Embedded Electronics Classes/Kits for Ingenuity

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Joe Gorse

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Aug 28, 2012, 8:42:59 PM8/28/12
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Go here to see the latest: http://wiki.makersalliance.org/display/MAB/Arduino+Classes

Schedule

Assignments

  • Find parts, prices, and lead times (BOM)
  • Submit to makersa...@googlegroups.com by Thursday COB (Close of Business)
  • Sam and Joe will review, pull together details, talk to James Krouse to secure funding and make decisions for going forward by Friday morning
  • Final Prototypes by Wednesday of Ingenuity, at the latest
    • Domestic board houses - Notacon special deal
      • DDI - flex, high end
  • Make it work
  • Package pre-made kits
  • Teach classes, sell badges, fabricate kits at Ingenuity

What can we do to enhance the Ingenuity Fest Experience (Drinking and Music)

  • Visual element
    • LASER graffiti
      • people can add their piece to it
    • Mood ring
      • linear meter
    • Visual representation of bass-line (beat detection), light art
      • SPL - Sound pressure meter
    • Rotating wing-based screen 
  • Audio Synthesizer
    • pencil tone generator
      • Electronic pencil pan-flute 
    • photo-sensor theremin
  • IR/Visual communications through sensor
    • Morse code blinker
    • 4-6 RGB linear array, QR-code like server-side decoding URL
  • Light Dice - 6 leds - Johnny
  • Drink Shield - ~$10
--
Joe Gorse

T: jhgorse
FB: jhgiv
G+: jhgorse


Sam Harmon

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Aug 29, 2012, 3:29:00 PM8/29/12
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Ok, here is my "mostly readymade" submission of a plan for the Ingenuity kits:

This plan gets us:
A- a really quick & easy to put together thing that is cheap ($1.50 each in quantity, can sell for $2-$3, or just in exchange for a donation or something)
B- An "Arduino Enough" thing that hopefully keeps us in the spirit and close enough to the letter of what we're supposed to be doing. If no one buys them, we'll have a bunch of extra Arduinos to do workshops and crazy stuff with in the future…
Also: If people really want a morse code blinky thing: http://brainwagon.org/2009/11/14/another-try-at-an-arduino-based-morse-beacon/ - which will blink the Diavolino's built-in LED.
C- Some additional tools so people can put these together about a dozen at a time...

Learn to Solder Skill Badge Kit
http://www.makershed.com/Learn_to_Solder_Skill_Badge_Kit_p/mkls01.htm
250 for $375 (+ $5 shipping), ships in 1-2 business days from California (time to receive 1 week-10 days?)

TOTAL FROM MAKERSHED: $380

EMSL Diavolino (w/6&8pin header set)
http://evilmadscience.com/productsmenu/tinykitlist/180-diavolino
7...@12.50 w/headers & 3AA battery holder ($937.50)

Adafruit FTDI Friend - Not really for us to sell, just so we can program the Diavolinos a few at a time, and maybe cope with one or two walking off...
http://evilmadscience.com/productsmenu/accessories/210
10@$15 each ($150)

TOTAL FROM EMSL=$1087.50 (Free Shipping over $75, time to receive 1 week-10 days?)

Parts-Express
Stahl Tools SSVT Soldering Station (we already have 6 of these already)
http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?partnumber=374-100
6@$15.98 = $95.88
60/40 solder, 1 lb
http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?partnumber=370-032
2@$23.49 = 46.98
Tip cleaner
http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?partnumber=341-223
$8.48
TOTAL FROM PARTS EXPRESS: $162.69 (7.5% Ohio sales tax, free shipping, total time to receive 1-2 business days)

TOTAL COST: $1630.19, leaving us with about $170 for incidentals (AA batteries for the Diavolinos?, more tools? anything else?)

That's my thought, anyway.

Sam

Paul "Froggy" Schneider

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Aug 29, 2012, 4:22:23 PM8/29/12
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I may be able to help with batteries to save you some money.  Let me know what size and about how many and I'll let you know what I can donate.

- Paul


Sam

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Joe O'Donnell

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Aug 29, 2012, 4:23:15 PM8/29/12
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That's a good, reasonable list. It would be great to include 2 of these on it as well:

A $40 student oriented FPGA board that can be programmed with classic video games:
http://papilio.cc/index.php?n=Papilio.LogicStartMegaWing

And can also be programmed to be a custom configured Arduino:
http://gadgetforge.gadgetfactory.net/gf/project/wiringide/

Joe


--- On Wed, 8/29/12, Sam Harmon <samuel...@gmail.com> wrote:

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Paul "Froggy" Schneider

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Aug 29, 2012, 4:24:10 PM8/29/12
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Makers' Alliance shouldn't have to pay sales tax. There a form you can fill out to give to the vendor.  I can find it for you if you'd like.

Paul "Froggy" Schneider

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Aug 29, 2012, 4:25:52 PM8/29/12
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This is probably a bit off topic, but I've become a huge fan of the MSP430 Launchpad boards as of late.  Available assembled for under $5 with cable, two different MSPs and some other neat stuff.




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Joe Logan

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Aug 30, 2012, 10:18:22 AM8/30/12
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The drawdio is a tone generator that makes noises as the user draws on paper using a pencil. I have not built or used one before, but there are numerous videos up on youtube that provide a good demonstration of what it is and what it does. I am all for doing more complicated and original kits and projects, but I feel like the time limit until ingenuity fest means that we should really be looking for a low risk, proven project such as this.

Benefits of the drawdio:
-excellent instructions already available on the internet
-open source schematic and PCB artwork in Eagle format
-involves both audio (noise from speaker) and visual arts (drawing)
-highly obnoxious
-proven, low risk design
-inexpensive BOM (few bucks each in volume)
-easy to construct for soldering newbies (all thru hole components)
-entertaining for adults/children/inebriated adults alike

I put together a BOM with digikey and mouser part numbers, quantities, and estimated per-component prices assuming medium volume (~200), which is attached to this email. In order to purchase PCBs, someone will have to download the Eagle board file, install the free version of Eagle, and cut gerber files. I work with Malaysian PCB houses that can do either a 1 or 2 week turn with 2-day delivery.

An additional note - I forgot to include a AAA battery on the BOM.
drawdio BOM.xlsx

Sam Harmon

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Aug 30, 2012, 2:01:24 PM8/30/12
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Addendum to my previous plan, based on putting together one of my Diavolinos last night (they don't include IC sockets…)

Mouser Electronics
737-ICS-328-T 28 pin IC socket 100@$0.14 = $14.00 (+$5 shipping) = $19.00, bringing the total up to $1650.

-Sam
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Joe Gorse

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Aug 30, 2012, 9:47:29 PM8/30/12
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Joe,

How does changing the quantity to 50 affect the unit cost on the drawdio?

I would like to do a combination of Drawdio, the learn to solder badge kit, and Diavolinos on a lanyard for the Ingenuity Maker/Hacker Badge. I think this allows for a decent amount of flexibility and hackability, though we may be a bit light on sensors and interface hardware yet.

Cheers,
Joe

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Joe Gorse

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Aug 30, 2012, 9:49:44 PM8/30/12
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Joe O,

I really liked this idea until I found out that it needed the Papililio in addition to the LogicStart, making it around $90/unit. I am fond of FPGAs, though at this price we may be able to do better for the quantity or functionality in the FPGA world.

Cheers,
Joe

On Wed, Aug 29, 2012 at 4:23 PM, Joe O'Donnell <joseph....@yahoo.com> wrote:
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Joe Logan

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Aug 31, 2012, 11:11:25 AM8/31/12
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In quantity 50, your BOM cost is going to rise 20-25% since all this stuff is sourced from Digikey and Mouser. On the PCBs, you are looking at a minimum order or 100 sq inches. Assuming these guys are about .5 x 2 in, it works out to be a $200 minimum order, 1 wk turn, with a net of 100 PCBs.

Sam Harmon

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Aug 31, 2012, 12:40:19 PM8/31/12
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I did some number crunching, and I think we can make 100 work. It goes over the funding by a little bit, but we'll be taking donations and whatnot, so I think it'll be ok.

Now we just need to get the funding secured from Ingenuity…

Sam
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Joe O'Donnell

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Aug 31, 2012, 12:53:59 PM8/31/12
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 Woops, I mixed up that megawing add on board with the Papilio FPGA board. We Don't need the add on board to start learning with the $50 Papilio board, though the add on board and free book sound like an ideal beginner package.

 If we did get 1 Papilio and 1 megawing, we could set up a nice educational display showing how high school students can work on their own stand alone video game system. We would just load the Arduino emulator and get it to output a test pattern minimally controlled by a joystick. So by doing that we would obtain a beginner oriented FPGA system while also educating and entertaining the ingenuity audience.

 A second device which would educate and entertain both us and the igenuity audience, is this $40 6 degrees of freedom position sensor:

https://www.sparkfun.com/products/11028

This sensor can be used with well established persistence of vision projects to make more precise and readable displays, such as an upgraded version of this:
http://hacknmod.com/hack/tiny-diy-persistence-of-vision-project/

My plan for the festival would be to use the sensor to replace spin timing with manual shaking as above with this simple project:
http://www.43oh.com/2010/09/launchpad-pov-air-your-message/

 This sensor is also the most inexpensive position sensor that is capable of providing full 3d movement feedback for robots and drones. In other words if we want to build a decent drone some day we need this sensor.

I think the drawduino looks like a great, inexpensive project, which despite it's name doesn't require the arduino. The speaker could also be used for a cheap and easy backup/additional optical thermin project for either the arduino, msp430 or stellaris:

http://blog.suspended-chord.info/2010/09/24/launchpad-based-glitchamin-take-2

The Stellaris is a new $5 launchpad board with an advanced 32 bit chip, 40+ gpio, etc,etc. Most Arduino's are 8 bit.

 I think by spreading the budget around a bit, will will increase our chances of having at least one both popular and workable project, while also educating both ourselves and the public in new areas.  That would maximize the benefit to both ourselves, the audience and future audiences.

 To reduce the cost of the drawduino, we could just go with perf board, and hand out wiring diagrams printouts. That also avoids the chance of not getting the pcb back in time.

 So here is my suggested budget, to maximize both our own and the audiences 'learning bang for the buck':


Learn to Solder Skill Badge Kit
150 for $275 including shipping.


EMSL Diavolino (w/6&8pin header set)
5...@12.50 w/headers & 3AA battery holder ($620)
     
Adafruit FTDI Friend -
5@$15 each ($75)

           
Parts-Express
Stahl Tools SSVT Soldering Station (we already have 6 of these already)
6@$15.98  = $95.88

60/40 solder, 1 lb
2@$23.49 =46.98

Tip cleaner
$8.48     

-Total cost so far: a bit less than $1110
   
1 Papilia + 1 mega wing + free FPGA book= $90

6 DOF position sensor=$40

TI MSP430 FRAM development board=$30
http://www.digikey.com/product-detail/en/MSP-EXP430FR5739/296-28530-ND/2642721?cur=USD
-FRAM is similar to having a fast solid state disk drive on an embedded chip, and is a new technology. Thus by working with this board one can do things that literally haven't been done before.

4 Stellaris development boards= $5 x 4 = $20
http://www.ti.com/tool/ek-lm4f120xl
-This is roughly equal to a low end 486 computer with 64KB of memory, with GPIO,PWM,IW,etc for only $5. This is also a new device. Imagine the possibilities of an embedded rasberry pi computer with just less memory for a few dollars.

15 MSP430G2 chips at $2 each=$30
http://www.digikey.com/product-detail/en/MSP430G2452IRSA16R/296-28129-1-ND/2514242
These are similar to the Arduino with a 16 bit upgrade and cost $2 instead of $15+. That price is cheap enough that for example one could use one chip per servo in robot projects for much greater control.

-Cost of above $210. Only $210 for 5 cutting edge technologies most of us haven't worked with yet, 2 of which where just released.

-Total cost: $1110 + $220= $1330

We can than spend $300 on the drawduino project using perfboard + additional sensors like cds, which would equal about 100 or more kits plus material for many optical thermins (which can be set up on both Arduino and MSP chips), bringing the total to $1630. Leaving $170 for incidentals.

Joe



--- On Thu, 8/30/12, Joe Gorse <jhg...@gmail.com> wrote:
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Joe Gorse

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Sep 2, 2012, 2:28:14 PM9/2/12
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As per the rough schedule plus a couple days, we have the written go-ahead for the $1800. Go ahead and pull the trigger on the orders we know we need. If unsure, confirm with Sam or I so we can track our progress and open tasks on the wiki. 

Next steps are to prototype test in small quantities, come up with a plan to use those projects/components from our experience from playing with them Tuesday, and then place the large orders by Wednesday.

I have re-organized our Ingenuity-related wiki pages under the Ingenuity Festival page (look for Site Contents to the right and Child Pages below) and added Project Management page for convenience from prior content.

The vision is to integrate these projects into individualizable and obnoxious lanyard badges for people to wear at the Ingenuity Festival.

Cheers,
Joe

Joe Logan

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Sep 4, 2012, 11:18:00 AM9/4/12
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Joe,
What was the final verdict on the drawdio? Do you want me to order the PCBs? I will work on getting gerber files made this afternoon. It probably makes more sense for you to do the digikey/mouser order to avoid having to mess with reimbursements.

-Joe L

Joe Gorse

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Sep 4, 2012, 11:35:53 AM9/4/12
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Tonight let's try to prototype/play with a working drawdio or two.

If anyone has the other kits, bring those as well. I would like to rough out what we can actually do with a physical lanyard and the kits we have in mind. Maybe there are some easy integrations which might be fun.

Orders go out tomorrow after we see how things work tonight and our ensuing plan.

Cheers,
Joe

Joe Logan

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Sep 4, 2012, 1:26:31 PM9/4/12
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OK, so I guess it's on me to track down some components.

Sam Harmon

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Sep 5, 2012, 4:06:33 PM9/5/12
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All of the major kits & parts have been ordered. We are looking into maybe getting some additional add-ons and things for Arduino experimenters, and have not yet ordered from Parts Express (ground shipping is effectively next-day from them, so no hurry)

Otherwise, things we still need(that I can think of right now):

For Drawdios:
-Pencils (100) - we have a fair number at the space, but I'm not sure of the exact quantity
-all-metal Thumbtacks (100)
-small Zip ties (200)
-AAA batteries (100)

For Diavolinos:
-AA batteries (about 150)
-laptops for programming them (need to just be able to run the Arduino IDE, so nothing too fancy is needed, probably just need one or two more- I'll have my netbook, and a friend is likely donating a netbook as well)
-Mini-USB cables (as many as we have computers for programming)
-lanyards (50+)
-possible Add-ons:
--Electret microphones (I have maybe 2-3 around right now)
--additional LEDs (I have many various ones around)
--photocells (I probably have some somewhere)

In general:
-A cashbox of some sort
-Some sort of bucket for donations (perhaps a plastic carboy?)
-A few hundred signable waivers
-Some sheets with information about the group?
-Updated web page?
-New business card design (deadline is this Friday!)
-Help setting up on Friday the 14th?
-Lots of volunteers to help during the festival
-some more hand tools for each soldering station?

Anything else I'm missing?

Sam
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Damon Ramsey

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Sep 6, 2012, 7:29:58 AM9/6/12
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Sam,

I have the following covered:
- help with Friday setup
- help with info and security on Friday & Sunday (have a pre-existing commitment on Saturday)
- cashbox
- donation bucket
- I'll bring my Dell Latitude laptop with the Arduino IDE and other resources on a guest login
- I think the # of pencils we already have should be fine (I'll bring my electric sharpener)

Regards,

Damon aka n0mad
Lakewood, OH


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Sam Harmon

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Sep 10, 2012, 1:47:09 PM9/10/12
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Ok, it's now the week of Ingenuity. Who's ready?

Current Status:
-Mouser & Digikey orders are in, so we should have all of the Drawdio parts except the PCBs.
-Diavolinos and FTDI friends have arrived
-Learn to Solder Badges have arrived
-Some electret microphone elements and other things were ordered Friday, they should arrive today or tomorrow.
-I ordered mylar bags and picked up some Avery labels for the Drawdio kits as well
-picked up some thumbtacks for the Drawdios

Still to-do (feel free to take some of these tasks…)
-Wait for PCBs to arrive (Sam)
-Zip ties for Drawdios - we have some at the space (enough? are they the right size?)
-Make & Print Waivers
-Make & Print Information Sheets
-Parts Express Order (Sam) - this will happen after tomorrow's meeting, in case there's anything we think of.
--(Good news on this, in their latest flyer, the soldering irons and solder are on sale vs. my cost estimations!)
-Business Card Order (unless somebody gets me a new design by 6pm today, I'm reordering the old-style ones tonight)
-hand tool run (Harbor Freight)? (let's inventory what we have Tuesday and see what we need)
-Get useful information onto the website
--this can just be a static page somewhere? Maybe just use the Wiki?
--group description, links to relevant web presences, etc.

SIGN UP FOR A SHIFT IF YOU HAVEN'T ALREADY. THIS MEANS YOU!
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AhLKKG941wqDdHlwTlVuZTgzU2xaaGtEcXFpa1hubkE

If you want to give a talk/workshop, please put the topic (preferably somewhat electronics and/or microcontroller related) and your name into the "Event" column.

ATTENDANCE AT TOMORROWS MEETING STRONGLY SUGGESTED. I'll be mailing more details/agenda later.

Sam

Joe O'Donnell

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Sep 16, 2012, 1:52:22 PM9/16/12
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Ingenuity Fest is fantastic. If you haven't checked it out yet you have until 6 today. There are thousands of people, art, technology, food and last night a band using a large blimp with a moving face on the front of it. The soldering kits were very popular yesterday during my shift. Thanks Sam for leading this whole weekend and all the volunteers. The club table is among the first on the left when walking into warehouse 32, the warehouse is on the east side of the area behind the Science Center.

Park near the Science Center and walk towards the water directly behind it.

http://ingenuitycleveland.com/

Joe O

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