If you’ve played around with electronic circuits, you probably know[1] the 555 timer integrated circuit, said to be the world’s best-selling integrated circuit with billions sold. Designed by analog IC wizard Hans Camenzind[2] in 1970, the 555 has been called one of the greatest chips of all time with whole books devoted to 555 timer
555 Timer Teardown Continue Reading
In this instructable, I’ll show you how to make a simple Arduino voltmeter. It can measure voltages in excess of 30VDC depending on how you configure it. The smaller the voltage range you want to measure, the more accurate that your meter will be. This project is going to be apart of a gauss meter
How To Make A Simple Arduino Voltmeter Prototype Continue Reading
The typical parallel LCD used with an Arduino (16×2 or 20×4) has 16 pins. Only 6 I/O pins are required on the Arduino, but what if you could get that down to two I/O pins, and still have those pins available for other devices? The I2C interface is on pins A4 and A5 of the
DIY I2C LCD Display Continue Reading
I’ve played with the Intel Galileo a lot lately, so now it’s time to build some Intel Galileo projects! In this project I built a very simple weather station that records the temperature and humidity and saves these to a memory card. I’ll show you how to read temperature and humidity from a DHT11 sensor
Intel Galileo Project: Simple DIY Weather Station Continue Reading
A couple of months ago I picked up cheap WiFi-controlled LED bulbs (one among dozens of very similar devices), after seeing them at a friend’s place. This turned out to be an excuse to play with the ESP8266, which has inspired several hacks. I was overall very happy with these bulbs: decent Android and iOS apps and, compared to fancier
ESP8266 touchscreen WiFi light controller and clock Continue Reading
I had two options: One required me to spend money. The other cost me nothing and gave me an opportunity to make something useful. To make a short story longer, I have an “analog” slow cooker (just a dial on the front) and I wanted the ability to set the cooking time and temperature. Now
Arduino-Based “Analog” Slow Cooker Controller Continue Reading
In LESSON 18 you learned how to use an ultrasonic sensor to measure distance, and in LESSON 19 you learned how to connect an LCD to the arduino. In this lesson we will combine what you have learned to create a circuit for measuring distance, and displaying results on an LCD display. – See more
Arduino LCD Project for Measuring Distance with Ultrasonic Sensor Continue Reading
The Meter The whole idea of this project was to create a giant meter to show website response time almost like a speedometer would. The result is something that’s both fun to watch and provides a meaningful ‘heartbeat’ of current status. After several revisions and different designs along the way, I ended up with what
Create A Giant Meter Using Arduino Continue Reading
I’m working on a project that requires full orientation information, so I built an Inertial Measurement Unit from scratch. I really like the 9DOF IMU board that Sparkfun makes – the calibration code that comes with it is fantastic – but I wanted to redesign the board so that it could be made at a
9 Degrees of Freedom – IMU Continue Reading
Smart lightbulbs cost your firstborn child. Which is a shame, because smart lights unlock tremendous potential for home automation, energy savings, and all sorts of cool projects. If only there was a way to control your lights without breaking the bank… And now there is! For $19 on Amazon, you can get a 4-lightbulb kit
Cheap Arduino Controlled Light Sockets – Reverse Engineering RF Continue Reading
