How to create a Field of Almost Identical Swaying Boulders:
First grid out your field like a graph paper matrix with a series of flexible upright prongs sunk into the ground at the intersection of each of the X and Y axis points.
After some chipping and bashing, collect your identical boulders together and drill two holes through each of them at right angles to each other. Insert one powerful magnet per hole, so that the poles of the magnets are just level with the exterior surface of each boulder.
Now mount your boulders on the supporting prongs, above head height, and orientate them so that the array of magnetic poles line up with the X and Y lines, in such a way as there is magnetic repulsion between each boulder and the one in front, behind, to the left and right.
Congratulations ! Your Field of Almost Identical Swaying Boulders is now ready for action.
Just shake any of the vertical prongs to create a disturbance in the entire field, which will cause all of the boulders to begin swaying, with waves of motion being transmitted across the entire array.-- xenzag, Sep 25 2006 Rock City http://www.roadside...p_AttractionNo==493 [Ander, Jan 17 2008] I think you could (or possibly should) sell this to the Tate.-- DrCurry, Sep 25 2006 You might get indentical if you were standing too close when the thing got going.-- bungston, Sep 25 2006 well spotted !-- xenzag, Sep 25 2006 I was toying with a similar idea recently.
place a spaced array of disc magnets (North polarities all facing up) between two sheets of glass. the magnets should all repel each other.
result: a wave should propagate through array nicely.-- xaviergisz, Sep 26 2006 Heh. [xenzag]'s silent dodgy boulders?
(Sorry, was just reminded of something) This is pointless. +-- Shz, Sep 26 2006 [Xenzag] you are a true genius and an artist as well. This idea makes me hear music. I regret that I only get to give a single bun.-- Rm Brz, Sep 26 2006 I meant to add that saddles are available for the more daring to "Ride The Boulders" - gazing out from their elevated mounts over a vista of hundreds of tons of gently swaying granite.-- xenzag, Sep 26 2006 Now you're talking.-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Sep 27 2006 I love this idea - in addition to the aesthetic value, I'm wondering if this might serve any secondary application - I considered seismograph - but I think that it would be interesting to incorporate wires into the idea somewhere that generate a current as the magnetic fields around them flip and fluctuate all over the place. How do radio transmitters transmit? If you stood in the middle of this field, perhaps with more sensitive 'pebbles' in the centre in order to pick up gentler vibrations and shouted really loud, might the perturbations caused by your vocalisations be translated into the wider grid, and, by means of electro-magnetic induction, produce radio waves. These might be broadcast over vast distances, only to be received by a similar array of boulders from far, far away, at the centre of which, a lone figure sits, waiting for a message...-- zen_tom, Sep 27 2006 //a lone figure sits, waiting for a message.// I think that's me......-- xenzag, Sep 27 2006 Cool. +-- DrBob, Sep 27 2006 sweeeeet [+]-- shinobi, Sep 27 2006 <applause>
Could we paint the tops of all of them so that the field looks like a face when viewed from the air? The face would eerily change expression when the boulders were in motion.-- wagster, Jan 17 2008 I was about to post this idea. Real potential here for someone to get rich!-- vincevincevince, Jan 17 2008 This was one of my favourite ideas when I first joined the hb, but I never voted for it. Now I have.-- jtp, Jan 17 2008 Also didn't see it. We could call it 'Stonehinge.' I don't think magnetic repulsion will be sufficient, however.-- RayfordSteele, Jan 17 2008 random, halfbakery