A Machine That Goes Bing!

Some of you might remember the famous sketch from Monthy Python's The Meaning of Life featuring the machine that goes Bing!

Although its sole purpose is to go Bing!, the concept of such a machine appealed to me for no particular reason. Besides, I had a few electronic parts that I needed to test so I figured that a machine that goes Bing! was just as good as any.

The requirements for my design were the following.

• The machine must go Bing! when there is someone nearby only.
• The machine must be running autonomously and use very little power. No PC or fancy image analysis algorithm must be used.

For detection, I've used a HC-SR501 passive infrared sensor. It has a BISS0001 chip on board along with all the filter components so that once installed, all you have to do is to provide a 5~24V supply and you get a high digital output when it detects someone. Trivial. I bought this thing from DealExtreme for a measly 4$. Well worth its price. You can even adjust the sensibility and delay timing using two neat variable resistors mounted directly on the board.

For the part that goes Bing!, I had a spare 5~12V buzzer on hand, so I figured I'd use that. But a buzzer isn't something that goes Bing! in itself; a direct current would only make the membrane go to one of its limit and produce a single 'click' sound. What I needed to use was some kind of oscillator so that the current would oscillate and make the buzzer's membrane do the same.

My first idea was to build a simple RC oscillator using an operational amplifier chip and a few resistors/capacitors. As I realized I was fresh out of capacitors (yeah, believe it or not there is such a thing as running out of capacitors) I had to change my design and transgress one of my original objectives that I had set. Without capacitors, you just can't build an oscillator. My final solution is to use an ATMEGA-328 chip (for those who care to know, it is an Arduino Duemilanove board with a 328 chip instead of a 168) and do the oscillation with a pulse-width modulated (PWM) signal. It takes much more current than it should, compared to a simple oscillating circuit, but fear not, I've ordered a bunch of capacitors. As soon as I'm re-stocked, I'll revisit the design.

Pictured above is the final assembled machine. I've even thrown in a few extra goodies, namely a SD card reader so I can record every time the machine goes Bing!, and a neat little LED.

Wiring wise, the project was absolutely trivial to assemble. Had I built myself the oscillator, there would be much to talk about in this blog post, but things being what they are, I managed to wire the whole thing using a simple prototyping board and a few wires.

I'll certainly revisit this project in a near future, as I plan to build some day a homebrewed home automation system. I've already ordered a bunch of 5VDC-120VAC relays and 315Mhz transmitters that I intend to put to good use, and intrusion detection will certainly be part of the whole.