In my office I have dozens (maybe hundreds now!) of books that I consider primary engineering texts. But there are a few that I consider essential. Anton van Beek’s Advanced Engineering Design is one such resource. I’ve spent all of this past summer working through it—it seems to cover every topic I’ve come across in my career, including many aspects of tribology and surface metrology. What I like most is that van Beek gets right to the point: the fundamental knowledge and practical applications. Each chapter has a number of “gems” which I hope to post more of in the coming months.
Advanced Engineering Design and several companion pieces are available through engineering-abc.shop/.
Van Beek has also compiled an amazing online resource at tribology-abc.com. The site contains a wide-ranging set of calculators, links, tables, and quizzes for everything from wear coefficients to “energy consumption during cycling.” There are so many handy tools here—it’s a great “rabbit hole” in which to spend a few (or many) hours!
