Ask Slashdot: a Good Geek Project For My Arthritic Grandfather? 122
Posted
by
timothy
from the spy-on-the-neighbors'-lawn dept.
from the spy-on-the-neighbors'-lawn dept.
An anonymous reader writes "My grandfather is a retired electrician whom I've been trying to keep mentally busy. Together we've gotten an Arduino kit and have been working on some simple projects. He does the wiring and I've been writing the code. Recently his arthritis has been getting worse and he's been unable to work with the tiny components that the Arduino projects require. Does anyone have a recommendation for something similar we could work on together that would be easier for someone with his compromised manual dexterity?"
Switch (Score:5, Informative)
Depending on how bad his arthritis is, you could take over the wiring and he could start writing the code.
Re:Non-grandfather here also interested (Score:5, Informative)
Build a damn tube amp. Build lots of them. You can make a killing selling them to audiophiles and guitar players.
This is totally true. Musicians love kit that's not off the shelf from Guitar Center. A friend of mine plays in a couple death metal bands and he's constantly amazing me with the home electronics projects he posts to Facebook: fixing up old amps, modifying pedals, etc. He gets tons of requests.
Re:Non-grandfather here also interested (Score:4, Informative)
LEDs come in Jumbo sizes [google.com].
Half seriously but who knows ?... (Score:4, Informative)
Enormous components [hackaday.com]
Re:Non-grandfather here also interested (Score:4, Informative)
I was going to say the same thing. And if a tesla coil is too pedestrian, there are plenty of other "macro-scale" electrical projects to build, like quarter shrinkers or Marx bank capacitor set-ups for crushing cans. Check out 4HV [4hv.org] and the Geek Group [thegeekgroup.org] for ideas and communities to bounce other ideas off of.
Re:Teach grandson how to do electrical work (Score:2, Informative)
Thirty years ago when I was a child I helped my Dad, a lawyer in the UK, to wire and plumb our house. He paid to have it all tested by the electricity and gas boards, and everything was good.
I recently moved into a new house and the experienced electrician (he looked to be in his fifties) had fucked up the strappers (one light with two switches). Nowadays it would be illegal to fix it myself. The law is bullshit.