New to your channel. Came here for the marble tracks, stayed for the 3D printer tricks. Never seen anyone use a 3D printer as a plotter before. Cool idea. 🤔 Quick idea as I’m watching the print: could you use this as the base pad for an art piece? Now print the hand and ball in 3D, embed magnets in the palm and ball to create “levitation” and place them above this sheet to act as an “x~ray shadow” for an even more striking sculpture. Just thinking out loud here, as I have no artistic abilities whatsoever. I bought my 3D printer to make mechanical items: gear patterns, prototype parts, etc. I’m always amazed by artistic brains. 👍
@@bitmachines so far i have 3/4 done straightening out the wire rods except a lot of them were breaking at the tip when applying the pressure and don't completely go straight. Also what size drill bit did you use for posting into the plywood. Cheers
excellent idea!! I bought 200' of steel wire. Is that enough to get started? The reason I ask it is difficult to gauge the wire length....(I threw in a pun). :)
Ive tried straightening the wire with a drill but it keeps snapping, i'm using galvanized wire, same as you. Ive been able to straighten a few cm but it snaps really essily and it's really brittle SO i can't Even bend it yo the right shape afterwards. Is there a step i'm missing? Ive tried with a few diferente wires Ive fondo laying arround at home and they allá snap excepto for one that was a little darker and les shiny compares to the other ones.
It sounds like it is getting work hardened which is a specific property of the metal (and has nothing to do with any coating). If it's happening to several different kinds of wires then you could be twisting it too much. It doesn't take a lot and you don't need it perfect. You can also skip that step and just straighten it by hand.
@@bitmachines Thanks. We're considering making a marble run as part of an exhibit at a local public library and wanted to reduce the amount of noise it would make.
Great! thank you for showing a full build with an easy listening presentation. I really like how you prep up and use 3 basic shapes, that's a really great tip for this wanna do one! Kind regards, Tony.👍👍
I tought of an easier method to create the spiral track wrap the wire around cylindrical tubes of different sizes to create the spiral and its length at the same time. So your considering the model in 3 axises at the same time, rather than 1 or 2.
So, I don't have a 3d printer but would like purchase your forms if you would want print and sell a set. It might be a bit too expensive to buy a 3d printer just to print the forms
perfect video!! i'm "eating" all about... your's are the best. i'm trying using 14 gauge wire. what do you think about that wire... isn't it easier? greatings from Santa Fe city, Argentina.
Thank you so much for giving this a try. I also have a 3D printer and thought about doing this. But since you pointed out the memory of the wire and still have to bend it prior to placing it in the guides, I think designing the patterns on the computer and printing them out will work better. I think using "offset" on some software will allow proper gaps between parallel rails. I'll give it a try and let you know. Subscribing to see how things progress.
I used fusion 360 and did use the offset to get the relationship between the rails, so yes I think that is a good idea. I did try following a shape just printed on paper, but with not much success. In particular everything just moved around too much on me. Using the form to hold onto the wire as it was bent, I could mostly just focus on the bends to be made. If you find any trips for doing it that way, do share!
Do you prepare the wire (for example with a drill) to create straight pieces? or you use the wire without any preparation? And i need another info: i live in Europe, so we don't use "gauge"; 14 gauge is about 2 mm diameter? Thx
For straight sections, yes I use the drill technique to straighten the wire. I've found doing it just by hand leaves some deformations. For the parts that form curves, you can leverage the curve as it comes off the spool so don't need to straighten those parts first. Yes, a quick google search shows 14 gauge is about 2mm.
Great video thx for sharing. What size ball are you using also, what's the wire thickness. I'd like to take up a hobby like that. Thx . Keep up the good work. Also what type of soldering iron are you using, or if would recommend another one. Thx.
It is just regular steel wire. However if I twist it too much, it will also break on me. I think there needs to be just enough twisting to straighten it, but not so much that it becomes brittle. For curves, you can skip the straightening since it'll get bent anyways.
Is that galvanized steel wire or non galvanized stainless steel? I heard that galvanized steel is dangerous to solder due to zinc coating producing fumes when heated.
Great point! You either want to use non-galvanized wire (which is harder to find) or remove the galvanized coating which I don't show here. And if you don't do either of those use an appropriate respirator/ventilation/etc.
I have been playing with wire marble runs during our current cold snap. I stripped surplus solid copper wire out of standard household wire ( 14-2 Romex?). I did buy a high power pistol type soldering gun (75/150W?) to cope with copper's higher thermal conductivity. My 30/50 W iron was not man enough. I have curves, straight sections and a spiral so far. The adventure continues. Thanks for the inspiration!
@@bitmachines Hi Bit Machines, can you tell me which pistol type soldering gun are you using? Im trying to make some wire marble runs with my 60w, but I think it is not enough, thank you.
I purchased the same soldering gun based on your recommendation. It works great. I had to practice a while to learn to solder the wires. They still break apart on me sometimes. Maybe Im not cleaning the wire good enough? Do you turn the temp all the way up on the machine?
I'm glad it's working for you! The connections breaking apart could be a few things. First, solder isn't really intended to be structural (when used in electronics for example). So minimizing stress is good. For example if the wire is under pressure when you put it in place (bent too much or not enough) or is too long or short and you force it in place, then it's probably better to spend a few more minutes bending the wires to they lay in the right spot with additional force. (I had a few break early on because of that). Another could be temperature, but likely of the connection when the solder is flowing and not necessarily of the soldering iron. You might need to heat things for longer. The magic phrase here is "cold solder joint" which you want to avoid. Here the connections arent as critical and I'm sure I have a few even in these videos. But it is a possible point of failure that would show up as broken joints when pressure is applied. Cleaning could help too. And I'm using about 350c on my iron.
Most people who make these, (including me) use specialized track clamps, two pieces of something, could be wood, or metal with two groves a tracks width apart, then you have a bolt in the middle and tighten a wing nut to clamp it
That sounds very useful! I have another video where I am experimenting with 3d printed forms to create the bends, but it doesn't (yet!) have provisions for clamping or space to solder in the connections between rails.
You totally inspired me!! I just spent $150 on Amazon and bought a bunch of stuff to start making these. I ended up going with 16 gauge, hopefully I wont regret that. If so, I can buy 14
Hey do you have any advice for soldering the wire? I just bought a pretty powerful soldering iron (Ksger T12) but when I try to do what you did in the video, I can't seem to heat the steel wire enough to even melt the solder (although the solder will melt of the iron tip). I'm using flux and sanding the wire too. Is it a specific solder you're using perhaps that works better for steel?
It sounds like you're doing things the right way. It does take awhile to heat everything up. This video is pretty heavily edited to keep the pace up. So the only thing that comes to mind is apply the heat a bit longer and do so to both wires simultaneously.
I don't have any videos on a lift yet. I'm playing around with a few ideas. I want to make something that is simple and robust. Some of the spiral lifts are pretty finicky with getting all of the tolerances right. However even 100% manual these are fun!
@@bitmachines I got used to using the motors on the space rail setup...this is definitely different and better...I bought most of my material already...working on a layout! Thank you for posting.
