Hoody

Yes he is dutch and member of our ft community. But he is more active in the dutch ft fan community, i think.

Hi Jelle, all the pictures available so far are on the web in the ftcommunity photo gallery. I just started a thread on "A Tribute To Imperfection". Probably you already see it. Some more pictures are only showing building phases or details for technical discussions. One gallery is already out documenting a disappointing construction of mine. I think it is okay to start about this in a different thread after I added some english descriptions to the gallery. Regards Hoody

'kbobam' ist the guy who started this thread. It is his nickname here.

This crazy cat-eye makes me crazy. Real fine stuff and fine ideas. I like it. Hoody

Hi, even if I am not the marble master like yellowmarble, I would like to give you a link to some pictures of my first marble run ever build and presented last year at the "fischertechnik Convention 2014" held in Erbes-Büdesheim (a small village in Germany): http://www.ftcommunity.de/details.php?image_id=39552 I just added an english description for you. There are more pictures available, you just need to click the texts on the upper hand left or right side directly beside those small arrows. "A Tribute To Imperfection" is the construction in the foreground. In the background is the giant wheel of Prater at Vienna modelled by another ft fan. This way the marble run seems pretty small. Since I am lacking proper video equipment I can not provide a video of the machine running. If you are interested in getting an impression there is a video of the complete event showing lots of other models and contructions at work - also other marble runs! And for the last minute Rob Van Baal considered some takes of my marble run - he told me "the best comes last". Thank you Rob, I am so glad: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SHFj3Tncvr8 Regards Hoody

Hi Steph and all you folks, the location of my marble run normally is my hobby room. It resides on the table while I am tinkering and improving things while I am watching how it works. I put it to the public relatively seldomly so far. Currently I am lacking a concept for its transportation and the machine is far from working as perfect as I want it for the next show. The interest of the audience is varying. I just put the contruction to 2 events dedicated to fischertechnik (ft) fans. Most of them like to watch the machine running and spend a while until they walk on. Mostly the younger ones: "Mom, Dad, can we stay a little bit longer?". Their reason seems to be the special construction of the tracks that take 5/8 balls and marbles. But there are also older people fascinated by it. I recently receive questions on how the tracks are made - even the Moms are asking while their kids are staring at the marbles rolling. Asian people are crazy for marble runs, I think. Really no one of those spectators just pass the machines on the shows. They really took lots of time time to take lots of pictures, and then they ask questions like "how many parts", "how much construction effort", "are there building instructions", ... Somewhere on the web I learned that in some big asian cities there are marble and ball run installations in shopping malls, airports and other public places. I have never seen such a thing in Germany so far. My experience is that most people on the ft fan events like watching marble runs but are not considering to go beyond what the readily available ft sets provide. My next trial will be next year at the Hannover Maker Faire (Hannover - Germany). I am curious about the reactions there. Regards Hoody

Hello folks, could you clue me in what a fiber optic marble is? Thanks Hoody

Hello, just sitting in the office at a break I am not able to view youtube. I will try it when at home at the week end. But tell me, please, how fast are the marbles at the end of the track? Regards Hoody

Hello Steph, thank you for your welcome. @All: Probably some of you might want to take a look on my marble run(s). Unfortunately for you the place to find some of the pictures is the german fischertechnik fan-community site. So nearly all texts are written in german. I just put an english description to one of the pictures to aid you. If questions arise, then please open a thread in the marble run subforum. The small version of 2014 "A Tribute To Imperfection": http://www.ftcommunity.de/details.php?image_id=39552 For this year I added some more features and reconstructed the marble run. There is currently no english description and fewer pictures of "Jubilee Edition": http://www.ftcommunity.de/details.php?image_id=41550 Regards Hoody

Hello all together! Since I am just new here and you just provide this subforum to introduce ourselves I just want to take the chance. Being somewhere between 40 and 50 years old I am living in Germany. I came across building a marble run, or marble machine or kinetic sculpture or however you like to call it, just by accident in early 2013. My children own some of those HABA rolling ball toys. My idea of buidling a simple motorized marble lifter for those HABA tracks evolved into a marble machine of its own and is still under reconstruction. Historical marbles are way to precious to have them run through a mororized track system. I just decided to take the cheapest glass marbles that actual toy stores offer. So I am not dedicated to collect marbles as probably most of you, my interest is building marble machines (how is the correct english word for it?). Playing with the physics behind is really hard work even if this is seldomly noticed by the audience. I am hoping to find here some people interested in the underlying physics and mechanics to discuss about issues and/or exchange ideas. Cheers Hoody