founder - Static Dynamics maker of electrostatic actuators
Mississauga, Ontario
- Tweets 1,154
- Following 666
- Followers 3,989
- Likes 31,810
Quick update on the electrostatic actuator I’m building.
I haven’t posted in a while, but development is on track.
Quick reminder of why electrostatics rules:
- direct drive, no gearbox
- avoids I^2R overheating problems
- costs basically nothing to make
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> taking traditional timber framing course
> venue is a church in rural Quebec
> lead instructor points to statue of Jesus
> « on est présentement dans la présence du chef charpentier »
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The way misfit research was/is funded in the real world is via self-funding.
Famous examples: Wrights, Marconi, Goodyear, Nobel, Appert, Newcomen, Gutenberg.
We realized that (to our knowledge) nobody had unpacked where the money for “misfit research” — work that is a poor fit for academia, startups, or large companies — was coming from.
So I wrote a short but hopefully comprehensive overview.
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His explanations were simple. He used no mathematics. He was the Master Experimenter.
- Young Thomas Edison on Faraday’s books
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Hertz thought radio waves were limited to line-of-sight, same as visible light, which would have made them useless for signalling.
He didn't account for the ionosphere.
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Look back in history, the truly big breakthroughs don't need narratives. They speak for themselves.
Marconi with wireless, Wrights with flight, Goodyear with rubber, etc.
I believe pretty strongly that a lot of our national success in frontier science has to do with narrative formation: convincing follow-on investors that the measurable progress is material+ the team will continue to innovate, so the team can continue to receive funding.
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This is fundamentally why I don’t trust computational simulations.
You get REAL data by just testing it in real life.
Empiricism vs Rationalism
It took the bicycle industry ~ 100y to realize that wider tires w/lower pressure are actually faster on rough & uneven surfaces (& vastly more comfortable).
All it took to figure it out is riding the same bicycle at the same effort w/2 different tires.
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This is incorrect. DARPA did not produced GPS and mRNA breakthroughs.
GPS comes from ground-based radio navigation systems. Developed in WW2 era, before DARPA existed.
Karikó made the key breakthrough on mRNA in 2005. But DARPA only started to fund mRNA in 2013.
A better model of governance is possible.
Since its founding in 1958, the US’s DARPA has produced a steady stream of technological breakthroughs: from GPS to mRNA vaccines.
Not because of DARPA’s scale, but its structure: empowered program managers who make and own decisions.
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I love this Charles Martin Hall story. Shows him FAFOing his way to figuring out how to extract aluminum from ore.
It teaches reader that it’s ok to just do and try things, no permissions needed.
When I have kids, I want to have books like this lying around house.
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Davide Radaelli retweeted
we helped over 100 people build their first robot.
As my graduating gift to Waterloo, I gave 37 teams a robot kit I designed, and took over the engineering buildings to host the largest robot hackathon, ever.
The demos are unreal!—check them out below
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Our team @alexrradaeli and @sashaprzybylski built a bracket bot controlled by a Wii balance board and Wiimote.
Demo is at 9:30 in Hudzah’s livestream.
This was an insanely fun hackathon to be a part of.
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Latest clip of the actuator. This is a single layer. It works sort of like a stepper motor, but runs linearly.
Next step is to add more layers. But first I have to fix an issue with friction. It’s an easy fix, but will require a new flex PCB order, which will take a week or so.
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Whether a domain has hobbyists working on stuff from scratch is the #1 determiner of if a field is dead or alive.
This is a very positive signal for chip space. MUCH more positive than any CHIPS act (meaningless noise).
Don’t worry, there’s actually a lot of people seriously working on chip fabs from scratch in the US 🤔
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Davide Radaelli retweeted
For my final year project in mechatronics engineering at waterloo, I made the worlds first affordable robot kit.
Introducing, the Bracket Bot Kit. A $500 robot kit that comes with everything you need to get started in robotics.
We are hosting a Hackathon to get feedback on the kit. 40 teams will get 40 robots and compete in challenges! -More details below
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Thanks to @sincethestudy for hosting an awesome Microbots hackathon this weekend. Was super fun building this mini walking robot.
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Correct take on why Canadian startups scene doesn’t work.
First post of the year. This made me sad to write. But someone needed to write it down:
Why the Canadian Startup Scene doesn't work
alexdanco.com/2021/01/11/why…
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