So, sometime before the holidays our company received a batch of new circuit boards, to the tune of several hundred dollar per board. These have several large electrolytic caps on them, which the board shop glued to the board using silicone rtv. Not until a couple of days ago did I realize...
Face palm? Head shake?
We moved our production and test facility down the road a bit several months ago. The large test stand took the longest to get back up to speed, partly because it has low demand right now, and partly because we were modifying the tank (welding on another vertical...
I've been tasked with the lucky job of designing the next trade show "demo. unit" for our sister company. The demonstration unit itself is mostly designed already, and will break down into two roughly 30 inch cubes. Easy enough.
But the boss wants the units to be easily moved, and easily...
Electric charcoal lighter plunged into a metal bucket containing wet sand...a colleague learned why you don't walk away from something like this. Luckily nobody was hurt (well maybe one person's ego), nothing burned down. A tech I work with heard the wiring rattling in the conduit just before...
Probably a lousy time to mention this, as I leave tonight for a 1.5 week vacation ...
My brother is actively managing my Dad's farm, as he is in the last stages of Alzheimer's, and Mom is suffering from senility/dementia as well. To keep some income coming in for them, he rents the pasture for...
Has anyone had any experience with the subject matter, and could you point me towards a reference that talks about this matter? We are having trouble with air inhibition of cure in molding and bonding (to primered bronze substrate) of a peroxide-cured EPDM. I have seen one referenced paper...
Doing some research, again, to find a fabric that can withstand 220-230 deg. F, wet (pressurized hot water) environment. The pH condition of the water can be assumed neutral (rare) to fairly strongly alkaline (to pH of 10, but could be limited to less than that if it improves the longevity of...
Some time ago, our colleague Skogsgurra posted a report on the results of some external ballistics research, involving cans of pressurized fluid and fast-moving lead projectiles.
In the spirit of his efforts to advance scientific knowledge, and to help him stave off recent grumpiness, I offer...
I have been asked to provide models of our company's devices in a Revit-compatible format (we make piping system components, FWIW). From the Autodesk website, it would appear that 3d solid model files (e.g. Inventor .ipt files, or .step "dumb solid" exports from Inventor) should import "just...
Ok, it may have been done to death, but I had not heard of the ASTM F1941 and its cohort spec. F1940 before. A quick search failed to deliver a succinct answer.
If zinc plating is applied per F1941, can an ASTM A574 alloy socket head cap screw be reasonably said to be free of hydrogen...
I think I know the answer to this, but want to ask.
Lots of fleece clothing on the market these days, it's cheap and warm. Makes good hunting clothing. But most of it also has optical brighteners or UV dyes (OBA's) added, and I assume it's added to the melt prior to being extruded to fibers...
For BigInch, I decided to start a new thread to discuss propellant tanks in zero G. More than he wanted to know, probably:
Propellant management for spacecraft, or the art of keeping gas bubbles out of the engine intakes, is done by a variety of methods. See...
I have some extruded Nylon 6 tubing that became surplus from our shop. I'd like to use it for making some waterproof containers (that I could dye to an appropriate color for its use), sealing the ends with an O-ring plug. Somehow I got the idea that the hygroscopic (moisture absorbing)...
I've seen a lot of science/nature type TV shows talk about the mysterious moving rocks (they leave trails in the dirt) on dry lake beds in California.
This video gives a dang plausible explanation, the first and best I've heard:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1hoiHvOeGc
A foundry sent me an email stating they would like to change the metal they will be pouring for one of our parts from a leaded brass, C83600, to "EcoBrass", C87850. We aren't making potable water system parts, so the low lead content isn't a big seller for us, but the higher strength and...
Looked through my Wahl's Mechanical Springs text on how to compute the shear stress in a coil spring when the "wire" is actually a coiled tube. I finally decided to take the "J" (torsional area moment) in the standard spring equation, and replace it with a (Do^4-Di^4) term. More specifically...
Have an application for a stainless shaft operating in a brass plain bearing (C37700 forged brass, 38-40% zinc, 1-2% lead, Cu rem.). Looking at a screw-machined shaft piece of either 203 or 303 stainless, it looks like they are roughly equivalent for corrosion resistance, but I'm not sure if...
Our company owns a 12" magnetic flowtube and transmitter from the Rosemount company, but it's pretty old. The meter is installed in a flow test system for cast iron valves, and may be subject to erosion from sand and rust particles. We (I) am now in the process of trying to update the...
