Newly Completed Overly-Complex Clock Synchronizes Multiple Mechanisms

July 11, 2024 by Donald Papp 1 Comment

Some time ago [Kelton] was working on a clock inspired by Rube Goldberg contraptions. It uses only a single motor, and he’s proud to now show off the finished product (video, embedded below.)

The clock shows hours on the left, and minutes on the right. Every sixty minutes the clock drops a marble. That marble kicks off a series of visually-satisfying operations that culminate in advancing the hour. Then everything resets, and it continues for as long as it has power.

The hour oscillates in a very satisfying manner as it locks in.

At the top of each hour, the minute hand tips a marble with a gravity cam. That marble runs down a track gaining enough momentum to flip a kicker, and a short series of falling dominoes builds enough force to tip and trigger the spring-loaded ratchet that locks in a new hour. You can skip directly to 2:09 if you just want to listen to [Kelton] explain the whole operation from beginning to end.

We think it’s very interesting to note that this clock’s complexity is, if anything, understated. Each of the mechanisms involved must individually reset by their own separate mechanisms, each of which are as intriguing as their showier counterparts, and we’re sure they were every bit as difficult to get just right. And of course, it’s all driven by a single motor.

You may recall the promising start this clock project was off to and we’re delighted to see it come to completion, especially considering its complexity. Not every project sees completion, and fewer still get a version two, but that’s okay. What really floats our boat is seeing the process and details as well as hearing about what worked and what didn’t. We’re glad this clock reached the finish line, but even if something doesn’t work out, there’s always something to learn.

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Intentionally Overly-Complex Clock Is Off To A Good Start

June 3, 2024 by Donald Papp 1 Comment

[Kelton] from Build Some Stuff decided to create a clock that not only had kinetic elements, but a healthy dose of Rube Goldberg inspiration. The result is a work in progress, but one that looks awfully promising.

The main elements of the design are rotating pieces that indicate the hours and minutes, but each hour is advanced solely by the satisfying physical culmination of multiple interacting systems. Those systems also completely reset themselves every hour.

Each hour, a marble run kicks off a short chain reaction that culminates in advancing the hour.

At the top of the hour, a marble starts down a track and eventually tips over a series of hinged “dominoes”, which culminate in triggering a spring-loaded ratchet that advances the hour. The marble then gets carried back to the top of the device, ready for next time. Meanwhile, the domino slats and spring-loaded ratchets all get reset by a pulley system.

There’s still some work to do in mounting the motor, pulley system, and marble run. Also, a few bugs have surfaced, like a slight overshoot in the hour display. All par for the course for a device with such a large number of moving parts, we suppose.

[Kelton] has a pretty good sense how it will all work in the end, and it looks promising. We can’t wait to see it in its final form, but the tour of clock so far is pretty neat. Check it out in the video, embedded just under the page break.

As for the clock’s inspiration, Rube Goldberg’s cultural impact is hard to overstate and our own Kristina Panos has an excellent article about the man that might just teach you something you didn’t know.

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This Machine Has Lost Its Marbles

October 26, 2023 by Jenny List 15 Comments

The astonishing variety of ways to tell the time which have appeared on these pages over the years provides a showcase of the talents and ingenuity of our community. Many clocks use designs we are familiar with, but every now and then along comes a clock that rings something new. So it is with [Ivan Miranda]’s latest work — a digital clock that shows the time with a dot matrix made of marbles. So far he’s published only part one of what will become a series. There’s technically no clock yet, but as it stands it’s enough of a marble machine to be a worthy project in its own right.

In the video below we see him solving the problems of creating free-running marble transport and handling via a conveyor belt, and solving such unexpected problems as cleanly releasing them from the belt, holding a row of marbles with a solenoid, and catching errant marbles that bounce free of the machine. The result is a rather pretty marble machine that makes an endless cascade of falling marbles on a curved track. We’re guessing that future videos will deal with the assembly of lines for the dot matrix display, such that the figures of the clock will be formed from black and white marbles, so this is a series to watch out for.

We’ve seen [Ivan]’s work in the past, not least for his giant 3D printer.

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This Kinetic Art Display Uses A Gin Bottle

August 7, 2023 by Dave Rowntree 8 Comments

[David McDaid] likes gin. So in homage to their favourite tipple, a certain brand of Scottish origin, a kinetic art project was brewed. Tabled as a Rube Goldberg machine — it’s not — but it is a very smart marble run type installation, dripping with 3D printed parts and a sprinkling of blinkenlights.

The write-up shows the degree of pain we go through with building such contraptions, apparently [David] burned through 2.5 kg of PLA filament despite the bill of materials requiring a mere 660 g. Much experimentation, trial and error, and plenty of print-and-reprint-until-good-enough, resulted in a clean looking run with some neat features. We particularly like the use of a stainless steel jigger to add a touch of metallic ting, to the soundscape produced. The whole show was put together in Fusion 360, since all those tight tolerances do not make for a simple construction without a lot of fiddling around with the layout. Once it was a sound, layout was prototyped on a wood board, which was subsequently used a drill template for the final acrylic version.

On the electronics side of things, an Arduino Nano clone is on control duty, reading an IR trip sensor to fire of a simple light effect, illuminating the gin bottle in a slick fashion. These machines need a mechanism to raise the balls against that pesky force of gravity, in this instance a 3D printed custom chain was constructed, driven with a stepper motor in turn driven from a TMC2208. You see, this thing lives in the kitchen, so the aim was to keep all the noise from the mechanics to a minimum so only the noise of LDPE balls rattling around can be heard. They are the star of the show after all! The build looks nice and would certainly be something we’d like to see on the wall. Obviously we’ve seen a few marble runs over the years. Here’s an interesting one that uses an elevator mechanism, and another project that shows how to generate runs procedurally.

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Gumball Coaster Is 3D-Printed Candy Fun

June 23, 2023 by Lewin Day 2 Comments

Marble runs are fun enough on their own, but what if you could eat the marbles? Gumballs are the satisfying answer to that question. To that end, [Adrian Seeley] whipped up a system for producing gumball runs programmatically for entertainment and candy dispensing purposes.

Track descriptions can be coded via basic instructions outlining a marble run, by typing out the order of straights, turns, and ramps that make up the course. Once created as a JSON file, the track description is processed via Javascript to create a tiled physical representation of the track via OpenSCAD, including all necessary support structures. The pieces can then be 3D printed to create an actual physical gumball run that can be easily assembled.

[Adrian] created a small tabletop “gumcoaster” as a prototype. Even at that size, it took 11 hours to assemble. It served as a trial run ahead of a larger version he hopes to build for a candy store display. We’ve seen some great marble runs before too, including those created via procedural generation. Video after the break.

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A 3D Printed Marble Run Features Neat Elevator Linkage

September 21, 2022 by Lewin Day 20 Comments

There’s seldom anything as joyful and relaxing to watch as a simple marble run. Of course, the thing about letting marbles fall under gravity is that you eventually need to lift them back up again. The Marblevator has a mechanism that does just that.

Overall, the build features a relatively simple marble run. It consists of just six 3D printed ramps which the marble tumbles down in just a few seconds. However, the real magic is in the mechanism that restores the marbles from the bottom of the run all the way back to the top.

A motor turns a gear, which then rotates a crank leading to a multi-link rhombus. On one corner of the rhombus is a small protrusion with a magnet attached, which picks up the marbles from the bottom of the run. As the mechanism turns, the rhombus shifts and brings the marble-carrying arm to the top of the marble run. There, it’s grabbed by another magnet, which holds the marble for a moment before letting it drop back down through the run.

It’s a simple project that nonetheless would make a brilliant desk toy. It’s also a great way to learn about linkage analysis and designing such systems on your own. If you’re big into marble runs, you might also consider procedurally generating them. Video after the break.

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Sisyphean Ball Race Robot Toils Gracefully, Magnetically

May 20, 2022 by Kristina Panos 5 Comments

Aren’t ball races and marble runs fun? Wouldn’t they be so much more enjoyable if you didn’t have to climb back up the ladder each time, as it were, and reset the thing? [Johannes] wrote in to tell us about a wee robot with the Sisyphean task of setting a ball bearing on a simple but fun course, collecting it from the end, and airlifting it back to the start of the track.

[Johannes] built this ‘bot to test small-scale resin printing strength as well as the longevity of some tiny linear actuators from Ali that may or may not be available at a moment’s notice. The point was to see how these little guys fared when connected directly to an Arduino or other microcontroller, rather than going the safer route with a motor driver of some kind.

Some things worked well, like the c-clips that keep the axles together, and using quick pulses to release the magnetically-linked ball from the gripper. Other aspects didn’t work out so well. Tiny resin parts do not respond well to force, for starters. And then there’s the actuators themselves. The connections are fragile and the motors are weak, but they vary wildly in quality from piece to piece, so YMMV. Some lose steps, and others occasionally seize. But you wouldn’t know any of that from the graceful movement capture in the video below. Although it appears to be automated, the bot is under remote control because of the motor issues.

Not into ball runs? There are other Sisyphean tasks available, such as moving sand around in the name of meditation.

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