The Most Ridiculous Kitchen Timer Ever(?)

Michael Teeuw is a self-proclaimed “huge coffee addict.” This substance is reportedly the core ingredient for his projects, and as such he owns a manually operated espresso machine. While those that aren’t coffee aficionados may not know this, the perfect brewing time for an espresso shot is reportedly somewhere in the range of 24 to 27 seconds. Being a truly discerning espresso imbiber, he’s found that 26 seconds is the sweet spot for his setup.

Obviously, manually timing things to within one second is a bit of a difficult proposition, and while something from your favorite brick-and-mortar or online shopping outlet would do the job, he decided to instead create the Ridiculous Kitchen Timer™.

This device features a PCB designed in KiCad, which accommodates 10 tiny SK6805–2427 LED modules, along with an ATtiny85 for control and a single button to get things started. When the button is pressed, the timer counts down, progressively “blueing” the LEDs. These then become red when it’s time to stop the brewing process.

While it all sounds like a simple and practical hack, the build write-up does note several reasons why it is actually fairly ridiculous. Reasons include its LiPo battery power supply with no under voltage protection or even recharging capabilities. Also, the fact that while the LEDs are way too bright, and it doesn’t actually have an audio function like any other decent timer. Still, the project looks pretty neat as seen in the video below, and perhaps there will be a slightly less ridiculous version in the future!