Things I’ve learned this week, episode II

Posted on July 20, 2006 by Eric
  1. Smooth the surface of the sour cream left in the container before you return it to the refrigerator, and it will not separate as much. (Thanks to the printed information on the seal of a tub of Daisy brand sour cream; I’d never seen this advice anywhere else.)
  2. Taking two 3 unit courses in a summer session (accelerated pace) is at least one too many. Though I’m doing OK so far, and enjoying it.  This leaves no free time to speak of, though I do have to take a few hours a week away from studies for some entertainment to keep from going insane.  (Oops, too late!)
  3. There are now companies offering “rapid injection molding” services (e.g., Protomold, Epsilon Industries, and probably many others). They use automated processes to produce aluminum molds from your CAD drawings, at substantially lower cost than conventional mold making. Open question: will they give their customer the CNC file if the customer wants to migrate to more conventional production using a steel mold?
  4. The NRE charges for a set of double-shot injection molded keycaps aren’t anywhere near as bad as I expected.  I’ve been quoted a cost of approximately $1000 for the NRE for a set of about thirty keys with custom legends.  Double-shot molding is desirable because the legend is actually molded in a different color of plastic than the background, so it cannot wear off.  HP used to use double-shot molding for the keys of their calculators years ago.  There are alternatives, such as dye sublimation, or a UV-cured coating, but they are not as effective at preventing the legends from wearing off.
This entry was posted in General, School & Education. Bookmark the permalink.

Leave a Reply