Wooden orrery prototype

Here's a quick film showing the virtually completed wooden orrery prototype I've been designing and building over the last couple of months.
-All the gears and frames are hand cut using an electric scroll saw, and the basic design, although similar to orreries produced in the 1800's, is all my own.

-The first 6 planets out to saturn are included, as well as an Earth that completes the expected 365 rotations to one orbit of the sun, and our Moon that completes 13 orbits of the Earth over the same period.

-Although absolute accuracy was not formost in my mind during the process of working out the gear ratios driving each planet, none of them is more than 1 or 2 percent off it's true speed relative to the Earth.

-I still have to adjust the handle size and position to allow easier operation - it's a little too low and close to the base, this makes it a little cramped to turn at the moment. The planet and moon sizes will also be played around with before it's completed - the Moon, for instance, needs to be larger, and the planets need to be in some sort of order of relative size. All the staining and varnishing will also be done over the next few days, but the basic look though will remain as you see here.

-Hope you like it. More update films very soon.

Category:

Entertainment

Tags:

• orrery
• wooden
• tellurian
• planetarium
• gears
• solar
• system
• model

[gera1690]

wow that looks like it took some work good job!!!!! Did you use a CNC machine the gears would be a pain on a scroll saw.

[minimoa69]

@gera1690

Hi, all the gears on these early machines were hand cut, yes, on a scroll saw. Took about a week to get them all cut and finished, and they worked great - as can be seen! All the machines I build now have laser cut gears. They have the benefit of saving both huge amounts of time (and my eyesight!) as well as being more accurate than I could ever hope to achieve with the fret saw.

Thanks for you comments - they are much appreciated.

[fluffterkyns]

Brilliiant, congratulations. I would buy one in kit form if it wasn't too hard to make (very few manual skills).

Unfortunately there seems to be no website or further info. Perhaps this was a project that died on the vine.

[minimoa69]

Hi fluffterkyns, no, the orrery building is still very much alive and well and slowly taking over my life! I have posted another film on Youtube of it finished, and there are some others of a newer machine I recently finished. I've also added my website address in the 'more info' box which has a lot more detail of what I've been up to in the past year. Plans are certainly on the way, with a kit not too far behind it I hope. I now have a company to laser cut gears - so I'm well on the way. :-)

[160savannah]

Put me at the top of the list to order one. I've been looking for an orrery for years, have been taken with the UK magazine orrery but its not offered in the States. It seems like there's a real market for a kit, and yours would become a collectors item quickly, I'm sure. I'll look forward to checking back on your progress and hope that the "fullness of time" isn't too full. :)

[minimoa69]

When the first ones done (next week or two) I shall also be building a web site around it, so as well as here, I'll put all progress on new variations and the kit on there. I shall try to make sure that 'the fullness of time' is reasonably rapid - 4 to 6 months I expect. Watch this space, and thanks again for your comments. Dave. :-)

[orrerystore]

beautiful mechanical orrery sold on (triple w).orrery.cc

made mainly from brass,amazing orrery,valueable to have...a

[MrLeonard55]

I didn't know the had birds in space, lol.

[Xar0mir]

Oh i forgot: You don't sell plans by any chance?

[Xar0mir]

Very impressive! I thought about planing such a thing myself,

and i thought about size,and how many teeth each gear must have,

and soon dropped it, because i thought the teeth would be to hard to cut and wouldn't live very long. Really nice to see someone gone through with this idea, and made it hapen.

Nice work indeed, and it seems to rotate just fine.

[kernulklink001]

woah!! i have been looking for plans to make something like this for a long time. never actually knew what it was called. now that i do, the all-important question....do you have plans or blueprints for this? if so, i would love to try making this. please respond

[gera1690]

Makes me appreciate the great craftsman that have build some very interesting things. Also makes me appreciate the old ways they use to build stuff and the new ways with cnc laser and plasma cnc routers. Computers these days. Good luck and I hope you can profit off your work. I am a welder/fabricator somewhat woodworker and machinist. Great job!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!­!!! I wonder what the time frame would be to build it the old way compared to the new way just out of curiosity. No CNC Parts

[MrDavidlubbejnr]

Great

[squarechannel]

i would go on about saying how impress i am n stuff...

but to put it simply: AWESOME JOB!!!!