High voltage fun and games... or is it? I've been diving into some exciting high voltage experiments with filaments scavenged from old Philips boards. After tinkering around with a YH11068A voltage generator, I'm now exploring a new version based on the MC34063 IC. Alongside, I've found a super handy voltage/current meter that's been a great help. If you enjoy my nerdy adventures and want to support my quest for more techy gadgets, check out my Patreon or pop by our new shop. Oh, and joining our Discord community or newsletter is a great way to stay in the loop! 26 June 2025
800 volt DC DC converter In this video, I tinker with high-voltage circuits to light up LED filaments salvaged from broken light bulbs. Using a makeshift setup with a MOSFET, inductor, diode, and smoothing capacitor, I explore switching at high frequencies to achieve bright light. However, limitations with low-voltage capacitors led to some explosive results. I also experiment with a DC/DC converter to reach higher voltages, but it too failed, leading to a troubleshooting session under the microscope. Despite these setbacks, I'll keep tinkering and waiting for replacement parts to continue my experiment. 26 June 2025
Not what I was expecting! Why are all my lightbulbs failing? So, we've been dealing with a little epidemic of light bulb failures in the house. I took apart a couple of dead bulbs to get to the bottom of what's going on. Turns out, one of the bulbs is kind of flickering and faintly working, while another bulb's base gets surprisingly warm. After some poking around, I found the PCB inside the bulb has a bridge rectifier and a LED driver IC, but all components test out fine! The investigation took a turn when I checked the LED filaments with a makeshift power supply, and surprise surprise, some filaments are... 26 June 2025
Electronic Chopsticks? So, I got this free gift from Secure - some HT140 solder tweezers, and they're pretty nifty! The kit comes with a stand, a power supply, and these tiny grub screws. Gave them a test run by desoldering components on a Pico board, and they heat up impressively fast! It's really handy, especially for smaller components. Thanks to Secure for sending these over. Definitely a great addition when working on my PCBs. Check them out in the description if you're interested! 26 June 2025
Taking KiCad Silk Screen to the Next Level! Take a peek at how my ESP 32 ZX Spectrum project is coming along! We're funded on Crowd Supply, ordering components, and adding a cool silk screen design to our PCB. Using tools like KiCad and Affinity Designer, I've jazzed up the back of the board with detailed graphics. It's been an exciting journey, making adjustments and ensuring everything works perfectly before ramping up production. If you haven't yet, head over to Crowd Supply and support the ESP 32 Rainbow project! 26 June 2025
It’s a Christmas wrap up - and a nice surprise! Christmas has arrived in style with a surprise Partner of the Year award from PCBWay! It's been an amazing year packed with projects, from dabbling in nickel plating to diving into full-color silk screen printing. The highlight? Taking the ESP32 rainbow from concept to a fully funded venture on Crowd Supply. With big plans for 2025 and exciting videos on the way, the future looks bright. Wishing everyone a merry Christmas and an exciting New Year! 26 June 2025
Level Shifter Circuit - simulation and real world test. Hey there! If you're around my age, you'll probably get nostalgic over the sound of old school tape loading on the ZX Spectrum. I took a deep dive into how the data loads, using my oscilloscope to break it all down, and even built a circuit to handle the signal for my ESP32. Throw in some cool simulations using CircuitLab, and I'm all set! Plus, I discovered a neat trick using diodes to perfect the signal. Hands-on and really quite fun! 26 June 2025
"Hair Trigger" So, I thought it might be interesting to show you how I fixed my nasal hair trimmer. It wasn't turning on, and after messing around a bit, I found out the contact piece wasn't reaching the battery properly. Just needed a little loosen-up to make solid contact. Now it works, but it's a bit sensitive; it just can't wait to start trimming, I guess. Anyway, hope that was helpful, especially if you're dealing with hair growth surprises like me! 26 June 2025
But does it run DOOM? ESP32 ZX Spectrum update All right, it's time for an update on my ESP Rainbow, the ZX Spectrum emulator with stunning full-color silk screen printing. I've been testing the latest boards, and PCB Way did a fantastic job. The enhancements include upgraded firmware, a 128k ZX Spectrum emulator, and a new 2-watt speaker replacing the old 7-watt buzzer. You can enjoy great sound with PWM and even play 128k games like The Never Ending Story. I've also added a snapshot feature and ported my video player over. Hardware upgrades include new capacitors and a slick power control chip for seamless battery and USB mode... 26 June 2025
This really SUCKS.... and I love it! Exciting news! Robin sent me a Pixel Pump to try out, and I'm loving it so far. It's really well packaged and comes with a ton of handy goodies, including two foot pedals and SMD magazines. It's perfect for my USB tester project as it makes pick and placing components super easy. Although it requires a bit of practice, the foot pedals make the process much smoother. Plus, with the interactive BOM plugin for KiCad, I can mark components as placed without using a keyboard! 26 June 2025
ESP32 Touch Spectrum - Battery and Expansion port test. It's time for a bit more testing of the boards from PCB Way, and I must say, these boards have come out amazingly well. Check out PCB Way – there's a link in the description! Today, we're focusing on testing the battery charging and the expansion port. The battery charging circuit seems successful, and even when playing music, everything is running efficiently. I've looked into some optimizations for the speaker side, such as adding more decoupling capacitors. We also tested the expansion port, successfully running an emulator on the Pico that drives the display via the expansion port. Excitingly, I... 26 June 2025
ESP32 - 40 Independent touch pins! Wow! I'm absolutely thrilled with the results of this video - I've been experimenting with my ESP 320x Spectrum board and its touch Matrix keyboard. Had a bit of trouble with combined button inputs, so I took a deep dive into how touch works and discovered these old, but gold, ICs. After some testing, they turned out to be a perfect solution to my multiplexing problem! I then got a new board design shipped from PCB way - looks awesome and it didn't break the bank. Can't believe how responsive the keyboard is! Got the 'Hello World' program up and... 26 June 2025
I blew up my dev board - and then fixed it! So, in my latest experiment with an 8 feather DVI board, I was greeted with a strange smell and a board that stopped working flat. After some hair-raising debugging, I discovered that our villain might be a dodgy Voltage Regulator, throwing a tantrum and refusing to output voltage steadily. After removing it, I conscripted an external 3.3 volt regulator and voila! The board sprang back to life, and we have a happy ending. But the mystery continues: what wreaked havoc in the first place? I'm pinning the blame on a rebellious USB hub. So, next on the agenda, shopping for... 26 June 2025
ESP32-S3 ZX Spectrum - Full Color Silk Screen is really cool! Super stoked to share this creation – an ESP32 ZX Spectrum emulator! Although it's still very much a proof-of-concept, it's looking pretty rad. I've got the classic games like Manic Miner, and yes, you can program in basic too! In perfect Sinclair fashion, I'm planning on selling this key piece of nostalgia for just £99. Work still needs to be done before the production phase, but rest assured, I'm meticulously working out the kinks, including tweaking the keyboard to ensure even better user experience. And on the technical side - a single ESP32S3 runs the show and we’ve multiplexed the... 26 June 2025
1024 LEDs - WLED Flame Lamp Today we're elbow-deep in LEDs for another exciting project — we're building a high-resolution flame lamp! Kick-starting the endeavour with a 1024-pixel LED matrix, we proceed to throw in the towel with a faulty old flame lamp boasting a mere 300 LEDs. Mislabelled PCBs and questionable diodes keep us on our toes, making this undertaking a little more Sparky than usual. With the help of competitive soldering skills, a beefy 5V power supply and a 3D printer, we channel our inner Edison to bring our LED matrix to light. After a pinch of struggle, our LED matrix rollercoasters into a... 26 June 2025
Look at My Shiny Crystal Balls - Custom ESP32 PCB With WLED. Step right up, folks, for the grand unveiling of my shiny new crystal balls – yes, crystal balls. I've transformed ordinary AliExpress pieces into juggernauts of light and color, all powered by the splendid WLED software. Dive deep with me into the nitty-gritty of the underlying electronics and come face-to-face with the true beauty of voltage measurements (I promise, it's more riveting than it sounds). While the original circuit boards from AliExpress might not thrill, my beefed-up version invites gasps of wonder, with microphone-controlled LEDs throwing light in a million dazzling ways. Join me as I chronicle my journey through... 26 June 2025
Is it time to change my batteries? Amazon thinks so! Got a heads up from Amazon that one of my device batteries was low. Gotta give it to the battery, it lasted quite longer than I anticipated. So, I peeked into the device usage history, which was a trove of data Amazon has kindly stored. In fact, I wrote a web scraper to download all this data. Sadly, records only go back to two weeks. Nevertheless, I plotted the data and surprisingly the pattern revealed that battery level gets affected by temperature change. Cool, isn't it? Finally managed to change the battery. Also, I might just plug in a rechargeable... 26 June 2025
How Good Are My USB Cables? In this video, I engage in a deeper exploration of USB testing, encountering a range of trials and tribulations along the way. First up, I attempt to test a couple of USB cables and discuss their data lines' peculiar situatedness. Then, I delve into the assembly of the PCB boards, sourced from PCBWay, which surely turned into a learning voyage than an easy sail. The first version faced challenges of misordered large-frame stencil, unseen connection problems, and even DRC errors in the submission process. Not dwell on that, I redesign and bring to table Version 2, complete with USB connectors... 26 June 2025
Surprisingly Clever DVD Eject Mechanism In this video, I dive into the exciting world of the ejection mechanism for a DVD player. The hook which mechanically keeps the DVD player in check is an essential piece of the puzzle. Also noteworthy is a small micro switch, which ensures the device acknowledges when a DVD is fully in. With a bit of blue-tack trickery, we convince the DVD player there's a DVD inserted. The key players are this cam-shaped, blue protrusion and worm gear. In a clever turn of events, the movement of these components manipulates the hook controlling the ejection. Quite astute of our humble... 26 June 2025
Nickel Coating PCBs At Home In this experiment-filled video, I explore the inner workings of a resistor box I spotted on the EEVBlog channel. With its ability to adjust in increments down to 0.1 ohms, I was fascinated, but also noticed the binding posts could do with an upgrade. Upon inspection, I was intrigued by the simple yet clever construction and the possibility of enhancing the durability of the copper with some nickel plating. Navigating through the potential challenge of the resistors on the PCB, I embark on the journey of creating a homemade nickel plating solution. A few hiccups, adjustments, and an hour later,... 26 June 2025
Easy - KiCad Symbol, Footprint and 3D Model! In this video, I walk you through the transition from EasyEDA to KiCad for your PCB designs. While we lose the tight integration with LCSC parts, we gain the ability to export 3D models in KiCad. I discuss the challenges of finding certain components and how a handy script can help pull LCSC components into KiCad. We also explore how to position and adjust components correctly. Needing enclosures for your design? We discuss how to export these 3D models for review and even import them into Fusion360. To top it off, I mention the value in using PCBWay for your... 26 June 2025