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An Inside Look at the Development of the Zuli Smartplug

We’re seeking out the most amazing hardware companies and engineers to help uncover the many challenges, lessons, and philosophies behind what makes them so awesome and how they develop their products. In this week’s Hardware Spotlight, we had the chance to sit down with Taylor Umphreys co-founder and CEO at Zuli. Taylor and his co-founders, Sid […]

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Stop Making Negative Progress — How to Build Stronger, More Reliable Hardware Products

Successful product development involves a rigorous and detailed process of testing, breaking, and fixing. However without the right system in place, it can be difficult to parse out the details of effective changes versus ineffective ones. German Hall-Snyder, VP of Engineering at Kespry, a commercial drone technology company that recently raised $10M in Series A funding, knows […]

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The Unique Design Behind Boombotix, a Rugged and Portable Speaker

We’re seeking out the most amazing hardware companies and engineers to help uncover the many challenges, lessons, and philosophies behind what makes them so awesome and how they develop their products. In this week’s Hardware Spotlight we had the chance to chat with Chris McKleroy, Co-founder and Product Designer at Boombotix. He shared with us his […]

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Iterative Product Development Philosophy from SoundFocus

We’re seeking out the best hardware companies and engineers to help uncover the many challenges, lessons, and philosophies behind hardware product development. In this Hardware Spotlight, we had the chance to sit down with Alex Selig, co-founder at SoundFocus. Alex, and his co-founder Varun Srinivasan, founded the company with the goal of building revolutionary audio processing technologies […]

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How Inscopix is Developing a Revolutionary Microscope System

In this Hardware Spotlight, we’re learning a lot about neurons and photons from Sam Malanowski, Product Engineer at Inscopix. Inscopix makes a miniaturized microscope system that allows for researchers to view large-scale neural circuit dynamics in freely behaving rodents.  Sam shares with us his experience working as an engineer amongst a majority group of PhD researchers, […]

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Most Common Hardware Components for 3D Printers

A 3D printing toolbox isn’t complete without the spare components necessary to build, maintain, and fix a machine. Below we highlight what each of those compnents are and what they are used for. Nuts & Bolts & Washers 3D printers commonly utilize metric components, ranging from M2 to M10-12 components for desktop models. The “M” […]

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The Product Evolution Behind Drumpants, a Wearable Musical Instrument

We’re seeking out the best hardware companies to help uncover the many challenges, lessons, and philosophies behind hardware product development.  In this week’s Hardware Spotlight, we had the chance to sit down with Tyler and Lei, co-founders at DrumPants. They founded the company with the vision to pioneer a more natural way for humans to interact with their […]

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How to Prepare Rhino Files for 3D Printing

We recently wrote an overview on How to Prepare CAD Files for 3D Printing, going over some general considerations and steps to properly export your 3D printing files. There are some unique considerations to keep in mind when preparing 3D print files specifically in Rhino, so for this post, we’re going to go into more detail on […]

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How to Start Designing 3D Models

Learn about the best way to start designing 3D models for printing below. There are a number of options for creating both simple and complex models for consumer and professional applications. For more info about how China Manufacturing parts, Inc. can help you, check out the China Manufacturing parts, Inc. Capabilities Guide. CAD Software For Designing 3D Models Below is a […]

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Overview of Basic 3D Printing Terms

Brim A brim consists of 3D printed material that surrounds and attaches to the base of an object to aid in adhering to a bed/print surface. EEprom EEprom is like RAM for a 3D printer’s electronics. Some values can be stored here and accessed quickly, in addition to what is known in firmware and held […]