18th Hull Raspberry Pi Jam

I went to the 18th Hull Raspberry Pi Jam today. It was great. They had loads of Raspberry Pi machines set up and a lovely exercise wiring up neopixels. Everyone who did the lab was knocked out by how easy it is to create and control coloured light displays from software. I was showing off the work in progress for my LED Cube, which is presently two of my older panels connected to a Raspberry Pi and displaying demo images. I’m using this software to drive the panels and it works a treat.

I was telling anyone who would listen (there were a few) that the panels I really wanted to use were stuck in UK customs. I’m really hoping that soon they will be released, I can pay whatever hefty duty they figure out that I owe and I can get on with building the device.

Then I got to talking to Jon about his recent project which involved making an awesome piece of artwork. For his next one he’s going to be using a coin mechanism. These are the devices that you find on fruit machines and the like. Apparently you can buy them from Ali-Express for not much money. So I’ve bought one.

You configure the mechanism by setting it in “learn” mode and then inserting loads of a particular kind of coin. It can remember three different types of coin and the output is a simple sequence of pulses that should be easy to pick up with an Arduino or Raspberry Pi.

I’ve absolutely no idea what I will use it for. I was thinking of taking it to a hardware meetup and offering people the chance to see if it recognises their coins:

“Lets see if it can recognise your two pound coin. Oh, bad luck. Sorry, no I can’t get your money back again.”

If nothing else, this could be a nice little earner. The device has cost me considerably less than a computer game and I think I’ll have at least as much fun with it.

The next Raspberry Pi Jam (which I think will be the 19th), is on the 14th of March. This upsets me, because I would really like to go but I won’t be able to make it. Kudos to Jon and Matt who organised the event, provided the coloured pixels and then helped everyone to make them light up.