2017-09-29 (F) Weekly Summary

This whole week was about the possibilities of electronic business cards. Last week started the conversation and this week wrapped it up with a special announcement.

The first attempt was a failure. Without heavy modifications, it wasn't possible to make this design work. The problem came from trying to make contact with the battery terminals with only traces on the top of the business card. Copper tape had to be added to make a good connection which was essentially using the bottom of the card.

First attempt, hacked to work at all

The next attempt was made by tracing metal on both sides of the card. This was more expensive but it worked and allowed me to add graphics to both sides of the card. It used the same 555 timer circuit as the first attempt. Components were all soldered by hand.

My first working electronic business card

Another method of powering electronics relied on harvesting electronic fields like those found at an NFC base. This not only powers the card, but it can also act as a tool for finding the antenna shape and location. This makes the card functional.

Function NFC harvesting business card

Powering a card with a battery was found to be possible but soldering all the components by hand was laborious so another iteration was done which simply used LEDs which changed color while powered. They didn't require any special circuitry and were identical to the slow changing IMT LEDs which can be found inexpensively on eBay.

Simple color changing lights on a card

Story time! Writing for Charged has started back up. I’m on the road for the foreseeable future and not all of my projects can come with me so I need portable projects. Luckily, Charged just needs a computer with a word processor.

Dawson is starting off on a mission of his own while the ship’s construction remains underway. This should allow Dawson to explore a bit without the insulation of his crew. Plus, I get to introduce a totally awesome character I created a long time ago and flesh out his or her backstory.







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