Tindie

Over the past few decades, robots have gone from a pillar in science fiction to something you can build yourself with the right tools. Much in the same way that people have pets, robots too have become a way for makers to build their own companions.

The Chappi Robot Kit is a 3D-printed robot with four legs controlled by an Arduino Nano. It’s also undeniably adorable. The inclusion of a distance sensor, an IR remote controller, and a piezo speaker also gives you the opportunity to interact with the finished robot.

Not only does the Arduino IDE let you freely control the movement via programming, the entire project makes for an affordable dive into the world of robotics!The control software comes installed, so all you need is the IDE and a USB to make changes or expand the functionality.

The seller also offers an optional turntable if you want Chappie to ride along with you.

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When art and hardware collide, some of the most amazing pieces come to life. I myself thoroughly enjoy circuit sculptures, for example. What we have here, could be the next step for artistic PCBs.

This Reactor Enclosure Sketch is part of a series that creates experimental renditions of sketchbook drawings. The drawing is rendered on the circuit board during the manufacturing process as a silkscreen.

The result is a passive board that works as a static object you can display like any other piece of art. As an interesting side note, the sketch itself is of a sculpture that would house a model fusion reactor. You can read more about its functionality on the store page.

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Beginner’s soldering kits are a fun way to get used to the nuances of a skill that all makers must possess. While they often end with a badge of honor (quite literally), this particular kit goes a step further by offering some interactivity.

The Electronic Cake Kit features two PCBs bolted together, and 8 LEDs on the top to represent candles. When it’s completed, the lights flicker randomly to mimic flames. When you blow on them, they’ll also go out and stay out longer depending on how well you can snuff out your electronic candles.

The kit comes with everything you need to build the finished product. The seller also provides detailed assembly instructions. The only thing you’ll need to complete the set are a pair of AA batteries.

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You may recall a Tindie and Hackaday Bring-a-Hack event last year, graciously hosted by the Tog Hackerspace in Dublin, Ireland. This year, the hackerspace opened its doors once again as part of Startup Week!

The event took place at the Tog Hackerspace on Tuesday, October 22nd, 2019 as part of the many events happening in the area. More than a few of the panelists should be familiar faces to the Tindie community, so let’s take a look!

Tindarians at Tog Hackerspace’s Startup Week Event

Of the five panelists, three of the speakers were indeed store owners on Tindie, making them uniquely equipped to talk about their journey to becoming an online entrepreneur of maker-focused curiosities.

Brian Lough

Brian is a software development and hardware tinkering hobbyist who makes videos on ESP8266/ESP32 over at his YouTube channel.

Over on his Tindie store, you’ll find myriad shields, stands, and badges to satisfy your maker curiosity.

Robert Fitzsimons

Robert is a member of the Tog Hackerspace who designs and makes everything from electronic devices to fashion and wearables.

His Tindie store features the “I Can Solder Badge” that we’ve written about before, along with some fun soldering kits that turn a bunch of LEDs into recognizable pieces of art by the time they’re finished.

AnalysIR

Our last Tindarian is also based in Dublin and creates a wide range of infrared modules for both pros and hobbyists. They are best known for AnalysIR: a leading application for analyzing and reverse engineering IR signals.

You can find examples of their infrared modules on sale over at their Tindie store.

The other speakers on the panel included the COO of an IoT startup, and the current CEO of Tog Hackerspace, Jeffrey Roe. While the talk wasn’t recorded, Jeffrey had great things to say about the event:

“The event went great. I could not get them to stop talking about things. After 75 minutes, I had to call a halt. They chatted to makers afterwards for another hour in smaller groups. All-in-all, a great topic and people seemed to like it.”

If there’s one thing I know about makers, it’s that we have a lot to say. Ask about our projects, but be prepared to say for a while and listen. In my personal experience, it’s always time well spent.

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When you think about iconic video game characters, I’m sure a certain yellow circle comes to mind. You know the one; has an insatiable appetite? Constantly pursued by colorful ghosts? I’m sure it will come to you.

As it turns out, the Chomper badge has a striking resemblance. Beyond the sharp pixelated design, the badge also plays music and uses a minimalist LED animation. Most interesting of all its features, is the fact that the entire melody is stored on an attiny13 (with 1k of flash), and when it plays it’s loud enough that there’s no doubt you’ll hear it.

Those who are interested in design notes that discuss how this was done should check out the store page for a detailed recap of the process.

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Raspberry Pi has been at the heart of countless projects, but it’s the HATs that are the silent heroes. The right combination of hardware can open up all kinds of functionality. That’s why the Quad Opto-TRIAC HAT should be on your radar.

This Raspberry Pi HAT includes 4 optocoupled TRIACs, allowing you to drive things like light bulbs, AC motors, fans, grow lamps, or anything else you need. Typically, HATS like this have a 24C32 EEPROM that auto-configures the RPi GPIO ports at boot time, but the TRIAC is a solid state device.

This allows it to turn on and off hundreds of times per second without any wear to the memory. The board also includes opto-isolators, which provide full isolation between both the DC and AC stages.

Beginners can quickly get started by writing 1 or 0 to the corresponding GPIO port to turn the AC channel on or off accordingly. For advanced users, open source drivers are available on GitHub.

An important thing to remember here is that improper mounting can lead to serious damage or injury. Always be safe when you’re working with electricity.

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Modern music performances often rely on a delicate ballet of lights and effects to create a visual art show around the music. Putting on that kind of show requires hardware that can follow the beat of the music.

Remora is a pseudo animation language that works as a companion to Orca, a different programming language designed to create procedural sequencers. It receives UDP short instructions and sends animations to addressable LED strips using a M5StickC.

The animations run entirely in an ESP32 controller and are purposefully short to be triggered by bangs — the packet sent by the Orca sequencer to keep everything syncronized. The product comes fully assembled, so all you need to do is plug it in via USB and start sending WiFi UDP signals to trigger various animations.

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When it comes to small screens, you can’t ask for much more than what a quality OLED offers. This 20×4 character alphanumeric I2C OLED shield for the Arduino MKR series is a perfect example.

It operates at 3.3V, so you can power the screen from a lithium battery. Compared to LCD screens, this has a wider temperature range, allowing it to function in below freezing conditions. It’s a great fit for outdoor projects as a result.

The product arrives as a soldered MKR shield that’s ready to use.

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In a world of `in the box` musicians and producers, tactile control over music making often gets overlooked in favour of track pads. The VLRM PRJCT ROT8.x is here to put control back at the heart of your mix, bringing the essential creative interaction which formed music of the past. It’s a rock solid configurable MIDI controller, featuring high quality knobs capable of outputting numerous types of musical data to your software setup.

The VLRM PRJCT ROT8.x comes in an aluminium enclosure, with 32 knobs outputting 7bit MIDI data via an Arduino, able to send control changes, program changes, pitch bends and more. It delivers expansive and expressive control over your daw, synths, drum machines and effects units – controlling filters, distortion units and effects sends with typeof control you don’t have with a mouse or trackpad. Finding the sweet spot is a lot easier now!

The VLRM PRJCT ROT8.x features USB power and MIDI learn, meaning you can send MIDI to it and assign a knob to send that data from the device! Of course, the VLRM PRJCT ROT8.x can control other types of software too, for light shows, VJing and any application which receives MIDI messages.

It comes fully assembled from Germany, made by Velorum Project and measures 220 x 165 x 35mm.

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There are numerous occasions for which a badge is the perfect accessory. Among all of them, however, Halloween must be the best. As someone who has been watching classic horror films lately, like a series about a certain Friday near the middle of the month, this Killer Badge kit immediately caught my eye.

The badge features 12 LEDs and sound, all driven by an ATtiny1604 micro that you can also hack using the Arduino IDE. The kit requires soldering and includes some 0603 SMD parts.

Therefore, a fine soldering iron tip, tweezers, and some soldering flux should be in your arsenal. Since the microcontroller comes pre-programmed, you just need to worry about soldering and you’re good to go.

Don’t forget to grab a CR2032 battery as well, since those cannot be shipped internationally. Happy Halloween!

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