A few years ago there was a demonstration by a team at Fulton Innovation of a product called eCoupled. Using the principle of electromagnetic induction, by which an electrical charge can be stimulated in a wire coil by placing another one nearby, the crazy boffins were able to display wireless power transfer.
Despite being high voltage, they said, it was safe, efficient and could be applied to any surface. The demo room consisted of a kitchen without plugs, but full of lights that could be stuck anywhere and a frying pan that heated up just by sitting it on the counter. Put a phone on the same counter and it began charging. Clearly, this was the future.
Fulton are still working on wireless power, but it’s a different company that’s beat it to the shops, Powermat – and its products are expensive for something that replaces a 50p mains plug.
The Wireless Power Consortium are going to be finalising a standard for wireless power called Qi later this year, which should mean prices drop and manufacturers have the confidence to build the technology straight into devices, rather than requiring an adaptor.
Another similar technology is the Airnergy by RCA. It’s a tiny dongle that can turn Wi-Fi signals back into electricity for charging phone batteries and the like.
The body of a bass is usually made out of wood, but other materials including graphite have been used before. Many different types of wood may be used to make the body, neck, and fretboard of a bass. However, the most common type of wood used for the body of a bass is alder. For the neck, maple wood is commonly used and for the fretboard, rosewood is preferred. Mahogany, maple, ash, and poplar are other commonly used woods for the body of the bass. Mahogany for the neck is also used and maple or ebony for the fretboard.
Strings types include all-metal strings and strings with different coverings. All-metal strings include roundwound, flatwound, halfwound, found wound, and pressure wound. Two examples of different string coverings include tapewound and plastic-coatings. This variety of materials used in strings allows bass players to have a range of tonal options. In the 1950s and early 1960s, the most commonly used string used by bassists was flatwound strings with a smooth surface. These strings had a smooth, damped sound similar to that of a double bass. In the late 1960s and 1970s, roundwound bass strings became popular, but flatwounds continued to stay popular as well. These roundwound strings were similar to those of guitar strings at the time. Comparing the two string types, roundwounds have a brighter timber (quality of a musical note) with greater sustain (amount of time it takes for the sound of the string to become silent) than that of flatwounds.
otal length of the panel lines falls by over 15% (400.5 cm to 339.3 cm). Building on the introduction of thermal bonding technology in 2004.
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