The good idea to mount a Swytch electric kit battery on the Brompton front luggage block had consequences. I’d lost a bestest way of carrying a bag. Finding an easy-on, easy-off bag for the rear...
when you want an e-bike and you don’t want another bike:
, If you’re a casual electronics hobbyist like me, the idea of using a LCD magnifier or microscope may seem attractive. For example this music spectrum display kit requires soldering 240 SMD LEDs, with...
topics on this page: what do I eat? how does my weight change? do I get enough sleep? where did I go today? how does my body react to exercise? introducing Google Fit You...
If you’re looking for a smartwatch consider the Huawei Watch / Huawei Band / family of wearables If you’ve yet to get yourself a smartwatch I’ll have a guess at the reason. One negative...
see the list of ways to sync all your Huawei watch data to other fitness apps SUPPORTED APPS as of 2022 SOURCES: you can send your health data starting from Coros, Diabetes:M, Fitbit, Garmin,...
What’s going on? Hec, I’m in a room with robot arms and fingers twitching as they respond to social media. THIS can only be art but it’s art powered by makers. Tucked away is...
There are LED strip lights where every LED can be doing something different with the result that you can create peculiar effects. You can start with a commercially available kit but after a while...
There are ‘analogue’ LED lights on a tape that do a fine job of creating interesting lighting. All the LED lights on the strip usually do the same brightness or colour. There are also...
The digits at one end of a large LED clock displayed much more dimly than they ought. I’d say they were about half the brightness – and it was quite a puzzle. The clock...
… how to service or replace the brewing unit on a Jura coffee machine and other fixes. It might be assumed that if you can afford the BMW of coffee machines, you can afford...
Some cheesecakes are set with gelatin and have smooth, jelly-like texture. This cheesecake is baked and sets due to its whipped egg. When chilled it has an appealing dry, soft, crumbly texture. I use...
A garden marquee is quite the thing in times not only when only outdoor mixing is allowed but also when you live in a climate with rainy summers. This page collects my experience of...
Here is advice to save money without affecting what you end up with. In short: your patio is going to end up looking like it was going to end up. Many tradespeople have a...
A page where I record successful repairs as they happen. The parts list on my 2008 C-series is downloadable below. Steering Problem – can’t steer The Countax steering mechanism is surprisingly simple – a...
If you need to know when a device, like a dryer or washing machine has completed its work, get a ‘smart plug with energy monitoring‘. Amazon list many of them but whichever brand you...
This ceiling ‘coffer’ is lit by four 5m LED strips cut down to size fitted in 2017. If you wanted really, really bright light, these analogue white LED strips were the thing to get....
My household can’t be the only one that burns the food. The dial on this shiny, expensive Smeg oven not only gives a wrong temperature, the temperature varies over a wide range. I replaced...
A home automation platform, such as Home Assistant, allows you to make temperature v time graphs using sensors that you might place around the home. Monitoring temperatures allowed me to get my heating devices...
This insanely bright headlamp / flashlight is excellent for hobbies, camping and cycling. Here are a few instructions to use it well This flashlight (aka torch) requires 2 x 18650 Lithium cells which have...
I discover my bicycle headlamp wasn’t working because some 18650 batteries have a button top. Oh my, that was embarrassing to admit The 18650 ‘battery’, like many batteries, is named according to its dimensions....
Here’s what to do when a restaurant asks you to scan a QR code for their track and trace (written in 2020). And here’s how to identify a plant, an animal and lots more....
a 3-gang wall switch for your home automation – using eWelink, T4EU1C and Home Assistant I got to a point where I had plenty of ‘smart’ lights and gadgets but few switches. But then...
In a previous project I set up temperature sensors in my room and sent the data via Bluetooth to Home Assistant, the home automation platform. Home Assistant is software that can record measurements and...
If you could look inside an old replaceable laptop battery pack like this you’d find 4 or 6 cells. Usually the cells are 18mm diameter, 65mm long and are called 18650 lithium batteries. Each...
Sometimes a laptop goes into a comatose state that no amount of charging or on-offing can end. If the laptop has a removable battery the solution might be to Disconnect the power supply and...
‘Smart meters’ and metering devices usually measure the electricity used by the whole house*. However I prefer to pay attention to the electricity used by individual devices, such as a combination oven, fan heater...
smart sockets have uses. A smart socket adds a little cleverness to a table lamp or electric heater. The printer upstairs takes five minutes to warm up so switching it on by remote control...
see also more about 433MHz devices The letterbox is five doors and fifty metres from my desk. The uncertainty of the post lady arriving in the afternoon means that I make wasted journeys to...
This quick post is for anybody wondering how much money they need to put aside for energy. If you don’t use electricity for keeping warm, your summer and winter electricity bills will be similar....
smart bulbs and sockets have select uses. A smart socket adds a little on/off cleverness to a table lamp, electric heater or the printer upstairs that takes five minutes before it’s warm and useful....
… and see how to add features to the Home Assistant display An interest in solar energy is a possible reason to record the sun’s azimuth and the time of sunset. Home Assistant can track...
The Google nest thermostat or its Hive equivalent are items which I’d be happy to pay for rather than make. A first reason is that we rely too much on warmth, and a second...
I am the person who wants to know if using an electric fan heater in one room costs less than heating the whole house using gas*. At parties I can keep a sofa to...
Domestic hot water can be heated by a gas or oil central heating boiler or by an electrical immersion heater. I take advantage of half-price nighttime electricity and use an immersion heater. In this...
ready dec 2020
There are a variety of camera types to help monitor the drive, a pet, a baby, a device, a bird feeder – whatever. You might want to know what’s eating the rabbit’s food or...
Here’s how to add a little functionality to Home Assistant, the automation platform. Do try this especially if you’re just starting to add features to Home Assistant. speedtestdotnet: scan_interval: hours: 4 Go to the...
Travel information can be one of the things you need easy access to. If you have Google Home or Alexa you’ll find it helpful to recall the exact way to ask for the info....
The LED striplights in a kitchen use 12v transformers and they are powered through smart plugs / sockets. The sockets are by TP-link – and they remember their on-off state if ever there’s a...
rogerfrost.com is a compendium of ideas for using technology with sciencey questions in mind. When Roger Frost started it in 1995 it offered ideas to school science teachers. Since 2020 it’s broadened to cover home automation and all sorts of gadgets and ways to monitor, or understand, what’s going on around us.
Use the search – everything is tagged and categorised for finding.
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Roger Frost has been writing since 1988 and this web includes his paper published articles about the developing use of the Internet; the work of scientists and how any of us might find technology useful at home or school.
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