Hearing about the hobby some folks are discovering during the pandemic set our mechanical engineering instincts alight! While you’d be hard-pressed to think of any good coming out of COVID-19, many amateur engineers are spending the extra time at home flexing creative and problem-solving muscles. How? With Rube Goldberg machines.
The Rube Goldberg concept
A Rube Goldberg machine is a complex contraption created to accomplish a simple, often basic task via a chain reaction. Think of the old Hasbro game Mouse Trap or the app Perchang (Perchang Games). The goal is all about maximum effort for minimum results.
Image: Rube Goldberg/Wikimedia Commons
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The concept originated through a series of drawings by Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist Rube Goldberg (1833—1970). Goldberg, who held an engineering degree from Berkley, eventually found himself a household adjective thanks to his 50,000 cartoons that depicted humor in the inventions he drew.
Today, Goldberg’s granddaughter, Jennifer George, maintains his legacy through RubeGoldberg.com and contests entered by all ages. At first, the organization planned to cancel its 2020 contest, but seeing the interest by people stuck at home, they issued an online challenge to build a machine that would deliver a bar of soap. (Check out a super collection of Rube Goldberg machines!) What a fantastic pastime for engaging kids in critical thinking skills!
The polar opposite of Rube Goldberg thinking
Meanwhile, at BPE, where we can enjoy silly engineering challenges as much as the next person, the pandemic has set our minds working overtime as well. However, our focus remains on helping folks achieve the best indoor air quality possible to minimize indoor exposure to the virus. And our approach to designing energy recovery modules is quite the opposite of a Rube Goldberg mentality.
Sure, we’re all about innovation, but where Rube Goldberg machines use as many parts, gadgets, and whistles as possible, our BPE mechanical ventilation systems have no moving parts. Consequently, BPE units are known for simplicity of use, minimization of maintenance, and our 20-year limited lifetime guarantee.
The solution to safer indoor air is straightforward: Superior, filtered mechanical ventilation provided by a true, air-to-air direct counter-flow design. Our ERVs use high-grade filters and offer 70% to 90% thermal efficiency. Also important for minimizing proliferation of the COVID-19 virus, these babies use our patented Regenerative Condensate Return® technology for keeping relative humidity levels in range (40% to 60%). In simpler terms? You need to know your indoor air is being continuously refreshed—displaced, instead of just moved about—and it needs to happen in a superior manner.
Images: BPE-XE-MIR-200-i for smaller spaces; BPE-XE-MIR-2000 (modular, stackable)
Check out our brochure to find the right ERV for your commercial or residential space. No indoor environment is too large or small for our technology. Questions? We love to answer them! Simply call 201.722.1414. You could say we’ll deliver maximum results for your minimum effort!