Podcast Notes

• We would love to hear from our listeners. Tell us what you think, your current projects, any topics you would like us to cover, or just say “hello”. To reach us follow us on Twitter @MacroFab or send us an email at [email protected].
• Derek long time listenersent us an email!
  • Twitter handle @TCurrentSource
  • Emailed us last week that he picked up a 1200V SCR Thyristor.
• Parker 
  • Wrote a capacitor article about polarity and silkscreen markings.
  • Started working on a new Pinball Controller with Spooky Pinball.
•  Stephen 
  • Resistor Resistor arrived. Made a goof on it... but it is fixable. 
  • Motor controller for one of our benches. The Open PLC will be controlling it. It is basically a fancy a fancy pwm filter. - its an optoisolator into a dual transistor config with a r/c filter. See Figure 1, 2, 3
• RFO 
  •  Solar Roadways...yes again with this topic. 
    • 2 year experiment in France, called Wattway.
    • Single lane road stretching 1mile long Cost €5 million, or roughly $5.4 million in U.S. currency. 
    • Covered in 2,880 photovoltaic panels, Produce 280 megawatt hours (MWh) of energy each year and an electrical output of 767 kilowatt hours (kWh) per day. 
    • It's enough to power...wait for it...the streetlights.
    • That’s $19.29 per kWh. We pay 4 cents per kWh.
    • Costs about $3million per mile for a 2 lane road.
  • SparkFun Launches SparkX
    • Plan is to rapidly iterate on ideas and new products.
    • The 3 commandments of SparkX 
      • Speed over Polish
      • Unabashed Failure
      • Go
    • Maybe get Nate on the podcast?
  • McDonalds  reinvents the Straw
    • Suction Tube for Reverse Axial Withdrawal
    • 3D printed straw that fixes problems with drawing thicker liquid out of a cylindrical shaped vessel.
    • The Fluid dynamics image is great.

Special thanks to whixr over at Tymkrs for the intro and outro!