X’mas, Lab@Home, stuffs.

Posted by HELiX

The past few days have been hanging out mostly with the same group of people (ie. XJ, KH, Jim) and we’ve covered kelong fishing, bowling, american pool, badminton… etc. So today was badminton. 3 hours of it. We played at CCK Stadium until 5pm, and JUST NICE, it started to rain. Heavily, if you must know. So… since we were all sweaty and stuffs, we decided to heck and just run through the rain, and thus I was (and still am) extremely, extremely wet. On top of that, we took bus 307 back to CCK interchange. Or at least we wanted to. It ended up, that the bus turned away from CCK and towards Teck Whye… so we (me and XJ) alighted in the middle of the downpour, and walked through the rain to the nearest method of transport back to CCK MRT, the LRT. Bleh.

And as you might have noticed, which you should have, I made a X’mas banner to last the festive season. Yeah, got the idea from Hazel’s blogskin and decided to put some effort into flash and photoshop, and after an hour or two, the product is what you see above.

Also, since Kok Hong recommended that there should be a music going along with the banner… very well, I included a Christmas song… by The Chipmunks! LOL. Quite a nice song, really cute, and I remembered being addicted to Chipmunks on my US trips.

Here’s the lyrics if you want!

(all right you Chipmunks! Ready to sing your song?
-I’ll say we are!
-Yeah!
-Let’s sing it now!
Okay, Simon?
-Okay!
Okay, Theodore?
-Okay!
Okay, Alvin? Alvin? ALVIN!
-OKAY!!!)

(Very good, boys
-Lets sing it again! Yeah, lets sing it again!
No, That’s enough, lets not overdo it
-What do you mean overdo it?
-We want to sing it again!
Now wait a minute, boys
-Why can’t we sing it again?
-[chipmunk chatter]
Alvin, cut that out..Theodore, just a minute.
Simon will you cut that out? Boys…)

And lastly, I had a second attempt at the Class IIIb High-Powered Laser today. I’ll just paste the entire report here…

Attention: To all police departments, law enforcement agencies, task forces, Delta Force, Secret Service, FBI, CIA, Interpol, spies, S.W.A.T., Rainbow Six, Splinter Cell’s Sam Fisher, etc.

All documented work on this page is purely for educational and entertainment purposes, with no misdeeds intended. I am fully aware of the Radiation Protection (Non-Ionising Radiation) Regulations 1991, stating that:

“In Singapore, any one found using class 3b & 4 lasers without licence would be charged for violating the Act and could be fined up to maximum of not than $10,000 or imprisonment for a term of not exceeding 12 months or both.”

Overview

The objective of this project is to create a high-powered laser pointer, with sufficient output to fall under the class IIIb category of laser classification.

A normal red laser pointer used in presentations are class IIIa, having an output of <1 mW.

The decently high-powered green lasers pointers used in astronomy for pointing out stars and constellations, are at the legal limits of a class IIIa laser pointer, rated at <5 mW, and they are easily 50 times more powerful than the standard red lasers used in presentation. Thus, their beam can be seen clearly in the nightsky.

Using the laser diode from a CD/DVD drive, I plan to create a homemade Class IIIb laser, which has sufficient output power to melt thin plastic and tape, possibly light matches and pop balloons. Also, another main purpose is a workaround to the Singapore Law, which does not permit the importing of Class IIIb lasers.

After my first attempt at construction a Class IIIb laser which failed, I couldn’t resist giving it another shot. I mean, boys will be boys and thus, lasers are ALWAYS cool.

I brought a DVD-RW drive this time, second hand this time, at $40. Fair enough…

From my experiences with the CD-RW drive, opening the drive was quite straightforward as both drives are based on similar concepts.

First, I removed the chassis.

And the circuit board…

And finally, isolate the laser diode from the rest of the drive.

The laser diode is mounted onto a heatsink, which has many many lens and outputs the laser onto the CD/DVD.

Since we only want the laser diode, might as well remove everything else…

The laser diode was mounted so securely to the metal heatsink that after 1 hour of sawing, I gave up trying to remove it. Maybe another time…

Here, you can finally see the laser diode in its heatsink with everything else stripped off.

The contact points of the laser diode!

From my previous attempt, I knew that the laser diode was attached to the entire heatsink which was at ground, so I simply needed to connect one end of the batteries to the heatsink, and the other end to one of the 3 contact points.

And it works! Compared to the CD-RW drive, the laser here was extremely extremely bright and seemed very capable of burning stuffs.

So I tried to burn some stuffs. I started off with a piece of tissue. I held the tissue there for 5 seconds… and suddenly, the laser dimmed! WTF. I removed the tissue, tried again, and the laser was obviously dimmed. I added more batteries, from 2 AAs to 4 AAs, but the laser is still as dim and wouldn’t be as bright as previously…

This was extremely extremely weird, as the laser diode, for one, is definitely working as its lighting up. Secondly, only 2 batteries was used, so there’s no reason that the laser diode could be damaged by overvoltage. It just… suddenly dimmed. Until I can figure out what the heck happened… I’ll just leave it as it is.

Also, I gotta figure out someway to remove the laser diode from the metal heatsink. I could use a solder iron to soften the metal and force the laser diode, but I’m afraid the laser diode might be damaged.

Comments(0) 10:32 PM 12 December 2006

Dopod D810

Posted by HELiX

Gameboy Advance emulator with FFIV.

2.0 Megapixel Camera!

Surfin’ the web.

Eh. My bad drawing.

MSN Messenger.

Skype!

Much other cool stuffs on the Pocket PC-Phone, but these are the few that I’m gonna highlight. =D

Comments(0) 11:32 PM 12 December 2006

Shopping spree, they call it.

Posted by HELiX

To put it simply, today I went shopping. Yes, shopping.

Ok, it started with my Dopod D810. Or maybe the cooler name, HTC Trinity. But either way, I’m in love~ JUST LOOK.

Some of its features? WIFI-enabled, meaning you can connect to wireless internet networks and use the web browser to surf the net, sign in to MSN Messenger, etc etc etc! Oh, it comes with 3.5G, so I can practically access the internet in the most remote areas of Singapore as long as there is a telecom connection. Also available are video calls, and the touch screen’s such a beauty. Except that my fingers are too fat and the stylus gets irritating sometimes. Oh oh and Windows Mobile is such a new experience. Okok normally for mobile phones, when you receive a message, you get that dumb plain tone thing. Here, the default tone is “You have 1 new message” in that famed Windows female voice. so LOL. I’m trying playing around with it, so until I learn more… it’s still cool anyways, heh.

After I got my Dopod at West Mall, I headed over to CDANS to see whether I can get the astro BBQ chalet booked. To be honest, no offence intended to y’all organisers and blah blah blah whatsoever, at the rate things were being planned, nothing would be done and so I just thought that I might as well settle it. Well, the weekends were fully booked, and they needed 3 working days in advance for the booking, so there’s ONLY thursday available. And thursday it is. $68.25, quite cheap if you ask me. Yup, so that’s the second thing I shopped for. A chalet. =___=

Weeeeell, what happened then was… it was still early. So… so… my mom. Yes, my mom. Decided to be random and asked me whether I wanted to wear contacts instead of specs. I have nothing against them, but in fact I find having 4 eyes kinda inconvenient at times. I’m pretty sure all the myopia victims know what I mean. And the plan was that, she wanted me to TRY contacts. So we entered the shop, and my mom was attracted by most expensive lenses. Those permanent types, lasting 2 years, tailor-made and stuffs. $220. Since it was the most cost-effective, my mom said I should try that and thus, I got PERMANENT LENSES. Made in UK, shipped to Singapore and collection this Saturday. Ahh well.

So I got home, played with my Dopod a bit, and went off again for more shopping. This time, I wanted to get materials for Lab@Home. It’s addictive I tell ya.

I walked around the Bugis area for stuffs like hardware shops and junk shops, but the former were all closed at 6pm and the junk shops… Well, I was looking for used Microwave Ovens, and they only had refrigerators (phase-change cooling project in the future? BUT I gotta learn brazing), TVs, audio systems, air-cons and washing machines. After 2 hours I gave up and headed for Sim Lim Square. There, I found the Microsoft Intellimouse Explorer 3.0 selling at $69.90, was extremely tempted to buy, but… I think China and HK might be cheaper. So I didn’t.

And I returned home again.

And I left home again for more shopping.

Well, not exactly… but I arranged to buy a DVD Writer at 2nd hand to continue my High-Powered Class 3b Laser Lab@Home project. So I met the dealer at CCK MRT, paid $40 for the DVD Writer (it’s $70 first hand) and so here we are, attempt 2 at making a high-powered laser. If it fails… $40 gone… AH WELL.

Comments(0) 12:46 AM 12 December 2006

COME HERE YOU DOPOD.

Posted by HELiX

And so today I was to get my Dopod D810, aka HTC Trinity, retailing at $1298.

So my dad brought me to West Mall’s Singtel shop at almost 8.45pm. 15 mins from closing time. No problems there.

We reached. And guess what? 15 mins from closing time, we got into the queue system. Those ticket kinda things with a number.

Uh huh…

Nothing wrong there right? Indeed indeed. But there were something like 90 people waiting in line in front of us, and the staff advised us that our turn will come in roughly two hours, way past their closing time.

And thus ends the story of why I didn’t get my Dopod today =(

TOMORROW IT SHALL BE =D

Comments(0) 10:46 PM 12 December 2006

Lab@Home Update: Final Infrared Camera Pics

Posted by HELiX

I think I’m over-hyped over the infrared camera, so this is probably my last post on how coooool the camera is. Unless, I get some cool suggestion or idea or whatsoever. Yup.

Okok, I tried the infrared camera on various objects over the past few days, and these are among the cooler ones.

Comments(0) 7:02 PM 12 December 2006

Delaaaaay.

Posted by HELiX

Just as much as I am well-versed in the art of draaaagging, my parents are too.

Apparently, they draaaaagged our vacation. It was originally planned for 11th to 26th (or something) December, and because they draaaaagged, they couldn’t get any tickets and now it’s 18th to 31st December. In fact, they were verging for the return trip on 3rd Jan ‘08.

As such, this is has become the vacation-latest-into-december I ever had. I mean, usually- no ALWAYS, my vacations starts on early december and spans over 3 weeks easily.

Fortunately, our afternoon plane will NOT be shot down by the New Year celebrations’ fireworks. But the return trip on the 31st makes me wonder, wouldn’t it be COOL if our vacation was somewhere slightly beyond the international dateline, and after celebrating New Year at whatever country that is, we cross over the international dateline again and get to celebrate again? Um. Hm.

So, so, you might be asking, where to?

Apparently, because my family aren’t that rich [insert sad face] my parents decided on cheapass China, Guangzhou I think. Well, not really. In fact, it’s Guangzhou and Hong Kong.

And half of you now are probably like, HONG KONG AGAIN?!

Well, here’s a quick fact if you aren’t expecting my family to drop by Hong Kong for vacations anytime soon. When my family went to Taiwan a few years back, Hong Kong was included as well. Few years back again, Beijing, Hong Kong again. Tokyo and Shanghai last year? Hong Kong.

Basically, as long as the country of interest is in Asia, there’ll be a good chance of Hong Kong being included.

Why? To make the long story not any shorter, my late grandparents were from Hong Kong and had a decently respectable house there blah blah blah so in Hong Kong, my family doesn’t need to pay for accommodation! I can go on to elaborate how respectable the house is, or why my grandparents left it for Singapore as with many other migrants, or even include a short bit on the East India Company’s domination of South-East Asia, but I won’t.

Ah, so generally, each year, it’s [insert country here] for sightseeing, and Hong Kong for shopping and free stay.

…

After the success of the infrared cam, I’m veryyyy tempted to do more lab work. Maybe it’s the underlying hitch to get electrocuted again. So fun.

Comments(0) 12:14 AM 12 December 2006

coooooooooool. period.

Posted by HELiX

The infrared camera only gets COOLER.

Ok, my Science Team file with a gradient of yellowish colours and stuffs.

Before and after images again!

Comments(0) 3:59 PM 12 December 2006