There's a lot of work being done on anaerobic digesters at UC Davis as well: http://news.ucdavis.edu/search/news_detail.lasso?id=10202 Patrik On Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 12:45 PM, Matthew Meier <wolfy(a)wlfy.it> wrote:

That's cool, and seems like maybe it might make a good pair with a gasifier to take care of whatever makes it through. On Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 12:45 PM, Matthew Meier <wolfy(a)wlfy.it> wrote: _______________________________________________ sudo-discuss mailing list sudo-discuss(a)lists.sudoroom.org http://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss

Hi Folks, We had a good session last night, with a mushroom environmental control system and an RGB color mixer both advancing to the next operational stage, a beer brewing robot gaining a good amount of ground on its grainy prey, and a wood gasifier control system not getting much attention at all as the maker was having such a good time helping others out and generally talking shop. Also had a first-time solderer successfully execute a cut-and-solder list on some heavy amperage connections, learned how to google our debugging problems into submission, extolled the virtues of power transistor arrays, and determined experimentally that it probably isn't a good idea to put a glass jar of process water in a bench vise. Throw in some chips and salsa, and a good night was had by all. I'd like to make this a recurring thing and build momentum in the cycle of getting an idea, turning it into a project, building the project, and coming away with more and better ideas. To facilitate this, we could take over the newly (?) vacated alternating tuesday meetup spot at sudo room. I propose we break it up into one night a month for fresh ideas and new entrants, one night a month for refining and implementing more developed ideas. Here is what I propose: Microcontroller Project Hack Night @sudo room March 26 @ 5:30PM - 11PM April 23 @ 5:30PM - 11PM May 21 @ 5:30PM - 11PM "A shared worktime for tackling microcontroller and robotics projects. Bring that complex project you've been putting off finishing and hunker down around the communal soldering iron and serial terminal for a high-productivity, high-spirited build night. Both independent work and collaboration strongly engouraged, as are snacks and other refreshments." Basic Microcontroller Hack Night @sudo room April 9 @ 5:30PM - 11PM May 7 @ 5:30PM - 11PM "A good night for both beginning and more experienced microcontroller users. Emphasis is on first principles, trying out new sensors and actuators, testing out new ideas that haven't yet found a home in a project, and cracking open black boxes of all sorts for fresh ideas. Eventually we will have low-cost starter kits available to get beginners hacking right away." Are there any scheduling conflicts? Do people want to meet up more than twice a month or does this seem like enough to satisfy your need for group hacking sessions in this area? My theory is that we can always meet more than this, but scheduling too many (ie weekly) meetups will max out peoples bandwidth and result in decreased cohesion between attendees. I will also work on getting this added to the calendar in the near future. Cheers, Hol _______________________________________________ sudo-discuss mailing list sudo-discuss(a)lists.sudoroom.org http://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss

Hi Folks, We had a good session last night, with a mushroom environmental control system and an RGB color mixer both advancing to the next operational stage, a beer brewing robot gaining a good amount of ground on its grainy prey, and a wood gasifier control system not getting much attention at all as the maker was having such a good time helping others out and generally talking shop. Also had a first-time solderer successfully execute a cut-and-solder list on some heavy amperage connections, learned how to google our debugging problems into submission, extolled the virtues of power transistor arrays, and determined experimentally that it probably isn't a good idea to put a glass jar of process water in a bench vise. Throw in some chips and salsa, and a good night was had by all. I'd like to make this a recurring thing and build momentum in the cycle of getting an idea, turning it into a project, building the project, and coming away with more and better ideas. To facilitate this, we could take over the newly (?) vacated alternating tuesday meetup spot at sudo room. I propose we break it up into one night a month for fresh ideas and new entrants, one night a month for refining and implementing more developed ideas. Here is what I propose: Microcontroller Project Hack Night @sudo room March 26 @ 5:30PM - 11PM April 23 @ 5:30PM - 11PM May 21 @ 5:30PM - 11PM "A shared worktime for tackling microcontroller and robotics projects. Bring that complex project you've been putting off finishing and hunker down around the communal soldering iron and serial terminal for a high-productivity, high-spirited build night. Both independent work and collaboration strongly engouraged, as are snacks and other refreshments." Basic Microcontroller Hack Night @sudo room April 9 @ 5:30PM - 11PM May 7 @ 5:30PM - 11PM "A good night for both beginning and more experienced microcontroller users. Emphasis is on first principles, trying out new sensors and actuators, testing out new ideas that haven't yet found a home in a project, and cracking open black boxes of all sorts for fresh ideas. Eventually we will have low-cost starter kits available to get beginners hacking right away." Are there any scheduling conflicts? Do people want to meet up more than twice a month or does this seem like enough to satisfy your need for group hacking sessions in this area? My theory is that we can always meet more than this, but scheduling too many (ie weekly) meetups will max out peoples bandwidth and result in decreased cohesion between attendees. I will also work on getting this added to the calendar in the near future. Cheers, Hol _______________________________________________ sudo-discuss mailing list sudo-discuss(a)lists.sudoroom.org http://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss

I think we would do well to try out a few different busses and come up a list of subsystems that would best run on each bus. There are Dallas 1-wire and I2C 2-wire busses, CANbus for ground vehicles http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CAN_bus, 1553 for aircraft and spacecraft http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIL-STD-1553, and I'd be very interested in learning what type of bus is used for building and industrial automation. Any others? I would bet the CANbus arduino library is out there somewhere ...wait...http://arduino.cc/forum/index.php?topic=8626.0 BOOM ...LCD gauge cluster anyone? _______________________________________________ sudo-discuss mailing list sudo-discuss(a)lists.sudoroom.org http://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss