[chbot] Robotics Group meeting, 5 Idris Rd, 6:30pm, Monday 19 Aug 2024 report

[Mark Atherton]

Hello everyone,

Good turnout with 27 attendees, and lots of huddles-of tech-talk. $30 + 
change (in gold, and flat-money) collected and transferred into the 
robotics loose-change jar (for later banking).

All sales from the trading table should go into the brown box on the 
wall, and are directly for the benefit of our host club, Christchurch 
Amateur Radio Club, NZART Branch 05.

Equipment donations are welcome for the trading table, but no CRT based 
product, printers, toner or items that are likely to be a disposal burden.

With thanks on behalf of the group,

Mark Atherton

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September meeting: Don Clucas, former CTO of Whisper Tech will be giving 
a talk about the technology of his former company.

Mark talked about real world issues with timing and interface associated 
with the UI rotary encoder. Specifically detent to detent sequences, 
required pull ups, and associated power implications.

He also talked about attempting to interface to a 1.3” OLED LCD – 
without associated schematic, and making a (wrong) assumption about a 
configuration bonding.

Also covered was the possibility of using adhesive carbon buttons (for 
remote control repair) + gold-plated PCBs to allow custom membrane 
push-buttons to be fabricated.

Graham brought in a scrap turbomolecular pump he disassembled along with 
a laser-tacho; the unit has had a rough life. Part of this investigation 
is to see how the unit was manufactured, and how much abuse it has received.

Andrew brought in a home made flight simulator cockpit panel,and talked 
about some of the associated adventures. Also he talked about 
e-nable.org (volunteer group making 3D printed prosthetics).

Angus Phillips and George Timmermans gave an impromptu talk about the 
meshtastic system (in lieu of  Russel Werner, who was snowed in). Thank 
you guys, well done.

Michael Glaser did a demo of some of his Aliexpress gadgets, including a 
ridiculously low cost ESP-based LCD+touch screen device for NZ$14.

Robin gave us an update on his ultrasonic anemometer project.

Interesting stuff on YouTube

Zamak low temp (400 oC) casting alloy (muck metal) 
youtube.com/watch?v=8IBWICVNfz4

Light communication on CH32V003 youtube.com/watch?v=IHD3ji-F600

A stunning set of lectures. MIT 6.622 Power Electronics, Spring 2023 
youtube.com/watch?v=f7oXhDatwtY

The Tactical Thermite Powered Hot Dog youtube.com/watch?v=8X1_HEJk2Hw