Megamachine from the Hacked Gadgets forum has made his version of the Hard Drive Oscilloscope.

Watch some videos of it in action:
Video 1
Video 2
Video 3

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Want to stay cool and loose some weight? Why not make a fan that is powered by sugar. That is what some researchers at the University of Birmingham have done.

“The scientists fed leftover caramel and nougat (mmm, nougat) to sugar-loving bacteria, which release hydrogen and organic acids as they eat. The organic acids were then fed to a second type of hydrogen-producing bacteria, and the combined hydrogen production of the two (when converted into electricity by a fuel cell) was enough to power a small electric fan.”

If you are in need of a CNC machine but don’t have the cash to buy one, why not make your own? Engadget has part 1 of an article explaining how to build your own CNC machine.

“Computer controlled mills have been around for a long time. If you just want to buy oneone, Sherline makes mills that are ready to go (pictured is their CNC ready model — just add your own motors and controller). But then again, if you wanted to buy one, you probably wouldn’t be reading this, now would you? A CNC machine is a lot like a precision drill press with a table that moves in two directions — seeing a commercial unit like the one above should help you visualize the end goal. We’ll be making ours from scrounged, recycled, and adapted parts; today we’ll be going over the basic parts we’ll need to build our own.”

A mix of extreme high voltage and tunes, does a project get any better! Steve Conner has posted his ultra cool visual instrument on 4HV.ORG. Note the second video was listed by EastVoltResearch and can be seen on this site.

“I finally gave in and decided to post footage of me testing my OMG super secret musical DRSSTC. I designed it last year as a paid commission for a Danish arts group who wanted a chorus of six musical coils that could be played by MIDI. I made a single prototype to test it here, but they ran six coils together in the final system, built by Finn Hammer over in Denmark.

What I made was an adaptor board that connected the internal tone generators on a Roland JX-8P synth to one or more DRSSTCs. The board converted the volume envelope to burst length, so the harder you pounded the keys, the bigger the sparks got. Hitting a high pitched note hard would blow the fuses, and the MIDI arrangements had to take this into account.”

Via: Make

The Handy is an interesting project by Zaizhuang Cheng, Derrick Ko, Colin Tan and Naga Setiawan from Purdue University. Very impressive since the parts cost is around $100.00.

“The motivation is to provide a button-free environment in which the user can just use hand gestures to control the sound system. For example, when the user is driving, all he has to do is perform the appropriate hand gestures to control his sound system, all without taking his eyes off the road. Our project will comprise of three main hardware components: the Microcontroller, the sensing plate and the LCD screen. The infrared sensors will be mounted on a flat plate in a 3×3 grid. When a user passes his hand over the plate, each sensor will detect the position of the hand and send the information to the microcontroller. The microcontroller will then process the raw information and translate it into a specific command which is then sent to the sound system via infra-red. Users will be able to assign their own hand movements to correspond to different commands (eg. play, pause and next). An LCD screen will then display the command that is detected by the microcontroller and provides a user interface for the user to assign hand gestures to each command.”

Via: TechEBlog

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If you are looking to attach something that is real annoying to your car or truck look no further, the HornBlaster is for you.

“Ever heard a train sound its horn from a mile away? How about from up close? HornBlasters.com specializes in selling extremely loud train horn setups for just about any use. We have lots of specialized kits already perfected for use on trucks, cars, SUVs, boats, or just about any kind of vehicle imaginable.”

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