aeh5040

I expect most people have seen akiyuky's astonishing 20 unit GBC loop, although I didn't notice it posted here: I could just sit and watch this for hours... But most amazing of all, in my opinion, is his "Automatic crane loader" module. All the functions you see here are driven by one motor, located on the train itself. It really is hard to believe this is possible....!

Nicely done - the splitter is working very well!

Both the loom and the Digicomp I are absolutely fantastic! Awesome work! The Digicomp was actually on my long-term list of things to make, but you beat me to it! :) Many thanks also for making instructions. I'll definitely be making one of these...

I don't have any instructions or parts list at the moment. I could perhaps take some more photos to make the construction clearer. Is there any particular part of the construction that you would like to know more about?

Seven-segment numeric displays are found in clocks and calculators everywhere. Sometimes you will also see a mechanical one like this, where the segments take the form of physical objects. I decided to try making one of these. It counts from 0 to 9 by entirely mechanical means (just one motor). I think it's a safe bet that none of the real-life ones work quite like this! Although the idea is simple, it was quite difficult getting it to work well. Enjoy! More pics: http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/aeh/

Actually I don't think that should be a problem. If there is resistance on the output then the "floating" gear gets pushed harder onto the correct side. I tried to show this in the video. (If the resistance is VERY high in your application then you will want two liftarms, one either side of the floating gear, so that its axle is held more firmly. You might also want to limit the movement of the liftarms so that the gears are not pushed together too hard. Like I said, lots of experimentation needed!) One potential issue is not enough resistance - in that case it's possible that the floating gear will not engage at all. There needs to be a bit of friction between the drive axle and the floating liftarm to avoid this.

It would be hard to improve on akiyukiy's amazing construction:

This is an interesting challenge. Here is a mechanism I just put together that might work for you. The output is powered when the motor is on, and free to rotate when it is off. It's not perfect - it would need some experimentation to get it right.

Wow - that is an amazing machine - I'd like to see that in action!

Here is something I've been wanting to make for a long time, finally made possible by Zblj's amazing design for Mecanum wheels. Like Zblj's and esrtiece's impressive vehicles, it can drive and turn in any direction. What makes this one different is that it is controlled by a system of differentials (similar to an add/subtract mechanism but a little more complicated). This means it can be controlled by just 3 motors: one for forward/reverse, one for sideways, one for turning. With a lot of effort I was able to get the mechanism quite compact - it uses only 4 differentials. I usually settle for pure functionality, but this time I made some attempt at styling too . Enjoy!

It does fine on low carpets (in fact it is a little smoother), but gets bogged down on thick ones...

Elegant simplicity! Very nice indeed!

Now this is a model! Absolutely amazing!

Thanks for the renewed interest in this little model! This has prompted me to finish making the instructions: http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/aeh/Lobster/LDraw/lobster.mpd http://toad.net84.net/lobster/

Here is a mechanism that does what you ask. I'm not sure how practical it would be for a real application, but it does work...

Brilliant, as always, Mahj. Great originality, and I'm also impressed with the way you fitted everything into such a tight space.

USA, Seattle area. (Doesn't that make 3 of us already?). Haven't made it to any events/meetings yet, but maybe next Brickcon...

What could be more obvious? This is awesome! I so wish TLG would make official sets like this (technic animals) - 4958 was unfortunately a rare exception.

Wow, what an amazing story. Reading this just made my day! You are an inspiration to us all. You reminded me of one of the reasons I never feel guilty about spending money on Lego (other than the obvious ones) - it brings so much joy to the world that I want to make sure TLG continues to prosper forever.

Here is a purely mechanical four-phase oscillator. Essentially it is a mechanical analogue of a two-cylinder pneumatic oscillator like this. There is just one motor, which powers two "direction selectors". Their outputs are fed into a add-subtract mechanism, and the outputs of this power two linear actuators which flip the selectors. The result is that the two actuators take turns to move back and forth. The outputs (orange wheels) could be used to power something else - not sure what! Maybe a GBC module or some kind of walker... Enjoy!

Wow, that's awesome! Any chance of instructions...?

I think there should be great potential for mechanical puzzles in Lego. Besides these, I've seen relatively few: sliding piece puzzles, some Rubik cubes, and a few puzzle boxes...

This is indeed a very clever invention (among many on xyzzzach's youtube channel). I was also inspired to make my own studless version of this a few years ago!! I also made instructions for mine here. I've been interested (some people might say obsessed) in purely mechanical (non-electronic) obstacle-avoiding robots for a while. Here are a couple of my other attempts at this: And here is one by someone else:

Absolutely amazing! That's a very clever solution to something I would have thought impossible. Very much looking forward to seeing more details of the mechanism working...

Wow! Absolutely amazing!!!! What a great idea! Now how about a purely mechanical (non-NXT) version (like this)...?