Inspired by electronics

So the other day I got to have a little play with this amazing DIY programmable sequencer built by a good friend of mine who's a damn talented hacker/creator/maker. The sequencer is called "Hextep" and has so much functionality I don't know where to start so instead I'll post the video!...



Brilliant isn't it! Seeing this in the flesh got me thinking about making some electronic music again as a side project from my current ongoing writing of instrumental stuff (I'll update on that soon). The thing that has finally tipped me over the edge into definately deciding to do some electronic stuff is this lovely post by Ashley elsdon about rediscovering my old ep. So I'll get to writing some stuff soon...(in fact with the wonderful Sunvox just releasing a new version it's kind of already started).

In other news I've decided that I am going to start collating the stuff about mopeds/puch stuff under a different blog and keep here more about music and electronics...will update when I get it off the ground.

Heatsinking my Pi

I haven't spent that much time with my raspberry pi but I aim to remedy that over the coming weeks. I have done a couple of things with it though...firstly I plan at somepoint to probably mess about overclocking it and so I thought I'd make up some heatsinks for the wee beastie. I found an old alloy heatsink off an old gpu chip which I cut into pieces sized for the proccessors and power regulator IC's I was wanting to cool. I attached them by using a small amount of thermal paste under the heatsink applied with a cocktail stick to provide a thermal bond but then to physically attach them I used a tiny amount of JB weld carefully applied (just tiny bits in each corner of the heatsink).

To go with my tiny screen I also picked up this wired usb keyboard/trackpad combo...I thought this would be a good compact solution that only took one of the 2 usb slots so that I still had an onboard usb slot negating the use of a powered hub (unpowered hubs aren't working so well with the pi). However don't buy this keyboard...its useless!...Unless it's just the one that I have is defective it seems to give random repeat keypresses and cut out etc...the trackpad works but the keypad is pants!

So had a play tonight for the first time with the Raspbian distro (I know I'm about 2 months behind the crowd!) which was great but I cracked and slapped the composite connection into a projector for some large pi action!...

I'm really keen to try some GPIO stuff with this...when time prevails!

Puch projects updates! Custom Intakes

Keeping tinkering with my Puch stuff...My main Maxi project is back on its feet again with everything running well...It's pretty much ready for its MOT test, I just need to get my ass into gear and order a numberplate for her. She's been christened "Newt" in agreement with my daughter as I've built the maxi under the watchful gaze of the newts from our pond!...Anyhoo I'm in no rush to get the maxi on the road as its fast approaching autumn and I will probably wait till early next year so I'll have all year to spin around on her without needing an mot in the middle. I've started messing with some ideas for whats next with the Puch stuff...I want to try a bigger carb and I have a pair of 17mm Bings which would give me a 3mm increase but would require a larger intake...the intakes I have are off a puch magnum x (childs crosser) so althought they fit they have 2 90 degree turns to throw the carb out on the opposite side than a maxi requires....like this although this diagram is hard to see what's angled where...

I have 2 of these intakes so I thought I'd sacrifice one to an experiment. The intakes are alloy so I can't weld them but I've made a new intake by cutting the magnum one down and rejoining the end using JB weld epoxy....blimey it's good stuff...

So this is after the JB had gone off and I'd cleaned it up a bit. I tried with a couple of pairs of wrench's to snap this joint and I couldn't so I'm pretty sure it's strong wnough for a while!

Quick lick of hi temp paint and she's finished and you can see the complete assembly in the top picture. Also in the top picture is a 2 shoe clutch assembly...in my main Maxi...sorry...Newt...I have a 3 shoe clutch widely regarded as the best clutch there is for the e50. In racier puch engine builds a common problem is that the clutch posts that hold the shoes on that stand off the clutch back plate eventually bend out of shape and the whole thing flys apart!..The solution is to build (or buy and mount) a clutch brace which is a plate that is bolted across the tops of the posts (which need to be drilled out and tapped). This 2 shoe clutch above is pretty knackered so my plan is to try and fabricate and mount a clutch brace and also to DIY reline the clutch shoes (brake pad material and hi temp epoxy) possibly increasing the contact area of clutch lining to get more 3 shoe like performance. (Even if this doesn't work out I should have developed a bit more as an engineer!)

I'm also stripping down my 2 other E50 engines to see which has the best crankcases for a kitted engine build and planning to build another spare engine out of the remaining parts just for kicks!. I also picked up really cheap of ebay this frame...

....which is going to give my welding skills a workout this winter! I could register this and aim to get her back on the road as she's still on the dvla database...but hanging around on the mighty netherlands forum Puchforum has tempted me to build a racer and maybe try and find something in the uk to race it at (or even maybe take a trip to the netherlands!)...pictures like this do not help me with this!....

as for racing I think Newtspeed is the team name!

A Curious Rover

So my 5 year old daughter and I have been looking at pictures coming back from the mars Curiosity rover and also we've watched the videos of the landing etc. She's really into it and has lots of questions...one aspect that she found a bit difficult to get her head around was how the pictures get back from mars. So...in effort to explain (and also completely for my own amusement) I made the quickest Rover ever from a piece of double sided tape, an old RC rock crawling truck I'd been saving thinking it might make a good robot base and a cheap wireless security camera (17quid ebay).

It was great, I hooked the receiver up to the little 4" monitor I've been using for my raspberry pi and we drove the wee beastie around for a while. She really started picking up on the facts of radio wave propagation (ie you drive the model behind the metal filing cabinet and the signal goes a bit funny) and she understood that the Rover was sending and receiving different types of data...brilliant...

My daughter has already forgotten all about the car/camera...but I keep thinking about improvements....pan and tilt camera platform, autonomous navigation, obstacle sensing/avoidance, robotic grabber....must resist another project!!

New Demo Tune "Peh"

Just a quickie post (3rd this evening...some kind of record I reckon!) I put up a new demo of a tune I've written (although I'm not sure it's finished) it's called "Peh" and its here...

Concretedog Cubesat progress!

So I am still allocating a little thinking time to my cubesat obsession, I've been meaning to post about this for weeks but never seem to find the time however having appearred to have got my good friend obsessed with cubesats also I thought I better had!...I've built a Cubesat frame model out of scrap aluminium cut from an old tv aerial on my scrap pile. I've made this to adhere to the dimensions of an official cubesat although it is nowhere near the required +-0.01% tolerances a flight model would have to meet, (it also would have to be 6061 or 6063 grade aluminium but heh). I got the idea to fabricate one from a frame made of aluminium angle as it is friendly to home fabrication with handtools but has also been considered as a cubesat design before ( I took my inspiration from this document)

Inherently a frame structure from separate lengths of angle has some structural problems. In its current state, with each bar held at each end via a 3mm diameter threaded bolt, the whole structure has strengh but lacks rigidity and can skew about its angles. Cubesat specifications actually call for some extrusions that sit proud of the corners above the rails that act as standoffs containing kill switches for power and separation springs that aid ejection from the deployment pod. I imagined and consider that a framed cubesat design could utilise castings containing the standoffs and molding for springs and switches could be triangular in shape and could cross the corners of the frame adding strengh and diminishing skew.

I also (if I had smaller preciser taps) would use multiple smaller fixings for each beam...it has been a great challenge of skill to tap a 3mm thread into aluminium that is only 1.5 mm thick!! In a flight model you also couldnt have steel screws/bolts lying flush with the outside of the rail as the fear of the steel cold welding to another touching cubesat causing 2 cubesats to fail..eeek!

Of course having built a small aluminium model I couldnt help but just see if my raspberry pi would fit in it! It does but would require adaptation to fit in with the sd card inserted! (I'm not sure a pi would be a good brain for a cubesat...quite power hungry!)

Anyway as ever my ramblings about cubesats should be taken with a pinch of salt as I am only in it for the thinking and learning!.....and dreaming!

Puch Project

I threw a load of work at the Puch Maxi project over the last couple of weeks and at one point I almost had it finished! I got the engine in and the wiring loom on and all the electrics working etc...unfortuneatly I seemed to have not quite tightened the magneto flywheel well enough and it caused me to shear the woodruff key keyway causing damage to both the flywheel and the crankshaft...B#$(#(cks! I added insult to injury as when removing the damaged flywheel I used a makeshift piston stop through the spark plug hole and despite being careful I've managed to gouge some scars into the piston and also chew some of the threads on the cylinder head (although this would be fine i think). So I've decided to take a break and put this on the backburner for a bit as the summer weather is awful I am less inclined to get it on the road this summer anyway! I think I'm going to do another rebuild of this engine with a new crankshaft...I always try and put better parts into things when I rebuild so I'm going to replace it with a race crankshaft (bigger big end, small end has bearing and cranks are lightened etc) and as I'm at it I think I'll buy a racier overbored cylinder kit as well!! The great guys I order from at Puchshop are on their summer break/holiday for a few weeks so I'll get to ordering the bits in a few weeks time! So for now enjoy the above images knowing that she actually sits in bits in my shed!!