Hacker News: alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=alextousssHacker News RSShttps://hnrss.org/hnrss v2.1.1Sat, 04 Jul 2026 14:53:45 +0000<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "39c3: In-house electronics manufacturing from scratch: How hard can it be? [video]"]]>Reminds me that comma.ai has its own line. While their setup is quite expensive they do run production for a smartphone-level of difficulty in-house. They detail it incredibly well at commacon [0].

[0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iiBSN224w4

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LE-QlIWMHxM

]]>Mon, 12 Jan 2026 10:39:02 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46586616alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46586616https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46586616<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Show HN: MARS – Personal AI robot for builders (< $2k)"]]>Had a chance to see a live demo last month. Looks great, can do a lot more things than an SO-101 and the teleop via the app if both fun and useful. Would definitely buy if I had the money.

]]>Tue, 07 Oct 2025 21:36:36 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45509217alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45509217https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45509217<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>That will end up either dangerous or unreleased. Their system sends a 40W laser, which is what you use to cut plastics. There’s no way to make this safe as even a diffuse secondary reflection out of the field of view could blind someone.

]]>Mon, 28 Jul 2025 16:30:19 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44712442alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44712442https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44712442<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>Exactly! Plus we’ll get a nice beautiful sonar echo when they’re on walls/ceiling

]]>Mon, 28 Jul 2025 16:28:06 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44712409alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44712409https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44712409<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>Long term, around $300/unit

]]>Mon, 28 Jul 2025 16:04:57 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44712181alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44712181https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44712181<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>Unfortunately it won’t. an eye that collimates light is much more fragile to laser than a mosquito.

]]>Mon, 28 Jul 2025 12:29:35 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44710179alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44710179https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44710179<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>Everything works in simulation, and the detection works in the real world! We’re working on miniaturizing the electronics to embed it in a real drone.

]]>Mon, 28 Jul 2025 11:19:27 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44709685alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44709685https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44709685<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>Mosquitoes use different cues (olfactory, CO2 and infrared emissions/heat) depending on the distance to target.

]]>Mon, 28 Jul 2025 11:18:14 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44709681alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44709681https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44709681<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>We could do something about it. Any flying insect is only a change of parameters for us.

]]>Mon, 28 Jul 2025 11:16:28 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44709664alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44709664https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44709664<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>What do you mean by fidelity? We’re still unsure about the tails in terms of detection probability/false detection rate

]]>Mon, 28 Jul 2025 11:15:39 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44709654alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44709654https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44709654<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>It might be, but it’s a crowded market where politics and connections are worth more than technical expertise. So, we’re okay to stay out of it

]]>Mon, 28 Jul 2025 11:14:43 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44709648alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44709648https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44709648<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>Yeah, it’s one of our goal to work for government agencies at some point to implement city-wide mosquito control. 10 of our drones could cover a square kilometer, so we’d be a lot more efficient working at the city level rather than at the individual household level.

]]>Sun, 27 Jul 2025 21:42:31 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704972alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704972https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704972<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>Not our highest priority concern haha

]]>Sun, 27 Jul 2025 21:39:36 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704947alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704947https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704947<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>Their velocity is much lower than the one of the drone, so it wouldn’t make much sense to increase efficiency

]]>Sun, 27 Jul 2025 21:39:00 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704938alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704938https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704938<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>Yeah, you’re spot on! The original name was « mosquitorgnole »

]]>Sun, 27 Jul 2025 21:38:31 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704935alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704935https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704935<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>Just an insane obsession with ultrasound! (and some control theory classes)

]]>Sun, 27 Jul 2025 19:47:46 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704081alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704081https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704081<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>Glad to hear we could be of help! Some of our tech could be used for defense, but traditional defense companies and ukrainian startups already do low-cost shahed interceptors.

]]>Sun, 27 Jul 2025 19:46:59 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704070alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704070https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44704070<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>Yeah, what they do is very cool. Not sure how far they are in the development but the videos are super cool.

]]>Sun, 27 Jul 2025 19:12:18 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44703737alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44703737https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44703737<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Ask HN: What are you working on? (July 2025)"]]>My roommate and I are still working on Tornyol, our mosquito killing drone! It uses ultrasonic sonar to detect mosquitoes, and missile control theory to ram into mosquitoes and grind them in its propellers.

Our target platform is a 40 grams tinywhoop so it’s safe to fly everywhere and makes almost no noise :). A Roomba for mosquitoes!

The main plus compared to traditional systems is that a drone can cover an enormous surface in a short time compared to static systems or man-portable insecticide spraying. Our goal is to be competitive with ITNs against Malaria.

Some links :

https://hackaday.com/2025/03/25/supercon-2024-killing-mosqui...

https://manifund.org/projects/build-anti-mosqu

]]>Sun, 27 Jul 2025 18:45:36 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44703517alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44703517https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44703517<![CDATA[New comment by alextousss in "Laser-wielding device is like an anti-aircraft system for mosquitoes"]]>Light being coherent and light being dangerous are two completely orthogonal concepts. A laser is dangerous because of the very tight beam, but any household mirror keeps that beam focused. Plus, a mosquito needs 100millijoules to fry (from the intellectual ventures study) which is a lot more than what a retina can handle. The short duration actually makes it even worse, because the eye lids can’t close soon enough to avoid the retina burning (they take 100ms to close). That’s the reason why lasers are classed by power.

A retina being easier to burn than a mosquito is the fundamental reason why we haven’t seen that tech deployed. LiDAR detection with a 2D goniometer + high power laser has been available commercially for a while. There just never was someone to create something so deceptive as to sell a 40watts device as possibly safe.

]]>Sun, 06 Jul 2025 21:12:54 +0000https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44484102alextoussshttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44484102https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44484102