Aaron Beckendorf – Page 13 – WindowsTechs.com

Magnetohydrodynamic Motors to Spin Satellites

Posted on May 18, 2025 by Aaron Beckendorf

Two rings of magnets are shown encasing a circular channel in a white plastic piece. The channel is filled with liquid metal, and a loop of wire is about to be lowered into the metal.

Almost all satellites have some kind of thrusters aboard, but they tend to use them as little as possible to conserve chemical fuel. Reaction wheels are one way to make …read more Continue reading Magnetohydrodynamic Motors to Spin Satellites→

Home-casting Thermoelectric Alloys

Posted on May 16, 2025 by Aaron Beckendorf

There are a number of metal cylinders displayed in a line. Each cylinder has a rectangular brass plate mounted to each end, and these brass plates stand upright, with the metal cylinders held horizontally between them.

If you want to convert heat into electrical power, it’s hard to find a simpler method than a thermoelectric generator. The Seebeck effect means that the junction of two dissimilar …read more Continue reading Home-casting Thermoelectric Alloys→

A Toolchanging Delta 3D printer

Posted on May 13, 2025 by Aaron Beckendorf

The frame of a delta 3D printer is shown. The toolhead of the 3D printer does not have a hotend installed, but instead has a frame with a circular hole in the middle.

We’ve seen quite a few delta 3D printers, and a good number of toolchanging printers, but not many that combine both worlds. Fortunately, [Ben Wolpert]’s project fills that gap with …read more Continue reading A Toolchanging Delta 3D printer→

A Toolchanging Delta 3D printer

Posted on May 13, 2025 by Aaron Beckendorf

A Constant-Fraction Discriminator for Sub-Nanosecond Timing

Posted on May 8, 2025 by Aaron Beckendorf

An oscilloscope display is shown, showing two plots. A blue plot is shown at one level, and over multiple exposures at different places, it jumps to a higher level. Another yellow trace is shown which, at some point after the blue trace has jumped to a higher level, also jumps cleanly to a higher level. The yellow line is labeled "CFD output," while the blue line is labeled "leading edge discriminator."

Detecting a signal pulse is usually basic electronics, but you start to find more complications when you need to time the signal’s arrival in the picoseconds domain. These include the …read more Continue reading A Constant-Fraction Discriminator for Sub-Nanosecond Timing→

The Most Printable 3D Printer Yet

Posted on April 20, 2025 by Aaron Beckendorf

A 3D printer frame made of red plastic is shown on the left-hand side of the image. On the right-hand side, there is a large motor with a plastic frame attached to the frame. Next to the 3D printer, a blue plastic mesh is being fed through a red plastic frame.

Despite the best efforts of the RepRap community over the last twenty years, self-replicating 3D printers have remained a stubbornly elusive goal, largely due to the difficulty of printing electronics. …read more Continue reading The Most Printable 3D Printer Yet→

Elastic Bands Enable Touchable Volumetric Display

Posted on April 14, 2025 by Aaron Beckendorf

A man is looking at a volumetric display while using one finger to interact with it. Two roughly-spherical blue shapes are visible in the display, and he is moving his index finger toward one of them.

Amazing as volumetric displays are, they have one major drawback: interacting with them is complicated. A 3D mouse is nice, but unless you’ve done a lot of CAD work, it’s …read more Continue reading Elastic Bands Enable Touchable Volumetric Display→