Very nice project. Well done. Maybe a hall or a reed sensor could help to automate calibration.

This sounds like something my brother would love as a gift.

I think the design looks like it came out of the 70s or 80s and it's great! Educational, too. :)

Just getting around to watching this now. Really cool outcome. Nice!!!

Nice project. You could 3d print a cam for the motor shaft and align it with the home position and then use a micro switch or a hall effect sensor to stop the moon at the home position.

that looks really awesome, would also double as a mood light for the living room.

Cool project! I'm curious if there's only 8 positions (New/Full, First/Third Quarter, Waxing/Waning Crescent/Gibbous) or if it gets more granular than that? You could remove the need for manual calibration each time it's started up relatively easily by adding a hall effect sensor to the top of the black acrylic column that the LED board is attached to and a magnet attached to the inside of the blocker hemisphere. It could also be neat to program in an idle mode where it would just slowly rotate to show a full month's rotation every 60 seconds, 5 minutes, 1 hour, or whatever amount you'd want.

Love this! Blogging it today... which I really should get on with...

Nice project, obviously the main thing to change is the silver paint that doesn't dry

Very nice 👍👍 I really liked it ❤❤

Its a nice approach from a learning perspective and looks great too! I was thinking at the start it was going to be an arduino, RTC module ann then just maths to calculate any phase based on days before / after current time. That way it does away with needing an internet connection and could return to current phase after a period of time. Certainly got me thinking on how I'd do this. Also thinking about could it be done with no moving parts and I think a strip of addressable LEDs and a 3d printed 'pie chart' for the inside of the moon, might work.

@lorrainbow

3 ай бұрын

oh yeah, so many ways you could do it. I'd like to do an offline version too cause it's difficult to demo these projects away from my home wifi. I like the LED idea, but I also love the 3d-ness of this project 😀

@Andrew_Sparrow

3 ай бұрын

Same...why rely on a internet service?

You do not need to have another device connected to the wifi just for this. As long as you can obtain the current time/date (RTC?) you can calculate moon phase by a relatively simple formula (unless you go too far back in time). But visually very nice. I would take it visually even closer to Back to the Future style and there are also 3D models of moon lamp shade, which you can 3D print for even more DIY spirit. With current 3D printer prices, there is little excuse for a maker not to have one. The stepper gets hot only if the driver sends too much current, which in this case is definitely not needed, there is adjustment on most stepper drivers using a reference voltage to limit the current and also since the motor is not under a load when not moving, there is "enable" pin on most drivers to disable steppers when not used.

I heard that Jaffa Cakes reference (17:08)! I'm actually looking to build something using more or less the same components, and was struggling to determine whether to use a Pi or an Arduino. That motor driver board looks as if it would work out.

@lorrainbow

3 ай бұрын

haha, yes I was definitely funnelling the Jaffa Cake ad accent! you could definitely do this with an arduino, I only used the Pi cause it's cheaper, less bulky than a full size arduino wifi board and I already had the code to connect to an API working from the last project.

Luv u for such content...

What could I think to change? Use NTP over WIFI to get the current date and time to position to that as the starting position, but to get to 'home', use a sensor or switch for the 'home' position wherever you think that should be. Just some musing.

I think i would have wanted it to default back to the current Phase as well as a time and date display

@WesleyNixon

3 ай бұрын

Came her to say this!

@lorrainbow

3 ай бұрын

Yeah, great idea!

zamzam water

Very cool but... did you try to look up in the sky?

@lorrainbow

3 ай бұрын

in 1955? 😀