Product Idea |

Working Orrery

795 comments
On

Sooo clossee!! One final (and pretty big!) update.

Wow what a journey this has been - and we're almost there! 154 to go, as I write this. It's been 8 months since I submitted this project, and now we are so, so close!

For about a month now, I've been working on the design of the Orrery, improving the functionality, making it more stable and smoother to turn.

To start off, here's the new video of the Orrery - to show how the new one works. (I forgot to change the video link when editing the project, so the video in the description is still the old one!)

You can check out the old video here, to see how much it has changed!

So, without further ado - what have I changed?
  • First off is quite a big one - the new version has no motor - it is turned by a crank. I decided to do this for a number of reasons: the motor is noisy; power functions are expensive, and add a lot of cost to a set; and I think it's a lot more fun to turn it with a crank.

  • The next change is one that I got a lot of comments about! The moon was rotating in the wrong direction in relation to the earth. While the aim of this orrery is not to get an accurate number of rotations, to have the moon spinning the wrong way was definitely something that needed fixing - and it is now fixed!

  • I've also made a lot of improvements to the internal structure and how smoothly the earth turns, as well as strengthening and stabilising the turning arm that holds it up - but these are harder to describe. You can check out a 3D version of the model on Bricklink here: Orrery (New Version). For comparison, here is the old version: Orrery (Old Version)

  • I've optimised the design of the Sun, so that it is a lot less heavy, and also added better connections with the turning arm, so that it doesn't wobble so easily. This also means it is far safer to pick up by hand than the old version.

Apart from that, not much has changed! The exterior design is still very much the same, with only a few tweaks here and there to accommodate the changes made to the internal structure.

Thanks so much for following me in this journey, and even more impressively - if you actually read this whole update! XD

And thank you to each and everyone of you who has supported so far! :) You're the best!

On

Thank YOU for 3333!! 1/3 of the way there!!

If you're one of the people interested in this project to be reading this - thank you so much! I really appreciate your support! I'm busy working on improving the stability of the model, and making the functionalities smoother - but it's proving trickier than expected! So in the meantime, I've made a short speedbuild of the Earth from this project, and turned it into a globe!

Thanks for watching, and thanks again for your continued support and interest! :D
On

Thanks for 100!! (a bit late but anyway..)

Thanks so much for 100 (and 200, and 300!) already everyone! It's going up fast! Here's a digital render of in internal workings of the orrery! What do you think of it?


Thanks again, and if you have any ideas for improvements, do tell me in the comments!
Oh and don't forget to share! :D
795 comments

Recommended

More To Do

Product Idea

Submit A Product Idea

Submit Now

Opens in a new window