Nissan Juke Annoying Rear Creak Fix
For over a year I lived with an annoying creaking noise coming from the back of my 2012 Nissan Juke. Symptoms were a creaking noise that sounded like really bad hardwood creaking in a house. Happened when turning, going over bumps or anything that caused twisting of the chassis. I first tried checking the rear area including removing all the bits in the trunk including the spare, foam parts and side panels, it was still…
Mazda MX-5 Miata – Dynamic Rear Brake/Running LED Strip
It's only been a few weeks since I've had my new 2021 Mazda Miata MX-5. Already added sequential LED turn signals & side markers all around, but not being the type to leave well enough alone, I needed a little spice to make it my own. Combining that with my passion of microcontrollers and LEDs ( see similar ) and taking inspiration from others before me (this) , here's what I ended up with. Granted…
Personalized Vinyl Decals – Check it out!
Get yours: PBStuffCo at Esty
Drift Trike Electrified!
Tag along on my journey electrifying this Triad Drift Trike with an e-bike motor and battery pack. You'll also get to hear about my experience as a first time noob MIG welding. When I first got the drift trike, it was really just for myself and my son to scoot around on. With few hills and no access to those mountainous roads you see in most videos made the fun became more of a workout…
3D Print: Electronics Soldering 3rd Hand
After years using my reliable PanaVise, it was time to step it up with some extra help for soldering and electronics work. I had this idea over a year ago, and pick-up some 3rd hand arms. They then sat on my Now that the weather is cooling down, there's more time for hobbies. That, and my eyes are not what they used to be, so this has become somewhat of a necessity. Given MCUs…
How To: TFT LCD with TouchUI on Raspberry Pi OctoPi Rig
I recently ventured into adding a " TFT to my LulzBot Mini. I already have OctoPrint running, but there are times (usually during filament failure events) I need to directly control the printer (heat the filament, move axis motors etc). After 3 painful days of messing around with different tutorials, I finally figured it out and it works dammit! I haven't found a single source that has all steps in one place, so I decided to…
USB Dial
This is another one of those "did it because I can" projects. It's a USB dial that uses a Teensy Arduino unit at it's core and allows me to emulate my mouse. I use TinkerCAD avidly to design my 3D printed models. I wanted to have both this and my mouse at the same time. The mouse would be used for some activities ( object selection/rotation/editing) while the dial would fill in to perform rotate/zoom in/out…
3D Printed RC Hex to LEGO Hub Adapter
After building BluCrawler, I wanted to see what other possibilities there were with builds using RC crawler tires. LEGO is not there yet with similar tires (closest are the Claas Xerion tires - but they are not crawler tires). Anyway, it's challenging to mate a LEGO hub to an RC tire. There are aftermarket adapters out there, but they are expensive, so I decided to design and print my own. You can download the STL file here. Samples…
Nextion TFT LCD – Why you need one!
I'll start this by stating that I don't work for iTead, and nor am I getting any sort of I just really like this TFT LCD. I stumbled upon the Nextion (which is a slick easy-to-use TFT LCD with a HMI editor) when they had their first crowdfunding campaign a year or so ago. I ignored it as there was not a lot of documentation, and frankly, I really didn't understand the concept of…
WIoT-2 Weather and Home Automation – Nextion with ESP8266/ESP32
This is a continuation from my first iteration of WIoT weather station. What is WIoT-2? I use it as a cloud-connected (IoT) info center of sorts. It is a culmination of information my wife or I often look for either on our way out of the house, or when we come home. It displays current/forecast weather, temp/humidity from outside the house (this), date, time, our local waste collection schedule, currency rates, the status of our garage…