Mike Haney

In this episode of Cocktail Party Science, host Chuck Cage sits down with Popular Science writer Rena Pacella, author of Extreme Engineering and Executive Editor Mike Haney to get the inside scoop on all six of the Extreme Engineering projects featured in the March issue. From the tallest skyscraper to the deepest oil well, today's most ambitious projects are bigger and wilder than ever. Prepare to be amazed.

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Satisfy your scientific curiosity and your craving for some Frosted Flakes. Editor Mike Haney shows you how to use an old cereal box and a CD to build a device that reveals the hidden rainbow inside any light source. Find more examples of DIY spectrometers over at Wikipedia.

For guys on a job site drilling hundreds of holes a day, power matters—it lets them work faster and blow through knots, nails and other obstructions. That’s why corded tools, with their bigger, stronger motors, still reign for contractors, and why DeWalt challenged its engineers to deliver even more oomph. Their answer: a motor that squeezes in extra copper to deliver 40 percent more power.

World of wires got you down? Clear the clutter with your very own fire-proof gadget charging station. Editor Mike Haney shows how a power drill and some tape can transform a bread box into a pint-size panic room just for chargers.

The only thing better than beer is more beer. And the only thing better than more beer is more beer you make yourself—it saves you a trip to the store. Thus, the NanoBrewMaster—an all-in-one, computer-controlled brewing system that takes your beer from wort boil to frosty pour. It’s the creation of PopSci staff photographer and resident crazy-project-builder John Carnett, who dreamt and built a first iteration of the device that we covered in the magazine last year.

In our latest episode of Cocktail Party Science, host Chuck Cage and executive editor Mike Haney sit down with Greg Mone, author of May's "Building The Real Iron Man" to learn about the true-life exoskeletons of tomorrow and how they compare to the stuff of science fiction.