How to Make Spirals - Video

For all of you out there that wants to make an RBS but is intimidated with all of the different parts and elements that go into one, I have decided to start a video series to help out. This video "How to Make Spirals" is #1 in the series. I plan to do more more complicated videos on how to make spiral lifts and chain lifts, etc. but before tackling that, I needed a little training.

I decided on something easy, but very necessary, like the trusty spiral. This video shows you what tools you need, how to get the spiral bent, and a few handy tricks. Well worth the cost of the video.

The video is available two ways: First is with youtube. I have uploaded the video (384 mb - 35 minutes) and set it to private. I can have up to 25 usernames set to watch it anytime. The cost for the youtube video is $10.

I can also send you a DVD - cost $15. Now I hesitate to do this as I do not have a way to make labels for them yet, and you will only get a DVD with a handwritten title in felt tip marker. Not very nice to look at, but the video would be better quality and you won't need an Internet connection to view it.

Paypal only for payments. Email me @ matthew.gaulden@gmail.com for more info or to purchase.

Let me know what other things you might like to see in a "How To" video and I'll see what I can do!

Desktop #40 - Hojo Racing

Here's my latest desktop, #40. This desktop has a theme - Racing. Ferrari racing to be specific. The marbles are kept at the top and are released with just the touch of your finger into a tipping arm. My usual desktop has the marbles roll into a track splitter. This desktop has them roll into a tipping arm that tips when two marbles are inside it, side by side. When it tips they are dumped out at the same time giving them each a fair start on one of the two full tracks.

This desktop will be going to Hojo Racing in Beverly Hills, Ca. (I tried to trade for a couple laps around the track, but no-go!) I made his car out of wire and also wrote out Hojo Racing in wire as well. In the photo below you can see Hojo Racing in red. I painted the letters red because if left in stainless steel you would never notice it behind all of the tracks. The red really brings it out, especially in person.

The car was quite challenging. I thought I could do it, but plans sometimes don't work out the way you imagine them when you actually get to doing. I cruised his website - www.hojoracing.com for a good photo. Once I had found one I used Adobe Photoshop to "find lines". I enlarged and printed this photo and then laid the wire right on the prited paper to make sure it was exact. I started out with the front tire, and then added the bumper, then added each piece one by one. I had at first tried to use 1/8" wire, but (HA!) that didn't work out like I wanted it to. It was much to stiff to get the small curves needed for the tire, and gave it up in about 5 minutes. So I switched to 1/16" stainless "fill" wire. I say fill wire because it is sold as a filler when welding thicker metal. I get it in 1lb packages from my welding supply. It is great for detail work, or like you might have guessed, filling in those gaps when welding.

I don't normally paint my sculptures because the paint doesn't stick to stainless well. But in this case it needed painting so it would stand out, and make it look very clean. Without the paint the small weld spots are noticible. With the paint it looks much cleaner.

The back of the sculpture:

The front of the sculpture:

And the video!

New Desktop

I like new ideas. They take hold in my mind and percolate slowly, but constantly. I was given the idea of making a desktop rbs that tipped back and forth, with the marble rolling back and forth as the track itself tipped up and down. I did make one and it wasn't exactly what I had hoped for. So it sat. I showed it to my machinist, Bill, and he was all for making more of the motor mounts. Who was I to say no? So in a few days I had 8 new motor mounts with very nice machined aluminum center nose pieces.

Last week I went to San Francisco to deliver a sculpture - wall mounted #82;

And, Aaron, the lucky recipient of #82 had three sculptures from Stan Bennett a kinetic artist that lives in Ferndale, Ca. Stan's sculptures used a rotating arm to lift the marbles. Actually they used several in a row to get the balls from the bottom back to the top. I was so impressed with the arms, that I went home and used one of my new motor mounts for this type of lift, the ARM lift.

So here it is. Under the hood, it is still a basic desktop with a tetrahedron frame. But this baby has three tracks, is 26" wide X 18" high X 19" deep and is automatic.

Check out the video:

Catching up.

Hey Everyone. I wanted to dust off the blog and post something before it's been two months between posts... I know, I know, I need to post more often, and I think about my blog often, but it just does not make it from my brain to my keyboard. So for all of you regular readers out there, I apologize that I do not post more often. I have been busy with projects and have finished a few things since my last post and I aim to correct my lack of postings starting with this one. : )

I've since built several wall mounted RBS's. This one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOelpqNLT8A #79 and this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iSm9TVWUvc #81.

Now these two wall mounted sculptures have a little story behind them. When I built #79 the buyer wanted a sculpture like #69 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSpbsehaJLw) - and I didn't clarify with the buyer exactly what he wanted... So I built him a wall mounted the same size and with the same one slow track. It came out fine, but when I talked to Greg he was a little less than happy and explained to me that he wanted a copy of #69. Apprehensive, Greg asked what we could do...I cheerfully explained I'll just make you another. And that's #81. If you look, it is a pretty close approximation of #69, maybe even a little better... : )

So I sold #79 made him #81 and Everyone was happy!
And for anyone who is following my progess on sculptures, #80 is on hold for the moment.

Next post soon, I promise!

Wall Mounted #81
Battery Powered

Wall Mounted #79

Going Home

Ooooooh Yeeeahhhhh, this is what I want for Christmas!!!

I dunno....if you got going really, really fast inside this tube (especially at the beginning) you'd be beat up pretty bad, if not dead. I'd still try it.

Making nylon bearings

I wanted to share with you how I make my nylon bearings. I have gone through several different kinds of "pivots" for elements on my sculptures and these have proven to be the best. I start with a rod of 1" acetyl plastic. I get 4ft lengths. First I cut the rod into sections 1.125" long. This will allow me to take face off side of the bearing without making it less than 1" wide. "Facing" makes the end (face) smooth and flat.

(above) Here is some of the plastic pieces I am left with after cutting the rod into lengths.

(Above) Here's the part chucked into the lathe.

(above) This photo shows the first side of the part with the chamfer. Once I did all of the parts on one side, then I set my stop, and did the other side. With the tool shown I cut the chamfer, and faced the end so it was smooth.

(above) The center drill. The center drill just cuts a small hole to make sure the drill bit cuts true in the next step.

(above) Now I will drill the hole. It's drilled 1/64th under 3/8" (the OD of the bronze bearing)
(above) Now the final drilling step, the reamer. Since plastic "closes" on you after you've cut it, the reamer gets the plastic closest to the size you want without going over, or being too small.

Finally, here is the bronze bearing inserted into the plastic. The bearing on the left is to show you the bearing halfway in, and the bearing on the right is all the way in. I've still got more than a hundred to go. My son, who is 10, has drilled more than 20. I think he could do them all.... Who says child labor is wrong?

Desktop #32 and #33

I posted quite a while ago about the 5 frames and accessories that I made up in advance for desktops. #29, #30 and #31 can be seen below in an older posting. These desktops just seem to keep getting better and better. It's all about practice. The more I make, the easier it is to build and the easier it is to add new things. Now these two desktops don't have anything new, per say, but both have some very nice track. I like track. Track is the fun space between elements.

What is noteworthy of these two desktops is why they were made. Desktop #32 was ordered by a woman for her mom's birthday. Great! I love to think of people opening their gift and receiving one of my sculptures! And just to make things interesting, desktop #33 was ordered by and man for his dad's birthday. Two in a row for b-days! Cool!

So to make these special I added a heart shape to the spinner for the mom, and the initial "S" (stands for the last name) for the dad.

Happy Birthday Everyone!

Desktop #32 (a gift for someone's Mom)


Desktop #33 (a gift for someone's Dad)

#78 Finished

Well, I need to start posting more than once a month. : ) The best time to start is now!

This is the finished sculpture #78. It measures 30" square and 36" tall. There are 3 different tracks. Almost finished...It still needs the acrylic case that will cover this piece so it will be safe while unattended in the law firm's waiting area.

Track 1 is the loop d' loop track, track 2 has a marble collector which tips when the 3rd marble rolls on (then the three roll off together), and track 3 has several cool elements that it activates. The picture below shows the first section of the loop d' loop.

Here (below) is the second section to the loop d' loop. The marble, after exiting the loops, turns to the left and joins with track 3 before heading back to the lift.

This picture (below) shows the chain lift - lifting a yellow marble. The chain lift picks up and releases about 3 marbles per minute.

Here is a photo showing a couple marbles in motion.
In this picture (below) you can see the "Scales of Justice". The scales are really cool to watch. The scales will tip when the third marble rolls into the side closest in this photo. The other side has several smaller marbles to provide the counter weight so it will reset itself when the other marbles roll out. It tips with 3 marbles but is inconsistent with how many marbles are dumped out. Sometimes only one marble goes, mostly two marbles will dump out, and then sometimes all of them dump.
See the marble collector at the top of the photo.
And as you can see, (below) this sculpture will be going to the law offices of Kam, Ebersbach and Lewis. They are trial lawyers.

All pictures clickable. See this sculpture in motion here:

Getting Personal

There's nothing like having your own RBS. Better than that, there's nothing like having it personalized so it says, "Look at Me! I belong to (you)". My next project will be located in the office (lobby?) of a lawyer, located in Georgia. As you can see from the photo below, the law firms name is Kam, Ebersbach & Lewis - Trial lawyers.
To make the letters I welded wire into a square, 3.125" high X 2" wide. I then cut the wires for the letters and fit them into the wire square to make sure they were all the same height and width. The B's S's and R's are the hardest because they all have curves.

Below you can see the names after they were installed in the sculpture. I made sure that I added them first so I had plenty of room for them, and I didn't weld myself into a corner, so to speak. When somebody comes in to his office, they will have no doubt of who this sculpture belongs to, or where they are.


To also reinforce the idea of a lawyers office, I also constructed a "scales of justice". This element interacts with the marbles. The right side of the scales has a permanent number of marbles. The right side of the scale does not lose or gain any marbles (unless you change it by hand), it is the counter-weight side. The left side will have a track to feed it and when the left side has one more marble than the right it will tilt down to the left and drop the marbles onto the large receiving plate below. There are a couple things that made this tricky. One is that I had to come up with some way to make the left side tip the marbles out when it dropped down to dump the marbles. To do this I attached a 1/16" wire to the back of the left plate. When it gets full (one more marble than the right side) and drops, this wire catches after a couple inches of downward travel and provides the lift needed at the back to tip the marbles out the front. The ring that is around the chain is there to keep the left side from swinging around too much after the marbles have rolled out. It would be bad for it to swing around too much and catch one of the ball pick-ups on it's way down.

Next up: Motorized table sculpture 30x36 - #78

My next project, in progess now, is a table standing sculpture with a chain lift that stands 36" tall and is 30"w on each side. I only have the frame and lift built now...but I think it already looks great! This sculpture (will have) 3 tracks. These tracks will be my "standard" fare of: one track will be a loop d' loop, one track will have one marble rolling at one time, and the third track will have a marble collector so the marbles (probably 3) on that track roll together when the collector releases them.

This sculpture will have a couple items to personalize it for it's final location. The final location will be a lawyers office in Georgia. So to help visualize the lawyer theme I am going to make a "scales of justice" element. This element will be a ball collector, but not "the" ball collector which will be added near the top for maximum effect. The single marble will roll onto one side of the scales - tipping when it gets full. The other side of the scale will have marbles as the counter weight. The other personalization will be the Law Firms name spelled out in wire inside the sculpture. Under each name, I am going to add "marbles on track" as if the marbles are underlining the names on the shingle.

More pics later.....

Wall Mounted #79 - completed

I just finished a wall mounted RBS. (click picture to view larger image) This one measures 33"w X 22"h and has a spiral/helical lift to transport the marbles from the bottom to the top. Something new is the adjustable speed of the lift. I purchased a "universal" DC power supply which has switchable voltage. You can choose from 3v - 4.5v - 6v - 7.5v - 9v and 12v giving you 6 different speed settings. (I say 4 speeds in the video because there isn't much difference between 3v and 4.5v or 6v and 7.5v) It's as easy as switching the voltage up or down to see it go slower or faster. Interestingly enough, Low (3v) has 1 marble going, (4.5v) has just about 2 marbles, (6v) sports 3 marbles rolling at the same time, and (12v) gives you 4 marbles.

One long continuous track, this sculpture is very smooth and quiet. See the video below to see it in motion. Oh, and if you are interested, this one is for sale: $1250 includes shipping in custom wooden crate within US. : )

A trio of new desktops: #29 - #30 - #31

I really like desktops. They are fun to make because they do not take a long time to build, I can see right away how new improvements work, and I can try new things without having to worry too much about changing it if needed. These three were made in a row. I started out making 5 frames with the marble queue built onto the top, 5 arms and 5 track splitters. Then I worked one by one finishing them. I still have two left, but not the time to complete them now. It will be a few weeks before I get any more of these built.

The finger operated marble release is a somewhat new thing. I have added it to other desktops - but not for quite some time. I decided that to be really cool, they definitely need one. All of the marbles can be kept at the top of the sculpture and can be released one by one, or all at once, whenever you like. This eliminates the pesky chore of reaching out and placing marbles at the top each and everytime you want to see it run. If it is just you around, your toe could operate this kinetic desk toy when your relaxin' on the couch.

These sculptures are made from 100% stainless steel. They are neatly and durably TIG welded. 1" colorful glass marbles.

Desktop #31

Desktop #30

Desktop #29

Desktop #28

Really, this desktop should be #27, because it was made before...But as these numbering things go...I mean shoot...who really cares anyway? It's only off one number. But enough of that. This desktop was "commissioned". I had someone in mind when I started on it. This desktop is different in that I made an effort to leave the track spacing a little wider than normal. I have track clamps that are spaced at 7/8" that I use for loop d' loops with my larger marbles (1-3/8"). I use these for my desktops and squeeze the spacers a little to make them usable for the smaller 1" marbles. Leaving the spacing wider than in the past helps make the marble go slower, and in turn, make the action last longer.

There are three tracks on this desktop. My previous desktop had 4 tracks; two loop d' loop tracks, 1 tall spiral and 1 long track with elements. The person requesting this current desktop didn't much care for the teeter totter, or the loop d' loops (he said they go too fast). So I made this one with extra track, since that was what they wanted. In fact I was so focused on the track I almost didn't have room to add the tipping arm and spiral that are connected on the same track. But, with a little "can do" attitude, I got it to work. : )

The last thing I have changed for the better is where I merge tracks. I have found that using a little bit of plate eliminates the need for lots of wire. When one track dumps into another, the ball has to get over the rail onto it's new track. Now, this is not a problem if I have some vertical room to use. If I don't, then I have to use several wires to keep the ball moving, and not make a spot where the marbles can settle before merging. With the plate, that problem is eliminated completely and easily.

I don't have a snapshot handy, but here's the video on youtube:

Wall hanging RBS #77, in progress

I am currently working on a wall hanging sculpture that measures 36" high by 24" wide. It has a chain lift that lifts 1-3/8" marbles at the rate of about 5 1/2 per minute. There are three tracks in this RBS. The loop d' loop is split between two different tracks instead of being a single path from top to bottom. Both of the built tracks in the pictures have just one marble on each track. The last track, still to be built, has a ball collector which will tip when it has 4 marbles. That track will be fast and slow, zipping about the sculpture with the marbles in a row. The marbles in a row are fun to watch because sometimes the marbles stay together, sometimes they spread out. It depends on the size of the marbles whether they stay together or not. Check out the pictures to see this sculpture as it comes together.

Desktop #27

So here's my latest desktop. #27. It's 22" high by 18" deep/wide and has two tracks. This desktop has all the usual fun stuff such as; track splitter, 3 loop - loop d' loop, tipping arm, ring spinner, spiral and over 25ft of two rail track. On this desktop I decided to add a finger release. The finger release is a great way to play with your sculpture without having to reach out and place marbles at the top every time. Instead, place all the marbles at the top where they stay until your press the lever to release one, or all. Place the sculpture out of reach, and you could use your toe to release them during commercials. : )

So here's a couple pics, and the video I have uploaded to YouTube.