A traffic light looks like the simplest control system in existence: three lamps, one at a time, in a fixed order. Almost everything about it is a compromise between constraints…
Mostly about air, not water. Here are fifteen.
1. The Bend Is Holding Water on Purpose
Every fixture has a trap, a dip in the pipe that retains water after…
Watch the top of an escalator for a few seconds and something slightly impossible happens. A flat plate slides out from under a comb, then rises into a step, then…
The lift is the piece of machinery most people use most often without ever seeing any of it. What is visible is a box and two doors. What makes it…
A railway looks like the most rigid thing in the landscape: steel lines running dead straight to the horizon, apparently welded to the earth. The reality underneath is the opposite,…
The round cover is a famous interview question with a famous answer, and the famous answer is correct but incomplete. Roundness solves one problem extremely well. The lid is solving…