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Hi-fi, Radio, and Retro: The DIY Projects Spectrum Readers Love

Cars That Think

Far and away our most popular article in the last five years has been “ Build Your Own Professional-Grade Audio Amp on the Sort of Cheap ” (November 2018). And a follow-up to that article, “ A Web-Enabled, High Quality, DIY Audio Amp ” (March 2022), comes in at No. Are there trends in DIY projects you think we’re missing?

DIY 78
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A DIY Tracker Tough Enough for the Arctic

Cars That Think

So, I set about building an open-source ice tracker from DIY components that not only proved to be much, much cheaper but also much more capable than the commercial options. James Provost We tested the basic design by deploying a prototype onto the ice in February 2021.

DIY 94
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From Cleaning Offices to Designing EV Charging Stations

Cars That Think

Greta Bekerytė started out cleaning offices and ended up designing electronics for EV charging stations. He was a DIY enthusiast willing to try his hand at just about anything, from electronics to plumbing. The job involved designing signaling systems on subsea oil wells. It wasn’t easy. she says. “So It weighs 1.3

Clean 100
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A DIY E-bike Conversion on the Cheap

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At the time, e-bikes were still rather exotic, at least in the United States, so it seemed worth the expense and effort to build my own. It uses an "outrunner" motor designed for electric skateboards. motor designed for electric skateboards for $88 and fashioned a mount for it out of a few pieces of scrap aluminum.

DIY 145
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Build Your Own Hi-fi Ear Defenders

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Now, after countless versions of wiring things together, and even designing my own audio mixers, I finally have a DIY solution that works within a reasonable budget. The WM8960 has a quieter initial gain stage that’s designed for microphones. It was for the audio codec chip by Wolfson, the $18 WM8960.

Building 119
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A DIY E-bike Conversion on the Cheap

Cars That Think

At the time, e-bikes were still rather exotic, at least in the United States, so it seemed worth the expense and effort to build my own. It uses an "outrunner" motor designed for electric skateboards. motor designed for electric skateboards for $88 and fashioned a mount for it out of a few pieces of scrap aluminum.

DIY 98
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Build a Passive Radar With Software-Defined Radio

Cars That Think

Building off the demand stimulated by this activity, a number of manufacturers have started making premium, but still relatively cheap, SDRs. This includes RTLx-based USB sticks built with better supporting components and designs versus the original TV tuners, and completely new receivers such as the RSPDx. James Provost.