3 ms·

Those are a lot cheaper than I was expecting - I'm seeing $3.60 for most units.

• Klathmon 11y ago
  Someone needs to give this company a marketing budget... Is there a catch i'm really not getting, because these seem WAY too good to be true, and i'm really surprised that they aren't being used literally everywhere already.
  • Natanael_L 11y ago
    First of all it takes some mental adjustment to start designing things with these. Engineers need to build experience to avoid designs where unexpected forces of movements causes internal lockups due to misalignment, for example. Second, the feedback isn't immediate in the way a physical object is, magnetism is always "springy". That means hybrid designs for many kinds of mechanisms with both mechanical and magnetic parts - see the paragraph above again for why this can be complex. And then there's limits to the range, precision and maximum forces it can handle vs regular mechanical components. Although over time I do expect it to show up in more and more places as it gets better understood, where these designs start to substitute classical mechanical designs where they're both good enough and more durable. Also, another idea for these magnets: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinetic_art https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinetic_art
  • lambdadmitry 11y ago
    One of catches that I can think of is a danger of swallowing a couple of them. For example, there is a special regulation regarding small magnets in objects that children can access. If they cling inside a body through some tissue, one will need a very nasty emergency surgery. It's not made easier by the fact that most surgical instruments are made from steel.