Time to fire up the old soldering iron.
I've been fascinated by electronics since I was a kid. At first it was the inscrutable bits and bobs inside the salvaged radios - what were they? What did they do? How did these things work?
My first serious foray into this mysterious, magical world was the Ladybird Book 'Magnets, Bulbs and Batteries'. A brilliant introduction to the wonders of electrickery.
As you can see from the cover, you get your sister to wind wire around a six inch nail and then you connect it to a bicycle lamp battery and it turns into a magnet that you can pick up smaller nails with! Un Be Leeevable! You acherly lookit like that in the 60s Awa Rich!
Later, I got a job in electronics - that radio amateurs certificate came in useful. Later still I actually got some qualifications. Then I discovered computers - in the early 80s they became affordable thanks to good ol' Uncle Clive (Sinclair). I learned programming and - with my knowledge of electronics was able to use my Sinclair ZX81 to flash lights and whizz motors.
I ended up teaching computers, first to YTS kids then to adults. But this was all off the shelf software and I let the programming and electronics moulder in the glark.
As computers became appliances, employers and universities bemoaned the lack of hardware and software engineers missed out there dint you Awa Rich? and various plots were hatched to rectify this - the Raspberry Pi and Arduino being a couple of the better known examples. Now, even Mighty Microsoft are at it.
I was interested in the Raspberry Pi because it's British (and I believe some of the developers were involved with the early Sinclair computers). The only problem was that it requires a HDMI TV or monitor to display its output - much like the early 80s computers plugged into your telly. This was going to make it expensive as I haven't had a telly for over 20 years. The tellyboxes these days are brilliant Awa Rich. Shame there's nowt worth watching.
I went for the Arduino, partly because its needs are simpler but also, its primary function is to control things like motors, lights, relays, beepers and all manner of other magic stuff - That reminds me of a song Awa Rich, summink about a dragon. This seemed like fun.
I got me a starter kit from Oomlout - I like the name and they're in Yorkshire. - I worked my way through the book of examples then forgot about it for ages. Mostly because I didn't really have a practical application for it. I could think of a few things it would be fun to build but I got distracted by other shiny baubles (in my world that's an interesting idea rather than an amusing trinket).
One such shiny bauble was sous vide cooking - where you seal the food in a bag and dunk it in a bath of hot water for a few hours - the water baths cost a fortune and even the 'light sabre' devices you can put in a pan are pretty hairy prices. I just use a big pan of water on a very low heat on a regular electric hob.
Deedly doo, Deedly doo, Deedly doo (time travel music) back to 1976 when I was working in Croda lab. We had lots of such temperature controlled water baths for getting the knowing of edible oils and fats. They were pretty simple so why so expensive? (I'll leave you to work that one out).
I could make one. An analogue controller would cost a fiver at the most. I could probably knock the whole thing together for about 20 quid.
Then I thought...
This is a job for an Arduino!
This morning a package arrived in the post - Crystals of liquid! I assembled the components, loaded up the code and had a digital thermometer up and running in about 20 minutes!
The other thing in the package was a Real Time Clock (as opposed to those pretend time clocks - still working on that one Awa Rich?), so the next step is to get that assembled and running.
Stay tuned.
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