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Development with Resistance

As you may know, I sell a variety of USB controllers (on Etsy and my own shop) and I accept custom orders where I work with the customer to build (and program) what they want or need. So last year someone got in touch with me and said “Your Dual Button looks great! I need it with a 2.5mm stereo jack though, and it’s going to control some [REDACTED] equipment.”

So this was not a USB controller, but they liked the form factor of my product. Well, no problem. I do custom. I got as much detail as I could about the device they had (which was not working anymore) and asked for photos. There was a resistor wired into one of the buttons, so I asked the customer to check it with a meter to get the value. He couldn’t quite figure it out, but we made some guesses based on the color bands in the photo and I came up with a solution.

With the 2.5mm stereo jack we determined which of the TRS (Tip, Ring, Sleeve) parts were ground, and each of the buttons, and which button had the resistor on it. One button supplied full voltage and the other a lower voltage. I didn’t find out too much about the extremely expensive equipment it was connecting to, but I didn’t need to.

I came up with an easy way for the customer to swap the resistor, and even sent spares of various values in case we didn’t guess correctly. I think it worked fine with our “guess” resistor, so maybe the equipment just looks for full voltage versus a lower voltage. Who knows? I don’t work in the [REDACTED] field.

I often find these projects fun and a little challenging. I probably don’t always cover the time I put into them, but often they’re a good learning opportunity and sometimes turn into a product or repeat business.

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Creality Ender 3 V2

Hey, this is not my printer! I’m still mainly rocking my Monoprice Maker Select Plus with a number of upgrades over the years. It’s printing well enough, though I tune-up is probably in order one of these days… And yes, my RepRap 6000 is still in progress.

But this Creality Ender 3 V2 is what we’ve got at work now. As we’ve been making more 3D files (and parts) the old Monoprice MP Select Mini was showing its age and… it’s loud. The Ender is much quieter, which is nice.

We’ve already done a few upgrades, including adding OctoPrint and a Pi with a touchscreen, new PEI flexible sheet, and metal pars for the extruder. We had a bunch of issues extruding filament at first but I swapped the nozzle and all was good. It’s only been a few days but so far I’m impressed with quality the way I was when I replaced my 2011 printer with a new one in 2017. I’m still not a huge fan of Bowden extruders, but I can see the appeal and reasons for them.

Oh, I will note that I assembled this using the printed instruction book that came with it, then later realized the included SD card had a video that was ten time better at showing how to assemble it. This isn’t the first time I’ve found printed directions lacking in comparison to video. This doesn’t mean video is always better, it means people are bad at making printed directions.

Oh, I forgot to mention my other other printer. A Creality3D CR-20, which I picked up from MatterHackers at a discount after a giveaway win last year. I gave it to my daughter and her boyfriend to babysit for me until I get room in my shop. Yeah, I expect to have room for it by 2024 or so. Happy Printing!

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Non-Fancy Signs

We’re growing new grass on the side of our house and wanted something to remind our neighbor not to mow it. Typically I would be 100% in favor of someone else mowing our grass, but it needs to grow more before being cut. Dana asked me to make two signs to put in the lawn, so I did.

I didn’t want to spend a lot of time on it, but I do enjoy making signs so I made them “nice enough” but not too fancy. When I was done Dana saw them and said “Why are they so fancy!?” and I explained that these were not fancy. I did not sand, I did not stain, I did not polyurethane them. Quick and dirty, in my opinion. I just hot glued some wood dowel scraps on the back, though I did sharpen them on the belt sander.

She said she would have just used cardboard and duct tape. I cringe when duct tape is mentioned. This is a gaff tape household, though we do dabble in electrical tape, blue painters tape, Maker Tape™, etc. but NO duct tape.) I told her cardboard would have been destroyed by the rain, and really… these were not fancy signs.

What do you think? Are these scrap wood signs I laser etched and quickly rolled one coat of white ink onto fancy? I didn’t even do any kerning!

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Omni Wheel Robot (LEGO Build)

I’ve always found omni wheel robots fascinating. I even tried to design my own omni wheel (which did not turn out great.) But over at Brown Dog Gadgets I thought we should give it a try and build an Omni Wheel Robot. (And there’s a full guide and code available.)

This is a perfect use of LEGO parts. It is completely possible to fabricate all the parts needed to build this, either using digital fabrication (laser cutter, 3D printer, etc.) or by hand, if you’re the handy kind. But honestly, the LEGO aspect made the build super-simple, and the guide links to all the parts on BrickOwl (which are all pretty cheap.)

The other magic of this build is using 4 servos instead of stepper motors. While you do lose precision, this makes things much less complex and just simplifies everything. We’ve also got an Arduino and a battery pack. That’s it. Yeah, the goal was simplicity.

This is a beginner project in many ways, but it can also serve as a platform for code exploration. We provided the basic code for movement, but there’s room to expand on that, add sensors, etc.

And since it’s LEGO, it is by definition a platform you can build upon and add to. (We’ve even got 3D printed LEGO compatible parts for you.)

Check out the guide to this Omni Wheel Robot if you want to learn more.

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Fast Laser Cut Sign

I got a message from my daughter asking if I could help her make a sign for an event happening later that day. I said yes, and without much time asked he what it needed to say. She texted me the copy, and I cranked out a design very quickly.

I did ask if it was a tabletop sign or a wall hanging sign, and she said tabletop, so that’s what I made. It’s just two simple pieces that slot together. I think this came together in about 30 minutes total. I did a quick sanding and didn’t really have time to stain it, so I just applied some paste wax to it.

And yeah, you can check out BrewCityWraps on Instagram if you are into wire-wrapped jewelry. I heard back from her during the event saying people liked the sign and they had made some sales. Awesome!

The sign can flat pack, and I threw in a few rubber bands to hold the two piece together. Overall I’m pleased with how it turned out in the time given. Sometimes with larger projects you spend so much time planning you never get around to actually making something, so cranking out a quick one is nice.