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As an engineer, you’ve made many 2D drawings, because drawings are still essential to the manufacturing process. Given advances in design tool technology, you may also have wondered: “Why am I creating this drawing? Why aren’t we using CAD?”  Good questions! Computer aided design (CAD) and computer aided manufacturing (CAM) are amazing tools but they […]

Gears can be fabricated using a myriad of different manufacturing methods. As you may expect, the profile of the teeth needs to follow specific dimensions and constraints in order to transmit torque, prevent slippage and excessive undesired contact stresses. Therefore, the fabrication process you select should accomplish the necessary tolerances and properties. This article will […]

Fabricating a product without deviations from the original design is extremely complicated. Even if you’re able to get an instance comparable to your design intention, it’s nearly impossible to achieve the same exact dimensions in a batch process. That said, you can decide how much a fabricated product can deviate from the original intention in […]

Welcome to Engineering Heroes: a series where we interview the mechanical engineers behind innovative products to uncover actionable tips, advice, and best practices to help you optimize your own mechanical design workflows. For this edition we sat down with Heidi Farrell, Sr. Mechanical Engineer at Peloton to learn about an impressive tip for collaborating on […]

Welcome to our first edition of Engineering Heroes: a series where we interview the mechanical engineers behind innovative products to uncover actionable tips, advice, and best practices to help you optimize your own mechanical design workflows. For this edition we zoomed in with Peter Lee, Sr. Mechatronics Engineer at Dusty Robotics to learn about his […]

Oh hey — I caught your attention! Guessing it was the 5-oh-one in the title, up from the 101 you might already be familiar with (self high five for engineer David trying to be a marketer). Welcome to my article (TED talk?). Here I’m going to walk you through the flow of how to set […]

The flexibility in adjusting plastic mechanical properties makes much of our technological advancement possible, from being able to produce fuel-efficient jumbo jets with high strength, to lightweight carbon fiber-reinforced plastic that can be made into impact-resistant silicone phone cases that save our precious phones from shattering into pieces. This article provides an overview of the […]

Sharp edges are beautiful: light glinting off these clean lines as a product rotates through space, music swelling dramatically in the background of a commercial. Edges are precise. Edges are distinct. Edges are horrible for injection molding. A general rule of injection molding is: Radius all edges. What do you do if your design calls […]

The advent of CAD systems, additive manufacturing, and CNC machining has made the design and manufacture of complex part designs almost routine. Engineers today are being asked to design parts that will probably be exposed to many different factors, including extreme weather, chemicals, bodily fluids, high stress/high load, impact, and other elements and situations that […]

In 2006, Nintendo took the world of interactive gaming by storm. The launch of the Wii welcomed gamers and, more importantly, non-gamers alike to physically interact with a virtual world. Whether the user was playing a competitive round of Wii Tennis or customizing their Mii, the Wii remote (otherwise known as the Wiimote) invited users […]