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Interview: Ask Forrest Mims About Rockets, Electronics, and Engineering
With his popular Getting Started in Electronics, and Engineer's Mini-Notebook series and a number of different electronics kits sold at Radio Shack, Forrest Mims inspired countless scientists and engineers. Even though he received no formal academic training in science, Forrest has appeared in 70 magazines and scientific journals. He has worked as a consultant for the National Geographic Society, the National Science Teachers Association, and NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. Today, Mims works on many scientific projects including climate change research. He's agreed to answer all your questions about science and engineering. As usual, ask as many as you'd like, but please, one question per post.
You are the quintessential tinkerer with a non-standard education. What was the key inspiration that started you on this path?
Either give it away or get top dollar, but never sell yourself cheap.
What do you feel provides the most inspiration in others, in particular kids, to learn and do hands on tasks?
Either give it away or get top dollar, but never sell yourself cheap.
What's your opinion on the old ways, i.e. buying parts locally from Radio Shack and meeting people in local clubs compared to the new online way of buying parts and kits, publishing tutorials and forums full of people helping each other?
More to the point, what do you think has been lost from the old way and what has been gained from the new way?
Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
Please retell the story of how you got started in Model Rocketry and some of your earlier projects, successes, and of course failures. Be sure to name names and clubs!
JJ
Don't you think he would want books on how to get off a desert island?
Of all the projects you have worked on, what has been your favorite? Personal or professional. (I would like to express my gratitude, getting started with electronics, got me started in electronics and I am now an engineer. I also have a "non-standard" education as they say, having mostly taught myself from reading and taking online free courses.
As is typical, you are stranded on a desert island: Which three books on the whole of technology would you bring?
Know Your Knots - Jonas Grumby
Coconuts, Bananas, and Pineapples, Oh My! - A Guide to Edible Plants of the Tropics - Mary Ann Summers
Bamboo: 1001 Uses and Counting - Dr. Roy Hinkley
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
grew up on your Popular Electronics crew, all those soldering wizards who educated us all. like to hear the back-story of how you and AT&T got into a cage battle over optoelectronics.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
Second that. I was introduced to Forrest's work back in the TRS-80 days, but his quintessential work for me was the Radio Shack publication, "Getting Started in Electronics." Handwritten on graph paper and printed on 8.5" by 11" newsprint with a soft cover, this was the ultimate intro guide for anyone who had any interest in electronics. Many years ago, I worked at Radio Shack as a summer and holiday job, and every time my manager was away, I'd sneak away the a copy and read it (along with some ham radio books as well). One time a customer came in asking about a fake car alarm box, and I grabbed out the book and we used that to build one. He bought dozens of parts that day (oddly enough, I got in trouble with my manager for that, despite really cleaning house). An original copy of that book still sits prominently on my shelf--one of the biggest influences in my life. So, yes, thank you very much Mr. Mims!
How could he read them? Isn't it very dark in that cave?
Not the AC above, but logged in...
Mims, why do you trust science when it comes to electronics, but not when it comes to biology?
What do you feel about the Maker movement and Makerspaces in general?
It seems to me as the Maker/tinkerer is the new equivalent to the electronics hobbyist. Do you believe new project designs need to keep this in mind? (i.e, present the design of an entire gadget instead of just the electronics)?
the theory was that electrons travelled through conductors at almost the speed of light
I don't know when did you learn that, but no physicist worth their salt would say that by mid 1930s at the latest, I'd hope.
A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.