precision engineering

Breaking Taps explains how the cryogenic mirror actuators on the James Webb Space Telescope achieve nanometer precision using flexures. It shows a 3D-printed replica and how one motor handles both coarse and fine motion.

First of an 18-part lecture series by engineer Dan Gelbart on building prototypes. The series covers practical mechanical design and fabrication of precision machines.

SuperfastMatt looks at how the Tesla Model S retracting door handles were redesigned over time, from many parts to a motor plus sensor, with a focus on engineering and reliability.

Dan Gelbart shows his home-built air bearing CNC lathe and grinder, which reaches about 1 micron accuracy. He demonstrates the machine and its parts.

An engineering explainer on why Tesla abandoned the induction motor for the Model 3 and used an IPM-SynRM design. It covers the reluctance torque and permanent magnet principles behind the choice.

Engineering Explained examines BMW's Hydrogen 7, a V12 that burns liquid hydrogen or gasoline. He covers cryogenic storage at -253C and why the approach is impractical.

Bill Hammack of engineerguy explains how medieval engineers designed stone cathedrals using rules of thumb, with no science, mathematics or literacy. He uses it to define the engineering method.

Part 10 of Dan Gelbart's prototype-building lecture series, covering flexures: flexible joints that give precise, frictionless motion. It shows how a cheap piece of aluminum can become a nanometer-accurate mechanism.

A Tom Scott guest video by Grady Hillhouse of Practical Engineering on the 1981 Hyatt Regency walkway collapse. A seemingly minor change to the support design led to catastrophic failure, which is why the case is taught as a lesson to check and double-check everything.

Real Engineering looks at why nuclear power plants are expensive and how their economics compare with fossil and renewable alternatives. It is based on a video from the Illinois Energy Professors.

Veritasium explores compliant mechanisms, devices that move by flexing rather than using hinges and joints, with researchers at BYU. It covers advantages such as fewer parts and precision, including uses in nuclear weapon safety.

Tom Scott visits a rotating house near San Diego and explains how electricity, gas and water keep working on the rotating part. It includes a 3D render of the utility connection system.

Musician Thoj performs a live looping session on the Teenage Engineering OP-1 synthesizer, building a deep house track layer by layer.

Practical Engineering explains Mechanically Stabilized Earth, where layers of reinforcement make soil strong enough to hold heavy loads, shown with a sand structure supporting a car. It notes that MSE walls are everywhere in infrastructure.

Practical Engineering summarizes the 2017 Oroville Dam spillway failure, explaining the engineering details behind the incident. It also discusses how operators and regulators failed to keep downstream residents safe.

Technology Connections takes apart a 1940s Sunbeam Radiant Control toaster. It senses the toast's own browning and lowers and raises it automatically using purely mechanical parts and no electronics.

Bill Hammack of Engineer Guy explains the engineering behind the aluminum beverage can: why it is cylindrical, how it is manufactured, why it narrows at the top, the double seam, and how the pull tab works.

Mark Rober shows an automatic bullseye dartboard that tracks a thrown dart with motion capture and moves in real time so it always hits the center. He spent over three years on the project.

Scott Manley looks at SpinLaunch, which aims to throw launch vehicles out of a spinning launcher at hypersonic speed. He covers its recent Mach 1 test of a one-third scale launcher and the engineering problems that remain.

Destin Sandlin of Smarter Every Day explores how grain bins work and the engineering and know-how involved in farming. His point is that farmers are exceptionally capable.

Practical Engineering gives a short introduction to concrete, covering the difference between concrete and cement, the ingredients, and reinforcement. It includes a hydraulic press demonstration of compressive strength.

Real Engineering examines whether greening the Sahara could draw down carbon and slow climate change. It concludes that the effort would be enormously costly and that changes in albedo and other effects undercut the climate benefit.

Practical Engineering explains why San Francisco's Millennium Tower is sinking and tilting, covering how geology and foundation design (friction piles in the Colma Formation) affect skyscrapers. It also covers the fix being attempted.

Practical Engineering explains how continuous welded rail copes with thermal expansion by restraining it, using the relationship between temperature, stress and strain. The video is part of a series on railways.

Technology Connections explains how old-fashioned non-electronic rice cookers work, using a magnet and spring switch tripped by the Curie point. It shows the thermodynamics and magnetism behind a simple appliance.

A 1930s Chevrolet training film explaining the principles and development of the differential gear. It builds the idea step by step from first principles to the finished mechanism.

A 1936 Chevrolet-sponsored film that explains how a car transmission works by treating gears as spinning levers. It uses physical models to make the mechanism clear.

The first installment of a hobbyist's video diary documenting his build of a giant walking spider-like vehicle. The footage is casual and self-shot, following the early stages of the project.

Jared Owen's 3D animated breakdown of how a Brunswick GS-X bowling pinsetter works, showing its mechanisms for sweeping, lifting and resetting pins and balls.

Engineer Stuff Made Here builds two new supposedly unpickable locks with different designs and sends them to the Lock Picking Lawyer to see whether they can be defeated. The video covers the novel anti-picking mechanisms.

Part 1 of an episode of the British educational TV series The Secret Life of Machines, about how vacuum cleaners work and their history. It mixes humor with explanation of household technology.

Kurzgesagt's animated explainer on CRISPR gene editing, covering how the technology works and what it could mean for curing disease, designer babies and aging. It frames genetic engineering as an irreversible change coming to humanity.

Wintergatan's video of the Marble Machine, a hand-built music instrument that plays a song using about 2000 marbles on a mechanical clockwork-style mechanism.

Technology Connections praises a 1940s-50s Sunbeam toaster and explains what makes a toaster well designed, drawing on a vintage Sunbeam video.

Mark Rober builds a machine that plays the Cyclone arcade game with perfect timing and discovers the game is rigged so that perfect play still loses. The video explains the physics and electronics tricks behind carnival-style skill games.

A Kurzgesagt animation on using gene drives to modify mosquitoes against malaria, and whether we should. It explains the mechanism and the ethical trade-offs.

Stuff Made Here designs and builds an "unpickable" lock, then calls in a locksmith to see if it can be defeated. It covers the mechanical design effort and the attempt to pick it.

Tom Scott visits ThyssenKrupp's test tower in Rottweil to see the Multi, a rope-free elevator that uses linear motors to move cabins sideways as well as vertically.

Engineering Explained argues that internal combustion engines are far from dead, and discusses the continued development of ICEs and the problems facing electric vehicles.

Asianometry explains the EUV light source inside ASML's lithography machines, where lasers hit falling tin droplets twice to produce 13.5 nm light. It walks through the engineering of the droplet generator, the pre-pulse and main laser, and the plasma that results.