Sunday, December 20, 2015

All That and a Bag of Chips - The Talking Gift Box

The Talking Gift Box


Items Needed for this project:
  1. Gift Box - I used the box that the necklace I purchased came in. 
  2. 5x7 cm prototype board
  3.  64M bit MP3 Voice Module Serial SPI FLASH SSOP24 Amplifier MINI USB for Arduino
  4. (4) momentary switches
  5. 1uF Capacitor
  6. 10uF Capacitor
  7. 7805 Voltage Regulator
  8. 220 Ohm Resistor
  9. 4 pin header
  10. 5mm LED and LED holder
  11. Speaker with 4 pin female header
  12. On/Off Switch

 The 7805 Voltage Regulator was scavenged from scrap parts we had in the club's shop
The piece of aluminum it is attached to made a great heat sink and wire organizer. 

This is the schematic I found to regulate the 9V battery down to 5V to power the MP3 Module

  Here is a great video that shows how the MP3 Module works:

The maker of the video I mentioned above was nice enough to include the
instruction manual in his support files. This image of the pinout is from that PDF
This is a link to go to his support page




 I installed the buttons on the bottom of the prototype board so that they
can stick out of the top of the box and all the components can have room inside the box

 Finished all the wiring.

 I added Velcro to the bottom of the board to allow removal if I wanted to upload different sounds

 Finished the lid. The LED lights up to let you know when the circuit is on.
I got my son to add the sound effects.  He says "Ho Ho Ho" on the Santa Button
"Merry Christmas" on the Christmas Wreath button, "I Love You Mommy" on the Heart
button and "Bonsai!" on the Karate Kid button.

 I hid the speaker and 9V battery under the necklace
 All connected.

 See it in action.


Thursday, December 17, 2015

All That and a Bag of Chips - The CHIPSmas Wreath

The Christmas Light Circuit
My original plan was to have two of these circuits running to add to the randomness of the lights.

 The Schematic of the Christmas Light Circuit

 Went for some festive colored wire and weaved it through some of the prototype
board for more of a decorative look

 Finished wiring the prototype board

 Prepping the RAM chips
The Heat gun made short work of the glue on those labels.

I drilled holes in 20 chips and inserted 5mm LED holders

I used small gauge wire to solder to the LEDs for easy wiring.

Foam core base

 Once I got the RAM into place I glued each one down to the foam core with hot glue.

I used more foam core for the back of the wreath to protect the wiring.
 
 Inserting and Gluing the LEDs in the RAM chips

 I made a small hole under the RAM to run the LED wire from the front to the back of the wreath.

 I ran 18 Gauge solid wire around the wreath for a ground. At each place I needed to attach an LED to ground I just whittled the protective coating off ground wire, twisted the LED wire around the exposed part and then soldered for extra strength.

Hard Drive arms make a great Christmas Star.
 
 Gluing down the hard drive stepper motors and Hard Drive star as ornaments. 

The CHIPSmas Wreath and all its glory.  



Watch the full video here


Thanks for stopping by our blog.
~Kilo (All That and a Bag of Chips)