Help design a new ballmachine element!

**Kairah** · #1 01-25-2010, 12:43 PM

Alright guys, I came up with this idea for a new ball tower element but I can't make it work. Hopefully someone could help me with this one.

It's supposed to work like this:
The red ball drops on the step above the one where the yellow ball is. And as the it comes on the step it should somehow push the yellow ball one step further. Making it possible to form a long chain reaction if you make a long stairs.

Here's the best solution I could find so far:

The green connector pushes the next ball further. And I added the (sort of ) gates to prevent balls from going down further, you'll see what I mean if you build it. This setup has worked fine most of the time but there are some balls that get stuck and they will hold up all other balls.

Any ideas??

~~Kairah

Shadowman · #2 01-25-2010, 05:01 PM

Great idea! It seems similar to the element I used in Wipe Out, where the balls are lined up and one is pushed out the end when a ball pushes the beginning. Maybe you could try tubing in the design. Maybe slanting the stairs at an angle would help the balls to stay put.

floris2burn · #3 01-26-2010, 04:17 AM

Well, i can't come up with a better version yet so it might be better to find a way to improve yours. So how or where do the balls get stuck exactly?

**Kairah** · #4 01-26-2010, 05:03 PM

Alright this is where they get stuck:

@shadowman, with tubing it wont be a stars anymore but it might work. Maybe with like a wave-ish ~~~ path under a slight angle, where there is a ball in every dale (I don't know the word lol).

lazor 22 · #5 01-26-2010, 08:49 PM

Congrats, I have no idea what yourtalking about in the first post lol.

floris2burn · #6 01-27-2010, 07:45 AM

@ kairah

to me it seems the middle grey ball didn't push the lower ball out. I'm going to try building this too and see if I get the same problems.

**Kairah** · #7 01-27-2010, 08:57 AM

Alright, making it a path would be easier to do:

@Floris
Yea you are right. I think that a ball went over the green connector instead of landing on it, therefor not pushing the next ball out. Let me know how it works for you and if you can find any solutions

@Lazor
Yea well... maybe this short film will explain the idea better? ^^

floris2burn · #8 01-27-2010, 10:52 AM

@video: waah, that's so cool

Shadowman · #9 01-27-2010, 05:06 PM

I like the one in the video. Pretty easy to build, too.

floris2burn · #10 01-28-2010, 11:51 AM

Aw, I realy want to try build this "knex walker" before the contest ends (31st of january), so I don't have much time to help on this right now :s

Sorry for that. Though, 31st january is close already, so I should continue working on this in a few days!