Wednesday Workshop - cardboard automatas

Last Wednesday, our Workshop goers made cardboard automatas - simple mechanical sculptures that playfully introduce simple machine elements. I'd like to try this again with group workstations that each have a wider variety of materials to use and examples of more intricate movements. Everybody completed an up, down, round and round motion similar to this one here but with the axis in the vertical cam slightly off center, pushing the horizontal cam up and down as well as around. Some still needed some tinkering but most automatas were properly functioning mechanical sculptures by the end of the Workshop. I encouraged makers to experiment at home by adding cams and three dimensional sculptures to maneuver. Anyone interested in trying this at home can get some ideas by clicking the cardboard automata link to the Exploratorium how-to page or checking out Makerspace. If you search Google images for cardboard automatas you'll see some fun spins on this project as well. -pun intended!