My off-the-cuff remark about building an auxiliary bilirubin light manifested itself into a quick project.

In order to approximate the specific color of the bilirubin lamp, I figured that I would need to provide a means of setting PWM values for the three inputs. I had hard-coded values in Arduino code in the past, so thought about taking that route initially. I blew the dust off my Duemillova, fired up the Arduino IDE, and promptly decided to modify my Java servo PWM code to do the job.

Sort of growing attached to the IOIO…sorry Arduino.

So, the controller was born…IOIORBG.

As usual, I posted the code on github…

For testing purposes, I also dumped the apk on the Android Market…

I have some work to do on my descriptions, but the gist of the setup is:

Red - Pin 10 Gnd - Gnd Blu - Pin 11 Grn - Pin 12

Give it a try…I’ll see about ramping up the output for the baby…

My sidekick is already dabbling in solid state physics… …namely, the optics around the 440 nanometer range. She is oxidizing some bilirubin into biliverdin. I have a bunch of RBG LEDs on my workbench…maybe I should go slap together an auxiliary biliblanket. DIY neonatal hack…

Much like the girl has decided to keep at the in-womb thing, I have decided to keep at the Java thing. Little brat. I decided to figure out how to dump accelerometer / orientation data off of the phone, for use with the IOIO. In short, I am roughly attempting to see how the data exists in its natural state, in order to figure out how to scrub and interface with my physical components. So far, I have nice looking code that blasts a force close scenario. Great. Anyhow, I’m hoping my time on this effort comes to a close and the girl decides to join us. Teamwork…I’ll code, she can practice her singing.

For a long while when we buffering used to stream YouTube buffering videos our inter… buffering …net connection used to be sort of buffering OoO buffering OoO buffering lousy. It would randomly stop buffering a movie for several seconds, which does buffering not seem like much of a deal unless you are trying to buffering OoO buffering OoO buffering concentrate on buffering something. Buffering. Well, fortunately for us, our issue was an easy fix. As the technician did the normal technician thing, whereas he checks line levels at the modem and works backwards to the stub in, he (we) found a splice into the neighbor’s place. Must have been an inside deal at some point…an inside deal that would have gone unnoticed a few years ago. Once I moved in and started cranking high speed internet and two digital cable connections on the coaxial, it became a sore thumb. The question of the day is this…what do you do in a place without the physical connections that we have? Are you just s.o.l. and stuck buffering? Nope. Whereas dial-up connections were the status quo, the future is now here, my friends. Satellite Internet is your answer. It is pretty amazing if you stop to think about it…jumping up to broadband speeds from dial-up, using technology that is superseding that of the cellular industry. Leaps and bounds, when comparing geosynchronous orbit to the height of a cell tower. Think about that. Anyhow, hit that link above to see how a good provider does it. Or buffer…your choice.

Our daughter has not arrived yet. Stubborn like her dad, who has somehow been able to keep out his hospital bag jerky… I am ready for both…baby and jerky. Soon, hopefully.

Consider this the conclusion of the IOIO DC motor experiment until further notice… I’m chalking this up as a success. Even though it is ugly and raw, I learned a ton mashing this thing together. Very fulfilling project from a nerd standpoint: I learned more Java, had to buckle down and do a little EE, kicked up the soldering skills a notch, and introduced a few more components’ features into my ghetto skill set. My code is live on github with a preemptive v1.0 push… I also dumped the apk to the Android Market as promised. Pins 21 though 26, wired through the usual candidates on an H-Bridge. Contact me with any details…it should be very spec sheet-heavy though. The main stumbling point is with the power source, so keep that on the front burner. Cheers. This may be my last time intensive project for some time. Hardware is time-costly…I am planning to take on the software project I have been contemplating between diaper changes and feedings. Look for some dad stuff in the mean time…

Better sweeping through technology:

Still really enjoying this leaf blower…

Better snow removal through technology:

Good times with the Hitachi.

A few months ago, I picked up a killer leaf blower on Woot. Our yard is devoid of leaves. Last week, I tried to fire it up to clean the pine needles off of our steps…no dice. The thing wouldn’t fire up. I checked everything obvious…pulled the spark plug to see if it was flooded…ensured the kill switch circuit was intact…checked the fuel line for a vacuum…nothing. I came to the conclusion that the issue was with the primer bulb, as it was ‘pushing’ but not ‘pulling’ air when depressed. I was getting a bunch of pressure in the fuel tank, but no fluid was making it to the primer bulb itself. Time for leaf blower surgery. I figured that I could take apart the air filter and figure out how to bypass the primer bulb somehow. It turns out that the filter assembly is pretty accessible. Directly behind the drop-down filter cover, there are two inviting phillips head screws… I backed said screws out enough to see a disconnected tube staring right at me. Sure enough, it was the rubber tube that feeds the primer bulb. See below—-v It looks like the engineers at Hitachi sunk a spring in the end of the hose to avoid kinks, and relied upon friction to keep the hose in place. It looks like a design flaw, as the two-stroke’s vibrations had the thing rattled loose in much less than an hour’s worth of operation time. Quick fix though…the unit fired up immediately upon reconnect and priming. Back in business. It might get old pulling the filter assembly off if this hose becomes a nagging issue. On the plus side, this thing was a steal and is crazy overpowered. I hate to say that I would still recommend this even with the flaw…it really does blow.