Tindie

If you’ve ever played with radio-controlled  remote control electronics, such as model cars and planes, you may “know” that an RC transmitter (Tx) signals a reciever (Rx) to output signals to servos and electronic speed controllers (ESCs) via a pulse-width modulation (PWM) signal.

Technically though, this isn’t quite correct. While true pulse-width modulation functions by regulating the percent of time a signal is on versus off, the signal going to a servo has to do with only how long the on state lasts, and doesn’t account for how often the on pulses are seen.

It’s a distinction that I didn’t understand until extremely recently, and you can find out more about it here. The good news is that R/C components generally work pretty well together. The bad news is that if you want to control motors or anything else via “pure” PWM, then you need something to take the pseudo-PWM from the receiver, and translate it into an actual PWM signal.

For this conversion, this R/C to Dual H-Bridge board offers an interesting solution. It’s set up to accept inputs from an Rx, and mixes the throttle and steering to control a vehicle tank-style. It can then supply PWM outputs to an H-bridge motor driver of your choice. The device can also control two on-off signals, so you can have your tank, robot, or strandbeest walk around, then perform two other simple actions (turn on lights, launch a projectile, etc) of your choosing!

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If you’re a fan of DIY electronics, and I’d have to assume you are since you’re reading this, you’ve probably noticed the array of DIY clocks out there. Binary clocks, Nixie tube clocks, mechanical clocks powered by an array of stepper motors, RGB LED clocks, the list goes on and on. And of course we’re entertained with each new and interesting revision that someone comes up with.

On the other hand, while people seem to be obsessed with hours and minutes, DIY calendars are in somewhat short supply. You could argue that smart mirrors, or recycling an old monitor into a calendar display count, but the list just doesn’t extend quite as long as with clocks.

One interesting take on a simple calendar is the PCB Calendar from Femtocow. The material is such that it can be marked with a sharpie, then wiped clean using alcohol. Interesting, it’s available for 2017, as well as for 2015 and 2016 at a deep discount. I’m sure there’s an interesting project there somewhere; perhaps you could permanently mark dates of note from years past and place them somewhere as a reminder!

A backlight stand is also available to fit these calendars, which looks pretty neat itself. Given its array of LEDs and interesting form factor, it looks ripe for non-calendar uses as well!

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It’s Maker Faire this weekend and Tindie is excited to be there with Hackaday and the Supplyframe team.

Tindie – The Maker Marketplace

Head over to Tindie’s booth (RW22) in the ‘Maker to Market’ Pavillion in Zone 7 to say ‘Hi’ to me (Jasmine), Shulie Tornel, Jordan Bunker, Rich Hogben, and Gerrit Coetzee. You may even be able to catch Mike Szczys and Chris Gammell.

Tindie can help you reach the maker market, so come talk to us. We can’t wait to see your cool projects and give you the latest Tindie and Hackaday stickers. If you’re already a seller, we’d love to catch up with you and put a face to a name.

Jetset Sellers

We’re also super chuffed to have Tindie seller Spencer Owen, of RC2014 fame, flying in from the UK to help us out. Plus we can point you in the direction of more Tindie folk like Nick “Crazy Clock” Sayer, Scott “MePed” Pierce, Lumen Electronic Jewellery and more of our community who are exhibiting at the show.

RC2014 Modules in its full glory:

Can’t make it to the Faire? Don’t despair!

Join us at the 4th Annual Hackaday x Tindie MFBA Meetup. After the Faire on Saturday, carry on the festivities with us at O’Neill’s in San Mateo from 7 pm.

Bring your finest blinky, flashy, IoT, hacks, wearables, or other techy items for us to paw. Bonus points if you bring a demo using a Tindie product, or a Hackaday Prize entry to get us super excited.

RSVP over here. Space is limited, so get your foot in the door early. 21 or over only. Please bring ID.

Hacks and beer – we know exactly how to show you a good time. Here’s the scene from 2016:

Not even in the Bay Area?

You can still ask us questions, share your projects with us, and see our shenanigans on social media:

• Tindie’s Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram
• Hackaday’s Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram

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Computers, in their various forms, are certainly the most complicated devices that humans have come up with. Though we take it for granted, consider that a Raspberry Pi 3 (which processing-wise isn’t that impressive by today’s standards) can execute instructions at 1.2 GHz, or 1.2 BILLION cycles/second in four separate processing cores. Considering what’s involved in just the main processing unit, as well as the associated hardware like a graphics processor and a full gigabyte of RAM, it’s mind-blowing that something like this can be had for just over $30.

In fact, given how advanced computing power has become, it’s easy to forget that all of this boils down to binary logic in the form of transistors that form logic gates. HowStuffWorks has a good rundown of the different gate flavors, which include NOT, AND, and OR logical elements, as well as other components that combine these elements in different ways.

Though modern computers and microcontrollers are great, sometimes you don’t need that kind of power. For simple control, you can instead turn to discreet logic components. These components normally come as small chips, but you’d like an easy package for experimentation with these fundamental electronic building blocks, “Dave’s Boolean Bits” look like a great solution. As shown above, the bits are logic components soldered onto a PCB, which give you extra visual feedback for breadboard positioning.

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Javier Rodrigo, of the J.Rodrigo store, has been selling on Tindie since February 2015. He’s currently studying for a degree in Industrial Electronics and Automatic Control Engineering, giving him a good background for Tindie-ish pursuits.

His main pursuit here is retro gaming, though more specifically, he sells several accessories for working with the classic Game Boy. He also lists an FTDI serial breakout to USB board which could be quite useful for microcontroller programming.

Rodrigo’s Game Boy flash cartridge

Rodrigo started selling on Tindie after trying out eBay and finding that it wasn’t quite the right market for his products. After starting a storefront here, he’s found the sales process simple, and the staff to be very helpful. On the other hand, though he thinks the process is “just perfect,” he dos note a couple inconveniences including the fact that you can’t do refunds after the seller pays, and there’s no tax preview on your product page.

As for what other Tindie sellers need to remember when listing their products, he says:

Innovation and improvement, if you go to make an open source board based in another, don’t make a clone try to improve the design and functionality.

In addition to pursing an engineering degree and selling on Tindie, Rodrigo has several other projects that he’s working on. These including a scientific calculator, 3D printer, and even an open-source SMT pick and place machine called Little PnP! Another project of his personal site that I thought was great was his tiny 3D-printed table saw, though there are no plans to sell this anytime soon. Perhaps we will see one or more of these projects listed here in the future!

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The bowtie spinner

If you’ve been paying attention to DIY/hacker/maker media for the last few months, you’ve certainly come across “fidget spinners.” These devices feature a bearing in the middle, and some sort of fixture that can be spun around for your entertainment. Personally, I don’t see the appeal, but then again I haven’t tried and/or made one, so perhaps I should reserve judgement.

Gearsngizmos fidget devices

Given their simplicity and popularity, Tindarians make and sell quite a few of these devices, including the Gearsngizmos store, which has several models in different bearing configurations. Other Tindie spinner listings include:

• A three-lobed spinner with a fully ceramic bearing. This one resembles a ninja star, or shuriken, which admittedly, seems quite interesting.
• The Swirl spinner features a rather organic design, sort of the opposite of the previous spinner. It’s out of stock as of this writing, so it’s apparently quite popular. Note this is the same person that came up with the very successful $5 spinner on Kickstarter.
• The Turbine wooden spinner looks quite interesting, and, again, is out of stock as of this writing. Perhaps it’s time to list your own spinner design!
• The Revo Bowtie spinner, as you might suspect, looks like a bowtie. This device is actually in stock, so if you need a spinner right now, be sure to check it out!

Though there are some (admittedly) pretty interesting designs here, perhaps what you’re really interested in how fast you can get one of these going. If so, check out Kevin Darrah’s spinner tachometer in the video below. As seen at 1:50, it’s able to pick up a spinner rotating at nearly 1600 RPM by hand, and using an air compressor, they’re able to spin it up well over 6000 RPM. Perhaps, it’s time to give one of these devices a try!

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If you’d like to build your own clock, there are many ways to accomplish this. On the one hand, you could go “old-school” and make a mechanical model with gears and such, or perhaps you’d like to step up a few hundred years, and make one with an Arduino or other microcontroller. Unfortunately though, either method is prone to stray from the actual time after a while.

In the microcontroller’s case you can use a real-time clock (RTC) module (like this one) to improve things, though your clock will eventually stray even with one of those. If you decided to build a mechanical version, I suppose you could attempt to reduce friction — this is how ruby bearings came about — or tune your pendulum. But unless you’re a professional watchmaker or very serious hobbyist, I’d be skeptical about how effective this will be.

Taking things in a different direction is Nick Sayer’s GPS clock. It’s available in a laser-cut wood and acrylic case, and importantly, doesn’t rely on local equipment to keep things on time. It instead gets its signal via a GPS antenna (that you’ll need to provide).

You might be thinking that since you have a smartphone, wall clocks are generally meant as decorations and being extremely accurate doesn’t matter. That’s probably generally true, however, since this clock is accurate to within 200µs— that is, 200 microseconds, or .0002 seconds—of GPS time, it can be used to time-stamp slow motion video and perhaps other high speed applications!

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Tindie, is of course the premier marketplace for indie electronics, but perhaps you haven’t taken time to peruse the Flea Market section. As described, “This area is for the community to clear space in garages and offices for new projects,” and isn’t subject to the Tindie Guarantee. In other words, it sounds like a great place to poke around! Here are a few interesting items I found in my recent browsing:

Gigamint BlueRX

According to this listing’s description, this device was purchased via a Kickstarter campaign, but never used. It’s a 16-channel servo controller that is controlled via Bluetooth. Pretty neat!

Aluminum Wire

What can I say about this; it’s aluminum wire (or aluminium wire depending on your geography). As to why the seller “created it,” the description states that, “I did not make it. Found it in my old parts stock.”

Diode Umbrella

If you live in a rain-prone area and would like to show off your geek cred, I can’t imagine anything better than this. The description lists it as a great Christmas gift, and I suppose it’s never too early to start planning!

Xadow GSM+BLE Module

Here’s another item purchased off of Kickstarter that seemed useful at the time, but now needs a new home. It’s the basis for Seeed’s RePhone kits, so it would be interesting for cellular network and/or Bluetooth hacking!

Soviet Reed Switch

This keypad was found at a flea market (another flea market), and features magnets on each of the keys, which actuate reed switches. Making it even more of a curiosity is its USSR origin!

There is a lot more stuff there, so don’t be afraid to poke around or list your own unusual item!

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When working with electronics, you generally start out with a rats nest of wires breadboard, then after the requisite amount of fiddling with your design, transfer it to something more permanent. This can mean a printed circuit board (PCB) designed and manufactured for the task. If you’re only making one or two of your designs, or if you want it right now, you can instead transfer things to a solderable breadboard.

A quarter-sized PCB “breadboard”

These have a lot of advantages, like not having to wait, and the fact that you can make modifications to them if you really have to. However, transferring components from your breadboard to these PCBs can be frustrating since the layout is generally different.

To ease this frustration, these PCBs come in the shape of a breadboard. This isn’t an entirely new idea by itself, besides fulfilling this useful form factor, these boards have a few other tricks. These include support for power supplies, SO08 pacakges, and, in the case of the full and half size board, pins are spaced so they can accommodate the Raspberry Pi’s GPIO connector.

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E-Paper, E Ink, or one of the several other ways to compose/capitalize this class of device is likely best-known in Amazon’s Kindle and other eBook readers. And why not? This technology is easy on the eyes, and only uses power when it changes what is displayed.

It’s such a neat concept that one would think it would be used in more projects. It does, however, have a few drawbacks like the fact that it generally doesn’t come in color, and doesn’t refresh fast enough for any sort of acceptable animation. The other important drawback from a DIY perspective is that they are relatively difficult to control. As seen in this Hackaday.io writeup, you can’t simply tell one pixel to be a certain shade of gray and expect it to work without some serious fiddling.

In other words, don’t get too excited when you accidentally damage your spouse’s Kindle…not that I would know anything about that.

The good news is that, at least to me, it seems like there’s an increased amount of E-paper hacking going on. One such example is this IoT door sign PCB shield, which allows you to attach an E-ink screen to an ESP8266 Dev 1.0 board. This looks like a perfect application for this tech, as the screen doesn’t need to be updated often, and can be viewed as needed by people passing an office. Note that this comes in the form of a PCB, and you’ll need to add several components to get it working.

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