Technabob » buckle

Bioshock Belt Buckle: How Splicers Keep Their Pants From Falling Down

Technabob — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 12:14:45 +0000

Here’s the perfect fashion accessory for Bioshock fans.

Technabob reader Matthew Borgatti (aka “M@”) created this intricately detailed bronze belt buckle which bears the inimitable Art Deco logo from the classic underwater shooter. M@ started out by having a wax mold carved on TechShop’s Tormach CNC.

He then produced a silicone mold from the wax and had the bronze casting made by the guys over at JR Casting.

While I really love the way the raw bronze looked when it came back from the casting, M@ did a great job giving it that thoroughly weathered look that’s more apropos of the game’s decrepit atmosphere.

You can check out more photos of the Bioshock belt buckle and M@’s other creative works over on Sinbox and Flickr.

Mp3 Belt Buckle Perfect for Wrestlers, Truck Drivers

Technabob — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 12:50:45 +0000

What could say “I really know how to dress myself” more than a nice big brass belt buckle. You know – the type that’s so huge that you dare not try to bend at the waist, lest you puncture an internal organ? Well at least this one has an excuse for its size; there’s a fully-functional MP3 player built into it.

SparkFun Electronic’s mechanical engineer Casey came across this oversize belt buckle and said to himself: “self, I bet we can cram that new MP3 player development board we’re working on inside that massive brass buckle, because I really want to wear one, because after all, chicks really dig guys in huge brass belt buckles.”

Turns out that their MP3 player development board didn’t exactly fit, so the guys at SparkFun set to creating a custom circuit board with the similar componentry, and fit it perfectly to the rectangular opening in the face of the buckle. Now why the buckle has a huge opening in the middle, who knows? Maybe it’s so you can put an engraved name plate on the front. Sweet.

You’re probably asking yourself how you change tracks on this thing, right? Well thanks to an on-board accelerometer, you’ll just need to do a little pelvic thrust to jump to the next tune. And if you really get your groove on, a tri-color LED gets to blinking when you do your badass dance moves.

While you can’t find the belt buckle MP3 player in a store, you can make one for yourself. Just head on over to Spark Fun for the complete parts list, circuit schematic and source code.

Calculator Belt Buckle for Super-Duper-Geeks

Technabob — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 03:02:11 +0000

If you wore one of those Casio calculator watches from the 80′s, here’s something else that just screams “I’m a geek, I have no girlfriend, and I don’t care.”

The chrome calculator belt buckle lets you add, subtract, multiply and divide, all from the convenience of your waistline. If you just have to be able to do math while you’re sitting on the pot, you can pick one up from BeWild for about $10 bucks.

[Nerd Approved via GeekAlerts]