WIKI Changes

[George Shammas]

Over the past 24 Hours we have made some major changes to the wiki....

During this time you may have gotten some 404 Errors or other strange errors.

The wiki has been moved from http://nycresistor.com/wiki to
http://wiki.nycresistor.com.. You will be redirected their if you go
to the old link now, HOWEVER Please make sure that when you go to the
main page that the top of the page says:

"ALL CLEAR, FEEL FREE TO EDIT"

If you see that, your DNS and everything is up to date, if not please
wait till your DNS server updates.

Enjoy
--George

[Rolan Yang]

What are you guys doing with the vending machine project?

~Rolan

[Nick Bilton - bilton@nytimes.com]

The vending machine project will happen once we find a place. So, hopefully not too long... but that will be one of our first projects!

Nick.

[George Shammas]

Although, since this thread is about wiki, you can always create a
page and start working on the concept of it. =)

-G

On Jan 20, 2008 7:09 PM, Nick Bilton - bil...@nytimes.com

[Patrick Di Justo]

Wait, what is the vending machine project???



On Jan 20, 7:09 pm, "Nick Bilton - bil...@nytimes.com"

<nickbil...@gmail.com> wrote:
> The vending machine project will happen once we find a place. So, hopefully
> not too long... but that will be one of our first projects!
>
> Nick.
>

[Gregg Levine]

Hello!
Isn't that the one that would have the coke machine wander around a
room selling its cans, instead of having it sit against a wall and
call out to people in a New York accent to buy its cans?

--
Gregg C Levine gregg....@gmail.com
"This signature was once found posting rude
messages in English in the Moscow subway."

[Matt Joyce]

I am remembering the 7up commercial with the vending machine on treads attacking people with projectile cans...

[Gerard Barberi]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nkgQFOOr7ug

[Nick Bilton - bilton@nytimes.com]

Patrick.

The vending machine idea was Zach's ingenious solution for the space we are trying to accrue for the NYCR meetings, workshops, classes etc. George wanted to sell items like packs of resistors, led's, small kits, bags of capacitors etc.. which would inevitably require too many man-hours requiring someone sit around waiting to sell utilities... so Zach said why don't we just hack a vending machine and make it into a gadget vending machine that sells all these products in little baggies. So, we have the idea but no space to place the said vending machine, but, we're working on it!

Nick.

On Jan 21, 2008 9:59 AM, Patrick Di Justo <jus...@gmail.com> wrote:

[Matt Joyce]

Brilliant!

[Adela Kuehn]

My term exactly!

[Rolan Yang]

About 8 yrs ago, I wired a Coke machine to vend cans through an
embedded WAP mobile phone web "server" for a trade show.
http://photo.omnistep.com/et2000/

I have another machine, a full size one, in the garage (not modified
yet) that vends Veryfine drinks. If you guys need a machine, I'm
willing to part with it for a reasonable price. You'll probably need
a truck to haul it back. It's very heavy.

~Rolan

[Kevin Mark]

On Mon, Jan 21, 2008 at 05:29:32PM -0500, Nick Bilton - bil...@nytimes.com wrote:
> Patrick.
>
> The vending machine idea was Zach's ingenious solution for the space we are
> trying to accrue for the NYCR meetings, workshops, classes etc. George wanted
> to sell items like packs of resistors, led's, small kits, bags of capacitors
> etc.. which would inevitably require too many man-hours requiring someone sit
> around waiting to sell utilities... so Zach said why don't we just hack a
> vending machine and make it into a gadget vending machine that sells all these
> products in little baggies. So, we have the idea but no space to place the said
> vending machine, but, we're working on it!
>
> Nick.
>

I was googling 'used snack vending machines' and found the prices to be
between 1000 and 4000 USD. I found one that held 40 items for 1400 usd.
Is that the spec you were looking for? Would this be for uncommon items
about the size of a bag of chips or candy bar size?
-K
--
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|_______ Unless I ask to be CCd, assume I am subscribed _______|

[Alexander Reben]

You could get capsule vending machines. Probably can find them used. I
think capsules would protect the items better than a baggie.

like:
http://www.gumball-machines-r-us.com/capsulemachine.html
http://www.gumballmachinefactory.com/TOYCAPSULEMACHINES.html

-Alex
http://shoeblade.com

[Kevin Mark]

So you are looking at vending ICs,led and other tiny parts in the 1.5
inch or less range?
Then there is also the manual coin-type machines that are about 150 USD
each that hold the egg/capsules as you mention.
Hmm. I guess one benefit of those things is that we can recycle the
capsles so that we dont need to buy new ones.

[Rolan Yang]

Oh can you imagine the torture of seeing the component you need, but
having to shell out 20 quarters .. cranking away until the right egg
finally falls out. :)

I was walking through Target the other day and in the toy aisle they
were selling this mini (actually it was not that mini) crane/claw
game, similar to the ones they have at the boardwalk or Dave and
Busters.

http://www.asseenontv.com/prod-pages/the_claw.html

They're being sold at Target for $19.95. Not bad for a cheap motorized
x-y-z platform.

You could fill that thing up with IC's and LED's. At least there would
be a better chance of grabbing the part you need :)

~Rolan

[Kevin Mark]

Well there different ways to fill the units:
#1 random parts in a bin
#2 the same parts in a bin
#3 a mix of simiar (by some definition) parts in a capsule

So if you choose #1, then it would be torture.
For something like a 555, #2 would seem ok
For similar leds, #3 , may word
not sure what parts would be useful with #1

[dave.gi...@gmail.com]

Using the coin-op style gumball machines may take up a lot of space in
order to allow for enough variety of parts. If you use the standard
office style vending machine you will have control over your choices
and more variety.

To keep the parts form getting damaged the IC's could be put into
anti-static foam. Other parts can be taped to cardboard. Of course
maintaining stock in the machine is another issue no matter what you
choose. The parts need to be put into little capsules or foam in order
to load them into the machine.

A combo of the two types of machines may be the best solution ...
gumball machines for variety packs of resistors and caps and snack
machine for IC's and perf boards. Fragile items like LCD'd and
sensors should probably sold out of a stock area.

Dave

On Jan 22, 4:16 am, Kevin Mark <kevin.m...@verizon.net> wrote:

[Eric Skiff]

While I love the idea of the vending machine and hope we can do it, I just wanted to throw out the concept of "honor snacks"

We had this at one of my old jobs, and it was a cheap, easy way to do fundraising and provide snacks...

Basically, it was a special cardboard box with snacks stacked up in most of it, and a closed up section where you deposited your money. You could easily just grab something and run, but the box was generally close to the amount it should be, and there was a decent markup on the snacks for convenience (although they were still cheap) so even if one disappeared here and there, it was still quite profitable.

Sometimes, we even found the box with too much money in it - whether people needed change and just put in too much instead or they were making up for one time when they borrowed a snack, it all seemed to work out pretty well.

In the absence of a full-on vending machine, I'd love to see something like this at NYCResistor so that there's parts available for classes and "on a whim" ideas.

-Eric

--
Eric Skiff
http://clipmarks.com
718-809-8692

Blog    : http://GlitchNYC.com
Podcast : http://AlternativeMusicShow.com
Learn Stuff: http://clipiversity.com

[Adela Kuehn]

For more delicate things or grab bags, you could also use the box type vending machine like you get in laundry rooms and rest rooms.

http://newyork.craigslist.org/brk/ele/543163877.html

On Jan 22, 2008 6:57 AM, dave.gi...@gmail.com <dave.gi...@gmail.com> wrote:

[Gerard Barberi]

Just curious, but why not build one.  The outside shell doesn't have to be metal.
http://www.techeblog.com/index.php/tech-gadget/functional-lego-vending-machine

[Matt Joyce]

Honestly a snack style vending machine is fine for selling assortments.

A resistor pack, an electrolytic cap pack, an led pack, an arduino pack... 

Things of that nature.  In a pinch that sort of thing is doable.  Just dump the parts in a baggy (easy to do.)

-Matt

Though... one of those automated stamp vending machines might be good too...

On Jan 22, 2008 10:29 AM, Adela Kuehn <ade...@gmail.com > wrote:

[Zach 'Hoeken' Smith]

My original idea was to use one of those snack style vending machines with the clear glass so that you can see exactly what it is you're buying. Obviously baggies wouldnt be a perfect solution, but we could easily find the right kind of packaging that would work well in the machine and not get jammed. Keeping the machine stocked would be fairly easy, just have someone check on it every few days and re-order from mouser, etc when we need to.

Of course if you just need 1 resistor or something like that it will be easiest and most social to ask someone else for one.  The idea behind a vending machine is to allow us to sell these things that make a good start to a kit without having the overhead of a dedicated sales person.

~Zach

[Matt Joyce]

That and selling 10 cent items doesn't really provide much of a profit margin... and the machine would be out of change all the time =P

[George Shammas]

Well said Zach

On Jan 22, 2008 11:26 AM, Zach 'Hoeken' Smith <hoe...@gmail.com> wrote:

[raphael]

How about a cigarette vending machine? The kind with the pull lever
thingies. Everything could go in little cardboard boxes. I presume they
don't need electricity, except maybe for lighting, so they could even go
outside.

-r

[Matt Joyce]

To be honest fabricating one probably isn't extremely hard.

[Zach 'Hoeken' Smith]

I would imagine the hard part would be a reliable money sensor / change dispensor.  Thats pretty critical.

Hooking up servos to dispense things and building a case for it would be the easy part.

[John Cater]

So we connect it to a server and have it deduct credits from your
account. Everyone ids themselves with an RFID dongle. No cash
involved!

[Bill McIntyre]

Just a thought..

You could even set up a web service auth against something like a
paypal account. Just have the user key in a uid/password combination
(that's never stored locally).

It's got a transaction overhead cost, but would keep the group out of
the business of having to maintain an accounting / payment system.

Bill

[raphael]

It couldn't be that hard to do a camera based cash sensor, could it? Or
a bill reader from a standard vending machine. I know they can
distinguish bills...

[Adela Kuehn]

You could probably hack a kids toy ATM bank. http://www.nextag.com/atm-bank-toy/search-html

[Matt Joyce]

This might be a bit much in terms of a suggestion, but CCC had a prebuild requirement for everyone who got access to their space.  An initiation project of sorts.

Maybe requiring people to build their authentication card... then tying the card to their purchases as well as access rights.

Then again... that is pretty big brotherish.

- Matt

[Bill McIntyre]

Happ Controls ( a great source for arcade parts ) carries a few llines
of bill validators to get a sense of parts cost. Most are in the
$400-ish range, but some of the Pyramid validators are less than $200.

http://www.happcontrols.com/validators/validators.htm

Using an existing (used) vending machine may genuinely be the least
expensive route as well as the easiest. (although it's the
least-hackish)

-Bill

[Christian Decker]

While we're at it, why not have the machine figure out what it's sold and automatically generate an order for new components when it detects it's stock is running low?

[Zach 'Hoeken' Smith]

Ha!   This looks like its snowballing into a massive project =)

Lets get 2 vending machines:  the 'it just works' model that takes money and dispenses items and the 'everything but the sink' version that will give you a haircut as well as dispense resistors.

lol.

[Dave Clausen]

A CNC <a href="http://www.flowbee.com/">FlowBee</a>? Sounds good to me.
<img src="http://www.flowbee.com/images/webrickbotflat2%20copy.jpg">
<img src="http://www.flowbee.com/images/webmombot2flat%20copy.jpg">

[Zach 'Hoeken' Smith]

LOL!

I love how they measure suction in watts:

"950 max Watts of suction"

[Matt Joyce]

We all know the proper measurement for suck is "your moms".

- Sorry... I couldn't resist.

[casperelectronics]

I have to pipe in here and give my opinion.

I think the parts vending machine is a great idea, and I think the DIY approach has merit all over the place, but it's important to keep in mind when DIY is appropriate and when it is not. When we are dealing with OTHER people's money (taking it in exchange for a product)  it's important to have a system in place that is as reliable as possible. Also, as far as our money goes (for building, renting, upkeep of a vending machine) I think we probably all know that the DIY approach is, most of the time, as or MORE expensive than the consumer approach. 

Why make this more complicated than it needs to be? Let's just rent a machine.... or buy one used.

I think building one is an adventurous undertaking and would probably be lots of fun, but it's an ENORMOUS task! HUGE! What is our priority? To provide people with useful materials or show off a big hand built machine(and I'm sure inspiring if/when it's finished). Of course the ideal would be to do both, but the TOP priority in my opinion is reliably providing people with a useful product.

That all says to me: professional vending machine. 

there's my two cents.

-pete

[Matt Joyce]

Assuming you can find one.  I agree.

[Zach 'Hoeken' Smith]

well, someone did offer to sell us one of their old vending machines before this thread got crazy...

[Justin Day]

The hack should come from trying to determine when parts need to be reordered.  We can either rely on vending machine reporting (if available) or use something to detect the state of the machine.  Hooking that up to an automatic order would be the fun part I think.

On 1/22/08 5:29 PM, "Zach 'Hoeken' Smith" <hoe...@gmail.com> wrote:

well, someone did offer to sell us one of their old vending machines before this thread got crazy...

> > > >>>>>>>>>> On Jan 22, 4:16 am, Kevin Mark < kevin.m...@verizon.net  <mailto:kevin.m...@verizon.net> >

> > > >>>>>>>>>>> | `. `'      Operating System    | go to counter.li.org <http://counter.li.org>  and
> |
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> |
> > > >>>>>>>>>>> |  my keyserver: subkeys.pgp.net <http://subkeys.pgp.net>  |     my NPO: cfsg.org <http://cfsg.org>
> |
> > > >>>>>>>>>>> |join the new debian-community.org <http://debian-community.org>  to help Debian!

[e c kern]

some thoughts on the subject:

if the clubhouse plan is going to work at all there is going to be a workshop with tools available worth substantially more than a few components, so a lack of some level of trust among members is a deal breaker.  also, any money spent on vending machines is money not spent on soldering gear, oscilloscopes, milling machines, and so forth.  since trust is required anyway, i think it's more in the "hacker spirit" to spend the money where it will actually help with cool projects.  so, i think the right "vending machine" is a cardboard box, a coffee can, and some sensible rules.  a vending machine is a worthwhile investment iff both (1) the availability of components turns out to be useful (2) we are thieves.  even then, as a capital investment, you have to ask how long it's going to take the machine to pay for itself.

furthermore, i think it is way better to think of this problem in peer-to-peer terms.  in my own personal "hacker space" i have an elaborate system of junkboxes with way more variety than would fit in any vending machine i've seen.  i'd propose a different system -- everyone can optionally have a "public junkbox" with an honor system wherein you take what you want and pay the digikey @1 price.  unlike the single-common-box plan, this has the nice properties that (1) there is no need for public agreement on what components are worth stocking (2) there is an incentive for people to make useful components available in quantity -- if you buy a tube of avrs at the @25 price and sell them at the @1 price, you make a few bucks for yourself while providing a useful service for others.  (3) it also works for custom stuff -- i'm sure i'm not the only one here who wouldn't mind unloading the extra n-1 copies of the last circuit board i had made  (4) it mathematically reduces to the common-junkbox idea anyway; if someone wants to volunteer to stock some stuff and contribute the proceeds to the general fund, others would have an incentive to buy from there if possible, knowing it would support the group.

just my $0.02 anyway -- i'm not trying to kill off the enthusiasm here, just to inject a little economic realism.  in any case, lacking a clubhouse at the moment, it's sort of silly to spend time worrying about this.

-chris.

[Rolan Yang]

How about an honor box with a security web cam pointed at it? :)

[Matt Joyce]

Or a game of operation involving lethal current.

[Jon Goldberg]

Hey all,

Two thoughts here:
1) Changing bill designs. Bills change appearance every few years
now, particularly the higher-denomication bills. I had a friend who
once bought a Kodak vending machine - it had come from Disneyworld or
somesuch, and was set up to dispense disposable cameras. He stocked
it with, among other things, Super-8 film. It's now sitting useless
in his NYC apartment, taking up way too much space, because he got
sick of having to buy a new bill detector every few years - there's a
new bill released every year or so.

2) Anecdotally, his vending machine cost $50 plus another $900 to ship to NYC.

Jon