Once again, a few library patrons came over to see what was on display.  Only two members could make the meeting, so we had room to spread out and work on our current LED projects.

A flexible  sheet of 64 Neopixel LEDs with the brightness turned down:

 
That's not a LED panel, THIS is a LED panel - 256 LEDs, with a string of another 256 LEDs.  It was very memorising to watch waves of rainbow colour wash across it all:

Stephen started playing around with some STM32 development boards.  The battery is a largish 3.7V 2500mA Li-ion:

You can also pick up some cheap WeMOS ESP8266 boards, and various add-ons:

Paul tested out a 3.3V to 5V translator board, so he could drive a string of Neopixels from a ESP8266:

He also experimented with a couple of home made Infr-red LED boards (850nM and 940nM) to see how they worked with a Raspberry Pi camera:

A RPi IR view of the electronics world:

On the 19th of July, the SW Makers where invited to put on a display for the Shire of Dardanup Councillors and Shire Staff.  Four members where able to present some of their projects:

It was a full table, with 3D printers and card making machines whirring away and lots of robotics and electronics:

A white board was commandeered:

We had a couple of new people pop in and say hello and work on some robotic projects.  We also had the Dardanup Shire President visit us and we talked about IOT technologies, Make Spaces, education and his vision of the future for the Shire of Dardanup. 

Stephen showed off the Nano and Tetra Pineapple WiFi www.wifipineapple.com/ scanners, as well as his HackRF One SDR receiver:

He also programmed up his new Nextion programmable LCD:

His ESP8266 based Sonoff IOT power switch recently arrived:

Need a 180 degree USB adaptor?  Well they exist:

There was a Makeblock tank robot kit stripped down, rebuilt and running autonomously around the library floor:

Someone has a new metallic foil transfer machine, which produces some snazzy looking cards:

and there was a great textured/embossed card:

A new member seeing what we where up too, drove home and picked up their Mindstorm robot kit and started the build of a book issuing robotic system:

Diane has finished her Sashiko table runner:

and Sashiko rice stitch cloth:

My Raspberry Pi based pollinator /flower time-lapse camera rig was dusted off, ready for another season of winter use:

Version 2.2 of my home made ESP8266 based LED driver board was being tested out - now 6mm shorter than Ver: 2.1:

Meeting in a Library is a great way to meet new people and bringing along strange apparatuses is a way to start a conversation.  We have a number of people introduce themselves and ask what was going on and what we where up too.

Phillip's 3D printer printed out a great LED housing:

Diane worked on a number of fabric based projects - a pin cushion and purse:

Finishing of a Japanese Sashiko table runner and drink mats:

Ribbon embroidery:

Paul brought along some electronic projects:

A worked on an ESP8266 based LED driver board:

At this months meeting we had the President of the SW Science Council and Julie their Project Officer pop in to visit us and see what we get up too.  We had discussions on the various science and Ag. business and community interests around the South West of Western Australia.  We would look forward in holding some public demonstrations of our projects.

Rob brought along an interesting quick project that had sprung out of a recently defunct microwave oven:

At the moment, this is going to be an environmental chamber for growing crystals.  It has a thumping big peltier mounted at the end with a large heatsink (silver block) and fan, with the hope of getting down to -10 degrees and up to 50+ degrees in a controlled manor.

Someone has discovered the colourful 3D Doodling pen, which might have sparked other interest in it too:

Drone with VR googles - no flying inside a library though:

Colourful cards galore:

The Pi Cluster was back on the table:

Along with the Dobot robotic arm:

Some special fabric pens where being tested out:

Lots of electronic projects on the table - the LED driver project is progressing:

Only a few steadfast people showed up, with a few members of the public stopped by to see what was going on.  Missed taking a photo of Stephens current project.

Building a radio:

An Arduino based ultrasonic alarm circuit:

The Felix 3D printer ran hot printing out some fidget spinner housings:

Another style of LED driver board was being tested:

Designing up a SMD LED display board in KiCAD:

There was a lot happening this meeting. Once again, I apologies for missing photographs for people working on:  learning electronics via a kit, 3D doodling, muscle wire, Fusion 360 3D design of a fidget spinner.  There was a discussion around using SigRok for electronic decoding of signals.

Note: Stephen could be running a Fusion 360 CAD tutorial at the Eaton meeting in either July or August.  There will be an announcement via the mailing list closer to the event.  Fusion 360 has a free version for hobbiests, and it can generate files suitable for 3D printing, laser cutting and CNC work.  You can sign up for the mailing list via the above menu CONTACT link.

An M-n-M sorting machine is being designed up:

A Delta 3D Printer getting ready to go:

Playing around with a Windows 10-Arduino based  Latte Pander:

Tying off a quilt:

A 6309 based digital logic analyser is being reverse engineered, complete with ROM contents being disassembled:

Someone has a new computerised paper cutter, that was busy cutting out very intricate shapes:

A home lab has recently been upgraded with a new oscilloscope and function generator:

This spinning wheel has been very busy over the last month:

Below is an example of the different SMD component sizes you can purchase and use in electronics:

Due to it being school holidays and other events on around the district, it was a small turn out than usual - even though it was a World Create Day!

Tufting up a community donation quilt:

Getting ready to start programming up the Raspberry Pi cluster notification LEDs:

This robot project will eventually be able to be programmed in various languages, eg: Logo, Picaxe, Python, and others:

Playing around with Arduino Neopixels, testing PCB VIA rivets, various home made SMD LED boards and a LED driver board:

Come and join us at the Busselton Library on Saturday the 22nd April 2017, from 11:00 to 16:00.  Location details on the home page.

This months Eaton Makers meeting had a real mix of projects being worked on.

Some things that where discussed:

http://hackaday.com/2017/04/07/platformio-and-visual-studio-take-over-the-world/  a new programming IDE that came up last week on Hack-A-Day

http://sirlagz.net/2017/04/03/exagear-deskop-2-0-review/  a Raspberry Pi based addon that allows you to run some Windows based GPU based programs.  
https://eltechs.com/product/exagear-desktop/exagear-desktop-features-and-prices/  it's not free, but looks promising if you're  looking to run older Windows games on a RPi.

There was mention of the different 3D CAD packages that we use, here is a list of free-to-use:

• http://www.autodesk.com/products/fusion-360/students-teachers-educators  ; there is a free Makers version available
• https://www.rs-online.com/designspark/home 
• https://www.tinkercad.com/
• https://www.freecadweb.org/
• http://www.openscad.org/
• https://www.blender.org/
  

No flying inside the Eaton Library, but it comes with a 4K video stream - very nice piece of kit

A very pretty kaleidoscope Raspberry Pi Unicorn Hat

The Pi-Cluster is having an assortment of surface mounted boards created:

A close up of the above boards.  These PCB's have been milled with a CNC router, then hand soldered:

Someone has a wedding coming up, so some prototype wedding cards where made up:

The ROS based robot is now moving and is currently controlled via a Bluetooth network connection.  It's being powered form an old laptop battery:

I haven't seen a spinning wheel in action for quite sometime, but some people where testing it out:

An Arduino Mega being put through it's paces to see if it still worked - yes, it does:

more patchwork and fabric art being worked on:

A willow tree woven with wool basket was being worked on:

an ePaper/Arduino Nano based Temperature sensor/display:

an order for 10 ePaper displays arrived last week:

I didn't get any photos for the M & M colour sorter project that was being fleshed out in a 3D CAD program.  Nor the discussion on designing computer game layouts.