Devices helpers

When lighting fixtures and electricity were cheap, the question of a thrifty approach to choosing lighting for stairwells was not seriously considered by anyone. But life has taught everyone to count every penny, so there’s no need to convince anyone about the advisability of using an automatic stairwell and corridor lighting switch (ASCLS). The question Read more…

If a radio amateur’s inventory is burdened by a low-power portable radio station (or a set of two stations) designed for communication in the civilian range of 26.9 — 27.2 MHz, I propose a way to make good use of them. Often, a radio amateur is simultaneously a car owner and a dacha owner, who, Read more…

I propose a design for a gasoline-electric unit (GEU) “Firefly”, designed for charging batteries, powering lighting lamps and other DC consumers at 12 V. I developed this unit three years ago at the request of my friend, an avid hunter and fisherman. Since then, “Firefly” has been serving reliably, lighting his taiga cabin and helping Read more…

One of the inconveniences in the design of many cars is that the interior light immediately turns off when the doors are closed. There are, of course, special devices that delay switching off the lighting for 5–15 seconds, allowing the driver to check the dashboard, the controls, and insert the ignition key. However, such solutions Read more…

The metal detector I designed operates on the beat frequency principle, which arises from the difference in oscillations between the reference and the tunable oscillators (typically the 5th–10th harmonic, whichever is closest in frequency). This design allows the detector’s sensitivity to reach a level where it can detect, for example, a five-kopeck coin buried 10 Read more…

Many families today live in multi-storey buildings and use household washing machines. Anyone who has ever connected such a machine (to the electrical panel and plumbing system) knows how important both of these operations are. In particular, if the drain hose is poorly connected to the apartment’s fan pipes, a leak may occur. This can Read more…

An audible alarm on digital microcircuits for switching on/off electronic devices with 12 V power supply. There are many devices in a car that are switched on by a key or a toggle switch. The switching on of a particular device can only be controlled by the click of a mechanical switch (which may not Read more…

Easter is just around the corner, which means it’s time to work miracles. And if you’re tired of regular paints, I’ll show you how to build a real robot artist that will paint on eggs! Meet Eggduino. This is a small but very smart machine that runs on Arduino and is controlled via Inkscape. With Read more…