I adore how he does literally the worse thing to get noticed by the algorithm (months and years of no upload, followed by short bursts of uploads) and STILL has 1,26M followers. Shows the quality.
I'm sure he has thousands of requests and probably tens of thousands of ideas... Further this is probably been already mentioned on his channel but I'd love to see his take on Roman concrete which is significantly stronger than anything we make today
It's good content. Bill has such a knack for displaying the exciting engineering of many everyday items, while giving the greatest engineering sales pitch possible.
On another note, and at the risk of being melodramatic, I just subscribed to this channel and have only seen 3 videos yet. And my mind is kind of blown right now. I had considered engineering in my college years but thought it to be an exact science! I thought it would be too challenging for me and not quite fitting with my natural tendencies. But now I see that I use that engineering mind a lot in my life to solve problems and implement solutions. I just didn’t have any role models to show me and guide me to see that I just might have the mind for it. And I didn’t have the confidence in myself to find out for myself. This makes me sad for missed opportunities. But moreso excited! I still have plenty of life left and plenty to learn. This makes me feel like I actually do have something I’m capable of contributing. Thank you for breaking an old, outdated belief! *edited for clarity
Also just by ignoring it, stamping metal is quick and easy so it doesn't even matter whether it'll always work, you can make so many that you can still produce a lot.
@@hedgehog3180 but... if the dimensions have to be super accurate... wont all the layers be slightly miss aligned? you would be less precise punching holes and layering them together
but your kind of making your problem bigger, now not only do you need to make and align these plates with precision, you also need to build the very good aligner machine, and many of its parts that require precision. You kind of passed the problem to the next part. @@darkcoeficient
These four new episodes have been great! I really appreciate your featuring the positives rather than the failure analysis we get from most engineering-centric sources. Hoping for more in the future.
@@markfryer9880 I can't agree with this enough, I love learning about the brilliant solutions and creative thinking that goes into the development of an idea from something that is exciting but flawed, into a new paradigm that becomes ubiquitous throughout the world. These triumphs don't get enough attention compared to the focus given to disaster response.
Bill it is so good to have you back. I think the work and effort you put in is amazing and I for one am TRULY grateful for all these new episodes and not forgetting all your previous works. All the best from Steve in the UK
The magnetron is the literal definition of Sacred Geometry. And it's origins is not earthly. I guess the watchers really wanted the European slave revolt crushed.
Welcome back, Engineer Guy! I’m so glad this channel is producing videos again. The content is so fascinating. .0001 is a heck of a tolerance, and machining the magnetron from solid copper would’ve have not only taken a week per unit but wasted material. Microwaves would have never become affordable. Not to mention needed a plumber just to install in a kitchen.
If it takes a week to machine something just because it's made from copper, you need new machinists. Use sharp tooling with the correct geometry, a WATER based coolant, and correct speeds and feeds, and you'll have no trouble at all. Machining copper is one hell of a lot easier than machining titanium, which work-hardens in a single pass if the per-tooth pressure is too high.
Speaking of Magnetrons, I have some fun memories of playing with magnets from some. My father's a retired USAF radar maintenance tech. He would occasionally bring home a dead Magnetron and strip the twin horseshoe magnets from it. Those suckers were strong, and if you weren't careful, would do a number on any fleshy parts that got caught in the way. Never thought to disassemble the inside of the magnetron itself to see what it looked like. Sadly, that's a missed opportunity that won't come again.
you just said something I always thought, people like mythical stories about inventions and inventors, and sometimes even get angry when they read the real story because "it ends the magic". but it doesn't make sense to me, the details are the most amazing part of history, there is so much magic in reality when you try to dive deep into it. why would anyone prefer some mythical story ?
The mythos of genius comes in two flavors I've noticed. One is the savant who can effortlessly solve some problem (ignoring all the years of study to have a base understanding of the problem to begin with). Or the flash of inspiration (ignoring all the previous failures that lead down this path). Both seem to ignore the everyday problem solving people do as routine. So it becomes a story of either gods walking among us or some simpleton outsider recognizing the emperor has no clothes; relieving people of the burden of trying and failing themselves (or at least not viewing their own successes as worthy).
@@quintessenceSL The worst part is that it can discourage people when they hit the hard work of inventing, because they feel like that difficulty means that they're doing something wrong, or aren't cut out for the task.
Plus, I don't think the myth and the truth are mutually exclusive in this case. The idea of using microwaves to cook food could have been born from a radar technician melting a candy bar, and that wouldn't invalidate the fact that it took many design iterations and innovations to make that idea work in a household setting. Then again, that radar technician came from my state, so I might be a little biased.
Right side/left side of the brain usage. Right side of the brain harboring more of the emotional response to a situation and the left side harboring more of the analytical (numerical/cold facts) response to a situation. The general population uses the right side of the brain (warm and fuzzy) for their decision making... (not to sound dismissive of the latter - there are proper places for it).
@@GoatBarn no, that is another myth that people spread because they like the idea of separating people in neat little boxes, and when I say its based on nothing they get angry because I'm a party pooper.
As always after watching your videos I have a hard time finding the right words to express how much I enjoy them. I can imagine how much effort is put into every one of your videos. Please know that this is very much appreciated. Thank you so much for your work.
As a retired engineer myself (and both my son’s are engineers), thank you for this series. You do wonders to explain what engineering is! Well done!! 🎉
This was a really great way to tell this story. The story of "best" to an engineer and how it changes based on context, time and situation. Brilliant. Side note, My dad was a master machinist and tool maker. He had a contract to make those super precise magnetron cavities for raytheon ... He told the story often. He loved the challenge.
Great explanation. This is something I've seen alot of, people who fail as engineers because they're too rigid in their definitions of what quality is. They navigate on their own aestethic sense, rather than the constraints of the actual problem, and they like to imagine one type of solution suits every problem. Such people would enjoy the fine machining of the older magnetrons, and seeing the comparison at 8:50, would scoff at the less precise machining, claiming the angular holes are simply a worse design. When in fact the reason for the old precise machining doesn't exist when using it in a small consumer oven.
i see an engineerguy upload, i watch. i may be but a software engineer but the lessons in bill's videos and the principles they teach are equally as applicable in my trade as any other engineering trade. always excited to see you upload, bill. i hope you're well and thriving as you deserve to be
I am a professional design engineer, 9 years in the business. When watching these videos I regularly find myself nodding an smiling. Really good content! And I especially love the message, that even people decades in the field forget, that it doesn't need to be perfect, but good enough.
Early 70's, home from school on a sick day, watching the Price Is Right, and the late Johnny Olson touting emphatically on a Show Case presentation, "...and this beautiful Amana Radarrange! with its modern cooking capabilities..." will forever be stuck in my head for some strange reason...
Hello there! Great to see another video on this channel. I started watching this channel years ago in primary school and it has inspired me to become an engineer. I'm about to finish my third year in engineering and start my internship for the summer. Thanks for being a great teacher.
@@markfryer9880 I picked up civil engineering because my local university has an excellent CE program, but it was really hard to choose between civil and mechanical.
So 'Best' varies considerably with the specific requirements for an engineered product, it's so simple but a very important point to emphasise. I particularly liked the innovation to stack thin die-punched slices to produce a magnetron. A very elegant solution to the problem of requiring both high precision, and high production volume.
I’d be keen to see how they assembled those wafers into a single brick where they did seem to be spiraling in at least one example seem in the video… but that may have just been a demonstration piece not fully assembled yet.
@@JoeOvercoat I imagine that they built an alignment jig (or given the production volume, numerous jigs) and just stacked up the plates as needed. Quite like how you would be tasked to assemble a motorcycle or hydromechanical planetary gear automatic transmission clutch these days, since the construction is remarkably similar between those two items (many stacked sheets held to fine tolerances).
@@44R0Ndin Those jigs must have had have high tolerance & calibration challenges is a production environment. So much so, that I suggest that would be worth a video on its own.
Stacking stampings is a fairly common practice for other stuff too these days. The rotors and stators of brushless motors tend to be made like that to greatly simplify fabrication and reduce eddy currents, for example.
My heart is so full that new videos were released. The simplicity and easy of speaking helps get the point across without coming across as condescending. It's real information delivered in everyday language and I hope more comes at some point. Very well done, glad to see you well Bill.
Thank you Bill. When my wife left the Army she started college. I previously held a BA in psychology, but as I’d been teaching math and science, I decided to return to school. At the same time she earned her BS in microbiology, I earned about 50% of my BSEE. I love engineering and often dream of finishing, but sadly it’s an unlikely prospect. Your videos not only remind me of why I love it, but also that engineering is a widespread human activity from antiquity (with or without a degree). So again I say, THANK YOU!!!
Your closing address should be on every engineering school's prospectus, and mainstream media content creators should take it to heart. Engineers are every bit as creative as painters, musicians or sculptors and our lives would be as unbearable without them as it would be without pictures, music or statues.
This is one of the most awesome descriptions of the engineering process that I’ve seen on RU-vid. This video brings to mind another fantastic explainer of engineering practice. Back in the 1990s I discovered books by Henry Petroski - especially To Engineer is Human, a wonderfully accessible book that explores the relationship between engineering failure (example: metal fatigue cracks that formed in the early iron bridges during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries) in driving advancement of the art. Make more of these please 🙂
I am pretty sure that the plane pictured at 1:26 isn't being flown by Germans. I think it's being flown by a Finnish pilot in service with that country in a war with the soviets. Finland's uneasy association with the Nazis is really interesting history. Great video!
the Finnish airforce used a swastika in its insignia starting in 1918 for reasons unrelated to the Nazi party. Finland was officially prohibited by the western allies from using it after 1943, but is still unofficially the insignia used today. The fact that they both ended up as allies toward the end of the war and shared the same insignia was mostly a coincidence since it was already a popular symbol before being appropriated by Nazis.
I remember the anecdote about the engineer and the chocolate. I remember, from the version I read, that he noted the effect, but didn't get back to it until well after the war.
I will stop now … putting all the stuff away now in video and working on next video … some I posted a picture on Reddit showing the studio covered in all the stuff from this series
Thank you for the review. Being a Fire controlman in the navy in 1966, I used to heat up my submarine sandwiches with the 50,000 watt Fire Control radar. We also used to test to see if the radar was emitting by waving our hand in front of the parabolic dish. If it got warm , it was working. Just a quick check . Thanks for the video, it brought back memories.
My dad was an Electronics Technician on an aircraft carrier in the Pacific in WW2 and worked on radars that employed huge magnetrons like the one shown in this video. Segue to decades later, I'm talking with him about the new microwave oven he had just bought. I mentioned that it was powered by a magnetron and he stared at me and said in wonder, obviously remembering those wartime monsters and said in disbelief, "It's powered by a maggie?!" I finally convinced him that it had been miniaturized, but I think he still didn't quite believe it.
Does anyone know how they aligned the stamped parts? With the tolerances being so tight on the machined part it's impressive a similar performance can be reached with stacked sheets. Even stamping the sheets to such a tolerance by itself is impressive.
I don't believe the individual sheets had to match each other as precisely as the single block of metal had to be uniform throughout. The stack is a whole bunch of tiny magnetrons pointed in the same direction rather than a single strong one. As long as your die is precise any imperfections in each sheet gets averaged out, where in the single block imperfections would be magnified by the size.
As someone who worked in the field. Metal stamping as a die maker. It's really easy to get extremely precise parts from stamping. The same way broaching is more precise than drilling, milling, or boring. You can put a step in that just broaches a rough stamped part. To make extremely precise stamped parts you just maintain the tooling better than normally found in stamped parts.
As a career engineer I love hearing someone speak with such genuine love for engineering and explaining it in a way that can lift the lid on an otherwise misunderstood and sometimes completely hidden profession. The Egineerguy embodies all the best parts of human inventiveness and curiosity. Well done!
Absolutely love this series! Also, I want to thank you for these videos, they brought UIUC to my attention over 8 years ago and I just graduated with a bachelor's from them this weekend!
The best 'explain it like I'm 5' description for how a magnetron works that I have heard is that it's whistle for electron instead of air(gas) molecules.
Ok so I’ve just discovered your videos literally today and I can’t stop watching them , I’m no engineer but I’ve always been told I think like one , I guess it’s just how my mind works , I’m so thankful for your videos and more opportunities to learn stuff on a deeper level.
Glad to have you back Bill! Love this video, will have to check out your new book! I like to say that as a product design engineer I’m always just balancing equations. Computers make it easy to do the number crunching now a days but we still have to balance the manufacturing techniques available to us, the material, make it cheap enough someone is willing to buy it etc. Design engineering is what you get when you mix algebra, manufacturing, and a bit of instinct together
You are a real master of teaching. The script, the pace and the simple but clever animations are so perfect for the understanding of everything you want to teach. I wish I'd have a teacher like you in college. Learning would have been an amazing journey. I'm glad you are back, your videos always wake up that children inside me who wanted to build things and solve real life problems.
Bill, you can make a video on the basics of anything and we'll watch it. You do such an incredible job at breaking things down, explain the history and the how to and it's like a perfectly tunes symphony. Here's to many more awesome videos. Thanks for you hard work.
Bill, your content is so engaging and the presentation so easily digestible without being dumbed down. There aren't many better channels on RU-vid. Thank you.
Thanks for this series Bill! It's great to hear about the engineering stories that actually go on / went on behind the scenes. The Rule of Thumb for arch walls I probably never would have learned about otherwise!
The apocryphal story you mention was an amalgam of several things that did all happen - just not all to the same person, never mind at the same time. My grandfather was one of the RCAF radar technicians seconded to the RAF fairly early in the war, and he remembered how his group learned to respect the danger of microwaves: bypassing interlocks during maintenance was reasonably common then, and a few people with chocolate or candy bars in their pockets saw them melted. It only took two *in his unit* - over invalided back home, and one dead, of radiation burns and/or poisoning, to drive the lesson home. I can't imagine my grandfather's unit was unique - most likely hundreds of men got anywhere from minor to lethal exposure in the early years.
Thank you for the history lesson. I studied these in the 80’s while in the Navy as a CIWS technician. I remember learning about other tubes like Klystron and Twisted wave tube, but are now just a past memory. Thank you
Thanks for the video Bill. A question - Do you have more information about the process of stacking the laminations of the wartime magnetron? I'd think perfectly aligning the holes would be more difficult than machining the solid design. Not to mention the multitude of surfaces to keep perfectly clean/corrosion free. Feels like more potential for error. Maybe the limiting factor wasn't precision, but simple time of manufacturing. I'm surprised it worked! It makes intuitive sense but I wouldn't have trusted the idea if I'd come up with it. Suppose that's why I'm not an engineer!
I am not an mechanical engineer or a machinist, I work in IT infrastructure so I may be very ignorant here. My assumption was that one or many sets of rods was produced at the specified measurements to be pushed through the plates and they were then sealed in some way, by welds or otherwise, to a base plate at the correct positions.
Absolutely bang on! I despair the way the media trivialises scientific and engineering achievements, relegated to."fun curiosity stories" at the end of news bulletins or dumbed down and "artified" so much as to be pointless in "documentaries". RU-vid is my saviour - there are so many talented content makers who treat their viewers as intelligent individuals wanting to learn, unlike the mainstream media aiming at the lowest common denominator.
As a train fan, I have always loved the incredible beauty of the Dreyfuss locomotive. I am ashamed to admit that until this video, I had no idea Dreyfuss designed other iconic items. Thank you!
Wow, excellent video! 👍 I'm an IBEW wireman by trade, but have toyed with the idea of getting an EE degree off and on for a few years. This video definitely gives me the motivation to get started on that path sooner than later.
I'm in my third year of university for mechE after having worked various jobs before starting. Do it! You'd be surprised how many people in engineering are in our same boat. If you have the smarts and, more importantly, the drive/willpower, go for it!
My dad was in the Navy and the Air Force and worked on Radar and was also a amateur radio operator ( HAM ). Hetoldmethe idea of microwave ovens for home use came from air traffic controllers . That they would place their cups of coffee in front of the microwave coming from inside the tower to keep them warm . He also said that being around microwaves wasnt necessarily bad for your health or there would be a air traffic controllers disease.
@@engineerguyvideo I left in March 1983 to start my first job at Gould in Chicago. I'm now retired and kill some time with RU-vid videos. Today was the first I came across your channel. It appears you don't make videos very often but I've bookmarked your channel and will work my way through the older ones. You do a good job.
I almost skipped this video knowing how the Magnetron works...Happy to have watched it, I call this the elegant solution to a problem. Engineerguy never disappoints!
amazing work bill, might want to change the thumbnails though since it looks like its an audiobook which is probably why this isnt getting as many views as you usually do
"The notion of best changes with time" is a great underlying philosophy. You don't need change for its own sake, but you do sometimes need change in order to successfully adapt to new circumstances.
Indeed! Part of the reason for watching Bill's video clips is the _delivery._ His voice reminds me of broadcasting greats Charles Kuralt and Charles Osgood.
That's precisely the reason why I joined this race to find the ever-evolving 'best'. That's what makes becoming and being an engineer so fulfilling when you do find your first 'best'.
Thank you for making this. I'd never understood magenetrons. Are military and aviation magnetrons still built with the stacked plate method? After all that tolerance is still fairly difficult to achieve Its also nice to see you back. I'd figured you were done with making videos.
Magnetrons are obsolete in radars. The frequency fluctuates from pulse to pulse and as the device warms up, so they can't be used with the Doppler techniques employed in modern radars.
@@nerd1000ify The company I worked for up until retirement last year makes thousands of magnetrons for marine radars where they are cheap, powerful and effective.
Throughout the video I was like "Yes... Yes... Yes..." Oh my God!!! This is an invaluable piece of engineering history, information and philosophy on engineering. Thank you!
Not a single word uttered, just an end-title card, and this might be the first book plug that's made me interested in buying the book. The scripts of engineerguy's videos speak to the quality of his writing much more than hours of "buy my book to support the channel" b-roll could ever
What a great video series! The microwave always fascinates me because I get so much use out of it and it's just a really interesting device, seen other RU-vid channels do some crazy stuff with them. So what's next? Any hints you can give us?
on spencer's design of the magnetron (where slices are used instead of one metal cylinder), it seems like aligning those plates to fit the tolerance is a feat in itself
In compliment to the engineering of the magnetron specific to cooking, as I understand it, it is the specific FREQUENCY of the microwave that is necessary for its practical use in consumer kitchens. Taking advantage of the resonance of the water molecule to induce energy and heat for cooking. That 'science' (finding the resonant frequency of water molecules) is also amazing.
I am reminded what a good friend told me back in the 70's may he RIP. He told me that when he was serving as a radar tech in the early 60's, the guys would open a door on the Microwave channel and stick their coffee in to warm it.
Okay, but could we take a step backwards a moment, because I kinda want to get a microwave dome. More seriously, wouldnt the dome help causing some chaos in the microwaves producing a more even cook? I guess the rotating platform was a safer easier option.
I joined the University of Birmingham as a member of academic staff in 1984. In _Zorba the Greek_ style, when my predecessor left, his office furniture was redistributed, and his old/my new office was left with the furniture nobody else wanted. That included a tatty old desk. It turned out it had been Sir John Randall's desk in his office in the adjacent Physics building. The cavity magnetron he and Boot developed was displayed in a small alcove in the building that had been the student refectory. I believe that its is now in the Science Museum in London.
Best or 'best quality' - I struggle with my IT 'engineer' colleagues all the time over this. They just don't get it. To them best or best quality means they spent massive manpower on it making it the absolutely best bit of code thingy ever. it will do x, it will do y, it will cure cancer. The customer is rarely happy that their thingy cost 100k. For me though best means - FOR the purpose - performance required, cost required, efficiency required, lifespan required. I knock the thinhy out for 1k. customer is happy. But as far as my IT colleagues are concerned this is a compromise they don't want to make. My analogy is that if it was up to them designing a car, every car would be made of gold, go at 200mph and sit 50 people. customer: "but I want a car to drive to the shops with the wife". IT 'engineer' - this is what you need, it will not only do THIS, but is reusable and extendible - and can take up to 48 of your friends AND travel at 200mph. why do you not want that ? sigh..
Watched your videos years ago, before i was in college, then during college, and now as an engineer desigining and architecting microchips for a popular semiconductor company, that gets used by billions of people everyday. Im proud to be an engineer, and thankful for people like you for so elegantly enabling people like me.
Magnetrons and microwave ovens have always been a bit of a dark art to me, but that doesn't mean I don't have unending appreciation for the sheer amount of work which went into producing this now everyday commodity which we all take for granted. Of course, like most people, I have a cheap modern Sharp Carousel above my stove, but on the kitchen counter I still have an Amana Radaranger Touch II from the early to mid 1980s. There are some things it just does better, I find that taking the extra minute of my own time to occasionally shift the food gets a much more even heating. It's interesting to think about how any product was engineered, but the magnetron is one of particular interest due to it's military, commercial, and finally consumer trickle-down of technology. Thanks for the fantastic insight as always.
Great to have you back Bill! Just noticed that I can't see any of your old videos on your channel. If you've made them unavailable for some reason I really think you should bring them back. They were an awesome introduction to done wonderful engineering concepts. (And your probably leaving advertising income on the table)
You have a distinctly Bob Ross/Mr. Rogers kind of quality to your videos. They're just great to watch. I'm glad you've found your way back to making videos, it would've been a shame to lose you to the ages forever.
These latest 4 videos, published in the last 3-4 days, are top-tier quality. Please make more such videos! Those 4 videos are the only reason I subscribed and rang the bell to get all your new videos recommended to me, and I'm looking forward to more similar videos. Keep up the good work! I wish you the best!
Working for a very engineering oriented group in a power utility 30 years ago there were very few who could understand the somewhat deviant saying ‘If a job’s worth doing, it’s worth doing badly’ !
