Review: SunFounder Smart Video Car Kit for Raspberry Pi

We have a look at the ‘Smart Video Car Kit for Raspberry Pi’ manufactured by SunFounder, a kit for a small Raspberry-Pi-based Wi-Fi-remote-controlled car with color video camera. We built one and tried it; here are our findings and tips.

Taiwanese startup Cubiio Muherz ran a successful crowdfunding campaign last year on Indiegogo to finance a mini desktop laser engraver. By campaign end, it had raised 55 times the target to fund production of the project, but there are still a few perks available on the campaign page...

Even though LoRa is intended for communication between devices at the surface of the earth, nothing forbids us (except maybe regulatory agencies) to use it vertically, between a flying object like a (weather) balloon and a ground station. Here is a way of doing this.

Sometimes you get really odd projects touted on crowd-funding sites. One such novel ‘device’ that appeared recently on Indiegogo promises free electrical power, I think I’ve seen one of these before, if I remember correctly it was titled something like ‘So-Called Alternator Magic’ (SCAM) device...

Deep discharging of lithium-ion polymer (LiPo) batteries to under 3 volts per cell may permanently damage them. Luckily it is easy enough to build a deep-discharge protector using a microcontroller. Here is a design based on an ATtiny84 programmed in Flowcode.

Often projects are started on Elektor Labs with lots of enthusiasm and good intentions. Experiments are done, circuits are breadboarded, and a schematic begins to emerge. And then, for reasons only known to the initiator, everything stops. Why? Lost interest? Lack of time? Maybe the spectators can pull the project loose by shouting all together as if they were watching a Punch and Judy show?

When you can build a device exactly as you want it, the result may not be useful to many people. However, often the project itself contains inspiring ideas and techniques. This two-keyboard PS/2-to-MIDI converter is such a project.

Sailboat racing requires mastering the winds (among others). How about displaying wind speed and direction data for each course marker on a large display at the clubhouse using LoRa? Can you help with programming?

-- Hey guys, look what I made. I put a ball bearing in the center of this flat multi-lobed structure so that it can spin along its axis. That’s all it does, it just spins and I am going to sell billions of ‘em. -- Sure you are, dude. Now go away. The rest is history and even at Elektor Labs we encounter fidget spinner projects. This particular project combines the fidget spinner with a persistence of vision (POV) LED display. Will it be ready before the hype is over? Or will it create its own hype? Decide for yourself.

Although its operating principle is really very simple, the first time you see a solar-powered​ Mendocino motor you can’t help being fascinated. It looks like it came out of a wizard’s den — hovering in mid-air and spinning on its own, apparently without any source of energy. The ​magnetically levitated electric motor, named after the Mendocino County in California, is powered by solar cells. It uses a rotor suspended on low-friction magnetic bearings.