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1500 questions
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5 answers

How are passive houses made in very hot regions (like Saudi Arabia)?

I think, here is the main problem the difference between the internal and the external temperature. For example, in Saudi Arabia, in 50 C, a passive house needed probably much sophisticated planning as in Paris. Compared to the traditional cooling…
peterh
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3 answers

How does measurement uncertainty combine with tolerances?

Given a tolerance within which your workpiece should be manufactured, say some length should be $10\pm1$mm. If you determine that your uncertainty in measuring this length is $0.2$mm (at 95%). How should a measurement of $9.1$mm be treated? Clearly…
nivag
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2 answers

Modern method for teaching controls

Background When I took my first class in controls (2006-ish as taught by an aerospace professor for a mix of ME and EE students) it was basically all done in Laplace-transform, transfer functions etc. More recently (2012) I took a graduate level…
Dan
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If aircraft are pressurised, why do our ears pop during liftoff and landing?

Something hit me during my last flight: our ears feel that the pressure around us changes quickly during liftoff and landing, they hurt more and more until we make them pop. However, the cabin must maintain a level of oxygen higher than outside the…
Mister Mystère
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5 answers

Why is this bridge thickest above the support pillars instead of the mid-span where the bending stress is highest?

Why is a bridge designed like this? The depth of the section at pillars is more than the depth at middle. If I model this as a simply supported beam having load at mid span then the bending moment will be maximized at the middle and the area is…
MechaTrex
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3 answers

How do bike wheels keep turning when the rider stops pedalling?

I am very confused with something regarding bikes... How is it that a bike wheel continues to spin (either from momentum or from going downhill) when the rider is not pedalling, without also spinning the pedal? Similarly, what mechanism allows the…
Ankit
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3 answers

Why is it more reliable to use the land/pit transition in a CD-ROM?

I was reading about how CD-ROMs work and I came to this: Although it might seem simplest to use a pit to record a 0 and a land to record a 1, it is more reliable to use a pit/land or land/pit transition for a 1 and its absence as a 0,so this…
Kate
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What is it about the cabin electrical supply on cruise ships that makes surge protectors dangerous?

Surge protectors are banned on cruise ships, and so are confiscated during boarding. Extension cords and cube taps etc. are discouraged, but not banned. I'm asking specifically about surge protector incompatibility, and would like an answer that…
Ray Butterworth
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What limits the speed of a car?

From an engineering perspective, what limits the maximum speed you can reach with a regular car? I understand that some of the faster cars are for safety reasons limited to not run faster than say 250 km/h, but that's not my question. I can think of…
user1583209
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Does an electric vehicle going downhill recover energy?

I have to model the behavior of an electric car. For this, I use these equations and I can observe by "playing" with parameters that, when going downhill at constant speed, the car has a negative consumption (i.e. recovers energy). I was wondering…
Greg82
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4 answers

Calculation of Clamping force from bolt torque

I'm trying to calculate the clamping force resulting from torquing a nut and bolt to a particular level. I have found this formula in various forms in a lot of places. $$T = KDP$$ $T$ = Torque (in-lb) $K$ = Constant to account for friction (0.15 -…
harry courtice
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3 answers

How to determine the characteristic length in reynolds number calculations in general?

I understand that the reynolds number is given by the expression $Re=\frac{\rho v L}{\mu}$, where $\rho$ is the density, $v$ is the fluid velocity and $\mu$ is the dynamic viscosity. For any given fluid dynamics problem, $\rho$, $v$, and $\mu$ are…
Paul
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Why does temperature not increase by putting more logs into the fire

Why does temperature not increase by putting more logs into the fire ? It is a very common observation which I have seen but after some research online I found that it is not completely true. One reason which I think is that if I put more and more…
S.M.T
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While going downhill, does my car consume less fuel when in neutral or in gear?

I once meditated on the fact that a car, in downhill, would consume more fuel when in neutral to keep the engine on, rather than in gear. To keep the engine on when in gear, in fact, you mostly need the gravity and enough thrust to keep it rotating,…
Wes
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What is the most efficient means of warming a building with a high ceiling?

Consider a large auditorium, a church, or some other very large, essentially one roomed building with a high ceiling. Suppose that the building has many entrances which enable cold air in/hot air out and traffic in and out of the building is…
Paul
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