Engineering

So, we already have fridges with a tap of some buttons and you'll be delivered your weekly shopping, but we could take it further, right? I'm no expert in this stuff, to be honest I have no idea how it would work and what sort of technology you'd need/if it has been invented. BUT I have an idea. Automatic Food: Imagine you run out of food, but you can't go shopping (for whatever reason) What do you do? Order it online? Of course, that's the obvious choice but what if it's important? What if you can't wait for it to be delivered? So; the idea is - Tap a button and the food just turns up in your cupboards/fridge - I.E; teleportation from the store. M…

Hi, I am thinking of making a RC submarine based around the Arduino Uno or Leonardo, and I probably won't use a controller, most likely just either a joystick or 4-5 pushbuttons. Ontop of that I want to be able to send video footage back to me, whether it be on a laptop or just a LCD Display, or via a RCA cable. I think I found a good 100meter tether cable that only has 2 wires? Here is the cable: http://store.openrov.com/collections/2-8-replacement-parts/products/extra-100m-tether Is there anyway I can send so much data with only 2 wires? Thanks alot for the help! This is the camera: https://www.adafruit.com/products/397?gclid=Cj0KEQiAno60BRDt89rAh7qt-4w…

I daydream a lot and love playing video games. Black Ops 3 was recently released and revolved around bionics, attaching machinery to the human body to enhance the human condition and peak. I know there've been works on bionics like a guy with bionic legs presented it during a TED talk, but when do y'all think it will become a trend?

I recently had an idea for a toy line of fighting robots for kids, kind of like these robots from Japan. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufOz00oYzZM There are a few problems I've thought of, so I figured there would be people here, with enough engineering knowledge, to tell me how it would work. How much would it cost to make fully functioning robots like we see in the robots? I was hoping each robot would cost within the realm of $30-40 USD. What about projectile weapons? What would the projectiles be made out of, what size would they be, and how fast would they travel? What would be the sturdiest metal(s) to make these robots out of? Would something …

I had a small refrigerator that used an electric heating element to expand the freon, without the use of a pump or any other moving part and it worked quite well, it even made ice. With all the excess heat of a car engine going to waste, why couldn't a similar setup be used in cars for the air conditioning, making it as free as the heater is in winter?

I thinking of thrust ideas and I wonder if in proportion to fuel usage amount and the power to size ratio it makes up whick will be the best?

Hello. I am currently working on a project which requires me to design an electrical circuit. My aim is to use piezoelectric actuators in parallel (5-10 mm dia), and giving them a voltage of 9V using a signal generator. I want the actuators to vibrate in the 500-800 Hz range. Keeping in mind that I have to incorporate this in a light weight application, how do I proceed about this? Thank you.

I am trying to test a simple buck converter on 123D.circuits, but for the life of me I can't figure out how to make this work properly with NPN transistors. Lets say for the moment I want to convert 24V to 10V. Basically I want a to drive the base of an NPN transistor with a 5V control pin. The reason for this is that the 5V controller voltage is more stable than the input voltage of the buck and I don't want massive variation in my base current when it is sinking into the controller. Now the problem comes with the fact that there seems to be no good position to put a NPN transistor in the buck circuit. I have been googling around and have seen the ci…

A simple question that has always had me wondering. A broken pane invariably presents shards with smooth, perpendicular edges. A steel edge of 90 deg, even when precision ground and then honed, will not cut an unwary finger so readily as the bluntest profile in glass. The shape seems almost irrelevant to its keenness. Is it "molecular" or what? Does anybody know please?

If someone could somehow flood the frequencies of the EM spectrum with enough interference to prevent cell phones, radios and satellite signals to stop working... is it possible that other electronics could still work? (such as a computer on a hard line connected to the internet or a digital watch)

Hello, I love the friendly atmosphere around a lock and please help with three questions: Why do locks have angled gates? Someone said that the water pressure helps to close them. Is this right? Why do you see water pouring through closed gates? Is that just a leak? I was at the beautiful Thames at Goring and wonder why the boats cannot just use the wider part of the River? You see I need some education. Best regards Alan

I'm doing a science project that involves moving water through a 2cm pipe with graphene aerogel capacitors in it, but I don't know how to get the water flowing through the pipe. Should I use a pump? The ones I search for online are $200 and not what I'm looking for. Is there a way to get the water to flow through or should I just use gravity?

I was wondering if anyone knew tipes of thrust unlike the usual version of shooting molecules. I have looked up the math and just to reach half the speed of light you have to use more energy than the world's yearly energy revenue.

What education is needed to design weapon systems from scratch? Let's say it's basic stuff - an assault rifle or a simple solid fuel rocket guided from a PC for example. Would a mechanical engineer manage to do that?

Iam currently doing my project on nanorefrigeration systems. For that I have to add the nanoparticle/nanofluid to the refrigerant, this solution can be called as nanorefrigerant. I have a doubt that is there any process for mixing nanofluid to the refrigerants or we can mix directly (i.e by simply pouring nanofluid into refrigerant).

If magnetism did not exist, electrical generation would be confined to only electrostatic-friction generation methods as in several centuries ago experiments. Or perhaps collecting lightning bolts. If magnetism did not exist, would that early method of electrical generation somehow make its way to a useable, marketable, widely distributed and vital to modern life developments ?

Good whatever time of day it is where you are! Is it physically and theoretically possible to create a full visual replica of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bee_hummingbird and make it into a spying autonomous flying robot which theoretically could fly from one house to another, record some video footage and fly back to host (base) to upload obtained data, recharge and then repeat the whole process. Rough and early example of such machine is already made: http://www.avinc.com/nano Is it physically and theoretically possible to make the aforementioned robot fully invisible in optical spectrum (which will made him a better spying machine) by using https://en.wikipedia.…

Is it possible to Nanocomposite titanium alloyal and spider silk. The idea came to me that spider silk is strong and flexible, so what if someone made a substance, that's a combination of these materials. Well it be stronger? Well it be some what flexible? How much would it cost? (Sorry if this might be in the wrong topic, or thread, or its called)

Does anybody know how engineering of the floor under the ice court on the second storey building? I know how to design a floor under the ice court on the first storey, but i don't know how to make it on the second storey . Thanks in advance

I was surprised to see U.S. NPT threads in pipes and fittings several years ago in Europe. Are they still the norm or the market became metricated ?

Hello. A roof mounted solar water heater can be used in several configurations, as -Preheating the electric/gas domestic water heater inlet -Providing direct warm water to use points -Work in parallel to electric/gas water heater -Fill an insulated reservoir with warm water for demand moments -With heat exchanger -Combinations of the above They have their good and their bad; unless a bunch of flow diverters/valves are implemented in the piping circuits. That brings complexity, cost and attention depending on season, time of day, temperature reached... Trouble with colder than utility supply in too cold weather/nights/early morning. What is in your opin…

Just a thought here. Say, humanity goes to colonize Titan, which is awesome, much cooler than Mars both literally and figuratively. So, given that Titan has a nice and dense atmosphere in order to explore it faster using planes makes sense. So a normal jet engine uses atmospheric oxygen as oxidizer and carries fuel with it. Atmosphere of Titan on the other hand has about 5% of methane (in the troposphere) and no oxygen so is there any roadblocks from engineering perspective in creating a jet engine that uses atmospheric fuel rather than oxidizer and carry oxidezer on board? It it possible to create an engine that would work on a 5% concentration of fuel in the air?

Hi i am doing a high school research project. Last year we worked on determining what affect certain lighting had on the migration of organisms. We determined which light sources were most damaging and which would be most easily filtered. This year we are trying to work on a solution, i am having trouble coming up with a budget... is their a way to coat glass to filter out certain wavelengths? I have done a lot of research with little success, and i always seem to end up with an article about electron guns to apply thin film layers to the material. Any suggestions as to what i can do for this? i am truly stuck... Thanks

hi um, i am currently in college. i need help in designing a gearbox for a quad bike. the engine is Single Cylinder, Air-Cooled, 250cc Bore*Stroke: 67.0mm*65.0mm Compression Ratio: 9.0:1 Max. Net Power & Rotating Speed: 11.5kw/7000 RPM Max.Torque & Rotating Speed: 16.0N.m/6000 RPM Ideal RPM: 1420 RPM. the output sprocket has 9 teeth and the final has 43. can someone help me with finding the perfect set of gear ratios for such an engine.? its 4th gear should be high enough that the quad can be proplled to a max speed of 60k/hr. thanks people.

Hello engineers! So my left earbud got crushed, but everything else was ok. So I got this cazy idea to hook up the wiring to a speaker from a radio. The speaker works, I have tested it, and the wires for it are plainly labeled negative and positive. That is all fine and dandy. My problem stems from two facts: can my phone use a speaker like that if I get it properly wired, and I also am having trouble with the wiring in the earbud. They are the earbuds that came with my iPhone 5 and have worked fine (until being crushed). I cut the earbud off and discovered that there is three wires, not two like I had been expecting. So I have no idea what is negative pos…