2023

In the age of mass electronic waste, too little attention is paid to the repair of electronics. This poses a complicated challenge, as electronics are complex systems which may fail due to single component malfunction and require high expertise for repair. Also, the sourcing of more exotic components might not be trivial.

This laser level had a broken microcontroller, but all the other parts, including the lasers and power source, were functional. The solution was to replace the MCU with a commonly available ATTINY85 MCU fitted with custom firmware.

Custom firmware for this repair also gave the opportunity to create a secret party mode, which causes the lasers to flash uncontrollably!