All the objections to this that I have are from the breathless tone of this article, and the many others in the past that have made big claims for the sake of precious, precious clicks. Whether or not this particular design revolutionizes the field is beside the point. As we know, most things do not. But if he's made something novel that expands our understanding, and he's done it in a garage without institutional backing, or investors, or even a mentor, then it's an impressive achievement.
A 17-year-old designed a novel synchronous reluctance motor
131–140 of 296 posts
Re: A 17-year-old designed a novel synchronous reluctance motor
#132Earlier quoted context omitted.
Back before the internet, in 1964, I read a brief Scientific American column on laboratory glass blowing (for making condensers and so forth). This set me on a quest; and I acquired supplies and primitive homemade equipment. I was years away from being able to drive so I took the bus downtown to the Detroit public library where I found several books devoted to the subject. I studied these for hours. I worked on this…
> So I moved on to my next project, making a solid fuel rocket from scratch Remember when you could get the ingredients to do things like that easily; sometimes even in a "Science Kit for Kids!" one would buy at Caldor or the like? Man, how times have changed.
You can still do that easily today: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocket_candy
I have seen potassium nitrate stump remover on the shelves at my local Fred Meyer (Kroger). If you can't find find it on shelves it's easy to order:
https://www.walmart.com/ip/Potassium-Nitrate-Powder-99-8-Pur...
The vast majority of fireworks and rockets I made as a kid used potassium nitrate as an oxidizer. 5 pounds will provide many hours of entertainment and education.
Re: A 17-year-old designed a novel synchronous reluctance motor
#133This is inspiring, and let's look at why so many of us have the impulse to figure out what the flaw or missing part of the story is. For me, it's because I hadn't done something so cool at 17. That makes me think, huh, I wonder if I'm not a "natural born engineer". I start going through my life story so far and beating myself up for playing too many video games, or not going deep enough on my interests. Then I start…
If you want to be cynical about it see https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2015/03/why-sc... (of course that is another clickbait article from a magazine that was good before the web but now specializes in clickbait)
I remember when I was in high-school agonizing for over a year over the 100$ fee to publish an app on google play.
Ultimately it's hard to ignore the pattern when you see the stories about these precocious kids on the news, they always come from wealth.
Re: A 17-year-old designed a novel synchronous reluctance motor
#134Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is always the case when these young and wealthy prodigies are being covered by the media. They always invent a toy that the industry already tried or keep trying to make practical. Practical as in not just performance, but cost too.
Frankly you could filter out every HN submission with the phrase "-year old" and miss absolutely nothing of value.
Yeah, stupid kids learning about things with real world projects. They aren't state of the art at all!
Re: A 17-year-old designed a novel synchronous reluctance motor
#135Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the late 1980s, the toy store at the mall carried a section of model rockets and rocket engines, igniters... supermarkets carried cap guns and refills in racks just before checkout.
Can't you get actual guns at some US supermarkets, in the 2020s? Meanwhile I'm pretty sure you can get those combination cap/spud guns in the seasonal aisle at larger UK supermarkets, and almost all French^. Funny. (^when I was younger I remember being amazed by all the stuff you could get in French supermarkets, aisles and aisles of school supplies, summer toys/beach items, clothes, etc. - seems they were much earli…
Most of the mainstream chain supermarkets in the US don't sell guns (Kroger, Target, Whole Foods, Costco, Albertsons, Ahold, Publix, Sams, HEB, Meijer, Aldi, et al.). Walmart is the primary exception there.
Overwhelmingly that's now handled by independent gun stores, or a select few sporting good chains (eg Dick's Sporting Goods - the largest sporting goods chain in the US - which sells a restricted set of rifles and a few shotguns; they came under pressure not long ago to get rid their guns and they capitulated and reduced what and how they sell [1]).
Big corporations in the US are drastically more sensitive today to gun issues and the related bad PR that goes with selling guns (even Walmart has rolled back their selling of guns).
[1] https://finance.yahoo.com/news/why-dicks-sporting-goods-deci...
Re: A 17-year-old designed a novel synchronous reluctance motor
#136This is great, I'm happy for him! But I miss the creative aspect in myself. I used to be so creative like him, with so many half-finished inventions scattered around the house. Today there's nothing. I finally managed to carve out a day or two per week away from my job to work on personal projects after many years of failed attempts to get away at great personal expense. But the last 3 days that I went to work on som…
I'll try to give a more practical approach to complement other answers. I believe creativity (in specific field and broadly) is a skill like any other that you need to cultivate and practice. It's also much about problem solving, identifying needs, connecting ideas, and learning (i.e. having a good pool of knowledge), than apparent. The more of each of those you have, the better you become at innovating and creating in your field.
When you go into the world, you need to go asking yourself "What could we improve here? What could we change here?". If you're in a creative (artistic) field, it's a good idea to survey the work of others and develop "taste" -- i.e. your own perceptions of what's good material, and what things could be improved.
I'd suggest a few things:
(1) Develop a space. Decide what you want to create, and give yourself a dedicated space for it: 30 minutes a day, a few times a week, you name it. I'm pretty sure with the space you will star making things, whatever you like.
(2) Learn supporting skills and knowledge. Each field has necessary skills to really be able to create -- software skills, hardware skills, math, writing, drawing, art theory, etc.
(3) Survey what's out there. If you're a game developer, play games and develop your own ideas, what is my dream game like? What defines a good game? What's missing out there? What can I actually make with my means? You'll be able to feed back into your creations. If you're an engineer, the world is waiting to be improved upon as well :)
Re: A 17-year-old designed a novel synchronous reluctance motor
#137Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the late 1980s, the toy store at the mall carried a section of model rockets and rocket engines, igniters... supermarkets carried cap guns and refills in racks just before checkout.
Can't you get actual guns at some US supermarkets, in the 2020s? Meanwhile I'm pretty sure you can get those combination cap/spud guns in the seasonal aisle at larger UK supermarkets, and almost all French^. Funny. (^when I was younger I remember being amazed by all the stuff you could get in French supermarkets, aisles and aisles of school supplies, summer toys/beach items, clothes, etc. - seems they were much earli…
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Re: A 17-year-old designed a novel synchronous reluctance motor
#138What exactly is novel about this? I've participated in ISEF before and the amount of marketing/hyping and the lack of knowledgeable judges is frustrating. ISEF also clearly have a thorough fetish with patents. If you check the box on your form suggesting you may look into patenting in the future, your project performs a lot better.
The only thing that saddens me here is the patent aspect. I really wish we had a more open and effective IP mechanism.
Re: A 17-year-old designed a novel synchronous reluctance motor
#139This is great, I'm happy for him! But I miss the creative aspect in myself. I used to be so creative like him, with so many half-finished inventions scattered around the house. Today there's nothing. I finally managed to carve out a day or two per week away from my job to work on personal projects after many years of failed attempts to get away at great personal expense. But the last 3 days that I went to work on som…
Find a way to challenge yourself. Maybe find some "off-the-shelf" projects to build that don't require creativity, but maybe do require some new skills or new technology you haven't used before.
Re: A 17-year-old designed a novel synchronous reluctance motor
#140Earlier quoted context omitted.
Most 17 years old don't have access to 3d printers. Equipment is a big factor in making something tangible.
Are you sure about that? I don't know when you're allowed to leave school in the US, but they're pretty popular in schools - relatively cheap tools & a lot safer than others. They didn't exist (in the mainstream at least) when I was at school, but we had laser cutter/engravers for example. I know which I'd pick if I were in control of the budget (and had to choose one).
My High School which was a fairly well funded public High School in Illinois, US hadn't upgraded their shop equipment since the 80s really it felt like. We had wood tools, saws, the basics only. The coolest thing we had was a smelting forge, but students weren't allowed to use it due to safety concerns. This was in the late 2000s.