Maker-a-Day: Monday with Ripcoder Club, Frank Duignan & South Dublin Radio Club
Welcome to our first Maker-a-Day event with Spain Hughes (Ripcoder Club) showing you how to make a “Mini Arduino Hand Held Game Console” followed by Frank Duignan (IOProg) showcasing the how he makes the next revision of the “Dublin Maker Badge”. In the evening, we will have Adrian Connor from South Dublin Radio Club talking about “Signals from Outerspace! Make your own antenna to get images from Weather Satellites”.
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12:00 – 13:00
Ripcoder Club: Mini Arduino Hand Held Game Console
Spain Hughes will build a Mini Arduino Handheld Game Console inspired by the much loved Chrome off-line T-Rex game.
She will show you how to minimize your project with a LCD I2C Interface Adapter 1602 2004 PCF8574 and a digispark or a node-Mcu. This is an option for those with Arduinos without enough pins.
📍Where to find Ripcoder Club
13:00 – 14:00
Frank Duignan: Dublin Maker Badge
This project will show how a simple game can be made for the (unofficial) Dublin Maker Badge 2021. It will be a sprite based game that will run on the badge. It would be great to include the game produced by one of the participants in the final badge. You will be shown how to build a simple sprite game in a browser based development environment
The badge materials are quite specialized so we don’t expect others will able to make it easily however there all designs, code etc is open source on Frank’s github. Updates will be posted on his blog below.
📍Where to find Frank Duignan
20:00 – 21:00
South Dublin Radio Club: Signals from Outerspace! Make your own antenna to get images from Weather Satellites.
Adrian Connor will be talking about build a 137 MHz V-dipole receiving antenna for weather satellites and demonstrate it in action by decoding Weather Satellite images.
To fully partake & make this project work, participants should possess a Software Defined Radio, a cheap €25 RTL Dongle will do, & the appropriate decoding software (see links below) .
Adrian is aiming to demonstrate how anyone can engage with space-based technologies & learn along the way… in an inexpensive way i.e. by building cheap antennae and using cheap software defined receivers. The session will be open for anyone wishing to come along and ask questions.
Parts List:
- Dipole legs = 2-4mm diameter (approx) metal/aluminum rods (cut to 53.4cm length). Do not use a ferromagnetic materials due to increased losses caused by the skin effect.
- Choc-Block Connector x1
- 50 or 70ohm Coaxial Cable, approproate connectors for SDR. Length will depend on the distatnce from the SDR to the antenna.
- Mast or Pole. Antenna should be as high as possible, but 1.5m – 2m broom stick, length of PVC pipe or similar non-conductive material will do.
- Cable Ties
- Protractor – to measure dipole angle.
Method:
- Dipole legs = 2-4mm diameter metal/aluminium rods (cut to 53.4cm length).
- Centre of the dipole is made of Choc-block terminals where the aluminium rods are secured on one side and the coax from the other side of the terminal.
- The centre hole on the Choc-block is used to secure the Choc-block to the mast bracket so the antenna can be easily mounted on the mast/pole – screws & screwdriver required. As a temporary fix the Choc-Block connector can be secured to the mast with cable ties.
- Run the 50 or 75 ohms coaxial cable to your receiving equipment.
- An appropriate coax connector (usually an SMA or BNC type) to connect to the software defined radio
- Bend the dipole legs to create a 120 degrees angle and point the antenna to the North-South direction. You are ready for the NOAA Weather Sat reception.
- Wait for Satellite & decode images!
For a detailed outline of parts & method see links below.
Tutorial: Receiving NOAA Weather Satellite Images
How To Build A V Dipole For Receiving Weather Satellites
📍Where to find South Dublin Radio Club
For more info on our other Maker-a-Day events during Science Week, check out https://dublinmaker.ie/maker-a-day-at-science-week/ for more details.