After-hours Fun with Capacitors at Work? 82
Chiggy_Von_Richtoffe asks "Hey, Folks! I start a new job at a small manufacturing plant (capacitors and small run custom circuit boards) in a few days, which itself is kind of cool. What is even more cool is that their facilities include an electron microscope, programmable high temperature ovens (think kilns), rapid cooling chambers (liquid CO2) to test component robustness, a lapping machine, all the kinds of ceramics i can think off, as well as equipment for die cutting, electroplating, and a few other industry related tasks. This of course fills my mind with wicked designs for homebrew projects, but i am always looking for new ideas to try. Given this kind of workshop what sort of (non-destructive, and fully legal) DIY projects could you come up with?"
Serial and Parallel games. (Score:3, Interesting)
Put them all in parallel.
Charge them up.
Quickly put them all in serial.
The results can be interesting...
Speaking of die cutters... make capacitors of two metal plates with a layer of ceramic in the middle. Before you put the ceramic in there and glue it all up, dunk the ceramic in water. Charging it quickly should be fun.
Re:Short one of the big giant caps... (Score:1, Interesting)
Never intentionally bridge the leads of a capacitor - dummy
Uhm, what? Whenever I fix, say, a microwave oven, the first thing I do is discharge the capacitors and then short the terminals to each other and to ground and leave it that way until I'm through replacing whatever part I'm replacing.
Dangerous fun with Capacitors aside... (Score:4, Interesting)
These are a blast. Everything looks better if you electroplate it!
Any of the cool looking, under the hood gagetry for your car, found cheaply at Schuks Auto would look better in gold. Any flat sided metal object can be enhanced with whatever artwork you can make a sillouette of on your computer, print in Press-n-Peel [techniks.com] masking material
iron on, and plate.
Flatware should never be monochromatic
Your own Electron Microscope? Sweet.
The first thing to do is find the guy that's good at operating this and buy him several good lunches. Getting good images is tricky. That done, there is a world of stuff that looks better super close up, and best yet, the annoyingly black and white nature of this device lends itself to.... Yes! Electroplate sillouttes! Imagine how cool the aluminum case sides of your favorite computer would be if this [ist.utl.pt] were etched on the side. Your kids/nephews could have the coolest metal lunchboxes in the school. Like this [columbia.edu] or this [iastate.edu] or this [maths.org] or this [tamu.edu].
A clear spray-on enamel will keep oxidation from uglying things up if your experiment with some of the more easily tarnished metals like copper and silver....
Sounds like you're in for a good time. Good luck.
Re:Permission? (Score:2, Interesting)
Many of us maintain signifcant home labs specifically because anything created using the company gear is the companies' property.
Re:A few random thoughts. (Score:2, Interesting)
Yeah, I was wondering about that, too. I do a lot of work for startups, and I would never hire a geek that wasn't inclined to play with the toys. They should be smart enough not to break anything expensive. But if I want a job done in a perfectly regular fashion with no thinking or backtalk, I'll teach a computer to do it.