn. That kind of thing seems to be lost on the majority of Alphas out there. I suppose it's to be expected with a ride that could fit inside most SUV's of today but fightin the man is sort of a hobby of mine so it never really bothered me.

Unfortunately, the new VW's just don't have the styling or reliability of their older siblings. I believe I will go elsewhere to satisfy my new transportation needs. Any suggestions out there? I have a few options in mind but have yet to acquire the proper research needed to make an informed decision. I've heard good things about the Lexus preowned program but I'm not sure if buying right now is in the cards for me. I likey the lease, especially since you get a brand spankin new car with all the bells and whistles every few years. People will disagree with that choice citing the "rental" feeling and lack of investment value but I've crunched the numbers and any minimally added value of keeping a vehicle past the break even point isn't worth the upside of going new for me. The ideal situation would be to finally start my Lamborghini 25th Anniversary Countach kit project but I think that will have to wait for now. It will be mine... Oh yes, it will be mine.

Bed?...Nah, Bath?... Nope, Beyond?... I guess so.

2006-08-30T15:14:00.001-05:00

First off, this is a camera phone picture. Pretty gosh darn good quality for a phone don't you think?

K, so it's a hammock for bananas. What do you think the sales pitch for this was. "Yeah, so here's the thing see. You're gonna want your nanas to breath right? Get some air right? Toss a banana in there with a couple of plums maybe and it'll be like they're ripening in the tropics. And the women love it too, clears up a bunch of counter space. So, what do I have to say to put you into one of these banana hammocks today?"

I'd buy one.

I'm an adult, I assure you.

2006-08-23T12:06:00.001-05:00

I've been thinking about making one of these for a few years now but it wasn't until my neighbor Mark put one together that the wheels really started turning for me. His machine kept with the traditional size and look of 80's arcade machines but I knew I wanted to break from that a little.

I wanted to go minimal with the thing. Seems to be the running trend with me these days. Initially I contemplated using fiberglass and wire mesh for the shell. I thought some nice curved edges and a smooth fluid finish would look appealing but if you've ever worked with that stuff in large doses, you can probably figure out why I shied away. I went with 3/4" fiberboard instead but it didn't make things much easier. I used an LCD monitor to shrink the top depth to about 7 inches. It appears very svelte from the side. It gets a little thicker at the bottom so the PC and subwoofer can have a place to live. The one real omission is a coin door. It may make it on there one day but I really don't feel like spending the money for one and why should I have to carry around quarters in my own house.

I think I enjoyed making it more than I enjoy playing it. It really is a great hobby because there is still so much more left to do. The high score display is almost finished, as you've probably already read about, and I hope to have the automatically rotating monitor function completed shortly after. And then there are more lights. You can never have too much lighting.

I'm still a kid at heart and it's kind of comforting to find out that at least one thing hasn't changed about me. I am still terrible at playing video games. It's a good thing I like making them.

My New Office

2006-08-22T14:40:00.000-05:00

Looks comfy doesn't it? Sorry, comfortable. Pardon the informalities, these things happen when your new office is a couch and laptop. Hmmm, a red hot 8 lbs computing machine can never really be a LAPtop can it? And office really isn't all that accurate either. Call it a domicile command center... Excellent.

For the last couple of years I've been furthering the testing capabilities of the Tactical Electronic Warfare Division of the Naval Research Laboratory in SE Washington DC but I recently decided to part ways with that endeavor to explore other opportunities which at this point still remain TBD. I saw the proverbial fork in the road approaching on the horizon and felt that slowing down to delay the inevitable jerk of the wheel would only have caused doubt and confusion. Pedal to the metal baby.

Ok before I go on, how come the watermelon is the only inhabitant of my melon medley that has seeds in it. I understand that cantaloupe and Honeydew have their seeds hidden within their interior crevice but wouldn't they also benefit from the increased seed disbursal of even flesh seed distribution that watermelon enjoys upon its end. Watermelon probably had some tough decisions to make when faced with picking it's method of procreation. It probably counted on a high seed density and a tough striped shell to dissuade predators. Didn't consider beings with reasoning skills and opposable thumbs didjya. The jig is up dude. Your seeds are more a nuisance than anything else. I'm gonna eat you anyway, let's get those little baby watermelons in the middle where the belong already, k?

So on with rebuilding mind, body, and soul. The technology necessary to become a cyborg is not yet available so I'm pretty much all out of suggestions. I'll probably start with finding new employment. One thousand apologies but I'm afraid describing the details and nuances of a potential new job, that would be a better fit for me, is not appropriate for the format of this blog. I like to keep things short. I can tell you this though. I am excited for the change and I'm glad I had the courage to leave something with so much up side. If anyone has any non-cyborg related comments, feel free to speak up.

Arcade Display - Making Progress

2006-08-17T15:39:00.001-05:00

My Arcade Display project is almost complete. Actually, It'd be done already if someone didn't forget to add some critical parts to my last Digikey order. It's not important who so I won't mention it here. I was having trouble finding the perfect diffusion layer but alas, a quick walk down to my local Staples store produced the material I was looking for. I needed a substance that was thick enough to hide unlit segments yet transparent enough to allow a good amount of light through. A couple of ordinary legal sized sheets of paper "borrowed" from the copy machine worked out to my liking. You can see the results in the picture above. Clean design, huh? It really looks cool when whole words start scrolling across it. Curious, why didn't I take a picture of that. Check out my previous post to see what it looks like without the paper and plexi.

Oh, and check out the wiring job. It's like I've done this before or something. And I saved around $200 making the jumpers myself. I'm sure I'll regain the use of my fingers and eyesight any day now. How am I writing this post you ask... smell and taste. I play pinball the same way.

So, what's next. When my RS232 level converted arrives, I'm gonna connect this baby up to the Arcade's PC and rock some old fashion serial communication. The goal is to display game names and high scores when playing MAME and artist/song names when playing music. I'll have to dust off my Visual C++ skillz for that. Stay tuned for updates.

Battlesnake, ONE : Trimethylxanthine, ZERO

2006-08-01T10:04:00.001-05:00

As I exhaled, water vapor formed a cloud of exhaustion in the night sky. The moon angled itself perfectly to fill the alley with more than its fair share of borrowed light. The dumpster moaned disapprovingly as I hastily slammed my battered body against it. There was no time and little shadow from which to choose. I quickly gathered my thoughts in hopes of stemming the inevitable feeling of panic. I was playing right into his hands, deep breathing and elevated heart rate was just what he wanted. But ironically, I knew that's exactly what it would take to defeat him. The uneven pavement in front of me revealed newly formed puddles that made it difficult to tell where the ground stopped and space began. Dark water stowed aboard the fringes of my overcoat as I knelt at the ready. A dull cranial ache nudged my resolve. My hand instantly cupped the infected area as if I could rub away the sensation.

I knew that I couldn't hide here forever. Thoughts of escape forced their way into my head. The fence at the near side of the alley would assure me this same fight tomorrow. However, there was a reason I sought this foe and a reason I rested here. The sounds of footsteps and fleeing pests, echoing through the brick corridor, would make this decision for me. His slow, mocking gate, almost dared me to run. I came here to pick a fight and now I find myself cowering in doubt. Caffeine, you've ruled my actions for way too long. I am e-unit and this ends now.

I sprung free of the dimly lit shelter. My clothing held on tight and struggled to keep up. I turned to meet the gaze of my silent antagonist. He was 20 feet away but still close enough to make out his sharp features. "You wake me up and then steal my sleep. You promise me flight and then clip my wings". You hide under guise of taste and color. Why?" A shallow smirk crawled upon his face. There was no remorse in his stance nor attempt at empathy on his brow, just assimilating determination. I suddenly realized something important. This was going to be fun.

I moved forward with the silence of fabric waving in the breeze. A Wiffleball bat leapt from my coat to deliver a fatal blow. It met its counterpart and sent us stumbling. A quick step to the left and then a momentum forming spin to the right joined our bats once again. My slow and steady striking style was deflected easy by his staccato defense. He fought as if not to win but to wear me down, like it was a game to him. How wrong I would be. He unleashed a flurry of blows that seemed to gain in strength. I backpedaled to maintain distance. Tremors of frustration and haste grew on his posture at an unnatural rate. He gained speed and sheets of translucent yellow replaced his once solid weapon. He stabbed for my chest as I simultaneously spun to avoid the advance. His lunge took him too far and I parried his saber at the hilt. Caffeine fell to its knees as the Wiffle weapon hit the ground. My bat wavered in front of his face as I struggled to regain breath. "What are you waiting for", he said with a look or ennui. "You know you can't kill me. Whenever you study for a test, I'll be there. Whenever you wake up early to catch a flight, I'll be there. Wheneve...."

The bump on his head will heal, but I don't envy the headache he'll have tomorrow. I know he'll never go away but that won't stop me from fighting him. I like not crashing in the early afternoon and being able to go to sleep at night. Caffeine, don't come snoopin around my house if you're not lookin for a beating. See ya around the office..."friend".

Awe-stin

2006-07-27T10:02:00.001-05:00

I've been to many cities in this our United States of America and I've fought injustice (vigilante style) in most of them but few tug at the heartstings like Austin. It's got that "je ne sais quoi" factor going for it. Ya never really think about why it's so good while you're there cause you're too busy feelin good about stuff. The city makes you have a good time like you have no other option. Tucked away amongst the interior is a major university which fuels the electric 6th street night life but trip over a crack in the asphalt and you'll find yourself squinting over the rolling hills of the greater Austin countryside. Take a ride or a drive and you'll be knee deep in gems such as Barton Springs, Hamilton Pool, and Lake Travis just when you think you've tired of the subdued yet beautiful colors of the river cut landscape. And did I mention the BBQ. We hit the Salt Lick every year and occasionally we have even had enough leg strength to haul our massive bellies out on the town afterwards.

I've been fortunate to share these experiences with such great people though. I'm sure I'm a tad more than a little partial to the town because of it. You can have a good time in most cities with the right people but it's a town like Austin that keeps ya comin back year after year. See ya next August A-Town.

Till we meet again my mysterious friend.

2006-07-19T14:37:00.001-05:00

It was a sweltering day on the trail and the setting sun laid disorienting shadows upon the ground. A bead of sweat dropped upon my eye as I caught sight of motion up ahead. I approached the rock formation with hesitation. My curiosity was distracted slightly by a familiar feeling. "Fly away from this place" came the whisper from within. Logic forbade me from acting on my otherwise trusted instincts. An overactive imagination is a mark of childlike wonderment and should be held onto tightly. That thought rang with such force, I might as well have spoken it out loud. I brushed aside the tall grass to gaze about the battered face carved into the lifeless stone. What nature of body must the ground be hiding for you oh being of the wood? An age of his kind must have seen several of ours. It's expression bordered that of frustration and toil. Was the faint sign of life just moments ago a warning or a mistake? The trees rustled cautiously but I felt no wind. Suddenly the ground beneath my feet became slick and I lost footing. The hiking path cradled my forced retreat. The sky darkened and an eery mood set across the forrest. The clouds moved in as if on purpose. I knew I was being told to leave but by whom or what. Distant birds broke the silence with conspiring squawks. I turned but stood motionless. I had so many questions for you but knew the answers would not be easy to hear. I am but a steward of the land, forgive my intrusion. Till we meet again my mysterious friend.

And the search is over.

2006-07-19T09:15:00.002-05:00

The battlesnake has lived a few places throughout his life. Mostly here and there and back again, but he hasn't quite found that little patch of the earth's crust to call home. "Where do I fit?" That is one of the more recurrent questions I've been asking myself lately. That interrogative is not easily answered however. There are many geographic, personal, professional, and psychological elements to consider before making such a decision. Maybe I'll try a little mind mapping in lieu of the usual pros/cons list. Looks like it's a better way of organizing one's thoughts into a more readily "felt" format.

But why go through the trouble when the answer to that which haunts my waking thoughts is so easily answered in Front Royal, Virginia. It's on a sign gosh darn it! Signs are to be respected and adhered to without question. When was the last time you failed to yield when staring down a metallic yellow triangle? Guys, ever walk into the ladies room cause the skirted stick figure didn't apply to you? Didn't think so.

Living there won't be so bad. The town does have more 7-11's per capita then any town in the cosmos. (I can't confirm that) And Shenandoah National Park is a stone's throw away. The Bomb will love that. Or maybe I'll move to Key West for the winter. Yeah man, screw signs!

You can PIC your nose and you can PIC your friends but you can't PIC your friend's nose.

2006-07-06T12:38:00.001-05:00

Problem: How do I drive a bunch of high current LED's and incandescent bulbs at variable intensities? And while I'm at it, drive a powerful dual brush 12V motor.

Answer: Slap a 16F870 PIC microcontroller on a perf board along with some 800 mA switching transistors and a high current optically coupled solid state relay. Why didn't I think of this sooner?

This board will one day fit into an arcade machine to control six groupings of various lights, one high current light display and a 12V motor (to rotate the arcade's monitor). I've programmed the PIC to put on quite the light display. Using a variable duty cycle PWM (pulse width modulated) signal, I can vary the brightness of each light grouping. This is helpful when fading in and out like a heartbeat. Stay tuned for the video

Arcade Display Project - Retro Yet Modern

2006-06-28T13:36:00.001-05:00

I constructed an arcade machine a few months back and while I enjoy it just the way it is in all it's arcade goodness I realize that nothing is truely finished in my world. How would the average passerby be made to know the shear ineptitude of my Pacman skill. I'll tell ya, A homemade 6 character 14-segment display my man. Why not 7 characters you ask, cause if you break a million on any game you'll be asked to leave... seriously, get out. I figure a 4"x12" display hoisted above the arcade will get people's attention. And the thing displays uppercase letters as well. Sprinkle in a touch of embittered A.I. and my arade machine will be barking out orders to its subservient users in no time. I still have to wire up 84 LED's , find some frosted glass and write me some control software but I think it's well on it's way to being half done. Updates to follow.

2006-06-27T17:08:00.000-05:00

Gotta add a photo to this blog and well... why not Beaker. !Mee-mee-mee-mee! Hoooo! Hoooo! Hoooo!!