Entries for 'Ken Brey'

The following is a supplement to Geek Challenge Results: New Year's Beeramid by the Numbers. The partial summation of xy This function can be solved to a polynomial of order y+1 by the method outlined here. Below is a graphical representation of xy.  In this graph, y=2, but this is representative of any integer value of y>0.  The total area under the curve is ∫ xy .... [Read the rest of this blog...]

January's Geek Challenge questioned the construction of a New Year's Eve party beer can pyramid. I first encountered this challenge in my freshman year at Marquette. I was building the beeramid with five other students at a band party, some were engineers and math majors and we couldn't figure it out. I didn't sleep until I found the answer at 4am! The correct answer for an 8 layer Beerami... [Read the rest of this blog...]

During a New Year's Eve party, a simple pyramid was constructed by standing 3 beer cans on a table in a triangle, and then placing a single can on the top center of the three. The pyramid was expanded by expanding the triangular base to 3 cans on each side, adding 2 more cans to the second layer and adding a single can on top as the third layer. How many cans are in the pyramid when it is ex... [Read the rest of this blog...]

We didn’t receive a lot of reader-feedback to last month's Geek Challenge.  Some questioned the assumptions involved, and some guesses were taken.  Here is my analysis of the problem: The Deer Dilemma asks about the probability of collision between a car traveling an unspecified speed and a number of deer traveling at unspecified speed and route.  The primary challenge is fi... [Read the rest of this blog...]

A state forest is square and 6 miles on each side, and known to be home to a population of 1,000 deer.  A road runs straight through the forest (not diagonally) and is silently traveled by an electric car whose driver is oblivious to the deer.  Since it is mating season, the deer are constantly on the move.  They show no more or less affinity for the road than for any of the many de... [Read the rest of this blog...]

Last month’s Geek Challenge asked where in line was the optimum place to stand such that your birthday matches the birthday of anyone in front of you, but that nobody in front of you has made the same match with someone in front of them.   The problem is an optimization based on two competing priorities:  The farther back you stand, the greater the chance of making a match for yours... [Read the rest of this blog...]

A small movie theater has two movie screens.  One theater is showing a hit action movie, and has sold out for the evening.  The other screen is showing a comedy flop and has plenty of available seats.  A crowd has gathered outside the box office disappointed they can’t get tickets to the action movie.  Before they scatter, the theater manager quickly announces a contest to enti... [Read the rest of this blog...]

The question posed during last month’s Geek Challenge was to determine how much it costs me in extra gas to drive to my summer road trip destination at a higher speed, and to express this cost measured against the time I save by driving there faster.  I provided the following Fuel Mileage chart for reference: I did not provide the distance to my destination, but that turns out not to matte... [Read the rest of this blog...]

July is the heart of summer road trip season.  And with gas at about $4 per gallon, that trip to the national park can be pretty expensive.  So, this month’s geek challenge could help you optimize your trip. Everybody knows that at highway speeds the faster you drive, the lower your fuel mileage.  Also, we know that driving faster also saves time getting to your destination.  ... [Read the rest of this blog...]

The Sam and Brenda race problem was a fun one to solve.  Following simple Distance = Rate * Time methods, it is easy to get to 4 equations and 5 unknowns, which can leave you stuck because the problem doesn’t tell you, and you can never figure out either Sam or Brenda’s speed.  However, applying some clever logic to the problem can answer it pretty easily.  Here are some additional ... [Read the rest of this blog...]

Sam and Brenda start running in opposite directions from opposite ends of a symmetrical race track, each running at a uniform speed, although not equal to each other.  They first cross each other at a point 100 yards from Sam’s staring point.  They cross again as Brenda has 40 yards to go before completing her first lap.  If they continue to run at the same rates, how far from Sam’s... [Read the rest of this blog...]

At DMC we pride ourselves on being tech-savvy and using appropriate technology to solve common problems.  So as we moved to our new office space this month, we didn't want to be constrained by the wires that link to our new conference room projectors and wall mounted displays.  The solution we have implemented is the InFocus LiteShow III.  We have three of these on our office ne... [Read the rest of this blog...]

I hope you had a good time hunting for the solution to the Easter Egg Stumper.  The challenge was to most efficiently identify one peanut-butter Easter egg from a group of 11 identical chocolate eggs knowing only that the peanut-butter egg weighs differently, and having a traditional balance scale. Several people answered that it could be done in the worst case in 4 weighs (B), or that 3 cou... [Read the rest of this blog...]

During Easter basket arrangement, a mistake is noticed.  One peanut-butter filled chocolate egg has been mixed into a group of 11 solid chocolate eggs.  Fortunately, it is known that the peanut-butter egg has a different mass than the solid chocolate eggs (which are all the same).  Also, a traditional balance scale is available to compare egg weights on.  Any number of eggs can... [Read the rest of this blog...]

Last month’s Geek Challenge asked which football related activity used more energy: A. NFL Stadium Lighting for 3 hours B. Cooking 20,000 hotdogs C. Field heating to keep a football field unfrozen at an ambient temperature of 20 deg. F. We have concluded that the highest energy consumption, and correct answer is Stadium Lighting, A.  Here is a look at all three individu... [Read the rest of this blog...]

I have been working with DMC since March of 1997, when I joined a one-man upstart founded by Frank Riordan.  However, my roots in engineering go back a little farther, to a memorable day in February of 1991, which has now been 20 years ago.  As a junior in high school, I entered the Marquette University Spaghetti Bridge Contest, which was held for high school students as part of th... [Read the rest of this blog...]

January's Geek Challenge comes just in time for Super Bowl XLV, where the players on the field won't be the only ones burning energy.  And the excitement of the NFC championchip game that was held in Chicago got us thinking of some football related engineering. Which football game related activity consumes more energy? A. NFL stadium lighting for a 3 hour game B. A field heating s... [Read the rest of this blog...]

We received several interesting responses to the Santa’s Reindeer problem.  The best one was by Dave Montesano of IMAC Motion Control Corporation.  What Dave did was recognized that the harness between and reindeer should be treated as a two force member, exerting only an equal and opposite force vector on each end and carrying no moments.  He then analyzed a Free Body Diagram with ... [Read the rest of this blog...]

Santa’s reindeer and sleigh in flight are typically drawn nearly horizontally like they would be if standing on the ground.  However,  the lift and thrust comes only from the reindeer.  The sleigh, which is not wing-shaped, provides only weight and aerodynamic drag.   The 8 reindeer are connected single-file to the sleigh, and each reindeer provides equal lift, thr... [Read the rest of this blog...]

A version of VNC Server is available which works on Siemens MP277 and other Siemens displays that are WinCE 5.0 or higher.  The open source project can be found here:   http://sourceforge.net/projects/efonvnc/     The MP277 uses the ARM processor, so extract the contents of efonvnc_v4.3_wce5x_armv4i.zip into a folder in Program Files on the panel.  Run the file VNCCon... [Read the rest of this blog...]