h a l f b a k e r y"More like a cross between an onion, a golf ball, and a roman multi-tiered arched aquaduct."
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A fellow baker had proposed the rebirth of the mechanical
calculator that some may suggest is susceptible to the
criticism "w.t.f.?" However, clever people like me who talk
loud in restaurants understand that a complicated
mechanical
mechanism is like a ballet, while an electronic mechanism
doing it's thing is a non event, at least from an
entertainment
standpoint.
Taking the idea of re-birthing the mechanical calculator a
step further, I propose creating a calculating kinetic
sculpture
that turns the most boring calculation into a circus
sideshow
of mechanical mayhem. An extravaganza of juggling and
rolling steel balls, dancing levers and spinning cogs that
would make a task as mundane as tallying up the year's
utility
bills into a fascinating event.
Of course, rather than getting the answer outright, you'd
have to wait for it while the machine went through its
mechanistic machinations to come up with... wait for
it..."DING! ROOOOLL! SPIN! WIZ! CLINK!.... THE ANSWER!!
The arrival of which would be indicated by something like a
small dog popping out of the clown's head and hitting a
little
gong.
Imagine mechanisms like this doing your taxes.
https://www.youtube...watch?v=oiQzn8aHNt8
A beautiful desktop sculpture with a purpose. [doctorremulac3, Mar 09 2015]
Or this...
https://www.youtube...watch?v=1CNU3DQclGs
Eh? [doctorremulac3, Mar 09 2015]
How it would look in operation
http://3.bp.blogspo...nland+threshing.jpg
[pocmloc, Mar 09 2015]
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Annotation:
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//an electronic mechanism doing it's thing is a non event, at least from an entertainment standpoint// philistine. |
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Well then, let me rephrase that: |
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It's not very interesting to watch. |
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After years of being a wind-up-mechanical-watch snob I recently got a cheap digital and actually I find it much more impressive as a piece of design and engineering. |
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The way to do this: an old fashioned adding machine with all the levers and metal bits inside, but scaled up 100x and open so you could see it all move. One would need some sort of lever or other way to enter the numbers, and at that size I think the pull crank to do the calculation would need a mechanical assist. Power steering. |
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//mechanical assist// belt drive from a traction engine, of course. The engine could pull the machine around from place to place, and then power it for use. |
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///mechanical assist// belt drive from a traction engine/ |
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This could be powered by a set of handcranks, turning a flywheel up to speed. I envision heavy springloaded flappers folded in along the circumference. When the centrifugal force of the flywheel is adequate to swing the heavy widgets out and make the flywheel into a stone and iron flower, it is going fast enough to power a calculation. Get cranking kids! Daddy's got math to do! |
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//heavy springloaded flappers//
Inexplicable slip into some arcane speakeasy argot here but I think I know what you're driving at bungston. |
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