Mudd Makers

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In this blog I’m going to share some cool projects Mudders have completed in their free time. Some people think technical minds of scientists, engineers, and mathematicians lack creativity, but here at Mudd we know technical expertise complements it rather well. That’s why many students use their know-how to ingeniously modify, hack, or build their own contraptions. There’s enough of a maker community here at Mudd that we even have a club dedicated to supporting students in their maker space endeavors, namely the Fabrication Lab or FabLab. FabLab provides resources and funding for student projects, and one of the projects I discuss (mine, actually) is an example of such a project. But many Mudders forage their own paths in their maker space pursuits. Read on to learn more.

Pool Pacer Project

Moving pulses around on our prototype. Coolest thing you've seen all day, amirite?

Moving pulses around on our prototype. Coolest thing you’ve seen all day, amirite?

This is my own project! I’m working on it with two other students, and we hope to have it completed before the end of the year. I’m a swimmer, and I thought to myself; it would be useful to have a visual reference that tells me how fast I need to be going while I swim (because no matter how loud coach yells I just can’t hear him in the water). So my friends and I connected an addressable LED strip to an Arduino and programmed it such that we can send multiple pulses of light down the strip at whatever speed we want. We now need to waterproof the prototype and then scale up, but it should be a lot fun. The final version should be twenty meters long and lie at the bottom of a pool, able to be used by our coach via Bluetooth.
Electric Longboard

Hella regal

Ben being hella regal

This is Ben Kunst, a junior engineering major from Maryland. Ben is kind of a beast, because he built that odd looking thing that he’s standing on. You might recognize it (the board, not Ben) from one of my previous blogs where I talked about various modes of transportation Mudders use. Here is a close-up of the board.

BenLongboard

Not to be confused with a certain figure from Ed, Ed n Eddy on cartoon network way back when, though they may look similar.

plank

This, believe it or not, is a remote control electric-motor powered longboard. Ben quite literally slapped this together in the few hours before his first Hackathon, ironically. Not seen in the picture is the remote control he uses to vary the speed he goes, but an active imagination will suffice. He used the cheapest most powerful motor he could find, and the rest was circuitry based on a remote control car. It might not look like much but it can get going pretty fast. You always know when he’s coming by on it too, because it sounds like the wrath of a thousand angry hornets.

LED Longboard

A mad hacker at work.

A mad hacker at work.

This is Senghor. Senghor is also a junior engineering major. Senghor also hacked his longboard, but this time for aesthetic rather than functionality. He started his freshman year, with a simple addition of an LED light strip to his longboard. He gradually added more functionality to it each progressive year, and this year he actually has two completely addressable, programmable LED strips on his board that he can control using an android app via Bluetooth. Check it out.

senghorLongboard1

The underside, where the two strips are taped, and where the control box resides.

In it's full glory.

In it’s full glory.