Learning Electronics With Arduino

Welcome! 

I decided to tackle the functionality of my project first which I will be prototyping using an Arduino Uno. For about $35 I was able to get the Uno, a motor shield, 3 ultrasonic sensors and a chip off of ebay. Next came the need for other components to learn with. Luckily for me Vince (who is actually the person who came up with this idea and was nice enough to let me try my hand at building it) provided me with a bunch of resistors, wires, a solderless breadboard and other components to get started with. Watching some tutorials on youtube I was able to get a LED to flash! Yay me! 

I attended a workshop at Xerocraft which covered PCBs and soldering to help me down the road. Thanks to Steve for holding the workshop!

Next I decided to try my hand at getting a stepper motor going... still messing with it as I have not yet actually got it to move.. but below is a picture.. I think I need a bigger workspace.. what do you think?

Introduction

Hello and welcome!

This blog is to document my journey to create a working (minus the shooting bullets part) shoulder mounted Gatling gun for a steam punk costume. I have given myself roughly one year to do this. It will involve me learning a plethora of new skills which consist of, but are not limited to the following...

• Electronics
• Programming
• Soldering
• Metal Working
• Leather Working
• Painting
• A WHOLE LOT MORE!

While I am aware I could make something is aesthetically decent with PVC, and have it sit there and just look nice, maybe spin the barrel.. I am an over achiever and will not settle for that. I will (as much as possible) be using metal, I am thinking copper for most of it. I will also be making it so that it moves left/right up/down, controlled either by some sort of joystick or if I can figure it out it will actually mimic the movements of my head (head movement is the goal, but am being realistic with my limited abilities.)

Before this project I have done a minuscule amount of programming and essentially none of the other items that I figure I will need for this project. This is definitely going to force me to learn a lot.. So... If you have any constructive criticism please do not hesitate to comment or email me to give me your feedback.