Has anyone here ever made a (decently complicated) machine?

[Kyriakos]

I thought this may be a nice thread, hobby-related... I do have the plan to build, in the hopefully not very far future, a mechanical integrator. Which is old tech, to be sure, but still somewhat complicated.
Basically it would be about calculating (with good accuracy) the trajectory of a projectile, eg a marble or similar. In WW2 a few ships did have (much larger scale and more intricate) such to help with targeting and other procedures.
What it does is to (through mechanical forces, ie unlike digital computers) calculate where the projectile will fall, given some input (also from mechanical means, including manually operated). The main math process it uses is what gives it its name: integration. Although I am not currently at the planning stage, I expect the main input to be provided by a height-measuring part, which (like old astronomical instruments) is dependent on the operator adjusting it through sight of the target, and this allows the analog machine to compute the two concurrent basic movements of the projectile and apply the force needed, and from the correct angle, to the projectile so that it hits the target.

Google gives various images of different builds of this type of machine.

You are welcome to post about your own mechanical projects, or discuss.

 

[Gori the Grey]

In ninth-grade shop class, I disassembled my dad's lawnmower and reassembled it.

He bought a new lawnmower shortly afterwards.

 

[Kyriakos]

Lawnmowers are pretty dangerous...!

 

[Bonyduck Campersang]

I thought this may be a nice thread, hobby-related... I do have the plan to build, in the hopefully not very far future, a mechanical integrator. Which is old tech, to be sure, but still somewhat complicated.
Basically it would be about calculating (with good accuracy) the trajectory of a projectile, eg a marble or similar. In WW2 a few ships did have (much larger scale and more intricate) such to help with targeting and other procedures.
What it does is to (through mechanical forces, ie unlike digital computers) calculate where the projectile will fall, given some input (also from mechanical means, including manually operated). The main math process it uses is what gives it its name: integration. Although I am not currently at the planning stage, I expect the main input to be provided by a height-measuring part, which (like old astronomical instruments) is dependent on the operator adjusting it through sight of the target, and this allows the analog machine to compute the two concurrent basic movements of the projectile and apply the force needed, and from the correct angle, to the projectile so that it hits the target.

Google gives various images of different builds of this type of machine.

You are welcome to post about your own mechanical projects, or discuss.

 

[warpus]

This device you are building is in some ways the precursor to the analog computer, right? Are you going to order a kit or build it from scratch somehow? What's the process? Will you be documenting it? Cause that sounds kind of interesting..

A little bit of on the side advice: Conceal the construction of your trebuchet so that your neighbours don't have time to put up adequate defenses. Then strike with utmost precision when they least expect it

 

[amadeus]

I tried to put together this thing once, had a big triangle screen, then some weird dude with a huge forehead came on and invited me to some chalet where they were going to talk about some science stuff. The whole thing sounded really suspicious.

 

[ls612]

The only machines I've ever built are my gaming rigs.

 

[Zardnaar]

The only machines I've ever built are my gaming rigs.

That's more assembling

 

[Kyriakos]

This device you are building is in some ways the precursor to the analog computer, right? Are you going to order a kit or build it from scratch somehow? What's the process? Will you be documenting it? Cause that sounds kind of interesting..

A little bit of on the side advice: Conceal the construction of your trebuchet so that your neighbours don't have time to put up adequate defenses. Then strike with utmost precision when they least expect it

I am not yet at the planning stage for the building. First I need to be comfortable with how the integration is translatable to mechanical terms. I won't be making the bits myself, though - maybe it will suffice to buy some parts built in the shape needed, along with the triggers and connectors. The point for me is to have (literally) a manifested analogy for the math operations, since it implies you at least are well-founded in working with them
Besides, a personal semi-automatic turret is always cool.
It is, at least in a limited sense, a computer, and certainly it is analog. But I doubt it will be able to do much more than just compute (with manual input) angle and force of movement of the projectile (well, naturally it can calculate what the integral of stuff is, but so can a click at a math site).

I am also thinking of (digitally) creating a game with the same process. Some of you may remember an ancient game with a tank that shoots at an immobile enemy tank, on different positions on a hill (in the original it is 2d, so simpler) - that can be programmed digitally with the same math. Even an engine like AGS has calculus processes built in the code, which is very cool...

People have even modeled builds of mech integrators in 3d:

Of course mine will have the added bits and connectors to an actual propellant for the projectile, as well as the manually-operated (sorry, no sensors :S ) part which establishes relative position of the target. Basically the integration takes values from that manual sweeper (so to speak) and calculates how much force to use so that the curve it writes on the disk corresponds to the position of the target. Of course if later on I am interested and able, I may consider sensors so that this will become a robotic turret

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Waaay back in the early '90s, when our Star Trek club went to Con-Version (Calgary's annual science fiction convention, held every July), some of us decided to get ambitious. One of the events held every year was the Gumball Rally, and that year we decided to enter.

The Gumball Rally was a contest to see who could do the best job of constructing a machine out of whatever parts were in the kit that was given to every team (you could enter as an individual or as a team), and the machine had to be able to do whatever the instructions said it was supposed to do.

The kits cost a whopping $2.00, so we each pitched in 50 cents and got our kit. It wasn't very large; the whole thing fit into a SPAM tin (referring to the luncheon meat kind). It was an assortment of odds and ends, and we had to figure out how to make something that would move.

Well, we devoted part of Saturday to it, realized that the only one of our club who was mechanically-minded enough to figure it out hadn't come with us (he was still in Red Deer), and got ready for the Costume Bacchanal instead (costume contest & dance).


As far as building stuff, give me a sheet of plastic canvas, a pair of scissors, a utility knife, a tapestry needle, and a ball of yarn (worsted-weight acrylic), and I'll build something 3-dimensional. The biggest thing I ever made was a costume hat. It took 3 sheets of canvas, about 2.5 balls of yarn, and more time than I'd intended because I accidentally sewed part of it together sideways. So I had to take it apart and redo it - NINE HOURS' WORK!

My grandmother didn't understand why it mattered. She didn't understand why I was making a hat anyway. She couldn't even understand that it was a hat.

It was one of those ideas that came to me when I was playing around with a much smaller one, a little doodad that was meant to hold a small candy. I realized that if you turn it a certain way, it makes a nifty hat for a standard-size Barbie doll (my grandmother was collecting Barbies back then).

Then I got the idea that if it worked on a doll, a human-sized one would work for me. And thus my idea to make a medieval-style hat to go with my somewhat-medieval style costume (based on Robert Silverberg's novel Lord Valentine's Castle) was born.

It took some trial and error to get the size right, but I eventually figured it out. And then came the sewing. Holy crap, that was a lot of sewing. Thank goodness for all those VHS tapes I had, with the miniseries and documentaries. I'd put that into the VCR and listen while I stitched (this is one reason why I can still quote whole scenes from I, Claudius).

When the whole thing was finally done, I used some costume brooches and pins (some already in the collection, a few I made from bits and pieces of wood, paint, and jewelry findings; thank goodness my dad had given me a set of pliers for my birthday), and attached some gauzy fabric (think pointy hats with long veils).

I liked the result. It was godawful hard to figure out how to pack, though. Most women don't wear hats anymore, which means hat boxes are hard to come by.

So... imagine a long, floor-length, two-toned multilayered dress in light green. The headdress was white, with green trim and green/gold and white pins and brooches holding the light green veil on. Shoes were white with gold laces, white stockings. Other accessories included gold-toned jewelry and a dark green pouch with gold lacing (I made my hall costumes so that I could spend the day not having to tote anything mundane around with me, or at least not anything visibly mundane).

I was actually wearing this when a group of us decided to go to Arby's across the street from the hotel to get a pre-Bacchanal snack. The others in the group were also in costume, and while we were waiting to cross the street, one guy apparently forgot he was in the middle of the intersection as he stared at us. Fortunately he realized in time, and no accident happened.

This was also the time when one of my roommates decided that a chainmail bikini was a grand idea for a costume, but that's another story (she built that thing herself, one link at a time).