IoT Garage Door Monitor/Opener with Finger Print Scanner
I've got a lot of stuff in my garage, and having 3 kids (one of them being me!) with forgetful minds, the garage door is sometimes left open over night. I don't really like that sinking feeling after waking up the next day to find the door was left open. Between loosing valuables and critters that make a mess of garbage, I finally decided it's time to take a stance! I have an IP Cam mounted inside the…
DIY Speaker Build
The ShapeOko has been sitting idle for a while, so I decided to take a stab at making my own speakers. I wanted to do something small that I bring outside and hang on my pergola when entertaining guests on our new patio. After perusing the web and checking out some speakers and online enclosure calculators, I landed on a set of HiVi B3N's (3") and tweeters. Given that they won't be permanently mounted outside,…
Logitech MX Anywhere Mouse – Fix That Click!
The Logitech MX Anywhere mouse is by far the best mouse I have ever had. I currently have 2. However, these mice have a common design flaw - the mouse button that is used most often (left in my case) for clicking dies after a while. Maybe design flaw is a bit harsh. This is the only mouse that I have had for a long time and WANT to keep. I don't want another mouse because…
Quadcopter – Enhanced Lost Model Alarm
Just 24 hours earlier I built my first Lost Model Alarm. Not being satisfied with good enough, I've built an enhanced version. Of course, you could just buy one, but where's the fun in that?! As mentioned in my original posting, I wanted the alarm to have multiple modes. First, I wanted to be able to have it triggered while the TX is on using one of the available aux controls. Second, I wanted it to…
Shipped Products Packaging Praise – Sparkfun / Adafruit
I don't often do posts that are off-topic to my projects, but I could not resists posting this. Some of my schooling was environmental-related. Paired with moral obligation, myself and my family try to do our part to be environmentally concious. I wanted give praise to 2 companies that I often order electronics parts from for their effort to be environmentally concious with packaging and shipping. Specifically Sparkfun and Adafruit. I recently received my MicroView…
Outdoor LED Light Controller – Enclosure and Mounting
Over the past 2 years, we have working on our back-yard landscaping project. We added a patio, stones, a deck etc. One of the remaining bits was to add LED's to accent the rocks and other areas at night. After completing my outdoor LED light controller and Andriod app, I found myself struggling to find a way to enclose all the components in something that would protect the controller and power supply from the…
Fix: Samsung Galaxy Tab 3.0 – Won’t Charge
Let's cut to the chase. You have a Samsung Galaxy Tab and you are tired of Googling for solutions trying to figure out why your Tab won't charge. Hopefully this is the last place you have to look. My tab is about 2 yrs old and over the past few months I started noticing it would not charge consistently. I tried all the suggestions; using a different charger, swapping out the cable, disconnecting and re-connecting…
Crius I2C GPS Nav Board – Programming via RS232 USB to Serial FTDI Board
I had an Adafruit UP501 GPS module laying around and wanted to get it working on my Quad. However, my serial connection is being used by a bluetooth module which left me with finding a way to get it working over I2C. I found the Crius I2C GPS module and this video which provides some great guidance on how to set things up. However, I was having trouble getting it programmed using the Sparkfun 232RL …
DIY Quadcopter Build (MultiWii / NanoWii / Qbrain)
If I didn't have enough hobbies I've just gotten myself into the world of quadcopters and flying. I've never flown before. My RC experience is limited to 4 wheels on the ground. Navigating with 2 sticks and learning the world of yaw, elevation, pitch and throttle has become my next challenge. I've wanted to learn how to fly for some time, so here we I'm not going to re-create the wheel as credit goes…
HC-06 Bluetooth Module – Getting this sucker into AT Command Mode
After spending nearly 3 hours scouring the Web trying to find a way to configure my HC-06 Bluetooth module. There are a lot of great tutorials out there. Many of them refer to setting the key pin HIGH, or a combination of LOW then HIGH while powering on the module. However, none of these approaches worked for the unit I have. Read on to see how it can be done. Oddly, I found the answer in…