Rob Ives's Paper Crafts

There are so many creative people in the world. I found some of them through Twitter. One of my favourites is Rob Ives's creations. He's famous for paper crafts.
He occasionally updated his new paper craft on Twitter. It's a paper-made automaton. I saw a pretty rabbit rotating a wire handle yesterday; it's called "CRANK RABBIT." The structure of "CRANK RABBIT" is simple, yet I cannot help watching it.

Crank Rabbit! #STEAMjunk automata to download and make. https://t.co/W24F0X8Zyz #crank #automata #mechanism #maker pic.twitter.com/OZ5ROc00yj

— ✄---Rob--Ives--- (@robives) February 26, 2023

He usually uses paper, wine corks and wire that anyone can get easily. This is what I admire about his work. He can think of unique designs and make them happen using ordinary materials. Not everyone can do it. It's like cooking something extraordinary with very ordinary groceries that can be served at a five-star restaurant. It wouldn't surprise you to see a treat cooked with expensive groceries.  What I have learned from him was the importance of ideas and how to show them.

I'm making a marble run machine. Luckily, I have some ideas for it, but I think I should consider more before making each part. Everyone has different tastes, so it's impossible to make everybody enjoy it, yet I would like to make a marble run machine that everyone cannot help but watch.

Nuremberg Toy Fair Final day, He's still going strong! #NurembergToyFair #automata #STEAM pic.twitter.com/PRAzcQebV1

— ✄---Rob--Ives--- (@robives) February 5, 2023

 

Here is the link to Rob Ives's website and Twitter.
If you are interested in linkage, you would love them.

https://www.robives.com/
https://twitter.com/robives

My Challenge to Make a Marble Run Machine - A Looped Rail

In the previous blog post, I've written I want to make my marble run machine like an amusement park. You can imagine an atmosphere with attractions that cause dizzy feelings or going up and down, can't you? Unexpectedly, I got one part that was exactly an amusement type for my marble run machine yesterday. It was a looped, single-turn rail.

You probably have seen a rail that is looped on a roller coaster. My husband made it exactly like that.

Once, the idea of a looped rail popped into my mind, but I didn't think I could make it and abandoned it.
However, my husband did it!

He spent lots of effort. 

 

 

To begin with, he glued several small pieces of timber. There were two reasons he glued them.

One was making the timber firm. 

The other one was to prevent jagged edges. If you have experience cutting timber, you may know the direction of the grain is important to make sure.
If you cut timber the wrong way, you get chipped grain, and the edge of the timber would be jagged. Avoiding the jagged edges, he had to glue timbers in various directions because the shape he was going to make was a circle.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

He used a rounded T-groove bit. As it's called, the head is T-shaped so that it can cut even the deepest parts that the usual bit cannot. This was very useful because the rail needed fences on both sides.

Before cutting the timber, he edited the G-cord. When it started cutting, he was careful to cut only the part he needed. As you can see in the picture, if the bit moves straight right up, it hits the timber. He turned the timber over, cut the other side, and then turned it over again. He repeated this process several times.

After spending lots of effort and time, here it is, a looped rail.
It looks like a rail in an amusement park's roller coaster, doesn't it?

I haven't decided yet where this goes. I must make rails to connect to this looped rail too. Next time when I update this blog, hopefully, I could finish setting this looped rail.

It was the day my dream got one step closer to making my marble run machine like an amusement park.
Thanks, Juno!

 

My Challenge to Make a Marble Run Machine - Shishi Odoshi

I've completed making a part of Shish Odoshi on my marble run machine.
Shishi Odoshi is a type of water feature that makes a sound in a traditional Japanese garden. Initially, it was created to keep deer or wild boars away from Japanese gardens and avoid damage. Now it's a garden decoration.

When I decided to make a marble run machine, I'd been looking for ideas that could be used. One day when I was watching YouTube's top page, I saw a video of Shishi Odoshi. Then I thought I could arrange it and use it on my machine.

It's better to show you a video than describing it in my words. 

This is a Shishi Odoshi.

As you can see, it's made of bamboo. Water is poured into the bamboo with the ends cut at an angle. When the bamboo is filled with water, it gets heavy and declines and releases the water inside; then, it returns to the first position. When it returns, it hits the rock underneath and makes a sound. I wonder if the sound effectively kept animals away, but at least people love the sound.

Let's go back to the marble run machine.
I had a strong impression of Shishi Odoshi, shaped like a cylinder, because the originals are made from bamboo. Therefore, I drilled inside a rounded timber. However, the cylinder can contain only four or five balls inside.
Why didn't I notice it before I drilled it?

 

 

 

It wasn't enough. Seeing many balls rolling out of the Shishi Odoshi would be more fun and dynamic. I decided to make a box instead of being restricted to the original rounded shape.

 

 

 

 

Here is the box I made. The dark brown box on the right-hand side is the Shishi Odoshi. 

This box can contain 13 balls; when the 14th ball drops, it reclines and releases all the balls onto the rail underneath.

 

While making the Shishi Odoshi, I also had to make a long rail. 

 

This rail supplies balls. There is a hole at the end of the rail. Balls drop from the hole and go into the Shishi Odoshi. It's a simple structure, yet fun to look at.

 

Unfortunately, the rail sticks out too far, making it a little difficult to see the Shishi Odoshi.
I should have made the rail shorter.

Here is the video of my Shishi Odoshi moving.

 

This is a picture of the latest machine. There is still plenty of room on the above part.

I am still considering the rest of the design. I want to make the rest of the parts like amusement park attractions, kinetic and cheerful.

See you then.

My Challenge to Make a Marble Run Machine - I Like 90 Degrees

I completed connecting three rails of my marble run machine yesterday. This time work was arduous. It's because the angles of each rail are all different.

Stainless balls can rotate on a rail of 3 degrees for sure. About at least 2.7 degrees on a wood rail can rotate. It depends on the material of the rail, of course.

Therefore, I set the angle where the rail that balls don't need to run fast at 3 degrees. However, the next rail to be connected to the 3 degrees rail had to be kept at 9 degrees. It was challenging to cut the surface to a certain degree. Furthermore, I made the wrong length of the rail. One mistake caused the other mistakes, and inside my head was chaos.

How much easier would it have been if these angles were 90 degrees?
I love 90 degrees!
I want to say, "Who designed such a machine?!"
I know. I did. Before I started making it, my husband told me whether I really wanted to make such a complicated marble run machine. I thought it wasn't easy at the time, but I didn't take it so seriously. I've made it this far, and I have no choice but to continue.

The words: sin, cos, and tan were popping into my head meaninglessly. Besides me, who was confused and stuck, my husband gave a simple answer with a calculator.

I remember one teacher who taught a carpentry course at TAFE  (Technical and further education) couldn't calculate the angle of an arched bridge, and he asked my husband for help several years ago. He calculated the angles for the teacher. Since then, he has been dubbed a professor. Should I call him a professor as well? Anyway, three rails were connected somehow.

I made brackets to keep the rails. Those brackets were made from the off-cuts of burr puzzles. You never know what might be useful, you know?

 

 

 

 

Here is what I completed yesterday.

There is a hairpin turn right-hand side, and after that, there is a wavy rail. The wavy rail's angle is a bit steep. Otherwise, the balls cannot be rolled. The balls after passing through the wavy rail, go to the start point, and they are caught by gears and go up to the top of the machine.

I've completed the ball-rifting system and the rails around. From now on, I'm going to design the rails. This is the most fun part. I want to make lots of fun movements.