Building a self looping "SMOT"

[norman6538]

My ball performance is very poor. There are 18 inches to travel and the ball only goes 14 inches but I can increase the travel to 15 inches with hand held ceramic magnets. And when properly positioned they do not get stuck. So I have a long way to go but if Elecar took a month or so to tune it I guess I'm just beginning.
I used the opaque rigid tubing that refridgerator icemaker water supply line is made from but
it was 3/8 OD. I used a jig to space the tubing so the ball was up off the wood. And I  predrilled
1/8 inch holes for wire brad nails to hold the tubing in place.  And I used a jig to drill the holes about 1 inch apart but not all were needed to make the teardrop shape. The tubing and nails  is a great rapid prototype method.

better luck to you all,
Norman

[maw2432]

My ball performance is very poor. There are 18 inches to travel and the ball only goes 14 inches but I can increase the travel to 15 inches with hand held ceramic magnets. And when properly positioned they do not get stuck. So I have a long way to go but if Elecar took a month or so to tune it I guess I'm just beginning.
I used the opaque rigid tubing that refridgerator icemaker water supply line is made from but
it was 3/8 OD. I used a jig to space the tubing so the ball was up off the wood. And I  predrilled
1/8 inch holes for wire brad nails to hold the tubing in place.  And I used a jig to drill the holes about 1 inch apart but not all were needed to make the teardrop shape. The tubing and nails  is a great rapid prototype method.

better luck to you all,
Norman

Norman,
Do you have a photo?
Bill

[norman6538]

Here is a photo. The ball is sitting where it stopped at 14 inches and was dropped from the top on the left. I did not have magnets in this photo but there are 2 jigs in the center. One has two half holes to align the tubing so the nails can hold it at the right place. The jig on the  left was used to make the holes evenly and at the center of the tubing.
The tubing does not look evenly spaced due to the camera angles but it is quite evenly spaced.

Not much but may be helpful to other builders.

Norman

[happyfunball]

http://www.atlasrr.com/superflex.htm

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=atlas+flex+track&oq=atlas+flex+track&gs_l=youtube.3..35i39.1242.4480.0.4851.16.16.0.0.0.0.176.1779.6j10.16.0...0.0...1ac.1.11.youtube.BeoAw5DLsE4

[DreamThinkBuild]

Hi Elecar,

I've been "toying" with the idea some more and got it to arc away from the track. By adding a twist at the end will cause an increasing gradient away from the track.

I attached two pictures of the setup. The first one is the underlying framework. It's pretty simple to test we shorten the track lay card paper on top with a weight at the end. When you get the magnets aligned just right the sphere will be pulled down the track like normal but as the gradient increases the weight of the sphere will be greater than the pull of the magnets and arc away.

I visualize a possible butter bowl like shape with two ramps on opposite sides that curve towards the ends of the start of the next track. Like a racetrack, the raceways are the ramps and the two end corners are where it arcs. Attached is a rough render of the idea, the sides would be much higher than shown. Using this method we eliminate the problem of curving the magnets for a circular design.

It's untested so who knows.

Hi Norman,

Thanks for sharing your build.