aeh5040

Wow, that sounds impressive!

I always planned to make a multi-digit counter or a clock with mine, but never made much progress. Really the design itself was a bit too clunky. As you say, the key is to make a carry mechnism that is both reliable and can handle the torque. I think this would be very much worth pursuing, and starting with your version ought to give a much greater chance of success!

This is an amazing model. I did not even know about this kind of mechanism.

Outstanding! I love it. Varying the colours of the links could produce some nice effects... Any chance of more pictures, ideally enough to recreate it...? Perhaps there could be another machine that disassembles it, and feeds the parts back into the hoppers. That would be great for a show...

Great work on the mechanisms! To me the styling looks a little sparse, even though it is very similar to the original. I think it might benefit from a little bit of "filling in", although I have no idea how ...

Brilliant! Do keep working on it. I'm certain you will overcome the quirks and hiccups...

Nice, although not the first time it's been done: http://www.technicbricks.com/2009/07/let-dice-roll.html?m=1 It is an interesting challenge to fill all the connecting pin holes with pins - see below - I don't know if this can be done in combination with the die effect. http://brickshelf.com/gallery/aeh/Impossible/impossible.jpg

Mechanical FTW.

There were plenty of cranes before LAs: http://www.technicopedia.com/cranes.html

I'm completely with you on the preferences. Mechanisms every time for me. But I'm not convinced there is any clear trend away from this aspect. Unquestionably styling has become more important, but I think on the whole mechanisms retained or increased their sophistication. Realistic styling sells, and that has to be their primary concern. On the whole I'm just happy that their business model happens to accommodate my idiosyncratic interests as a byproduct. It's easy to single out the best sets of the past and get nostalgic about them (I do it all the time), but don't forget there were plenty of mediocre ones along side them. And on recent mechanisms: well, consider that a sequential gear stepper mechanism was unheard of in an unofficial set in the days of 8043. One recent change that I do find unfortunate is PF->PoweredUp. I understand why they felt they had to do it, but I don't like it.

It of course all depends where one draws the line between Technic and System parts, but my impression is that the recent trend (say, the last 5 years) is towards using more System parts in Technic sets. These days it is very common for plates, tiles and slopes to be used for more realistic styling on parts of vehicles (e.g. 42083, 42042), and for little tools, accessories, and details to be included (e.g. 42082, 42100). I think this was less common a few years ago. (Compare e.g. 42042, 42009).

Just a partial idea: if the sides could be sprung outward somehow, they could be actuated by pulling on threads, which might simplify things.

That's an extremely interesting model, always love mechanical computation! One way to get the required 10-fold symmetry is the drum from here (although it's bulky): Another random thought: if things were to only rotate one way, perhaps you could overcome the backlash problem.

That's brilliant, well done!

That is compact! And I like the symmetry - a pity the motor placement breaks it.

That's great! An improvement on my version from 10 years ago!

Hi and welcome. As the designer and a user of the machine, you are probably one of the best placed to decide what the needs are. If you can be more specific about what you want to achieve when you " finetune some of it's aspects ", then I expect people here can try to help you.

Cool! A good version of the "smooth cross" is a very worthwhile exercise. I think it could be useful for other things too (analogue computation...)

Interesting idea. It might work better to move the paper for one axis and the pen for the other, thus doing away with the "cross".

It would be sad if the new pin no longer admits a bar. That's a useful technique...

I did offer to help make instructions from photos... What was the nature of the unreliability, if you don't mind me asking?

Great work as always. Just remove a couple of parts and that should fit perfectly...

Interesting question. For me it depends. Mostly I will use whatever is needed, and the harder the task I have set myself, the more I appreciate the flexibility. But I am aware that other people might want to make some of my designs, so for that reason I sometimes make attempts to use common and recent parts. How much I do this depends on the model.

Very interesting. It would be nice to see a comparison with the 9V mains train regulator also.

Maybe two 1x1 round plates inserted into the holes underneath, and a rotating part that sits between them?