HACK A WEEK

Here’s a fun project to make with the 555 chip.
Here’s how it works. When it’s turned on by pressing SW1, the 555 astable oscillator is activated. It will produce a tone through the speaker that can be varied in pitch by changing the distance between the LED and the photo cell. The photo cell is mounted at one end of a 1/4″ diameter tube which shields it from 99% of the light. The LED is mounted on a piece of music wire and inserted into the tube. You change pitch by simply moving the wire in and out. Move it inwards and get a higher frequency tone. Move it outwards and the tone goes down in frequency. You can build the device as I have shown in the pictures and video, or get creative and come up with something new!

I encourage you to try building other circuits with the 555. It’s a very versatile chip with many applications.
Have fun and…

Keep On Hackin!

Parts list:
2 – 100 Ohm ohm resistors
1 – Photo Cell also call Light Dependent Resistor (LDR)
1 – 2.2 mF Electrolytic capacitor
1 – 100 mF Electrolytic capacitor
1 – Bright white LED
1 – LM555 8 pin DIP timer chip
1 – Small speaker
1 – Momentary push button switch
1 – 9 volt battery
1 – 9 volt battery clip
1 – small perf board to mount components on
Hook up wire
5″ length of music wire or large paper clip.

Rob Paisley’s 555 timer circuit page.
This has a TON of great info on the 555 including a few timing calculators to aid in component selection.
http://home.cogeco.ca/~rpaisley4/LM555.html

Well here we are back to the weekly projects! The down time was a good opportunity to regroup and dream up new projects ideas for the coming year.

My girlfriend Lisa has a 2007 Yamaha Virago that had a problem with its initial warm up. It just would NOT take throttle unless it sat and idled for about 20 minutes, and then it would still hesitate. It eventually just refused to start so I decided to take the carb apart and see what was going on. This was also an opportunity to shoot a how-to video. Follow along now as we get into the heart of this machine and find out why it wouldn’t run and set it straight!

Keep on hackin!

Hello! After a few weeks away from the blog I’m back with a video of the Mini Maker Faire here in Burlington, NC. Bennett and Jessica Harris did an excellent job of organizing this first time event. I had a table set up showing off Hackaweek as well as representing Make Magazine with some banners and free stuff. The crowd was steady all day long and I had a great time sharing the projects with others. Big thanks to Bennett and Jassica for putting on a successful event!

Keep on hackin!