Inspired by some of the unique retro display technologies I came across in researching this blog, about a year ago, I put a deposit down on a “split flap” display without any idea of what I would do with it. Well, with loads of time and lots of cancelled art shows and postponed commissions during the shelter-in-place of the first half of 2020, I came up with the idea of an airplane information board, since I live right in the flight path of the SFO airport.

This is largely a story of a woodworker who knows just enough electronics to be dangerous, and of scope creep in technology development as I explore new ways to make the flight tracker more complicated and more interesting: bluetooth; lasers; servos; wireless charging; gamma color correction; ADS-B over software-defined radios.

But, of course, it’s also a story of designing a few nifty (and compact) wood cases with a high degree of precision to fit the unique parts, and finding the right plastic pieces, both as functional elements and decorative flourishes. Suffice to say, it was a labor of love, but one for which the most focused work fortuitously coincided with that period of greatest immobilization due to the pandemic. So, in a way, this is my pandemic baby!

For loads more pictures, fabrication details, links to the code, and live updates of the radio, the flight info messages I’m generating, and more, visit my dedicated Flight Tracker website here.