Just because hardware is a couple generations old doesn\u2019t mean it isn\u2019t still useful. Don\u2019t believe me? Then check out Filip Grace\u2019s latest project and you will. He used a 10-year-old Raspberry Pi 3 Model B \u2014 which is ancient in the world of computing \u2014 to build a beautiful International Space Station tracker that would look great displayed in any home, and there is plenty of compute power to spare.<\/p>\n
Grace\u2019s project<\/a> turns the aging single-board computer into a dedicated real-time space dashboard. The device renders a rotating 3D globe on a compact 3.5-inch LCD, continuously showing the current position of the ISS as it orbits Earth at roughly 17,500 mph. The display also overlays telemetry such as latitude, longitude, altitude, velocity, and the region of Earth currently beneath the spacecraft.<\/p>\n A list of astronauts onboard the station (\ud83d\udcf7: Filip Grace)<\/p>\n The screen itself is a plug-and-play SPI display HAT from Waveshare that mounts directly onto the Pi\u2019s GPIO header using pogo pins. That means the hardware setup is extremely simple \u2014 no breadboards or complicated wiring required. The only optional addition is a physical toggle switch wired to a GPIO pin. Flip that switch, and the display changes modes.<\/p>\n Instead of showing the orbiting station, the alternate view lists the astronauts currently living and working in space. The data is pulled from free public APIs, including one that tracks the ISS position and another that lists active astronauts and their spacecraft assignments. Grace wrote the entire application in Python, but he notes that users don\u2019t need to know how to code to run it \u2014 installation instructions and configuration files are included in the project\u2019s GitHub repository<\/a>.<\/p>\n The hardware enclosure gives the tracker a distinctive aesthetic inspired by aerospace instrumentation. The housing itself is 3D-printed, but the front panel is CNC-machined from aluminum. After experimenting with a raw metal look, Grace ultimately painted the faceplate white so a custom waterslide decal \u2014 complete with the worm logo from NASA \u2014 would stand out more clearly. The result resembles a small module that might belong in a mission control console.<\/p>\n The faceplate was CNC machined (\ud83d\udcf7: Filip Grace)<\/p>\n There are a few clever touches in the build process as well. For example, Grace used the heated chamber of his 3D printer as an improvised paint-curing oven, speeding up the finishing process by running a filament-drying cycle for several hours.<\/p>\n The software is designed for continuous operation. A background service managed by systemd automatically launches the tracker when the Pi boots and restarts it if anything goes wrong. The program also caches pre-rendered globe frames so the device can start quickly after its first run.<\/p>\n Grace admits the tracker doesn\u2019t serve any practical purpose \u2014 but that doesn\u2019t matter. Like many great maker projects, it began as an excuse to experiment with spare hardware and interesting APIs. The end result is a stylish little space monitor that proves even decade-old tech can still reach orbit in the right hands.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Just because hardware is a couple generations old doesn\u2019t mean it isn\u2019t still useful. Don\u2019t believe me? Then…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":338949,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[85,46,141,145],"class_list":["post-338948","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-science","tag-space"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/338948","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=338948"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/338948\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/338949"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=338948"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=338948"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=338948"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}