arduino, robots, cameras, and life
Here’s two quick video related snafu’s I’ve run into today.
I have had to unserialize a copy of FCP and then put in a new (the correct one, technically) serial number. It turns out that unless you want to reinstall everything, then the file to find is located in Library/Application Support/ProApps and it is called “Final Cut Studio System ID” Delete it with fcp closed, and then open it up again
Continue reading “Unserialize/Reserialize Final Cut Pro & Why does apple hate me?”
As of last night I got my 16x sony diode all plugged in and turned on! I’ll have some pictures to prove it in a bit. I’m excited, but I really was expecting a bit more danger in the process. It’s bright, and it cuts very thin, dark things. It might even do a decent stencil if cut out of black paperboard, but I was hoping for something with a bit more killing power. I guess I had my hopes a bit high for a laser that cost $30!
I’m still gonna try to mount it to the cnc router and see what it can do. Hopefully I can find a type of wood, or a stain that makes wood “singe-able” I’d be pretty happy about that.
Here’s a pic of the laser diode and enclosure(silver thing in mid-air) and the power supply (thing on the breadboard) Yep, it’s not pretty.
Here’s a pic of the output. Shining gloriously on my hardwood floor.
Lastly, I went out and got drawer slides for the z-axis (at lowes), and bought a hitachi trim router (at ReconditionedSales.com)
With the exception of one L shaped piece of metal I should have everything I need to fully assemble this monster.
If there aren’t any posts for a few weeks, either my body is frozen out in the garage, or I’ve become even more fascinated with the fully functional router.
In case you haven’t caught on yet. I love projects, and I am always starting a new one in order to abandon an old one. Recently I have become fascinated by the DIY laser movement propagated by the fine people over at laserpointerforums.com. My interest was piqued initially by “lamedust” who posted an instructable here that showed how to build a laser powered stencil cutter out of 2 scanner corpses and a sony16x diode.
My previous post showed my homemade laser driver (ie regulated power source)
I bought a laser focusing tube/heatsink and a sony 16x laser diode from stonetek. Stonetek is run by a frequent commentor from laserpointerforums.com, and is highly recommended over there.
I’m really excited about seeing what this sucker could do if I were to hook it up to my cnc router. Right now it only has an x and a y axis, so this laser fits in nicely without the need for a z axis!
I havent been able to get a precise answer regarding how useful this laser will be. It certainly will not be more powerful than I need! It might be strong enough to burn (but not cut) wood and to possibly cut paper, paperboard, or etch plastic. I’m really excited to find out what it’s capable of.
Here’s to the start of another project, and hopefully the smell of burning things is in my future!
hello everybody!
I read a few posts mentioning you have to wait a certain number of posts till you can post live links, and a few more till you can post images. I know that when asking questions about drivers, pictures are important, so…luckily I have a blog to put it up on!
Here’s the deal; I bought and received a sony diode and axis module from stonetek. I built the driver in anticipation, but I’m a bit hesitant to “just plug it in”
Here are a few questions:
1)what is the intended input voltage (when using this with a sony 16x diode)
2)I have heard i should set the Ma to between 160 and 250, with the lower settings being safer for diode life
3)My capacitor doesn’t look like anyone else’s How do I determine the correct polarity of it?
4)after testing the setup for a while, what is the proper procedure to discharge the capacitor?
Here is an overview of the breadboard
here is a closeup
here is a closeup of the capacitor
Thanks a lot guys! I’m really excited to have yet another geeky, expensive, hobby that’s difficult to explain to women!
…i’ve been surfing the internet with a furious passion and trying to do little projects whenever possible. Here i wired up two uln2003a stepper motor drivers onto perf board. I’m not sure what i’ll need it for, but I’m pretty sure i’ll need it!
this is my view for the last 5 days… unchanged.
hopefully all this time on my back makes for a healthier knee
hmmm. i guess it doesn’t look much better. i think the swelling has gone down a tiny bit. I hope.
Here’s two pix of the old right knee.
Before and after ACL patellar tendon autography (with a side order of both lateral and medial menisci repair)
Kids – Make sure you always have health insurance.
I am going under the knife for ACL surgery in under a week, so I’ve been putting in hours on the CNC project like my life depended on it. I’m gonna be on the couch for about a week straight, and I’d like to be happy with where the project sits during that time.
I have tightened up the x and y axes, and mounted the stepping motors and drive screws. I am using a 3 axis kit from xylotex That kit interprets signals coming from the computer’s parallel port into pulses that move the motors. Just tonight I set up the x and y motors, tuned them, and then jogged the gantry around a bit using the keyboard! I clamped a pen to the z axis and drew out the words “love robot” etch-a-sketch style on a piece of wood.
I don’t have any ideas why “Love robot” was the first thing I thought of writing. If my girlfriend hears I’m making a love robot, I think she might feel threatened. Hopefully this was a message from the robot telling me that it
wants to be friends. Maybe I was just high on sawdust…
it’s been damn cold up here in the north country, but I’ve been out in the garage working on the gantry for the router. I often struggle with the problem of redesigning each piece a hundred times before I build it once. For this project I am trying to focus on getting a version 0.1 before I start work on version 1.0.
As you can see in the pix, I have the x and the Y axis mostly set up. I don’t know how I’m gonna mount the drive screws and nuts, but I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it. The angle aluminum and skate bearing concept is but one of many that I saw on cnczone and have adapted for my design.
I am going to be very interested in seeing how my machine works once set up. I am obviously not very careful with error correction and alignment. I’m not sure how muh those tiny errors will mutiply in the final finished pieces. Also I haven’t seen anyone build out of similar materials, or to the scale that I have. I doubt that tis will win any awards for accuracy, but hopefully it’ll do a decent job of cutting big pieces of wood. Only time will tell I suppose.
As you can see below, the engine is almost ready to mate with the frame.
After that, I only have all of the rest of the bike to put together!
