In Action

The bricked and refurbished relay board seems to work ok when put into live action:

PinByPin

This DIY solution utilizes Seletek's PinByPin application and particulary it's ability to provide PWM power into selected DB9 connector pins. My aim is to heat two small dew heater bands in order to keep some critical components warm and moisture away during cold periods.

Ready for relay

Unfortunately I broke the tiny micro USB connector on PCB and had to solder VCC, GND, TX and RX pins using USB to TTL convertor cable instead of plain USB cable. But it works like a charm now again.

Do we agree?

Relay Shield

How many relays does it take to change a lightbulb?

Arduino ASCOM weather box (part 2)

This is a backup solution if main temperature sensors attached into tubes fail for some reason.

Arduino ASCOM weather box (part 1)

I did some Visual Studio ASCOM development work in VBS and created a simple device driver for Arduino based weather box equipped with basic weather sensors. This was far more easier than I tought. From level zero knowledge into a working driver took only a couple of hours.

D:\JTR\Dropbox\VBS\AstroWeather>test.cmd

D:\JTR\Dropbox\VBS\AstroWeather>cscript test.vbs //Nologo
START
AAW - Arduino Astro Weather
VMDPV_1|1_VMDPV
23.34
35.12
1013
END

D:\JTR\Dropbox\VBS\AstroWeather>test.cmd

D:\JTR\Dropbox\VBS\AstroWeather>cscript test.vbs //Nologo
START
AAW - Arduino Astro Weather
VMDPV_1|1_VMDPV
23.34
35.12
1013
END

D:\JTR\Dropbox\VBS\AstroWeather>cat test.vbs'
WScript.Echo "START"

set fw = CreateObject("ASCOM.AAW.SafetyMonitor")

fw.Connected = True
Wscript.Sleep 5000

WScript.Echo fw.Name
Wscript.Sleep 5000

Wscript.StdOut.Write fw.CommandString("TEMPERATURE")
Wscript.StdOut.Write fw.CommandString("HUMIDITY")
Wscript.StdOut.Write fw.CommandString("PRESSURE")

WScript.Echo
Wscript.Sleep 5000

fw.Connected = False

WScript.Echo "END"

Yet another relay

Relay system for devices

KMR is UDP relay able to switch 8 ports and IPR is 4 port IP relay system for AC  power. Now I can switch on or off CCD camera, mount, display, heaters, lights and whatever.

Remote controlled laser (Obi Wan Kenobi)

Now you can just click the icons to set laser (mounted into the tube) on or off.

Behind the curtains inside the good old BAT-files:

Filter offsets

This is the most useful Excel sheet I've ever written. It automatically calculates averaged filter offsets for your favourite image acquisition program. No need to use paper and calculator any more.

Nice NAS

What would you do with 80 TB on-line storage at home? I'm still searching the answer.

12 TB home laptop

I found some spare external USB2- and USB3-drives lying around and connected them into my main home desktop computer (laptop). This computer is rather old and at some point I upgraded it's system drive with fast SSD drive. Anyway now there is plenty of space for almost everything to play with.

AZ-sensor tune-up

Obi-Wan Kenobi

Actually this gadget helps pointing remote controlled telescope when one gets totally lost.