Bonehead's Projects

More LED lights

2011-07-18T23:54:00.001+02:00

So, I know I suck at updating this blog .. But frankly I haven't been in the mood for projects for a long time.
Here is one of my latest projects though!
It's a 3x7W LED light for my piece-of-shit pitbike that I got dirtcheap..

The top 2 are aimed higher up than the single one to give a bit better throw.
It'll be mounted up on the fork with batteries placed somewhere within the frame hopefully, I'll also need to install a voltage regulator to charge them, hopefully the bike supplies voltage from somewhere as I haven't bothered to check that crucial piece yet...
Still ways to go on making this thing pretty.

Got 3 modes: 7, 14 and 21W.
Cycles through the mode with the push of a button.

And finally a pic of the pitbike itself, a 1 cylinder 125cc 4stroke.

4 gears manual and specified to have ~10hp(which is probably like 6-7..)

Later!

Bike season is drawing near.

2011-03-18T23:13:00.001+01:00

And with it comes some difficulties, like navigating dark roads ... So I figured I'd solve it with LED's..
2x5W power LED's in a box with optics, batteries and a simple resistor setup to limit the current flow.
A simple on/off switch is placed up on the handlebars, I should probably change this to a high/low setting later on.

This is the lighting at around 7.25W, still some way to go to maximum and I have plenty of flow, I do plan on changing one of the lenses to something with a better throw, that way I can get both angle and length on the beam.

Peace out.

CNC V1-3

2011-03-03T21:32:00.000+01:00

Well here's an update for whoever reads this, haven't done any changes to the cad but did some more fabricating ...
I just hope I'm reaching a good enough accuracy to make this work in the end.

The table is almost complete, missing the 4 bottom bearings and holders for those.

Test mounted, i.e just placed ontop.

CNC V1-2

2011-02-26T14:18:00.001+01:00

And the saga continues...

Some slight modifications and updates to the sketch;

Y-axis box redone to use less material now that I have smaller tubing available
Tube-adjusters redone as well to fit the smaller tubing and make better use of what materials I have.
Probably did some more stuff...

And this is how far I've gotten in reality, need to buy nuts&bolts for the adjusters and start putting everything together.

'till next time...

CNC V1-1

2011-02-20T17:05:00.001+01:00

Time for a new project since I still haven't finished any of my old ones... Either way, it's small CNC Mill made mostly out of MDF board, illustration isn't done and quite rough.

Work area of around 180x140x70 millimeters if I remember it right.

LED handlamp

2011-01-27T19:40:00.001+01:00

Not exactly a recent project but decided to post it anyway.

It's essentially an array of 45 high-output LEDs, current limited with resistors and on/off by a simple switch.

As simple as it can get.

On addition to this veroboard schematic is the battery composed of 8 AA/R6 batteries and the little switch.

Oh and .. It's effing bright.

Air-ram, PC cooling.

2011-01-26T19:29:00.002+01:00

So this is another need-to-do-something-but-what project.
My GPU(GTX260) got problems with heating, even on 100% fan speed it'll still go way above 80c.
It's just not pleasant when gaming...
So what if I use the cold Swedish weather to cool down the ambient air in the case hence increase cooling power of my GPU fan?

A lot of cardboard, glue and ducttape later...

There's a 120mm/12V fan in the duct sucking air in from outdoors.
The duct gets divided in 2(up/down section) after the first fan and then hits the case fans which increases pressure further.
Originally I ran the ductfan from an AC-DC converter with an output of 13VDC, using around 400mA.
End results for this version was pretty decent, knocked my temperatures down by a lot but also made a lot of noise by operating at ~108% of rated voltage all the time..

I have since the first version improved it a little bit by adding some control to the fan, with the push of a button it'll run at higher RPM's for a set amount of time.

The fan now works between around 9V and 16V, which means in default mode it'll run at 75% of it's capacity and in boost mode it'll run for around 2 minutes at 133% of capacity.
Boost mode is probably bad for it's lifelength but seeing as this is a quick mock-up I don't care too much about it.

Coilgun - v2b V: Coilgun vs 1.2mm Steel

2010-10-10T21:20:00.004+02:00

Just some test shooting at a 1.2mm steel/iron plate, took 5 shots to get through.

Metal sheet got more and more bent until the projectile finally managed to penetrate fully. Tip of projectile is quite damaged and more blunt than pointy now...

Coilgun - V2b IV

2010-10-04T19:44:00.001+02:00

Since my last post here I've gotten the V2b to work, break and work again!

Results are very promising, easily shoots through 2x3mm plywood and I doubt the second stage is tuned anywhere near good.

So here's the setup.
From left to right: Cap charger(230VAC -> 325VDC), Capbank 1&2, Coilgun.
Also featured in the photo is a complete mess of wires.

Target holder:

Little video of the shots I've taken so far.

Coilgun - V2b III

2010-09-21T22:59:00.001+02:00

Finally did something with this project
Capacitors should now be super-easy to hook up properly.
Charge and discharge wires properly set up and all.

Seperate positive poles and common ground.

I still need to:
-Hook up a battery for the trigger and lm311 circuit
-Get a better camera(Ugh, yes, I really do need one)
-Stuff.(I bet there's something really useful and critical behind this very useless line.)

Coilgun - V2b II

2010-09-12T20:16:00.001+02:00

Another little update...

I've connected the capacitors, soldered coils to thyristor circuits and mounted everything on the 'prototype'.
-Grinded one projectile to match the barrel within ~0.3mm diameter
-Optogate is fitted, might still need to cover the holes and barrel a bit better so ambient light doesn't get through.
-**ck the control panel, I'll just put a trigger to fire the first stage and the rest is automatic.
-Everything besides 1st stage trigger and battery is soldered.
-Mounted protoboards with a little slab of glue(Hopefully removeable if need be)

Need to:
-Connect capacitors in a better way and make sure charge wires gets attached along with the charge equalizer.
-Hook up a battery for the trigger and lm311 circuit
-Get a better camera
-Stuff.

Coilgun - V2b

2010-09-01T12:21:00.000+02:00

Just a tiny update on the 2stage/~400J coilgun.

I've found a suitable barrel, 6 meters of it to be precise, and the coils are now done as far as winding goes.

What's left to do is:
-Grind the bullets down to fit the barrel
-Make holes for and mount the optogate
-Solder all the circuits together
-Wire up what's left without electrocuting myself in the progress
-Make some kind of controlpanel for this

Nightlight

2010-08-25T17:45:00.000+02:00

Microproject this time, still waiting for a good projectile tube for the coilgun..

Either way, I got annoyed with not being able to see my analog clock at night and instead of choosing a sensible solution I decided to have a LED light it up.
At the same time that I have this low-current LED as light I don't want it to waste battery power by being on 24/7 so it needed some kind of on/off circuit.

First few ideas were based around the clock itself, to have it as a timer and manually set when to light and not, I quickly deemed this as unnecessarily complex for such a small project.

This lead me to the next, final, idea: Light control.
I'm using a phototransistor to 'measure' the light and then decide if the LED should be lit or not. The circuit got a draw of ~3mA(As far as I can measure with my budget multimeters) when lit and in the µA range when not lit, this should give quite a good battery life even on AAA batteries.

The entire circuit consists of 5 resistors, 2 transistors and a phototransistor and has so far been tested on breadboard and in Proteus. I'll solder this together whenever the mood strikes me.

Here's a schematic 'til I get it soldered together.

Coilgun, 2 stage, ~400J aka V2b

2010-08-04T21:37:00.004+02:00

Time for my first 'real' 2 stage coilgun I guess. First stage will be switched manually with a microswitch+SCR whilst the second stage will have an optical trigger.

2x3300µF caps with max 350V, planning to charge them to ~315.

So far it's just a pile of shit since I'm still looking for a suitable barrel, unlike my older coilguns I'm downsizing the projectile this time. Planning to have 9-11mm diameter projectiles.

Here's a little clip of the pictured optical triggering circuit and one of the SCR assemblies being used on another coilgun, that one has a inner diameter of 14mm and a 12mm diameter projectile weighing in at around 40 grams.

You can also check this clip out on my youtube: Click me!

Cellphone holder, again.

2010-08-02T23:47:00.002+02:00

I figured the plywood wouldn't really last at all if it started raining, especially since my bike is 'stored' outside and I'm WAY too lazy to remove it everytime I go in after a ride.

So I changed materials, this time it's up to plexiglas and PC to show what they can do.

I might add that cutting the plexi without proper tools was a complete pain in the arse...
This version holds the phone quite snuggly too but I chose to add the rubberbands for those "just in case" scenarios.
Comes complete with a clamp for wherever you'd want to clamp this.

Welcome back...

2010-08-02T13:30:00.003+02:00

With a renewed interest for electronics and the funding to back it up I've decided to relaunch this blog. Hopefully it'll give some people a good read and a good way for me to write down what I do.

I'll start this out with a totally electronics-unrelated project. A cellphone holder for my bicycle so I can watch the GPS/Tracker stats while biking.

Made mostly out of 2mm plywood, holds the phone quite snuggly so it won't fall out, just for safety I'll most likely use a rubberband around it to secure the phone.

'til next time...