Category: Electronics

Cup o’ Sound – Audio Playback Coffee Cup

Bring the productive bustle of ambient coffee shop sounds with you anywhere by building a white noise machine in a cup! This project uses the Adafruit Audio FX Board to play a 30-minute audio file on repeat. The circuit is battery-powered with the help of a lipoly backpack, which also allows for convenient recharging over USB and the easy addition of a power switch. A speaker rests inside the lip of the cup, driven by a class D audio amplifier using a 10K potentiometer for volume control.

The Cup o’ Sound requires no programming and is excellent for practicing your through-hole and free-wire soldering skills. The result is a satisfyingly compact handful of portable sound that can be reused in many contexts or rewired to act as a speaker alone.

Before you begin, familiarize yourself with the following guides:

For this project, you will need:

*Yes, I realize this is a linear taper pot. If you’ve got a logarithmic one, feel free to use that!

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Smart Phone Mittens

Do your fingers get frosty while texting? Have you missed a call because you couldn’t get your gloves off fast enough? Maybe you’ve tried a pair of the touch screen gloves available seemingly everywhere, but you just prefer mittens and like to knit! This pattern guides you through a basic pair of mittens knit on double pointed needles (DPNs).

Conductive yarn is knit with the working yarn as one strand in the upper hand and thumb of the mitten, enabling you to perform basic tasks on your smart phone or tablet like answering calls, pinching and zooming on maps, or switching the track on your latest favorite album.

Check out this pattern on Ravelry!

Materials

Yarn: Two skeins of worsted or aran weight yarn (shown: Kollage Yarns Glisten in 7317), stainless steel thin conductive yarn

Needles: US size 7 (4.5mm) double pointed needles, or adjust to obtain gauge of 5 stitches per inch in stockinette stitch

Optional: DPNs in one size smaller than main needles for tighter wrist ribbing

Notions: scrap yarn, stitch markers, tapestry needle

Sizes: small (medium, large)

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Laugh Track Jacket

Bring your own sound FX to the party! Turn a blazer into your own personal theme music machine, foley artist, or comedy audience. Battery-powered speakers in the pockets blast your sound while membrane switches in the pocket and lapel activate the audio.

For this project, you will need:

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Celebration Spectacles with NeoPixel Rings

Ring in the new year or any cause for celebration with your own NeoPixel glasses!

For this project you will need:

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Zipper Switch with Conductive Thread

Here’s a fun way to make your clothes more interactive– you can turn a zipper into a switch for activating lights, sounds, and more using stainless steel conductive thread.

To keep up with what I’m working on, follow me on YouTube, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, and subscribe to my newsletter. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases you make using my affiliate links.

The switch works like a momentary pushbutton. As the zipper pull travels along the teeth, two pads of conductive thread are bridged, momentarily creating an electrical connection.

This connection can be sensed by a microcontroller like FLORA or GEMMA with an activated internal pullup resistor, or be used in place of a push button in circuits like the TV-B-Gone or audio FX boards. Continue reading for the full tutorial.

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Solar Boost Bag


Make your own backup battery and recharge it with the sun! This is an upgrade project to our original Solar Charging Handbag and uses a PowerBoost 500 Basic, a solar lipoly charger, slide switch, and 2000mAh rechargeable battery, all housed in a 3D printed enclosure.

Before you begin, read through the following guides:

For this project, you will need:

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Cyber Tank Girl Costume

I’ve admired the comic character Tank Girl for ages, and this year I wanted to update her post apocalyptic Outback look for the 21st century. This guide covers the different elements I used to make this costume.

Bandolier of Light

This fun and flexible light-up accessory is made using 3D printing, DIY electronics, and a little bit of sewing.

You can easily wear it as a belt instead of a shoulder sash, and the modular design lets you customize the length that’s just right for you.

Before you begin, take a look at these prerequisite guides:

For this project you will need:

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