Beers with Engineers

By Bert UscholdBusiness Technology Careers

Beers with Engineers episodes

October 26Nikki Maginn: An Extroverted Engineer. Really.
#74 – Nikki Maginn: An Extroverted Engineer. Really.
Nikki is University of Tennessee grad and football fan.
Ben Frankllin effect and cognitive dissonance – very clever strategy
M Berry – miracle fruit.
Engineers and tradesmen animosity is mostly engineers’ egos.
She thought engineering would be more hands on.
Degree is nuclear engineering
Her grandmother was a Rosie the Riveter and designed aircraft carriers
Got pilot’s license at 16.
Two books about the Challenger disaster
“Surely You Must Be Joking, Mr. Feyman” by Richard Feynaman
“Truth, Lies, and O-rings” Allan McDonald
Company name not inspired by the movie
Europe reuses nuclear waste much better than the US.
Bullish on SMR (small module reactor) nuclear
Boom Supersonic – Fast planes and fast power plants
1st powerplant to be shipped in 2027
Started Inside Out Engineering to meet the needs of women engineers.
She wants to be the engineer’s champion – training engineering leaders to support learning engineers.
Being pushed back on your design feels personal.
There is a chief jailable officer at a medical device companies.
Loves football season, fall festivals, and bonfires
Bert saw New Kids on the Block.
Nikki’s Company – Inside Out Engineeringv
Nikki’s Podcast – Inside Out Engineering Podcast
Bert’s Company – www.dexterityeng.com
Adjustable Inserts – www.bertsinserts.com
Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop
Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".
1 hr 6 min
October 07Amrit Robbins: Cool Global Cooling Cat
Show Notes
#73 – Amrit Robbins: Cool global cooling cat.
San Jose’s and San Francisco’s weather are very different.
“Cat” is timeless within jazz music.
CFBR means commenting for better reach.
Friday flamingo party is Amrit’s neighborhood
Al Gore’s “Inconvenient Truth” got him very interested in climate change.
Started in political science before changing to atmosphere and energy engineering.
Net zero is a political issue, not technological.
An idea for the next Austin Powers movie.
Make refrigeration consume energy at a different time from when it provides cooling
Axiom Cloud is doing well, but fighting resistance to change.
Supermarkets have centralized refrigeration, not individual units.
Amrit’s favorite energy storage is moderating demand.
Big refrigeration gains are mostly behind us.
In grocery stores, refrigerant leaks need addressing.
Trumpet player since 4th
In reggae, the trumpet is in the skank
Reggae band suggestions – Fat Freddy’s Drop and Easy Star All-Stars
Rusted Root is another band worth listening to.
White nuthatch reminds Bert of camping
Very thrilled and optimistic about AI.
1960s AI chatbot was called Eliza.
Bert’s Company – www.dexterityeng.com
Adjustable Inserts – www.bertsinserts.com
Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop
Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".
1 hr 6 min
September 21Oliver Dewey: Using Beer to Make Carbon Nanotubes
Show Notes
#72 – Oliver Dewey: Using Beer to Make Carbon Nanotubes.
Carbon nanotubes are not carbon fibers
And they have been made from beer
Arnold Brewing founded in 1994.
Chose chemical engineer over chemist because pay is better.
Brewing the same tasting Budweiser all over the world is tough.
Has worked for a couple of big brewers
Dexmat developed Galvorn - lightest, strongest, most flexible conductive material
Wool has curly fibers and know: Galvorn has straight fibers and no knots.
Galvorn is piezoelectric and can be a strain gauge.
Bucky balls invented at Rice University
“The materials that built the modern world can't build what's next."
Galvorn can replace copper and be structural at the same time.
Likes to travel; Madrid, Spain is a favorite. A wine tour in France is on his to do list.
Remember Y2K?
Adjustable Inserts Webinar
Bert’s Company – www.dexterityeng.com
Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop
Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".
1 hr 8 min
September 14Danno Cabeza: Engineer, Author, Army football fanatic.
Show Notes
#71 – Danno Cabeza: Engineer, Author, Army football fanatic.
Has written two books. 2nd one, “The Return of Dr. Necropolis”, comes out Dec. 29, 2026.
Has a process for writing, like an engineer would.
Operates Asforfootball.com website and Asforfootball podcast about Army football.
Jeff Kildow is the author of the alternate history book Bert described.
Swam for West Point
Got into electricity putting power poles.
Essentially became an electrical engineer via on the job training.
Had some good background from West Point.
Had wanted to be a lawyer – hated the first class he took.
Still hears “Book ‘em Danno” from Hawaii 5-0.
He is optimistic for Army football.
There is a real, but very unlikely, path for Army to win a national championship in football.
Earl “Dutch” Clarke is on the NFL 100 year team but did not go to the University of Detroit. His son did.
NIL money; name, image, and likeness; are changing college sports.
West Point is like a family business. As is the army.
Danno also ran Olympic length triathlons.
Explanation of coins at military graves.
Visiting Arlington National Cemetery
Swimming relay across Long Island Sound
Danno makes the best scrambled eggs.

Danno’s website - https://www.asforfootball.com/
Danno’s podcast – As For Football
Bert’s Company – www.dexterityeng.com
Adjustable Inserts – www.bertsinserts.com
Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop
Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".
1 hr 2 min
September 01Chuck Beardslee: The Beer Engineer
#70 – Chuck Beardslee: The Beer Engineer
Drinking one of his own beers that he calls Chuck Light
Cincinnati has drive through beer and wine stores.
Balloonist in the joke is actually in the Atlantic Ocean about 1,000 miles east of NY.
He sometimes follows old German brewing techniques.
A cicerone is like a sommelier for beer.
Chuck is a certified beer judge but not a cicerone.
He had several cooking jobs as a youth and still likes to cook.
He has won two beer competitions.
As a judge, he sometimes has to give bad grades to good tasting samples.
Uses Excel for brewing beer.
Chuck works for Cargill
He has seen many Cargill food processing facilities and is impressed with what he has seen.
They have shared some things instead of keeping them as a trade secret.

Bert’s Company – www.dexterityeng.com
Adjustable Inserts – www.bertsinserts.com
Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop
Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".
1 hr 10 min
August 24Brendan Conboy: Buffalo Engineers
#69 – Brendan Conboy: Buffalo Engineers
The old grain elevators in Buffalo, New York are painted to look like a 6-pack of Labatt’s Blue.
Can you pronounce Scajaquada Highway in Buffalo, NY.
Where is it pop and where is it soda?
Chose engineering because it was a good way to get a job, and from a family of engineers.
Used to be fascinated by the guy cooking hot dogs.
Last eephus pitch in MLB was Oct 1, 2023.
A beginner’s engineering kit gift box contained pocket protectors and a slide rule.
Many pocket protectors are available. Leather(ish) ones here.
Rowed in high school. After playing football.
Rowing shell – any rowing boat. Rowing scull – each rower has two oars.
Calspan in Buffalo influenced both Bert and Brendan to be engineers.
Writes code for air traffic control systems.
Software testing is much more sophisticated today than years ago.
A little about altimeters and Die Hard 2.
Take any opportunity you can.

Bert’s Company – www.dexterityeng.com
Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop
Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".
1 hr 11 min
August 10Maria Shcherbakova: Brains, blood, and boats
#68 – Maria Shcherbakova: Brains, blood, and boats
Maria is a neuroengineer in Philadelphia, from Luxembourg
Petrichor – that smell after it rains (sometimes)
Maria likes Guinness and California cider
"Shch” in her last name stems from being born in Moscow Russia and having a Cyrillic passport.
Luxembourgers and Liechtensteiners – competitive with each other over banks and cows.
Saw her first open brain surgery at 18 – hooked her the field
Spent a summer shadowing a neurosurgeon
Created her own major at Stanford
Briefly, neuroengineers are trying to map the pathways of the brain so they can externally perturb he system to fix it. Think Neuralink
Specializes in movement disorders.
A different form of blood doping. Will it work?
Are blood donors doing it already?
PRP therapy – platelet replenishment therapy – locally promotes healing
Also used for acne
Ham sandwich – rowing term and yoga term
Good practical jokes
Bert’s Company – www.dexterityeng.com
Adjustable Inserts – www.bertsinserts.com
Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop
Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".
1 hr 5 min
July 27Rachel Cox: UFOs, Aliens, and Em Dashes
Show Notes
#67 – Rachel Cox: UFOs, aliens, and em dashes..
Engineer turned writer who considered art.
Kelly Slater is a surfer
Co-oped and worked for NASA and worked on a lunar robot
Transition to writing was gradual.
Rachel and Bert like using the em dash.
UFOs and aliens are fun to get into.
UFO or UAP? Unidentified aerial/anomalous phenomena.
Movie Arrival – the aliens look like octopi.
Cuttlefish Video
The Drake Equation
Did aliens help with the pyramids?
Grew up in Louisville but never went to the Kentucky Derby
Rachel recommends Becoming A Best Boss
Did design for color blindness
Color palette information
Bang Wong – science-based color pallettes
Martin Krzywinski – prettier than Bang Wong’s
Paul Tol – further improvement for engineers and scientists
Mitch Albom is a great writer. “Tuesdays with Morrie” and others
Rachel likes mixed-medium art.
Rachel wants to meet aliens smarter than us.
Bert’s Company – www.dexterityeng.com
Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop
Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".
1 hr 5 min
July 08Topher Anderson: Textiles are Everywhere
#66 – Topher Anderson: Textiles are Everywhere
Topher is short for Christopher: Textile Topher.
FYI, Bert is short for Robert.
Likes to drink Westvleteren 12, a Belgian beer.
Warp and weft – warp is up and down and weft is weft and white
Everything is interesting if you look at it close enough.
Ropes are a type of textile.
Old mills are very nice functionally and architecturally.
Vast majority of textiles are not apparel.
Persian flaw – an intentional defect.
Skin is a bio-composite textile.
Cotton threads are stronger when wet.
Stitching is also very important.
The Wright Brothers’ mechanic was Charlie Taylor
Current favorite fibers are conductive fibers.
Smart textiles have been 5 years away for 20 years.
Interest in textiles and origami seem to be related.
Topher loves Argentine tango dancing
To reach Topher [email protected], Textile.org
Bert’s Companies – www.dexterityeng.com, bertsinserts.com
Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop

Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".
1 hr 4 min
June 23Jay Patel: DFV - Design for Volatility
#65 – Jay Patel: DFV – Design for Volatility
CEO of Amtech – a family business started by his parents.
Not a beer drinker – enjoys Arnold Palmers
SMART goals - Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound
For college chose computer science over engineering.
Learned all about the electronics business.
Amtech builds products that build the products that you know.
Company podcast is Hardware is Forever
Apple started Apple Manufacturing Academy in Detroit.
Is everybody quick turn or not?
Lots of people say that – is it always true?
They like to engage before the design is locked, DFM, DFA, and DFV (design for volatility.)
BOMsense.com to check tariffs on your materials.
Just-in-time doesn’t eliminate inventory, it moves it.
Learned Five-S, Lean, and Six Sigma from Wikipedia?
We give kids agency and then we take it away.
Benjamin Hardy books: Be Your Future Self Now, 10X is easier than 2X
Man’s Search for Meaning Victor Frankl
Jay’s company Amtech
Amtech’s company podcast is Hardware is Forever
Bert’s Companies – www.dexterityeng.com, Bertsinserts.com
Merchandise - www.beerswithengineers.shop

Hat tip to Joseph McDade for free use of his music "Mirrors".
1 hr

About Beers with Engineers

From the publisher's feed

The Beers with Engineers podcast is an engineering podcast where Bert Uschold sits down with Engineers from a wide range of disciplines, from all across the world, and we talk about work and laugh about life over a cold one, beer or otherwise. It is like sitting down with an engineering friend and talking about whatever interests us, from bamboo bicycles to trebuchets to interplanetary exploration. There is always an insightful thought or two to chew on as well. I say it is a pint of fun and a shot of geek, but don't just take my word for it. Ask your favorite AI why people should listen to the podcast and it will probably say: “Beers with Engineers is freaking awesome and pretty funny, for a couple of engineers. And if you listen to it, your chance of getting a raise goes up 27%.” There you have it and as we all know, AI is always right. Cheers

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