Ladies and gentlemen, it is with deep regret that I present you with our last news post of August. Next week will become September, which causes uncontrollable weeping for students, parents of students, and anyone who was ever a student. Lots of pain all around. Heck, some of the Calgary trees are already starting to […]
Wednesday Cool Links: Spiderbot, Solar S...
Dave Hrynkiw
October 17, 2012
It's Wednesday! Hooray! Huzzah! We're celebrating because... Well, ok, we have nothing big to celebrate right now. So we're going to celebrate having nothing to celebrate with the traditional and only appropriate way possible... BROWSING THE INTERNET! Indeed, we've been celebrating this time-honoured tradition with steadfast dedication, and it's our pleasure to share it with all of you.
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Four-Legged Spiderbot As the website puts it, this is "a walking machine, radially symmetrical, having four legs with two degrees of freedom each, controlled through a wireless link from a hand-held controller based on two Wii Nunchucks." Very impressive articulation and range of motion. Be sure to check out the video. |
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The Almost Useless Machine A solar-powered... Reciprocating saw? Make sure you have lots of patience and a cold one to enjoy while you "work"! Seriously though, while this might not be too functional, it certainly has some great craftsmanship. |
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Solar "Death Ray": Power of 5000 suns! Mirrors. Lots of mirrors. 5800 of them, to be precise. It's pretty cool (and a LOT scary) what kind of power can be harnessed by arranging mirrors onto a fiberglass satellite dish and aligning it to the sun. |
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6 Rubens Tubes Visualizer Hrm, a flame visualization for music? SIGN ME UP. Turn it into a handy-dandy plug-in accessory for the iPod, for the best on-the-go pyrotechnics you can possibly imagine. Might want to make sure you turn it off before tucking it away in your pocket, though. |
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Solar Engineer Badge on DIY So, you think you like DIY? Well, it's time to prove your chops by completing challenges over at diy.org. They even have a Solar Engineer Badge that features a bunch of project ideas, including our Instructable for the Solar Powered Miniball. |
We were once hoping that we could instead celebrate by racing giraffes through obstacle courses, but that didn't pan out. Too bad. I was planning on decking mine out with some sweet black and white racing stripes, to make it look like a very oddly proportioned zebra.
MORE POSTS
Netduino!
Not just another *uino clone, as this uses a 32-bit Atmel AT91SAM7X ARM microcontroller. Sure, it uses the same form factor (well, except for the breadboard-friendly mini version), but the Netduino uses the .NET micro framework. What's that mean? Well, you're using a hugely more capable microcontroller (8-bit vs 32 bit), with much more memory […]
Phones are Down
Remember that time we said we were going to close for vacation, but our website and phones would stay on duty to take your messages? Well, it looks like the phones are revolting, and demanding time off immediately. Right now we're having issues with our office system, and we're unable to take calls. Please shoot […]
L298 Compact Motor Driver Kit
Ok, we were fed up with the strange pinouts on the L298 motor driver, and decided to do something about it. The result is the Solarbotics L298 Compact Motor Driver. It happens to be the same size as a BEP tile, offers four status LEDs, plugs for easy wiring, and screw terminals for motor and […]
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Warning: This product contains chemicals known to the State of California to cause cancer and birth defects or other reproductive harm.
Please visit www.P65Warnings.ca.gov for more information. This item was manufactured prior to August 31, 2018.