Tindie

The Power Harvesting Challenge is finished! Twenty finalists received a $1000 cash prize and are moving on to the finals of The Hackaday Prize 2018. It was a hard-fought battle to squeeze out every bit of power they could from their projects.

From the Vampire Charger to the Clock for a century, the winners are certainly some truly unique and inspiring projects. You can check out a full list of the finalists right here, but if you want to know which Tindarians are moving on to the finals, you’ve come to the right place.

3 Tindarians Score a Win in The Power Harvesting Challenge

The goal of the Power Harvesting challenge was to pull energy from a source other than traditional batteries or wall-power. Solar panels, wind turbines, or even whacky chemistry experiments were all acceptable options.

Among the twenty finalists, we had not one, not two, but three Tindarians claim a slot! Here are the winning projects, in no particular order:

Tiny Solar Energy Module (TSEM)

The goal of this project was to design a very small module that could easily interface with other projects. Jasper Sikken created a 1×1 inch PCB module with 2 solar cells, an extremely efficient Li-Ion charger, and out of 3.3V and 1.8V.

This project is unique because it’s easy to manufacture and simple to integrate into PCB or breadboard designs. It can even harvest enough energy from indoor light to power a BLE or LoRa sensor.

Ultra-Low Power LiPo Charger Via Energy Harvesting

This project from Pesky Products is a very small (0.5×0.5 inch) breakout board for the Texas Instruments BQ25504 Ultra Low Power Boost Converter With Battery Management for Energy Harvesting Applications.

After using the ESP8285 and other MCUs for environmental sensing projects, Kris Winer found that battery life is a big issue. By harvesting energy from direct sunlight using solar cells, remote applications like environmental data loggers can be consistently charged and powered by the sun.

The BQ25504 makes it easy to power an MCU. The low (>330 mV) cold start threshold also allows energy harvesting from indoor lighting as well.

PCB Coil Joule Thief

A joule thief is a minimalist self-oscillating voltage booster. It pulls the remaining energy from what most would consider a “dead” battery to illuminate an LED. It can also be used as an LED driver to power a white LED from a low voltage source, like an AAA battery. Joule thieves are small, inexpensive, and easy to build. This type of circuit goes by other names too, like blocking oscillator, joule ringer, and vampire torch.

This design from Bobricius is unique in that it replaces the toroid transformer with a PCB etched dual coil. You can find some of the initial boards for sale on Tindie.

Enter The Human Computer Interface Challenge Today!

The next challenge of The 2018 Hackaday Prize is already underway. Check out our full post for details on how to enter. Who knows, you could be featured in our next finalist roundup!

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Anyone who’s ever dreamed of the perfect MIDI controller will admit, big name brands can lack the exact elements they need. Wouldn’t it be cool to choose your own? Shantea Controls have the perfect solution, the OpenDeck DIY MIDI Platform, where you can put together your perfect MIDI masterpiece easily.

The beauty of the OpenDeck is that a PhD in programming is not required — just hook up the components you want and use the dedicated software to select what you’ve patched together! The OpenDeck allows you to customise your exact controller by selecting from Buttons, Encoders, Potentiometers, FSRs (Force Sensing Resistors) and Single color or RGB LEDs to suit your setup.

Featuring USB MIDI, MIDI IN, MIDI Out and 64 digital inputs for buttons (or 32 inputs for encoders), 32 inputs for analog potentiometers/FSRs (configurable as digital inputs for buttons) and 48 outputs for LEDs – enough to power a MIDI Mothership!

Because it is configured by a web interface, no drivers are required to operate and it works well with Windows, Mac, Linux, iOS, and Android. It has a huge range of features which can be seen in the documentation here.

The video below shows a custom controller built using the OpenDeck to control Native Instruments Traktor. But it is compatible with any MIDI software/hardware.

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There’s nothing wrong with keeping the score the old-fashioned way, but I think all of us would jump at the chance to use an actual scoreboard to showcase our victories. This six-inch LED Scoreboard Kit from NightFire Electronics LLC is an excellent way to make your scores known.

The kit consists of a 2-digit microprocessor-controlled up/down counter and reset. With three different screw-terminal inputs for these actions, the power comes in on a 2-pin screw terminal. You can use anything from 9vdc to 15vdc. The kit will run off a 9v battery as well. The display is composed of 50 jumbo 8mm LEDs. The numbers are 3.5 inches high by 1.75 inches wide. The visibility is well over 100 feet as well. You can choose from six different colors, but the default is red.

The scoreboard is powered by a Microchip PIC16F57 as the processor, which sits in an IC socket. This means that you can pull it out and reprogram it to meet your needs. You can also drive the device with an Arduino. You can choose from a “built and tested” kit or the original version to build yourself. Instructions are included, but you’ll need tools like a soldering iron and solder, which are not included.

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As someone who has been a gamer all my life, I often don’t realize how much I take my mobility for granted. Without the use of my fingers or hands, enjoying the hobby I love would be nigh impossible. For many limited mobility gamers, this is a reality. Take Dan Bertholomey, a lifelong gamer who lost the use of his right arm and hand in a tragic hit-and-run accident.

Or what about Solomon Romney? He was born without fingers on his left hand, which made it incredibly difficult for him to enjoy gaming with his friends and family growing up. For people with these kinds of limitations, solutions often came in the form of modifications made by makers who created their solutions at high costs. Now, Microsoft is bringing us a solution that empowers not only limited mobility gamers but makers as well.

Let’s take a look at the Xbox Adaptive Controller, and how makers on Tindie can start planning their designs to complement this upcoming controller’s release. Don’t forget that the fourth Hackaday Prize 2018 module is also the Human-Computer Interface Challenge, so you may some inspiration for that here as well.

Join us as we take a look at how this controller came to be and how makers can start developing designs that make gaming accessible for everyone.

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3D printing is an exciting technology with limitless potential in the long-term, but it comes with a few safety concerns. There’s a shockingly low amount of protection for the electronic components in modern 3D printers, for example.

Fellow Tindarian JasonKits has been working with 3D printing for 8 years, and this missing link caught their eye, so they decided to create a solution by leveraging a previously developed board and some new software. Enter the 3D Printer Guard.

With a 128×64 OLED Monochrome display, the device displays a splash screen, main screen, and alarm screen. It will monitor the temperatures in the hot end and heat bed with the option to set temperatures of each channel.

The software can be updated via the connector serial, and the WiFi connectivity allows you to develop software to send emails or monitor it remotely as needed. A buzzer also alerts the user when a thermal runaway occurs.

When it comes to 3D printing projects, you can’t be too safe. This device could protect both your device and your future projects.

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As someone who used to live in a stormy city, the sound of thunder immediately had me mashing the save button on my projects. Power outages were common during storms and without an uninterruptable power supply (UPS), everything shuts down without warning.

With the Pi-Zero-UpTime UPS for Pi or Pi clones, you can keep the power flowing, even when there’s an outage or interruption. It works like any other UPS and provides power from a backup battery that charges when there is power available.

A seamless transition between standard power and battery power ensures that you won’t need to reboot during the switch from one to the other. The hardware on the board monitors the battery level. When the battery level is low, GPIO pin 26 informs the software to change the state on the GPIO, using a sample code provided with the device.

The Pi-Zero-UpTime includes a micro-USB cable but does not include the battery. You will need to supply a 14500 size Lithium Ion battery. Depending on the one you choose, the time will vary. The sample code provided outputs the time stamp every 10 seconds so you can use this to run your own tests.

This device is compatible with any Raspberry Pi that has a 40-pin header. It’s approximately the size of a Pi Zero and even fits on top of a Pi-Zero with included mounting holes. An included Power Reset switch also allows you to reboot the Pi simply by resetting the power, so there’s no need to unplug anything. With a UPS device like this, you’ll never have to worry about an interruption in power again.

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If you need some perspective on the Hackaday Prize, think of it like the academy awards, but for makers. This yearly competition seeks out the best and brightest projects from makers, artists, hackers, engineers, and everyone in between. The goal is simple: build a better future.

The first three rounds of the challenge are done and the finalists for these categories have been selected, but it’s not too late to join in! The Human Computer Interface Challenge just began and runs from July 16th to August 27th.

This round challenges you to create some sort of interface where humans can talk to machines or vice versa. It can be a visual, auditory, haptic, olfactory, or any other form of communication. Your project should show information being passed back and forth, or it should control something.

Don’t forget to inspire other makers to adapt your interface into their projects as well. Now that you’ve got all the details, it’s time to submit your project for a chance to win $1000 and be one of the twenty finalists that move on!

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We’ve tried to make a handheld system better than the Game Boy, and we’ve come pretty close, but that design is still the best. The only problem with the original Game Boy was its limitations — mostly imposed by the state of the art at the time. Thankfully, makers like Old School Game are here to save the day.

This custom Game Boy-inspired system is a fully functional retro game console with a 5-inch HDMI LCD, a Raspberry Pi 3 quad-core CPU, 1GB of RAM, and plenty of other exciting features:

• 16 GB Micro SD Card Sandisk
• WiFi and Bluetooth enabled
• ABXY buttons on USB
• Access to both USB and Ethernet
• Micro USB charing
• Rechargeable 4000 mah Li-Ion battery
• Powered by Retropie: Plays NES, SNES, Genesis, Game Boy, Game Gear, Atari, PlayStation, and arcade games

The entire thing is printed in transparent PLA and includes a user guide. It’s a retro gamer’s paradise.

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When you think of an instrument, even an electronic one, you are the one in the driver’s seat. You blow a horn, strum a guitar, or press keys on an electric keyboard to generate a wide variety of sounds. The Autophage T4 is different — it plays pleasing tones autonomously with the compositions changing with light conditions and its musical algorithm.

While you could nominally “just let it play”, the video below shows that it can be manipulated to produce different sounds. The audio is quite pleasing and is transmitted to your sound system via a 3.5mm stereo jack. You’ll also need to provide USB power.

While interesting, this is far from the only unique musical device available on Tindie. Be sure to poke around in our sound section to see what kind of interesting gadgets Tindarians have come up with. For a bit more technical info on electronic music, you can also check out the article “Here’s Why MIDI is Magic” by Chris D.

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Home security systems can be quite costly, but a lot of interesting DIY systems can get the job done at a much lower cost. If you’re an Android user, odds are you also have an older version of your phone collecting dust in a drawer somewhere and now’s your chance to put that old phone to good use.

The Irdroid Alarm System makes use of an Android app and a magnetic door sensor to give your home an added layer of security with one simple device. The door sensor connects to the phone via the 3.5mm audio jack. The Irdroid Alarm System App (available on Google Play) runs on the phone and once the door opens, the user is notified via email, and the phone also plays a message to scare off intruders: “Security Breach, Police are on their way!”

The entire app is also open source, so you can add your own features or customize it as needed. The setup process takes less than a minute and hardware installation is simple.

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