MakerGear's Prusa Mendel Arrived!

Bam! Perfect timing! The RepRap Prusa Mendel kit from MakerGear arrived, just in time for easter and a few extra days off work. Excellent to use the extra time to build this monster!

Look at the adventure the package had today:

RepRap Prusa Mendel on a playground swing

RepRap Prusa Mendel on another playground swing

RepRap Prusa Mendel Parts (+ chocolate)

They even included some filaments for me to play with...

So, yea, I will assemble the thing now...

GameRunner released!

Wow, this is one of the reasons I also did my own product, as.. well, this GameRunner device was announced at CES 2006... that's right.. 5 years ago! ...and it looked like it would never come.






$500 for it, which isn't all that bad. Only problem here is that it will probably weight a lot, which adds to shipping. Currently 4 months wait time... Anyway, I wish them all the best with it!

Again, I'm doing my thing for the experience, and the fun of it. Mine will also be cheaper for those that already have a treadmill.. and, my device works on other things as well. Such as stationary bikes. There are also extra pins (breakout pins from the AVR) which one can use to expand it's functionality. Such as simple buttons. Then it's just up to the software to do the rest (send the appropriate command over USB). I have a few "add-ons" in mind already. But really, adding a few extra buttons is quite easy, and super cheap (a few bucks at most). You really only need wire and the button itself... Besides, there is a lot of flexibility as how people can hook up and place the buttons!

Header Image Updated

Yes, it's true! The header image has been updated to be wide. Should make for a better looking blog...

Eureka! It's Alive!

Just a small update to say that I've now tested using the sensor too, and by just fixing some rather minor differences between this and what I've used before (pins and USB setup little different) in the software, it worked! That means that not only is the PCB layout and connections correctly made, it was assembled perfectly too! What's really amazing about this is that I actually followed a different schematic before when I was using stripboards. Design that was based on 3.3V. This design is for 5V, which is great for external "add-ons", and wasn't really tested using stripboards, so it's amazing this works on first try like that! I have a few other boards I can test too. But hey, first board tested worked! Isn't that exiting!?

I include an image with the device on its side, also showing the plastic part underneath that is required. Besides, reading blogs with only text can get boring, so having more images makes it more fun. I like that myself.

Treadgaming PCB v1.0 is here!

Wow, guess if I was surprised to know that my PCB boards were sent to me by getting an UPS track number email last week! According to MyRO PCB's estimate, the whole thing was supposed to be done 7:th of April, and as you can see, it was ready a weak earlier! Good work MyRO PCB! I think they forgot to take a picture with someone there holding it though, but that's fine.

So far I've tested code to simulate a USB gamepad, and I also tested the LED's on it, and it all works! Next is to solder the sensor on and do the real test. But, so far I'm happy with the result!

Just look at that beautiful thing:

Without sensor

With sensor.


LED enabled.