First day in the new house/work shop. LOVE IT!

Posted on April 3, 2011 by Dino

I love this place!

I’ve finally got the room that I’ve always wanted! 560 square feet of living space and a whopping 810 square feet of work shop area with two roll up garage doors. The shop has two 30 amp welder outlets already in place an plenty of over head fluorescent lighting. There’s a very large fenced back yard for the dogs to run around in with a separate gated area that will make a perfect garden spot! My nearest neighbor is about 100 feet away with a row of dense trees between us. My driveway is about 200 yards long so the location is well away from the main road. A great place to hack, play and make all the noise I want at all hours of the day. Perfect!

The next hack will be about workbenches since I’ll be building a new one. It’s going to be a busy week of moving in and setting up shop.

…and now, I shall stroll outside with my coffee to witness the sun coming up over the nearby pond. 🙂

Sunrise over the pond

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The April Fool’s episode, Screaming Altoids!

Posted on March 31, 2011 by Dino

Here it is the very first project just in time for April Fool’s day!

I call this one “Screaming Altoids”. It’s a simple 555 timer oscillator put inside an Altoids tin. When the unsuspecting consumer of said Altoids opens the tin, WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE it emits a loud squealing sound that’s quite annoying!

The parts list is pretty minimal on this project. It’s a fun and easy build so hack one together!

PARTS LIST:
1 – Altoids tin
1 – 555 Timer chip
2 – 100 ohm resistors
1 – 2.2 mF electrolytic capacitor
1 – 100 mF electrolytic capacitor
1 – 9 volt battery
1 – 9 volt battery clip
1 – micro switch
1 – tiny speaker
Some fine hook up wire.

Here’s the schematic and a pic:

Schematic

Finished project

The video:

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Hack A Week mentioned on The Amp Hour

Posted on March 29, 2011 by Dino

The guys at The Amp Hour mentioned Hack A Week on their show yesterday! Thanks Chris Gammell and Dave Jones!
The Amp Hour is a great weekly radio show that I always look forward to. You just never know what’s going to get discussed. They offer two views on things that seems to balance out well. Great job guys and thanks for the mention! I’ll do my best to crank out a Hack A Week!

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First Hack is Built

Posted on March 28, 2011 by Dino

Yawn! Monday morning…. got the coffee in front of me getting this busy week started.
This is moving week! Yes that’s right, at the same time that I start a big project like this I decide to move! Actually it just kind of worked out that way. The people I rent from informed me that they had another place vacant two miles away from here for a bit more per month. The cool part is, it has a three bay garage attached! Perfect place to set up a new shop! So, since I knew I’d be busy packing and such this week, I spent yesterday building the first project.

It involves a 555 timer, a speaker, a vibrating phone motor and a tin full of Altoids! I need to shoot some more video then edit it into a final cut. Once that’s done I’ll upload it to YouTube. It’s a good project for April Fool’s Day since it’s a practical joke sort of thing and it only takes a few parts to build it.

After that, I’ll be busy getting settled in so the next hack will be posted by Friday April 8th, and every Friday thereafter.

Hope you all have a great week!

Dino 🙂

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Hacking the first project!

Posted on March 27, 2011 by Dino

I spent some time this morning updating the theme here on my Word Press based site. I like it!

Right now I’m at the bench working on the very first hack for Hack A Week! You can watch on the live stream…



Free live streaming by Ustream

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