If you start tinkering with electronics, eventually you will want to make your own printed circuit board, or PCB as it is generally called. In the olden days, this subject was pretty straightforward. You went down to your local RadioShack, and bought an etching kit. You drew your single sided design using a marking pen and some supplied stickers. The board was fairly big, and it had only a few simple through-hole components.

Those days are now pretty much gone. Now most electronic projects are much more complex, the boards are much smaller, and you need to deal with 2 layers, surface mount components and vias. In this overview, I will tackle the different problems you may encounter and the methods available. I won’t cover PCB layout software or commercially made boards. I’ll deal with those topics in separate articles.

Basic Steps

Making a PCB involves several steps. Today’s PCBs require a lot more steps than they used to, but for your own use, these later amenities can be omitted. The steps involved are:

1. Imaging your design onto a blank PCB
2. Etching
3. Drilling
4. Amenities – solder mask, silk screen, tin plating
5. Vias

• How can supposedly scientific studies contradict each other?
• Are scientific studies reliable?
• How can we determine the truth?

Modern double-blind studies are the gold standard of medical science today. As a result most Americans place unqualified faith in them, including medical professionals, government and court officials, and the members of the press. Is this faith well founded? Are double-blind studies truly reliable? This article will answer those questions and more – you will learn for yourself how to determine what is best for your own health.

Living organisms are exceedingly complex. As a result, it is difficult to devise a study to reliably show the health or harm of any given substance. It is even more difficult to remove human bias from the interpretation of the study. The fact that unqualified trust has been placed in modern double-blind medical studies has resulted in the suppression of many natural … Read the rest

In response to my article regarding the safety of microwave cooking, I recently had reader submit the following request:

Thanks for your comments that it is safe but I am not sure I am convinced. The preponderance of articles I read comment on how unsafe microwave cooking is. There is even an article stating that a women died from a blood transfusion where the blood was thawed in a microwave. More evidence supporting your thesis would be appreciated.

Here is my response:

1) I agree that there is a large body of articles against microwave cooking. It does not mean that they are correct. People are often afraid of things they don’t understand, and since microwave cooking certainly ranks with some of life’s mysteries, people’s fears are understandable.

I have examined quite a few of these articles. They all say the same thing, quote each other, and never offer anything that can be substantiated. Until I am shown something that provides some sound basis, I believe it is a safe form of cooking.

2) The case regarding the women dying is very instructive. I looked it up, and found an interesting discussion here. I also looked at the court brief cited in that discussion. … Read the rest

How would you like to buy dozens of gadgets and other useful equipment totaling over $1,000 for only $30?What’s the catch? There is no catch. It is simply the tremendous inherent value in today’s smart phones. Because of their built-in sensors, clever developers have created a large collection of apps, that replace a whole slew of equipment. Best of all, the controls and displays of all this equipment is far superior, often includes data logging and is completely self-contained in a small gadget that fits into your pocket.

My Story

I have wanted a tablet computer for over twenty years. Now that they have finally arrived I have been viewing them with a keen interest, but high-end tablets are too expensive for me. The looked really attractive, but I recently discovered an app that I couldn’t live without that requires bluetooth (more on this app later), which the Kindle Fire lacks. Mulling it over, I had an idea – what if I put the tablet on hold for a while, and instead see if I could buy a cheap, used Android phone.

I have heard about all the amazing things people could do with iPhones and Android phones, but … Read the rest

One of the biggest hurdles is actually not in the hardware, but at the software end. There are lots of hurdles at the hardware end, but without the ability to create and export designs, those issues are moot.

There is a new option available to solve the software problem. It is called TinkerCad. You don’t have to install any software either. Just go to their website and start designing. They even have a video showing how easy it is. It really is that easy. It is kind of like playing with toy blocks, except they are resizeable.

Once you have a finished design, you can then export it directly to 3D print vendors such as Ponoko. They are even running a contest for those using TinkerCad.

Why wait any longer. Give it a try and get started printing today. I am.

UPDATE: I cannot get this HTML5 application to work on either Linux Ubuntu computers, nor older Windows XP machines. If you have any experience with TinkerCAD, … Read the rest

If you do anything at all with solar energy, you keep running across this term solar insolation. Note the spelling “insolation”, and not “insulation”, which is the stuff you put into walls to keep your house warmer. So what is solar insolation, how is it measured, how can I find out the solar insolation for my location, and how can I used this information in my solar application?

What is Solar Insolation?

If ever there was a confusing term, this one is it. Of course you can always consult the invariably comprehensive Wikipedia, but you may end up even more confused. According to this site, the strange term comes from the phrase: “INcidnet SOLar radiATION“. It is the amount of energy from the sun over a given time period. In contrast, solar radiance is the instantaneous power coming from the sun. While both are typically measured in kW/m² , radiance is an instantaneous measure, while insolation is a measurement over time. Therefore, it is only correct to state insolation as kW-hrs/m² .in order to show the cumulative time measurement.

There is another complication – … Read the rest

As we all know, electric cars are all the rage. What about electric flight? Is it even possible?

Electric Planes

It is not only possible, but electric airplanes are here already, albeit with some obstacles remaining. The main obstacle is the FAA. For some strange reason, they think that electric motors aren’t as reliable as infernal combustion engines. Other less backward nations are charging ahead (excuse the pun). Check out this article describing some electric aircraft ready for production.

Electric Multi-copters

You may already be familiar with an amazing type of hobby R/C aircraft resembling a helicopter, but instead of one central drive shaft, they employ 4, 6, or even 8 or more, separated by spokes. The go by various names such as quadri-copter and octo-copter. They are small, electric-powered, and can do amazing things like carry full size digital cameras and still climb straight out of sight in mere seconds. Their stability is 100% due to built-in accelerometers. They can even fly themselves with on-board GPS.

The question begs to be asked – is it possible to scale these things up for human flight? Ponder no more – it can and has been done. This 16-copter aircraft has … Read the rest

One of man’s most fundamental needs is for fire – for both cooking and heat. With modern furnaces and electric cook-stoves, we no longer appreciate how important these things are – until we are without. In the true ProvideYourOwn spirit, I am always looking at how to use things at hand to meet these needs.

In that vein, I have been curious how various fuels compare regarding volatility and ignition points.  It is a useful thing to know if you want to understand, or possibly discover, new ways of making cooking or heating stoves or starting fires. We can expand our thinking by asking some of the following questions:

• What kinds of fuel can I use for a camping/backpacking stove?
• If I have to cook my food in a pinch, what sort of materials are available?
• How can I make my own waste motor oil burning stove?
• How can I use alternative fuels for my needs?
• What can I use for fire starting besides newspaper?

and make better use of the materials we have on hand, design new types of cooking and heating stoves that better suit our needs, and make better fire-starters.

Temperature Points

To do any of these … Read the rest

Whenever we set ourselves a goal to “go off grid”, whether the grid means electricity, water, food, or something else, we face a task that is in all probability high unlikely to be accomplished, and maybe impossible, at least at in the short-term. When we finally face that reality we usually become discouraged and just give up or file it along with our other pipe dreams. I have been there. I have also been learning an important principle – a little is better than nothing.

We must stop thinking in terms of “getting off the grid” and more in terms of gaining some measure of independence, no matter how small and then go from there. At first glance, this idea seems ludicrous. After all, if we are still attached and dependent on an electric grid, food supply grid, etc., we are still dependent on them. That is true, however, we must consider the level of dependence as well. When we account for that factor, we begin to see that any measure of independence, no matter how small, will not only lead to greater independence in the future (progress toward our goal), but also vastly increases our security by decreasing our … Read the rest

One idea I have is making an electric skateboard that starts and stops when you step on/off it. I think it would be easier to use. The only downside is restrictions on skateboarding due to misuse by kids. I think heelies are also great, but also banned in most stores.

Could an electric heely be built? Would store personnel kick out a responsible adult using any of these devices? I can really see their use in the big box stores like Walmart, Home Depot and Lowes. Sometimes you get tired when you have to transverse the entire store several times.

Any ideas? Please contribute some of your own ideas and projects in the comments section.

I have been coming across various tips on dealing with wintertime issues. Some of them are pretty good. Some are not. I have done some investigation and can pass along some tips that you can trust.

De-Icing Windshields

Sometimes, it is better to use a commercial product than a DIY alternative. De-icing windshields is such a case. Alternative recipes abound on the ‘net, including ones using vinegar or rubbing (Isopropyl) alcohol mixed with water. These products can de-wax or otherwise damage your car’s paint. Commercial products are inexpensive and safe for your car. It is penny-wise and pound foolish to not use a common inexpensive product on a multi-thousand dollar car.

Some other tips include:

• Raise your wipers when you come home at night. It makes the windshield that much easier to scrape.
• Pre-warm your car several minutes with the defroster running before going out with the scraper.
• Cover the windshield when you come home.

Starting Fires the Easy Way

Starting a fire in a wood stove is somewhat of an art. We have found that if you surround the small kindling fire with large blocks of wood (basically making a wall surrounding the fire), it reflects the heat and … Read the rest

Its strengths include direct peer-to-peer transfer, with 128 bit encryption and optional password protection. Their servers are never directly involved in the file transfer, since the file is directly transmitted from your computer to the one you are sending it to. Best of all, you don’t need to create an account to use this service.

Using  it is as simple as a single click to select your file and (optionally) attach a password. It then provides a link to the file to share with others. You then just keep that web-page open until your file is retrieved. The open web-page session is what provides the peer-to-peer connection.

That’s it to using it – it is fast, secure, and convenient. Give it a try next time you need to transfer a big file.

UPDATE: There were a couple of comments posted that referred to some other file … Read the rest

So what’s the solution? This how-to over at Instructables provides it. The author simply re-uses the small glass bottles that many popular drinks come in. Featured is the same bottle that piles up at our house – Starbucks Frappuccino. It is the perfect size for spices – not too small, not too large. You can probably find other drink bottles that work as well. The Instructable goes even further by coming up with an elegant and permanent means of labeling the bottles as well – etching the names into the side of the glass itself. The author uses a lettering stencil and which is a glass etching cream. It looks fast and simple to do.

You can go hog wild with this idea. In addition to organizing and beautifying your heretofore haphazard spice rack/cabinet, you could make great Christmas gifts or even sell them on Etsy or at craft shows.… Read the rest

If you do any coding whatsoever – either for a website, your blog or an Arduino, you have seen code blocks in a web page. Every now and then I need to do the same in this website. My first thought was – this is WordPress, the most popular blogging software in the world. The functionality I need is either built-in or a plug-in is readily available. While I found that belief to be true, it was not nearly as easy as I had expected it to be. Instead of readily finding a quick and simple solution, I found a lot of confusing and non-working ideas and articles. I have put together what I consider a simple and straightforward solution which I will detail here. It requires two plugins and is a WYSIWYG implementation.

Fixing TinyMCE

The first thing you must do is to make some changes to the default TinyMCE configuration. This is the editor called Visual in your WordPress admin page. This is easily done with a very safe plugin called Visual Code Editor. This plugin basically facilitates writing code in the TinyMCE editor. Some of its more necessary features are:

• Adds <pre> and <code> to block
… Read the rest

I was recently reading an article about soda-can stoves and was dismayed to discover that the Boy Scouts are more concerned about safety at all costs instead of providing a means for boys to be ready for any contingency. Despite the project depicted in the picture, the article states:

The Boy Scouts of America now prohibits “equipment that is handcrafted, homemade, modified, or installed beyond the manufacturer’s stated design limitations or use. Examples include alcohol-burning ‘can’ stoves, smudge pots, improperly installed heaters, and propane burners with their regulators removed.”

While I am not opposed to safe practices, our society has become such a worshiper of safety and security that we have become slaves of our current corporatocracy. The Boy Scouts prohibition of handcrafting such simple alcohol stoves in just another example of this lunacy. This type of thinking is exactly the kind that ProvideYourOwn opposes.

We want people, especially boys, to make their own stuff. While we don’t quite go as far as the tongue in cheek quip over at Make magazine – “poke your eye out”, we come pretty close. We don’t advocate avoiding risk, only unnecessary and foolish risks. We want people to become as self-sufficient as … Read the rest

CdS (Cadmium Sulfide) photo-resistors are commonly used for detecting light levels. Their resistance varies considerably depending on the intensity of light striking them. They are common, fairly cheap and easy to use. So what’s the problem? They are becoming hard to find. The reason is because of the RoHS directive. Since CdS cells contain cadmium, a toxic heavy metal, this important component is no longer stocked by major electronics distributors. The good news is that not only is there an excellent alternative, but it is more versatile and vastly cheaper.

If you guessed photo-diode you are close, but even better is the humble LED. If you are building an analog circuit, then you will be limited to photo-diodes and photo-transistors due to their greater sensitivity. If, however, you are building a micro-controller based circuit such as a PIC or Arduino, then you can use a simple LED to achieve the same end and even more.

Photo-diodes and LEDs

Both of these devices are essentially the same. Both are diodes enclosed in a translucent case. They will both permit a small amount of reverse current to flow through them when they are reversed biased. The difference is that the photo-diode … Read the rest

Hannu Vartiala has captured the real spirit of ProvideYourOwn.com. He needed a hand rail for his spiral staircase, and instead of buying the expensive factory one, he ingeniously fashioned his own out of… you’ll never guess – polypipe and then covered elegantly in leather. The polypipe was made rigid by filling with smaller dowels, then filled with epoxy. Check out his article for full build details.

A lighting revolution is coming. LEDs will usher it in, but the road may be rocky along the way. Why? Because LEDs are a radically different type of lighting than what we are used to. For them to be used effectively, we need to change our way of thinking about lighting.

The Problem

LEDs are so different from Edison-style incandescent bulbs, that trying to create a drop-in replacement is problematic. This article in particular points out that current LED offerings have poor color spectrum, poor luminosity, and poor reliability. Ouch – they don’t sound very good at all, at least as screw-in replacements for a hundred year-old technology. While I think that they will eventually achieve a screw-in replacement that is fairly decent (look at this innovative offering from Phillips as an example), this pursuit is really the wrong approach. If you want to learn more about how LEDs work and how we can create some really special lighting that is hard or impossible to do with yesterday’s technology than read on. The best thing about LEDs is that the technology to solve our lighting problems is not in the future. It is available today. You just need to know … Read the rest

Gary North recently wrote about his own impressions on Job’s speech. I have some of my own observations to offer as well.

Education

Regarding college education, Jobs found it to be:

• extremely expensive
• most of the courses to be of little value yet required in order to graduate
• some courses were very useful and could be taken for free if not concerned with getting credit for them

These observations mirror my own regarding college. Now I know that education, especially college education is considered to be sacrosanct in this country, yet I find its value similar to what Jobs found it to be. The sole reason to pay for an expensive college education is not for the education value, but for the piece of paper that opens doors into the job market. The truth is, … Read the rest

With today’s constantly fluctuating costs for energy, it is more difficult than ever to determine the best way to heat your home or shop. Being able to compare the costs of different sources of heat can be very helpful in lowering the high prices of dispelling the discomfort of a frigid Winter. To that end, this tutorial will help you understand how to evaluate energy sources and convert their prices into a standard unit for comparison.

Understanding Heat Energy

As with most measurements, there are two different units used for quantifying the amount of heat: BTU and kilocalories. I prefer to work in BTUs, so that is the unit I will use for this discussion. The term BTUs stands for British Thermal Units. It is a very handy unit to use for heating calculations. It is defined as the amount of heat needed to raise one pound of water one degree Fahrenheit. To use a very simple example, if you want to boil a gallon of 72 degree tap water, you would need: BTUs of heat.

Another useful unit for representing energy (not just heat) is the kilowatt-hour. A watt is a unit of power, and watt-hour is a unit … Read the rest

1. Terrorism
2. Car Accidents
3. Gunshots
4. None of the above

If you answered number 4, go to the head of the class. The #1 cause of accidental deaths is no longer car accidents, but drugs. Not just illegal drugs mind you, but legal drugs as well. In fact the number of deaths due to legal drugs far outnumbers those for illegal drugs.

Most people are not aware of the extreme dangers of legal pharmaceutical drugs, even ones available over the counter. Did you know that taking Tylenol even as indicated or prescribed can lead to liver failure? Did you know that the FDA’s main interest lies in maximizing pharmaceutical companies profit rather than public safety? That’s right. The head of the FDA is a political appointee. Who gets appointed? Whoever gives the most to the president’s campaign. In this case, the big drug companies name their man – usually a former CEO of one of them. Just do some research on Donald Rumsfeld and aspartame if you don’t believe me.

Another way in which drugs become more dangerous is when they go off patent. A drug … Read the rest

I don’t listen to his show, but I have met people who do and are big fans. One thing that has always troubled me is: here is a multimillionaire who sells expensive “get out of debt” materials to those who are in the greatest financial need. On top of that, he claims to be a Christian. I guess he never read the part of the Bible where it condemns those who profit by taking advantage of the poor. He could give the basic materials away for free and still be quite rich, but he doesn’t. He prefers to profit off the backs of the poor and needy.

Evidently, I am not only alone in this opinion. Gary North has recently published a scathing piece on this man and his financial advice. It is called How Dave Ramsey … Read the rest

In my last article, I described three steps anyone can take to drastically reduce their dependence on industrial sources for their food supply without growing any food yourself. By taking those crucial three steps you can be free from food tyranny and secure from possible supply line disruptions due to either natural or man-made causes.

You may have wondered; what about growing my own food? This article will answer that question for vegetables. It will address the various of types of produce you can grow and the options available for raising them. Since it is difficult to grow all our own food, it is profitable to remember one piece of advice from the previous article – buy as much food as you can from independent small family sources. By purchasing from independent sources, you can be free from industrial and government controls immediately, and then gradually replace some of those foods with ones you grow yourself. With this hybrid approach, you have secured your entire food supply without any gaps, and you also maximize your flexibility. If your own crop fails, you can still fall back on your small community or mail order sources.

The first thought that comes … Read the rest

The Arduino IDE is a great environment for getting started programming microprocessors. It radically lowers the cost of entry, and greatly simplifies the learning curve. The importance of these properties should not be underestimated. Most of us are capable of advanced microprocessor programming given time, desire and opportunity even without the Arduino environment. The biggest obstacle, however, is getting started. When that first hurdle is at last overcome, we can then soar to greater heights. That is where the Arduino is an incredible blessing. It is so simple that it removes most of the barriers to entry. From scratch, we can get started in microprocessors and build our confidence and knowledge at an easy pace. Once that is done, then we can advance to more complex projects and techniques.

That easy means of entry, however, can also become a limitation. Because the Arduino IDE makes the cost of getting started very low, that same simplicity can also prevent us from advancing to more complex projects. A good example is when you want to create new libraries that make use of existing libraries. When you try to do so in the usual fashion of including libraries, you are confronted with compiler … Read the rest