CarolinaCon 12 · United States · 2016

CarolinaCon 12 Electronic Kit Badge

555-timer light-reactive soldering badge kit

CarolinaCon 12 included an easy-to-assemble electronic kit badge in the price of admission, with a 555 timer, LED, photoresistor, resistors, capacitor, AAA battery holder, wire, protoboard space, and Hardware Hacking Village support.

CarolinaCon United States North Carolina Raleigh 555 Timer Photoresistor LED AAA Battery Arduino Micro Hardware Hacking Village Soldering Badge North America

EventCarolinaCon 12

SeriesCarolinaCon

LocationHilton North Raleigh / Midtown, Raleigh, North Carolina

CountryUnited States

People

Authors & Credits

event and badge-guide publisher

CarolinaCon Group

The official CarolinaCon 12 page identifies The CarolinaCon Group as the event organizer and publishes the badge section, partial schematic link, and instruction-manual link used for this record.

Source

Why It Mattered

It adds a Raleigh, North Carolina hacker-conference badge lineage to the worldwide compendium and captures a modest but well-documented soldering badge where the attendee credential doubled as a hardware-hacking canvas rather than a finished closed artifact.

Hardware

The official event page says the badge kit was included with admission, contained basic components and batteries, and had enough protoboard area for Arduino Micro or Arduino Nano compatible boards. The official PDF assembly guide lists a 555 timer, 68K, 1K, and 470 ohm resistors, one LED, one capacitor, one photoresistor, a battery housing, two AAA batteries, and red, black, green, and white wire.

Software & Apps

No badge firmware or microcontroller software is claimed for the base kit. The source-backed behavior is an analog 555-timer circuit where the LED blinks at different speeds depending on light reaching the photoresistor, plus an optional donation path for Arduino Micro compatible boards and boost converters for attendee experiments.

Lore

The badge guide frames the blank board as wearable on a lanyard but encourages attendees to build the electronics in the Hardware Hacking Village. The event page invited attendees to bring additional parts, sold Arduino Micro compatible board and boost-converter sets as donation rewards, and left the protoboard area open for custom badge behavior.

Lifecycle

Add-ons & Upgrades

analog badge circuit documented

555 timer light-reactive blinker

The assembly guide documents a 555 timer, photoresistor, capacitor, resistors, LED, AAA battery holder, and wiring; testing confirms the LED blink speed changes with light exposure.

Compatibility: CarolinaCon 12 Electronic Kit Badge

Source

badge distribution source-backed

Admission-included electronic kit

The official event page says the small electronic badge kit was included with the admission price and contained basic components plus batteries.

Compatibility: CarolinaCon 12 Electronic Kit Badge

Source

badge hacking surface source-backed

Arduino-compatible protoboard expansion

The event page says the badge had enough protoboard area for Arduino Micro or Nano compatible boards, with Arduino Micro compatible boards and boost converters available as donation rewards.

Compatibility: CarolinaCon 12 Electronic Kit Badge

Source

event support historical

Hardware Hacking Village assembly path

The guide points builders to Hardware Hacking Village equipment and personnel, and the event page says attendees could put their badge together there for the duration of the conference.

Compatibility: CarolinaCon 12 Hardware Hacking Village

Source

Operational history

Issues & Camp Impact

firmware-scope caveat note

Recovered sources prove an analog 555-timer badge kit and optional Arduino-compatible expansion path, but no CarolinaCon 12 badge firmware repository, microcontroller stock firmware, CTF code, or final attendee modifications were recovered.

The entry records the verified soldering badge and hacking surface without inventing software behavior.

Confidence: source-backed but intentionally narrow
Status: documented
Timeframe: current CarolinaCon pass
Source note: CarolinaCon 12 badge section and instruction manual.

guide-title caveat note

The official badge PDF title says 'CarolinaCon 2012 Badge Cheat Sheet,' but the official CarolinaCon 12 page, URL, dates, and badge-section link identify it as the CarolinaCon 12 / 2016 badge instruction manual.

The catalogue treats the PDF title as an edition-number wording issue rather than a separate 2012 event claim.

Confidence: official page plus PDF context
Status: documented
Timeframe: current CarolinaCon pass
Source note: CarolinaCon 12 official page and linked badge.pdf.

missing rights-cleared image note

No CarolinaCon 12 Electronic Kit Badge image is published because the current public source trail has not been paired with a reusable original badge or artifact photo or official upstream raster render with source URL, license or permission basis, attribution, and processing notes.

The United States record remains source-backed and image-free rather than copying source-page media, documentation screenshots, event photos, social media, placeholders, or generated approximations.

Confidence: local project policy
Status: needs licensed original replacement
Timeframe: current catalogue build
Source note: badge.gallery image policy and CarolinaCon 12 official event page and badge PDF source trail.

Resources

CarolinaCon 12 badge instruction manual assembly guide · Official PDF guide for the 555 timer, resistors, LED, capacitor, photoresistor, battery holder, wire, soldering steps, battery test, light-reactive blinking behavior, and lanyard/blank-board context. CarolinaCon 12 event page official event page · Official source for March 4-6, 2016 Raleigh dates, Hilton North Raleigh / Midtown venue, admission price, badge-kit inclusion, Hardware Hacking Village context, Arduino-compatible donation hardware, and links to the schematic image and instruction manual. CarolinaCon 12 partial schematic image schematic reference · Official linked partial schematic image used only as evidence; it is not republished because no reusable image license or explicit permission basis was recovered.

Sources

CarolinaCon: CarolinaCon 12 Retrieved 2026-05-15 · Primary event source for the March 4-6, 2016 Raleigh edition, admission-included electronic kit badge, Hardware Hacking Village assembly support, Arduino-compatible donation hardware, and official badge-guide links. CarolinaCon: CarolinaCon 2012 Badge Cheat Sheet Retrieved 2026-05-15 · Primary assembly source for the CarolinaCon 12 badge; the PDF title uses '2012' while the hosting page, URL, and context identify it as the CarolinaCon 12 / 2016 badge guide. CarolinaCon: badge.trim.png Retrieved 2026-05-15 · Official partial schematic evidence linked from the event page; cited for source traceability and not reused as a local image because no reusable media rights were found.