Any good summer electrical projects?

[Jon Stratis]

Originally Posted by JamesCH95

I'm not a fancy electrical type, but I have an interesting project you might try:

I was trying to microwave popcorn last night, and I had to listen to the kernels pop and stop the microwave after I started hearing 2 seconds of silence between pops. This was pretty annoying because I had to sit there for 4 or 5 minutes hitting "add 30 seconds" on the microwave. I bet you could make a device that would hit the required keys on a microwave (+30sec and stop) and use a microphone or some audio device to recognize pops. Maybe throw in a couple 555 timers (one to check time between pops, one to keep the microwave running by hitting +30sec), logic gates, a relay or two (controlling solenoids that press the microwave's buttons), and you've got a reasonably complex circuit to perfectly cook popcorn.

Best of luck in your summer projects.

This reminds me of my college days... A good example of how engineers can over complicate things very quickly...

The back door to the house we were renting had a very annoying habit of not latching when it was closed... and on those cold Cleveland nights it would blow open and waste a ton of heat before someone woke up, realized what happened, and closed it. Our solution... a small magnetic switch, timer circuit, and speaker... If the door was open for more than 30 seconds, the whole neighborhood knew about it!

In retrospect, we could have fixed the latch... but that wouldn't have been nearly as much fun.