Not to read too much into a video like this, but their tone when they say "Flipper, what did you do...?" — and then a bunch *more* switching — is quite the study in humans and (ab)use/hacking of technology.

I came here to say exactly this … complete avoidance of responsibility on the author of the videos part.

“Flipper what did you do?”

Should have been

“What did I make flipper do?”

In addition the articles title “flipper causes meter to self destruct” should be titled “person using radio device to cause smart meter to rapidly turn on an off causes failure in meter components”.

I’d probably phrase it more like “Idiot with ‘hacking tool’ rapidly switches electricity meter without understanding current inrush and failure states of high voltage high current system, luckily escapes death by explosion or causing a fire”

It's not clear to me what happened after the meter started to smoke. Perhaps it started turning on and off by itself after that point?

What's the average karma/comment for people with 10k+ karma?

Personally I don't care so much about genre categories, but it's interesting reading all these comments to think about "science fiction" vs. "speculative fiction" and then the lump category of science fantasy.

Anyway, one title I didn't see mentioned was Grass by Sheri Tepper, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grass_(novel).

This reminds me of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carved_stone_balls from the Neolithic era, perhaps these bronze pieces are a technical evolution of those objects?

Have you tried a Linnstrument?

I considered it! But I'm a piano player, and I like to be free to keep my hands wide apart, which I think requires more tactile feedback than the Linnstrument provides.

A great write up and I think the author has a bright future ahead of him.

However I can't help but think of something I read recently, https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/an-ontology-of-elect....

I'm still trying to square my enthusiasm for electronics and micros with the counter points raised in that essay.

Interesting you say that about the pinecil, I'm a little embarrassed to say I haven't touched mine since the day it arrived after impulse buying it. I guess I assumed it wasn't as capable as my Metcal. I'll have to give it an honest try.

Pinecil is a great soldering iron, especially the 88W v2, but it definitely doesn't compare with a fixed temperature inductive Metcal. I haven't found any soldering iron with a PID loop that does, simply because there is zero delay in the Metcal between the time the tip makes contact and the RF reheating it.

Give the book Practical Electronics for Inventors a try.

Will do. I had picked up that from a link from one of the earlier comments.

This book will get you farther faster than The Art of Electronics.

Given how much time it probably took to document the setup (never mind creating the setup), I'd say he deserves every penny.

Probably, but most sites that use Amazon Affiliate tags usually disclose it somewhere on the page. I didn't see any disclosure on this one.

Or the author is incredibly thorough and detail oriented, and cleaned it up for the photos. I agree, it's a great setup.