January 15, 2014

An Interview with Dave Taylor - Multi-talented Meter Maker

Listen Later

1 hour 28 minutes

Welcome, Dave Taylor! He was the designer of the Fluke 8060 and currently works as the Director of Engineering at Rice Lake Weighing Systems!

Most importantly, there is an epic thread on the EEVblog forum where Dave talks about his experiences. That is a must read set of posts!

Dave's first foray into electronics was building audio gear: Fuzz boxes, TA17s, Class D amps using 555 timers, soundboards/mixers.

He was hired by Fluke after a short stint at a job after going to the University of Colorado at Boulder (the Buffalos!)

He assisted on the design of the 8020 and the 8920, but was also sent to work on the production line.

Do young engineers get experience these days when production is elsewhere?

The Fluke handhelds used (and developed) the 429100, an all-in-one measurement chip for all its handheld 3.5 digit devices. It outputs readings directly to an LCD. Intersil then did minor modifications to the design and released it as the Intersil ICL7106.

There was a lawsuit after they decapped an ICL7106 chip and found the silicon said Fluke! It was functionally equivalent to the 429100, except for the range changing (which was patented).

After the experience with Intersil, John Fluke Sr decided to bring sensitive designs in-house and built a 5 micron fab.

Dave worked closely with Caddock Networks and learned a lot about resistors and how they're manufactured/sorted to be precise.

Once the project was over and there were unused 8060s, one was gifted to Jim Williams, who Dave knew.

The 70 series went to a rotary switch which still persists today.

These were a response to competition with Beckman. That company was later purchased by Fluke.

Fluke also bought Datron, a company Dave almost went to work for.

After Fluke, Dave went to WaveTek and designed the Model 52 datalogger. See one in action:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=caQmiw2170A

Once that company folded, Dave went to go work for MSI, which was then bought by Rice Lake Weighing Systems. They make industrial scales and weighing equipment. Dave still works there as the director of engineering.

Thanks again to Dave for putting up with our delays and our usual annoyingness! Find him as drtaylor on the EEVblog Forum. (must be logged in)

...more

View all episodes

View all episodes

Download on the App Store

Download on the App Store

Get it on Google Play

The Amp Hour

By The Amp Hour (Chris Gammell and David L Jones)

4.9

226226 ratings

January 15, 2014

An Interview with Dave Taylor - Multi-talented Meter Maker

Listen Later

1 hour 28 minutes

Welcome, Dave Taylor! He was the designer of the Fluke 8060 and currently works as the Director of Engineering at Rice Lake Weighing Systems!

Most importantly, there is an epic thread on the EEVblog forum where Dave talks about his experiences. That is a must read set of posts!

Dave's first foray into electronics was building audio gear: Fuzz boxes, TA17s, Class D amps using 555 timers, soundboards/mixers.

He was hired by Fluke after a short stint at a job after going to the University of Colorado at Boulder (the Buffalos!)

He assisted on the design of the 8020 and the 8920, but was also sent to work on the production line.

Do young engineers get experience these days when production is elsewhere?

The Fluke handhelds used (and developed) the 429100, an all-in-one measurement chip for all its handheld 3.5 digit devices. It outputs readings directly to an LCD. Intersil then did minor modifications to the design and released it as the Intersil ICL7106.

There was a lawsuit after they decapped an ICL7106 chip and found the silicon said Fluke! It was functionally equivalent to the 429100, except for the range changing (which was patented).

After the experience with Intersil, John Fluke Sr decided to bring sensitive designs in-house and built a 5 micron fab.

Dave worked closely with Caddock Networks and learned a lot about resistors and how they're manufactured/sorted to be precise.

Once the project was over and there were unused 8060s, one was gifted to Jim Williams, who Dave knew.

The 70 series went to a rotary switch which still persists today.

These were a response to competition with Beckman. That company was later purchased by Fluke.

Fluke also bought Datron, a company Dave almost went to work for.

After Fluke, Dave went to WaveTek and designed the Model 52 datalogger. See one in action:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=caQmiw2170A

Once that company folded, Dave went to go work for MSI, which was then bought by Rice Lake Weighing Systems. They make industrial scales and weighing equipment. Dave still works there as the director of engineering.

Thanks again to Dave for putting up with our delays and our usual annoyingness! Find him as drtaylor on the EEVblog Forum. (must be logged in)

...more

More shows like The Amp Hour

The Changelog: Software Development, Open Source by Changelog Media

The Changelog: Software Development, Open Source

289 Listeners

This Week in Tech (Audio) by TWiT

This Week in Tech (Audio)

3,061 Listeners

Security Now (Audio) by TWiT

Security Now (Audio)

2,009 Listeners

Software Engineering Daily by Software Engineering Daily

Software Engineering Daily

626 Listeners

Talk Python To Me by Michael Kennedy

Talk Python To Me

583 Listeners

SpyCast by SpyCast

SpyCast

1,534 Listeners

SANS Internet Stormcenter Daily Cyber Security Podcast (Stormcast) by Johannes B. Ullrich

SANS Internet Stormcenter Daily Cyber Security Podcast (Stormcast)

648 Listeners

Embedded by Logical Elegance

Embedded

190 Listeners

Smashing Security by Graham Cluley

Smashing Security

317 Listeners

Darknet Diaries by Jack Rhysider

Darknet Diaries

8,051 Listeners

Physics World Weekly Podcast by Physics World

Physics World Weekly Podcast

77 Listeners

Practical AI by Daniel Whitenack and Chris Benson

Practical AI

208 Listeners

Hackaday Podcast by Hackaday

Hackaday Podcast

64 Listeners

Latent Space: The AI Engineer Podcast by Latent.Space

Latent Space: The AI Engineer Podcast

101 Listeners

Robinson's Podcast by Robinson Erhardt

Robinson's Podcast

265 Listeners