This Ring camera hack helps me keep a close eye on my deadliest tech

In medicine, the term “off-brand” is used when a doctor prescribes a drug for a reason or in a manner that is neither specifically intended by the manufacturer nor approved by the FDA. When doctors prescribe an off-label drug, it is usually because they think it that drug will be successful in treating a condition that does not have a good solution with another drug.

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I’m not a doctor, and I don’t even play a doctor on TV. But as a techie who tends to work on special or unusual purpose projects, I often use electronics and software in unlabelled ways. That’s what I did with Amazon Ring Stick Up Cam Battery. This is Are not what Amazon intended for this product, but it still works great.

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Battery Ring Stick Up Cam

The battery-powered Ring camera can be placed anywhere.

Observe the laser and the wheel of death

The off-label problem I want to solve is to see Glowforge laser cutting machine And Inventables X-Carve CNC while they are working to make sure nothing bad happens. After all, Glowforge is a robotic laser — it fires a real laser beam — that burns material to cut or carve it. The X-Carve is a robotic cutter that can spin a steel cutter at thousands of revolutions per minute.

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So yes. In one room, I had a robot-controlled laser beam that could cut through most materials, and in another, I had a robot-controlled death wheel. My wife is very tolerant. I’m very lucky.

Usually, the best way to use either of these machines is to stay by their side as they work. That way, if something goes wrong, you can see it happen and shut down the robot. Unfortunately, it’s annoying to be in the room with either of these machines.

Even though I have an exhaust fan that sucks out the Glowforge smoke just outside, the small room where it’s located is still full of smoke that lingers long after the cutting is complete.

And even though I have a CNC vacuum cleaner, there’s still a lot of very fine particulate matter that gets into the workshop air that I don’t want to breathe. Both machines are also extremely noisy, especially with the additional exhaust fans.

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Installing a camera is the next best thing to being there. through a remote camera, I can see these devices on my phone or computer. If there’s a problem, I’m just a room away.

Why is the camera battery stuck

I think about using a combination of a Raspberries and a webcam to monitor my 3D printer, but I don’t want the extra wires (and the complicated hours of configuring a custom monitoring Linux distro). Plus, Amazon has previously sent me Stick Up Cam Camera Battery back when they sent me one of their Alexas for review and it was on the shelf for review, waiting to be put into use.

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If that was all, I probably wouldn’t have chosen Stick Up Cam. But the device comes with a heavy battery. Amazon claims it can monitor a home for about six months on a single charge. The battery is easily removed from the camera and connected to any micro-USB charger for a full charge.

It also comes with the Ring app, allowing for live viewing in a desktop browser or on a phone. While I don’t need most Features of the ring ecosystem (like motion detection and two-way audio), basic functionality, and solid 1080p video quality is a win. Plus, setup is quick in five minutes, which is a huge win, especially compared to what it takes to connect a webcam to the Raspberry Pi and install a custom version of Linux.

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But there’s a problem: the field of view, especially below the camera, isn’t good enough to see my dangerous little robot friends. I need to modify the camera.

Custom camera mount design

I did a quick test with a piece of cardboard and found that while increasing the camera’s angle helps, that small angle isn’t nearly enough.

In order for the camera to have a full view of the inside of the Glowforge and to see the CNC base, I needed to tilt the camera 45 degrees. Unfortunately, that much tilt resulted in the camera tipping over. So I need to do something to keep it at 45 degrees.

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Since I’ve been working with CNC cutters and laser cutters, I decided to complete the desktop build trio with a 3D printed camera mount. I modeled it in 360 . fusion uses parameter values ​​(allows you to easily resize) and requires the design to recalculate and enhance (creates a mesh between the two objects and is how I make the angular rotation work) .

The design has three main features. To the left is a tube for you to slide the camera into. To the right is a rectangular area where you can slide in 1-2-3 blocks for counterweight. If you’re not familiar with 1-2-3 blocks, they’re inexpensive tools that measure one inch on one side, two inches on the other, and three inches on the third. They are high precision heavy duty steels and are used extensively in shops and laboratories. I have got it two from Amazon for $18.

This is what the final stand looks like after it comes out of the 3D printer.

The third feature of the design is a hook that allows me to hang it up when not in use. It fits my dashboard very well.

I’m very proud of remembering to cut a hole in it, it won’t matter if it doesn’t get the job done. Let’s see how it works.

Use Stick Up Cam Battery to monitor my device

This solution works really well. As you can see, it sits beautifully in the corner of my Glowforge forge. Because the camera is both wireless and battery-powered, there are no wires to interfere with the use of the laser. The only thing I had to do was remember to move the camera so it wouldn’t get in the way of opening the lid.

It does a great job monitoring the cuts. While you can’t see the actual laser beam doing the cutting, here’s a screenshot of the Stick Up Cam’s video feed shot while the laser was burning the plastic material. Just to be sure, if there’s a fire in the chamber, I’ll be able to see it — and act immediately.

I can see what’s going on without inhaling noxious odors — and that’s thanks to a custom exhaust fan that vents outside. I can’t imagine how difficult this is for laser users who don’t have outside ventilation.

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Battery life is pretty good. After 15 minutes of clipping, the battery level in the camera remained at 98%. This means I can do 20-50 projects on the laser cutter on a single battery charge (although in reality, I’ll probably recharge when the battery drops below 50%).

Since the device is portable, I can place it on anything I want to track. This is the unit that sits on my CNC machine.

So there you go. The Orange Pin Stickers makes for a great surveillance camera, especially when combined with the cheap weight and 3D printed stand. If you want to make one yourself, you can buy it camera And block 1-2-3 directly from Amazon. I have posted the .STL file for my 3D design on Thingiverse, so you can download that free of charge. 3D printers aren’t very expensive, so even if you don’t have one, you might consider buying one for projects like this. This is List of cheap 3D printers of ZDNET you may want to consider.

You can follow my daily project updates on social media. Remember to follow me on Twitter at @DavidGewirtzon Facebook at Facebook.com/DavidGewirtzon Instagram at Instagram.com/DavidGewirtzand on YouTube at YouTube.com/DavidGewirtzTV.