Book recommendations ECE

I'm not sure if this is the right place to ask this, but I'm looking for books and other references that will help me with the electrical work that would need to be done when building a 3D printer with heating and cooling systems (i.e., a basic incubator and refrigerator-like enclosure) I may also end up using a solenoid valve to control airflow in the system.

I do materials science and bioengineering related research and I often have to build stuff. I have learned basic machining but I know absolutely zero about electronics. Even something that teaches basic assembly of electronic components would be of great help.

Thanks

Submitted July 12, 2017 at 10:44AM by Mecil http://ift.tt/2vb2wYc ECE

[US] Various things are shocking me in my garage. Is this because there is something wrong with the ground? ECE

I have various things plugged into the AC outlets in my garage, computers, refrigerator, etc, which have chassis ground as well as earth ground. When I touch parts of the chassis I get shocked to a noticeable degree, it actually doesn't feel good at all. I noticed this effect on my garage doors as well. My theory is that something might be wrong with the earth ground and is feeding back into the chassis ground as a result. I've put a multimeter set to AC on various surfaces that shock me and it reads anywhere from 0.4V to 0.8V. Is there something I can do to fix this?

Submitted June 20, 2017 at 09:40AM by redcodefinal http://ift.tt/2rPTYUM ECE

Electric (hybrid) vehicle conversion question ECE

It is my hope, within the next few years, to semi-retire and spend some time exploring the planet via an overland expedition vehicle (see /r/overlanding). The vehicle that I have chosen is a military surplus M934, or possibly an M1087 if I can find one. These are not your typical vehicles for electric conversion as their GVW is upwards of 30,000lbs. I am exploring the feasibility of removing the terribly inefficient diesel engine and replacing it with a hybrid system akin to what city buses use, or what Nikola Motors is putting in their hybrid semi trucks, with either a direct replacement of the main engine with an electric motor or an electric motor at each axle. Power would be supplied to these motors from either a battery or a capacitor bank which would be constantly recharging via a diesel generator or other high efficiency ICE generator. My hope is that the generator could have a significantly lower total KW output with peak demands buffered by the battery pack. For instance, if the motor is 300kw, it would only draw that amount during hard acceleration or hill climbing. Under normal, flat ground travel, it may only draw 150KW. My generator could then be a high efficiency 200KW unit. During peak demand (>200KW), the battery bank would draw down, until I stopped accelerating or climbing when the load would drop and the battery would begin charging again. An additional benefit of the battery bank would be to provide some power for electrical devices, such as a stove or refrigerator. It is my hope that we could operate through the night without starting the generator. I have some mechanical engineering and CAD knowledge to design the physical aspects of this system, but precious little electrical knowledge (as may be apparent from this post). I have done done web searching and I can't find enough solid information to verify this concept or calculate the size of the motor/battery pack. I'm certainly not asking for a design, but could anyone here comment on the feasibility of this and maybe point me in the direction of additional information. Or tell me the things that I don't know that I don't know.

Submitted February 04, 2017 at 06:33AM by mastema http://ift.tt/2k5AmJ1 ECE

Honeywell TH4110D1007 thermostat reconfiguration ECE

I am trying to create a temperature controller for a refrigerator and am wondering If I can use this Honeywell thermostat to do it. It will only be for heat. Basically if the temperature falls below a certain temp, it will turn on a lightbulb on that will heat the fridge to the desired temperature. The terminals are W,T,G,O,Rc,R,B,C

Submitted December 28, 2016 at 08:26AM by walrusballs http://ift.tt/2hmwaT3 ECE

Future Computer Engineer at UT Austin (HELP) ECE

Greetings,

I am a graduating high school senior that will most likely enroll at UT Austin as an ECE major, with CS as my second major of choice; it seemed like an opportunistic idea and idealistic move, and appealed to me greatly because interacting with the computer has basically been a thing I've done my whole life. More specifically, I want to become a Computer Software Engineer in order to deploy code in my future projects, works, and jobs. That's the problem though too... does this major even incorporate coding? And if so, is there heavy emphasis on it?

I have started thinking greatly about my choice (funny how I should've been doing this earlier), and I am not really sure about the differences between CE and CS. I mean I wanted to make sure coding and programming would be a repertoire of mine, but from what I've seen on the 4-year curriculum for undergraduate ECE majors at UT Austin is that programming courses are not even in the course choice. Moreover, CS at UT Austin is in the Natural Science college while ECE is in the Engineering college, so it seems there is a sizable partition between the two. I chose ECE because I read Engineering at UT Austin is in the top 10 in the nation, but I also read that a lot of the big fish out there are CS majors and not ECE majors, so I'm starting to regret my decision.

I want to be working on/with strictly computers and laptops, not toying with microwaves and refrigerators. I was never a fan of robotics either, but I can't judge a book by its cover. Gaming is my forte, so I aspire to working on stuff like that or at least application software.

On a side note, a lot of my friends - who are CS advocates - sort of slander CE because "companies want kids that can write code" and that you have more opportunities of landing a job with the big companies like IBM, Intel, Apple, Google, etcc if you're a CS major as opposed to a ECE major. I mean we're just kids, so I kindly ask for corrections and assurances!

Thanks!!

Submitted March 12, 2015 at 02:05PM by ejayshun http://ift.tt/1NNDXWi ECE