Cyberpage

Take a break!

You've been working hard all week! You deserve a vacation. But let's get serious, you'll settle for ten minutes of fun. Design News feels for you. That's why we recently launched the Take a Break page at www.manufacturing.net/magazine/dn/webex/takeabreak.html. Click on over and you'll find your fill of links to online games, brainteasers, gut-busting engineering joke sites, and a potpourri of interest-peaking pages. Don't miss the link to "Totally Absurd Patents and Inventions." It's one of our favorites. We also included a link to our new Head Work page. There, readers will find the worked-out solution to those tricky back-page puzzlers we know you love. So what are you waiting for? Take a break! Just make sure your boss is in a meeting first.

Nike meets ANSI standards?

What do design engineers spend their time doing on the web? Research suggests you need products and specifications, and you need them fast. Check out SoluSource at www.solusource.com. This subscription-based online database directly searches vendor catalogs. Their industry-specific search boasts that when you search for pumps, you will not end up with a link to a pair of shoes.

'Test' this site out

TestMart?, at www.testmart.com, buys, sells, leases, and rents new and used test equipment. No registration is necessary to browse. The product search includes information on configuration options and even delivery times. The site also offers technical articles and a reference library with online catalogs dating back as far as 1969. A great year for wine and for test equipment!

Get in the (plastic) zone

Moldflow's site at www.plasticszone.com is geared toward engineers working with injection molded plastics. It's divided into four main areas: the Simulation Zone, which offers the Moldflow Part Adviser for conducting flow analysis; the Material Zone, which includes a materials calculator; the Consulting Zone, an area devoted to trouble shooting; and the Event Zone, a listing of upcoming seminars and training courses divided by location and date. Get in the zone!

Learn at lunch

When you're not hanging out in the Take a Break page, maybe you could use your lunch hour to get a master's degree! The American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) has teamed with the Stevens Institute of Technology, the New Jersey Institute of Technology, and the U.S. Open University. Project management, E-commerce, Elements of Computer Science, and Information Systems Development are a few of the graduate courses offered.

Bear(ing) with me

Integrated within Dynaroll's website is their Handbook of Miniature and Instrument Bearings. It is designed to guide engineers through the selection process and includes an automated bearing specifier and sections on characteristics, fitting, mounting, and assembly. The handbook is in .pdf format, but you can choose the text-only version if you have trouble seeing it. Visit www.dynaroll.com to check it out.

Steel bar none

If you're worried about steel bar fatigue, the database at www.autosteel.org may be just what you need. It contains mechanical property and fatigue information to allow automotive engineers the ability to design optimized steel powertrain and chassis components. The download is free and will be updated with axial fatigue information in 2002.