I’ve been looking at failed kickstarters and a recurrent theme seems to be one of playing the big boys game with a beer budget. I get that everyone wants to come out with the latest widget and sell it for $99.99 in order to capture market share. Such can work wonders if your volume is […]
Category: gadgets, ideas, and headaches
Electricity is no Respector of Man’s Codes
Electricity is no respecter of the NEC or any other regional code for that matter. Electrical codes try to ensure some level of safety but are compromised due to political and economic factors. Codes also change over time, due to bad experiences, lessons learned, as well as changing political / economic factors. Alas, this does […]
On Common Core Math
The idea of common core math is to develop understanding, rather than superficial rote methods in the interest of global competition in STEM and related. The problem with this ideology, is that for the majority of folks out there, getting the right answer quickly rather than really understanding whats going on under the hood makes […]
Colorant Names and Character ID’s
Brown Oxide I Perm Red S Hansa Yellow AXN Lamp Black B Magenta M Medium Yellow T Raw Umber L Red Oxide F Thalo Blue E Thalo Green D White KX Yellow Oxide C
LED Illumination, Some Random Bits
The Osram LUW CP7P-KTLP-5C8E-35-Z is a rather inexpensive LED with some fairly impressive specs. Digikey pricing is $2.47 at 1200 piece quantities. The specs are the following; 109lumen at 350mA 243 lumen at max current 1A (assuming one can keep it cool) Viewing Angle 80 deg Color: Cool white, 6500K Size 3mmx3mmx2.23mm high A full […]
Canon EOS film and Digital Camera Lens Interchange
Canon EOS EF Lenses from film cameras can be used in Canon digital cameras which use EF-S lenses… sort of. They are not 100% interchangeable. A couple bid deal issues which must be considered. EF lenses from Canon film cameras will work on Canon digital cameras that use EF-S lenses, the reverse however is not […]
Long Wave IR Theremin Block Diagram 555 contest part 3
Here is the block diagram for the long wave IR theremin design. A full size expanded version is available by clicking the image. IR Sensor Discussion The IR sensors are an array of thin film Bismuth-Antimony thermocouples surrounded by Xenon gas. Active junctions in the center of the detector receive radiant energy through a thin […]
Long Wave IR Theremin Theory & Operation 555 contest part 2
The detector mounts are ready to roll but the it is getting more than a bit cold outside, so here goes the theory of operation and block diagram section. A simplified view of the long wave IR detector is shown in figure 1. The background radiation is ever present, and the detector is mounted in […]
Long Wave IR Theremin (555 contest) part 1
The traditional theremin used a couple oscillators, a reference one, and another one was controlled via physical proximity. The difference frequency between the oscillators was then sent to an amplifier, whose volume was controlled by yet another set of oscillators. In the 1920’s such an instrument was no doubt difficult to build. In our time […]
Broken Stud Removal
Broken studs can be a real nightmare, even more so because more often than not, they end up in locations where its near impossible to get at. The traditional approaches of drilling out the stud, and then using an ez-out or other broken stud extraction tool often fail. Sometimes they mere strip out, which inevitable […]