They say the last 20% of the work takes 80% of the time.
Getting this thing to work was BRUTAL, mostly on the firmware side. In the last post, I talked about how I needed 3 functions in the software: flip, rotateCW, and rotateCCW - easy enough, right?
Read MoreMy coworker dropped a cool looking print on my desk the other day. Using open scad, he was able to code a Hilbert curve and sweep a cut of the profile wide enough to hold a 5mm ball bearing. Over lunch we were seeing how fast we could get the ball through the length of the fractal (it fits ~17 meters of track in a 100mm x 100mm square).
Read MoreAll of my smart home devices are routed through Apple Home, which uses an API called HomeKit to control smart devices through a hub. Unfortunately, Apple has no native 3rd party support for random devices like my blinds but luckily some better coders than me already solved this problem.
Read MoreRiding my high from implementing a basic homing routine and command interface, I dove right into wireless control. To my absolute delight, I actually found this to be way easier than I thought.
Read MoreAs promised, I got through some of the more basic firmware to control the motors! I actually ended up spending a lot of time chasing down bugs than I expected. Most notably, I spent 2 hours trying to figure out why I couldn’t run my steppers backwards…
Read Morewent through a couple more iterations on the mechanical design over the last week, just nailing down the drivetrain to where I’m happy with it.
Read MoreI took the last week off of work (anti-burnout vacation time) and I’ve been working a lot on some designs for automated blinds to retrofit on top of some IKEA shades I have in my room currently. I 3D printed a custom bracket that could hold a small stepper motor, some gears, and drive small adapter that engages the winding tube of the blinds with a spline (I’ll have a full tutorial up when I finish).
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