Path: g2news2.google.com!postnews.google.com!j72g2000cwa.googlegroups.com!not-for-mail From: ryan.tur...@shaw.ca Newsgroups: rec.pyrotechnics Subject: Yes! I made a visco machine! Date: 16 Dec 2006 14:33:48 -0800 Organization: http://groups.google.com Lines: 67 Message-ID: <1166308428.506983.325190@j72g2000cwa.googlegroups.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 68.144.78.176 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" X-Trace: posting.google.com 1166308433 9487 127.0.0.1 (16 Dec 2006 22:33:53 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: Sat, 16 Dec 2006 22:33:53 +0000 (UTC) User-Agent: G2/1.0 X-HTTP-UserAgent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.8.1) Gecko/20061010 Firefox/2.0,gzip(gfe),gzip(gfe) Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com Injection-Info: j72g2000cwa.googlegroups.com; posting-host=68.144.78.176; posting-account=LuLzMA0AAADXOrntXTg801V0WGHFo05e I have been working on this one for a while and haven't said much about it because I really didn't think it would work. It is fully motorized and makes about two meters an minute. It hasn't jammed once yet but I wouldn't leave it unattended. Here is the real kicker. Its made completely out of *K'nex* (with the exception of the dies). Thats right, 100% made from a plastic kids toy. To top it off, the K'nex motors (which appear to be completely covered in a plastic casing) are powerful enough to run the entire machine alone! Its by no means perfect, I'll probably redo the top (white thread) die and the blue thread is too thin. It has only been tested with sugar but it works beautifully with it. Here are some pictures: http://img245.imageshack.us/img245/7750/overviewtworn8.jpg This is an overview of the entire machine. It has two rotating disks with eight rolls of thread a piece. They are positioned vertically. http://img429.imageshack.us/img429/3144/overviewro2.jpg Second overview. http://img392.imageshack.us/img392/8294/whitedieonetk9.jpg The "White" die (named because the first thread is white) is where it happens. It took two tries to get a working die, this is really the only important part. The brass tubing needs to be lowered as far as possible without jamming up the white threads wrapping around it. Currently about three quarters of the sugar that leaves the funnel gets woven into the fuse. http://img392.imageshack.us/img392/549/whitedietwozq6.jpg This view is a bit clearer. Its pretty much magic that it works, I never expected it to weave in so easily. It doesn't look like its possible for thread to just wrap around a powder but it works! http://img462.imageshack.us/img462/16/bluediexp5.jpg Here is the second die (the "blue" one). The machine isn't operating when I took these pictures so there is no sugar. The blue die isn't really that important. http://img462.imageshack.us/img462/2848/comparisonoh5.jpg This is a comparison of the fuse with no sugar inside (left one) and fuse with sugar inside (right one). As you can see, the sugar can work its way out (which is why I need thicker thread) but it works beautifully. http://img462.imageshack.us/img462/5566/fuseonesa8.jpg Just a close up of the fuse. The sugar on the ground didn't leak from the fuse, any sugar that doesn't get woven into the machine hits the spinning disks and flies everywhere. I'll have to use the machine outside. I found that the only two factors that affect the machine is the feed rate and the first die. Without the first die, the machine doesn't weave in any of the sugar. If the feed rate is too slow the sugar won't leak out but it doesn't get woven in properly either. Its much better to pull the thread through too fast than too slow As soon as the tracer (black ones that go through the funnel) threads start twisting, the machine wont work. I haven't tested the machine without the tracer threads but I think they make a big difference. In the finished fuse, they are not twisted at all and you can see that the sugar is suspended between them. They also control the sugars feed rate so the fuse is a constant diameter.