High Speed DIY M&M Sorting Machine Uses iPhone Brain

Posted by Soulskill on Friday December 26, 2014 @06:28AM from the solving-tasty-problems dept.

HughPickens.com writes: Canoe Tech reports that M&M sorting machines are a popular project for people who like combining electronics, programming and machine building. Most of them send a single M&M down a chute to a simple color sensor where the color sensor will then take a second or two to figure out the color. A servo motor will then rotate a chute that will direct the M&M into the correct pot. But a new project created by the nameless blogger behind the reviewmylife blog that uses an iPhone 5s as its brain is capable of sensing different colors and so can "sort" the M&Ms as they fall past. The iPhone communicates the information via Bluetooth to an Arduino board, which in turn fires off the correct electro magnet controlled gate. One practical application of the sorter could be creating a bowl of M&Ms — with all the brown ones removed.

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I don't get it by Anonymous Coward · 2014-12-26 06:33 · Score: 5, Interesting

I must be getting old. I did this in college 20+ years ago in my process automation course. I assure you that color-sorting photocells don't take a second or two to figure out the color.
It was all done with standard industrial stuff on Allen Bradley PLCs.
People do this for a hobby? I don't get it.