Amicus1

Looks to be door rails with tiles on top, attached with a 4 sided snot brick so the rails all point in one direction around the circle.

Congrats!

The "geometrical approach" of splitting up the chain is actually well suited for my use case. I'm using this arm as a fancy forklift for loading train cars in a circle. This means what I'm essentially dealing with is a three-chain system. 1. The base turntable at the center of the track circle rotates the rest of the arm to point at the target (train car, a stack of shelves, etc). 2. The first two joints are a two-bone IK chain in two dimensions, bringing the base of the wrist near the target. 3. The wrist (Akiyuki wrist) then has the job of "canceling out" the angle at which it attaches to the arm, in order to continuously keep the forklift end level. Analyzing this, the first 1DOF chain is very simple, and does not need any kinematic algorithm beyond a P loop. The second is slightly tricky, but 2-dimension 2DOF solving basically comes down to constructing a triangle given three sides, which basic trigonometry can easily handle. The third chain, however, will present more difficulties, at least if the wrist rolls. If it stays in two dimensions it's simply an arithmetic calculation based on the angle of the "forearm".

Hopping on the train because these arms seem to be a common thing to do. I’ve found that for my purposes I can probably work in one section of cylindrical coordinates. The base turntable and everything up to the wrist provides a position in a cylinder (a 2d plane rotated around the turntable) and the wrist is a quaternion in Cartesian. I haven’t actually tried it though.

TIL saw and paint are four letter words. Hmm :)

Thread resurrected. The thing hasn’t been posted in for over five years.

Correction: most 4DBRIX products are now available for make-on-demand. I would not be surprised if the next wave contained the R56 switches.

The 12-tooth and 8-tooth aren’t “supposed” to mesh nicely, but it will likely work well enough.

Inspired by War of the Worlds?

Cool to see the dimensions figure base and the Ninjago Airjitsu pod in the same build!

As the 4DBrix website gets reconstructed, a marketplace framework is being put in place for exactly that purpose.

That use of the crater baseplate as steam is genius!

He was offering print on demand since not many other producers were stepping up. Also for the people who want a guaranteed same quality.

It makes a nice sci-fi elevated railway. The problem is most things that can run on it wrap around the track.

The track is compatible with narrow gauge wheel sets, but the curve is too tight (R12) to accommodate most locomotives, so the best method is train wheels facing inward and running on the outside of the track.

I bought some 9v track on EBay, just to be able to drive an elevated railway from ev3 without requiring a battery box. Wouldn’t make my entire layout 9v.

Bluebrixx is not the same thing as Bluebrick the track designer program for those confused like me.

Just checked back. They have released the models for a few basic tracks, and have added a forum: https://www.4dbrix.com/forum/index.php?show=000006

This is something else I'd like to get out of this thread: Is there still enough demand for the 4DBrix unique products like the monorail tracks and the automation ecosystem that other manufacturers could feasibly pop up and make and sell the 4DBrix designs?

Just curious, is there still a market for 4DBrix products? Would people buy from other microbusinesses printing and manufacturing the 4DBrix designs?

https://www.4dbrix.com/shop/ now shows this: Dear fellow AFOL, We apologize for the radio-silence of the last couple of weeks. We have been dealing with the fallout of the Covid-19 pandemic on both personal and professional levels. Some of you have contacted us and we still need to answer those emails. We’re sorry about that, we’re going to try to get back to you as soon as possible. It has been a period to reflect on the future. We started 4DBrix because we had several ideas to increase the playability of LEGO® creations by combining 3D printing, electronics and programming. We are proud of what we achieved and we’re grateful for all the support and wonderful feedback we got from many of you. Unfortunately not everything is awesome in our AFOL community... One of the first things we did was launching a kickstarter campaign to introduce our modular switches. The campaign was successful... too successful actually. Before we had shipped out the tracks to all our backers there were already copies of our modular system being sold. It didn’t stop there, in the following years that same company started systematically copying our train products. It has become clear that copying our ideas is their core business strategy. To our surprise this is not only condoned by a part of our community, some prominent members of the AFOL community are actively supporting this. In the long run, this is not a sustainable situation. We’ve always focused on what’s in the best interest of our community, e.g. our nControl software has always been available to everybody for free, and want to continue to do so. One of the main concerns we found in your feedback was the cost of our products. We’re located in the US so our production costs are high, there’s not much we can do about that. That’s why we decided to transform 4DBrix into a Do-It-Yourself platform. We will release our 3D print models so you can print the parts yourself. We’ll also release building instructions for the automation components so you can build your own automation system from readily available off-the-shell components. We understand that some of you don’t have a 3D printer and/or don’t have the skills or interest in assembling electronics. That’s why we’re looking for 3D print and electronics enthusiasts who want to set up a micro-business and start producing for their local AFOL community. Like that we can also get rid of long distance shipping. If you’re interested in this, please let us know. It’s a radical change and we believe it’s the best way to move forward. We’ll start by updating our website site: adding download links to the models, assembly instruction and all the other information you need to build your dream layout, so stay in touch! Tom (aka @Lowa) Discuss here, especially if you would like to start a micro-business as described in the post and want to get an interest gauge..

I am not aware of any app where the blocks link vertically. What is the name of the app you are using?

Not at the moment but I will take some when I get home.

Here is a ship that uses an engine block I’ve had around for years. More pics later.