If you want to impress somebody on Valentine’s day this is a great opportunity, make a DIY led heart, the project comes along with all the source code schematics and even a tutorial to explain the software.
Beside the obvious, lets take a deeper look at the project, the leds are twinkling at random speed and pattern, and yes there are fading not just turning on and off, and there are 20 of them, so how do they do it? No there isn’t a large micro controller with 20 channel pwm, they emulate it in the firmware, and use random numbers to set each leds twinkle. Its worth looking at the solution since in many application, especially with leds you will need to fade more channels than your pwm hardware can handle.
The project also comes with schematic, if you build this kit, place at least a series resistor of 100 Ohm value with PC5 pin, just in case you start to improve the software and forget that the pins can handle only 25mA.
This is an advanced robotics project, the robot arms follows a moving object, anyway that’s the idea. The arms moves a little sloppy, it surely isn’t in the final stage of development, but the author explains what problems encountered. The motion is detected using IR leds and receivers, and subtracting the ambient light from the readings to get the reflected light from the object which is tracked.
If you are interested in motion tracking this is a good place to start, my opinion is that the analog part needs to be reviewed, the IR leds should be mounted inside a tube, otherwise interferes with the reflected light and reduces the sensibility.
This is the final version of the spectrum analyzer, this is the version that will get shipped to buyers. The two boards can be connected either by cable or one on top of each-other trough pin headers. You need to specify the model you want on ordering. You can get the kit assembled or unassembled, for this there are two separate products in the shop(for assembly guide check the forum).
I’ll post some of the most important features and specifications here:
Dimensions:
motherboard: 81×88 mm.
matrix: 236×72 mm.
Power:
7,5 V 1 A DC (the maximum current draw is 600 mA).
power is supplied to the board trough a 2,1 mm DC power connector.
9 display modes selectable trough button 2 present on the display board.
on/off (standby) control selectable trough button 1 present on the display board.
ISP (in system programming, if you have an AVR programmer that supports this feature, you can update the firmwire if new version is released)
First units were shipped, and I’m curious about what you think related to the project so visit the Youritronics forum and share some of your thoughts also if you have any questions you can ask them there.
I received most of the parts for the spectrum analyzer and also the boards, this means i should be ready to ship them to you in a few days, but the holidays are knocking on the door, and i cant work on Christmas eve . Probably the first packages will be shipped on 3-4 January 2009. I hope you’re not upset by all these delays, it’s difficult to maintain a schedule when parts are coming from lots of different countries.
