‘Pig eBank’ is an IoT-Connected Piggybank for Kids #IoT #IoTuesday
Here’s a physical piggybank that you don’t put coins into, but it does keep track of your child’s bank account value and allows them to check it – with a simple shake! You can deposit money to the ‘Pig eBank’ from a mobile app and the ears even rotate to signify transactions taking place within the account. The blog post documenting the project even shows the laser-cut layers and gear mechanism that make up the body of the bank. Brilliant!
In this article I will explain how I made a prototype of a talking piggy bank that connects to an online bank account. I’ll explain how it works and the process I went through; I’ll discuss how it progressed from an ‘interaction’ prototype to an ‘experience’ prototype and how I used the Monzo API to do so.
Pig eBank is a piggy bank, but rather than containing physical coins, it is connected to an online bank account. Here’s a quick video explaining it in more detail:
VS1053 Codec + MicroSD Breakout – MP3/WAV/MIDI/OGG Play + Record – v4: This breakout board is the ultimate companion for the VLSI VS1053B DSP codec chip. The VS1053 can decode a wide variety of audio formats such as MP3, AAC, Ogg Vorbis, WMA, MIDI, FLAC, WAV (PCM and ADPCM). It can also be used to record audio in both PCM (WAV) and compressed Ogg Vorbis. You can do all sorts of stuff with the audio as well such as adjusting bass, treble, and volume digitally. There is also 8 GPIO pins that can be used for stuff like lighting up small LEDs or reading buttons. Read more.
Adafruit Mono 2.5W Class D Audio Amplifier – PAM8302: This super small mono amplifier is surprisingly powerful – able to deliver up to 2.5 Watts into 4-8 ohm impedance speakers. Inside the miniature chip is a class D controller, able to run from 2.0V-5.5VDC. Since the amp is a class D, its very efficient (over 90% efficient when driving an 8Ω speaker at over half a Watt) – making it perfect for portable and battery-powered projects. It has built in thermal and over-current protection but we could barely tell it got hot. There’s even a volume trim pot so you can adjust the volume on the board down from the default 24dB gain. This board is a welcome upgrade to basic “LM386” amps! Read more.
Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.
