Monthly Archives: January 2008

Poor Man’s Jacob’s Ladder

Here is a simple Jacob’s Ladder design that uses the transformer from a florescent tube. I fed it with 25V by putting a 20V supply in series with a 5V supply (its too bad the 40V one is out of … Continue reading

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Penguicon 2008!!! April 18-20th Troy, MI!!!

Even though posting events on this blog is a sure sign that I will not attend them, I thought maybe someone in the Detroit area might be interested in this, looks fun. Alexio and Nanciko are coming to visit the … Continue reading

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MC Escher’s Window Manager

Get it??? Sigh…

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More fun with 555 timers

I converted the blinky circuit we are doing at the workshop into a little Theremin-esque analog synth. There is an on/off switch (the photoresistors dont turn ‘off’ enough to modulate the volume directly, unfortunately), a frequency doubler switch (adds more … Continue reading

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HOWTO: Macros in Minicom

Minicom is an old-school serial terminal emulator, and is indispensable for developing serial projects with Linux. It turns out that most of the things I need to do involve repeating a few commands over and over, and it would be … Continue reading

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PhoenixDIY: Meeting 4 is January 24th@7:30pm

This time around, we are having a workshop on the venerable 555 timer. If you’ve never soldered before or perhaps need a bit more hands-on experience to kickstart your geek career, come check it out! But be right quick and … Continue reading

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A VU meter from an old tape deck

Just for fun, I picked up an older tape deck and a VCR to see what interesting stuff was in them. Among the spoils were a number of motors, some nice switches, a nifty looking solenoid and a VU meter. … Continue reading

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