Replacing a $120k bowling center system with $1,600 in ESP32s

A developer who bought an abandoned bowling center faced a grim choice: replacing the aging scoring system would cost eighty to one hundred twenty thousand dollars. They built their own instead. OpenLaneLink uses cheap ESP32 microcontrollers, costing just two hundred to four hundred dollars per lane pair, reading infrared sensors and controlling relays through a Raspberry Pi-based state machine. The system feeds a React-based web interface that lets any developer create custom scoring displays and tap-to-pay features. Per Adafruit Blog, the engineer plans to open-source the full hardware and software stack.

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Open The Chonkerton