There’s a definite charm to the glowing display on an old-school vacuum tube clock, and if you’ve ever been curious how they work, or how they go together, this Ice Tube Clock Kit let’s you build your own. It comes with everything you’ll need, including a glowing blue tube with 8 digits plus an alarm status indicator, and when assembled you’ll have all the functions you’d find in a traditional model like a snooze button, date functions and even a 2-week battery backup. The kit will set you back $70 from the Adafruit Industries website, but it appears they’re currently out of stock until September 22 at the earliest.
Since most cameraphones are just barely capable of producing decent photos anyways, it’s not surprising that their macro capabilities are far from amazing. But Flickr user cnflikt has found that by mounting the focusing lens from an old DVD player to a small piece of cardboard, and then placing it over the lens on their Sony Ericsson K800i, they were able to get some pretty great results when it came to macro photography. Not exactly the cheapest hack if you don’t already have an unwanted DVD player lying around, but the results do speak for themselves.
There are levels to nerdship and we’re pretty sure that spending countless hours building your very own miniature replica of the Tumbler from Batman Begins and The Dark Knight qualifies your for a lifetime achievement award. Ebay user “tully712″ did just that but at least had the presence of mind to try and capitalize from his obsession by putting up plans to his creation for auction. The starting price was $29.88 and with 13 hours left, bidding is unfortunately only up to, well, $29.88.
Should you be the lucky winner of this auction you will receive a zipped copy of the files by email, granting you a license to build this yourself although not ownership of the design itself. We’re not certain about the legal implications of this user profiting from a car actually designed by a multi-million dollar cinematic production, but we doubt anyone really gives a damn.
Keep reading for a video of the Tumbler Go-Kart in action and a little photo gallery.
Instructables member ‘laxap‘ has posted a relatively painless tutorial on how to turn an actual cigar into a glowing, fully functional USB flash drive. The most involved part of the build is trimming, boring and then completely sealing the cigar inside and out using a wood primer, but there’s also a bit of wiring and soldering involved in order to replace the cannibalized flash drive’s read/write LED with one that will cause the tip of the cigar to light up while the drive is being accessed.
Some people in this world have awesome parents. I’m not talking about the rich ones that buy their kids everything, but rather the kind that teach their kids to build potato guns. My mom and dad didn’t approve of such contraptions, however, the DeRose family is much cooler. Last December they decided that the potato gun they had previously built just wasn’t enough fun, so they would instead try to create a Gatling gun version.
As you can see from the video above, they did in fact reach their goal. It’s a somewhat complicated device, but will definitely turn heads at the next block party.
(Fun Monday drinking game: Take a shot whenever someone says the word “ah” or “um” in the video. Make it a double if both are used in one sentence!)
Sometimes it’s fun to go back and play some of the old games that you enjoyed from childhood. The easiest way to do that is usually with an emulator and a folder full of ROMs. Of course if you don’t actually own the game it can be something of a sticky legal situation. If you want to make sure that you’re on the up-and-up, or just like to show off your mad hacking skills, you might want to check out this little DIY project.
Some guy thought it would be cool to actually plug in an SNES cartridge to his computer and play the game that way. It sounds a little crazy, but it is possible. The video gives you a pretty decent idea of what the end result is. It really only took less than $40 worth of equipment, but I can’t imagine the amount of time it took to solder the “thousands of little wires.”
Telsa coils are just plain cool. Of course they’re not usually the sort of thing that you just put together in your garage one day. Or are they? One man decided to go raiding a few dumpsters and looking through his garage for the necessary parts. He managed to find them, and make a pretty decent little Telsa coil. Here’s a rundown of what he used:
Primary power source: Small neon sign transformer
Discharge capacitor: High-voltage television capacitors
Spark gap: Pair of 1/4-in. bolts and nuts
Primary coil: Lamp shade and electric cord from a humidifier
Secondary coil: Cardboard tube and microwave fan wire
Secondary grounding: Metal spike pounded into the ground
Torroid: Two stovetop grease catcher pans
Chokes: Two Bic pens and wire from a RC car tossed away
Naturally, as with any DIY project like this, you’re going to want to be really careful. I’d advise looking through the instructions that the guy posted so as to get everything right.
If your timing is right, it’s not hard to pick up a used lunar module from the Apollo era on eBay or Craigslist for a steal, but what really kills your budget is when you have to take in to NASA for repairs or a tune-up. Those rocket scientists don’t work for peanuts. So if you’re the DIY type, you’ll be happy to know that Haynes has an Apollo 11 manual circa 1969 that also covers the Saturn V, the CM-107 Command Module, the SM-107 Service Module and the LM-5 Lunar Module. Basically everything you’ll need if you’ve been considering a trip to the moon, including launch procedures, how to moon walk and dealing with that tricky Earth re-entry procedure.
You can order your copy directly from Haynesonline for about $29.
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