507 Mechanical Movements

317 pointsposted 4 hours ago
by helloplanets

42 Comments

emacdona

3 hours ago

Many of these aren't animated... which gives me a great(?) idea for a new AI benchmark: "Animate the mechanical movement at this URL: ..."

Way more telling that "draw a pelican on a bicycle"

worldsayshi

3 hours ago

Also, set up formulas for calculating speed, torque, forces etc, of each system.

Then create a modular simulation library and point and click simulator where all the component variants are covered so that the user can piece new systems together using those components.

bonestamp2

2 hours ago

Also include sliders so parameters can be adjusted to see how it affects the mechanism (ex. wheel radius).

scrollop

2 hours ago

Ironically, before coming to the comments I was thinking this would be a good dataset for llms to learn real world mechanics.

MisterTea

2 hours ago

For me it's a great dataset to train my own brain. This way when I'm in the field and need to come up with a fix for something I can query my intellect and come up with a solution. No accounts, internet connection, or compute needed!

wowczarek

3 hours ago

It's a great collection and exploring it is fun, but it misses on titles / names of the given linkage or movement. It makes sense when you are reading the book [0], but on a site like this where you see the individual item in isolation, a title or name would be helpful.

0: https://archive.org/details/fivehundredseven00browiala

WillAdams

3 hours ago

One of my favourite sites! and an interesting example of that class of sites which are book made into sites with animations/interaction --- the another classic and notable example is:

https://mathcs.clarku.edu/~djoyce/java/elements/elements.htm...

Really wish that the folks doing the 507 Mechanical Movements would finish the balance of the animations.

Curious if folks are aware of other similar text/website combinations which are still extant (many others such as Bembo's Zoo are no longer available, and of course at one point in time, this sort of thing was the province of CD-ROMs such as Leonardo).

kazinator

an hour ago

What is the purpose of using bearings to build a crank mechanism as in 39? https://507movements.com/mm_039.html

Maybe it's for bearing efficiency? Note that the spur gears are rigidly attached to, respectively, the crank and the shaft. So they don't require bearings at their centres. There is a link arm which pulls the gears together, and that rotates. But the key is that this arm is not transmitting the cranking power; it just holds the parts together. So its bushings/bearings don't have to be so hefty. (Their load is going to be proportional to the transmitted power; obviously the bigger the crank and more horsepower going through it, the more tightly you have to hold the gears together. But it's going to be some fraction compared to a bearing that is directly driven.)

The note only alludes to this mechanism being used to elude a patent claim, not mentioning any advantages. Someone had patented cranks in such a way that you can weasel your way out with this arrangement. I'm guessing that the patent's drawings and descriptions specifically indicated a rotating bushing on the crank wheel where the arm is attached, and this has no such arm attachment.

derriz

11 minutes ago

Looks like there's contact between the outer diameter of the sun-gear and a surface close to the center of the planet-gear? The link arm is pulling them together and this contact keeps them apart I guess. The rotation speeds are different so you'd need a bearing? I dunno tbh - I'm not sure what the colors represent and I'm not even sure if I'm using the correct words to describe what I see.

mkl

3 hours ago

Past discussions:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10374436, 27 comments 11 years ago.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26373539, 30 comments 5 years ago.

dang

2 hours ago

Thanks! Macroexpanded:

Five hundred and seven Mechanical Movements - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41579354 - Sept 2024 (5 comments)

507 Mechanical Movements (1868) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26373539 - March 2021 (30 comments)

Five Hundred and Seven Mechanical Movements - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19968114 - May 2019 (147 comments)

507 Mechanical Movements (1868) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10374436 - Oct 2015 (27 comments)

Mechanical Movements, Animated - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8019787 - July 2014 (1 comment)

Five Hundred and Seven Mechanical Movements - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6230363 - Aug 2013 (66 comments)

Five Hundred and Seven Mechanical Movements (1868) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5660770 - May 2013 (25 comments)

rkagerer

an hour ago

This is great, but repetitive. A lot of them are minor variances on a previous example. Is there a shorter list that distills it down to novel examples of the major concepts?

jihadjihad

3 hours ago

It makes me want to find a way to boot up The Incredible Machine [0], so many hours spent on TIM and TIM2 back in the day.

0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Incredible_Machine

nsbk

2 hours ago

This so much! What great games, probably my favorites over the early FPSs of the time, but in close contention with Day of the Tentacle and Monkey Island

taftster

24 minutes ago

I'd love to play a game that uses these as building blocks. Is there anything that approaches it?

stoneman24

3 hours ago

Well, there’s a book from my past. Got the book to see if I could find a clever way to get high speed, low displacement and high torque from small motors without huge gearing.

The side project was dropped as life got in the way, but I really enjoyed looking at all the different mechanisms.

akshay_akula

2 hours ago

This site is a treasure for anyone who has ever tried to get useful motion out of a small motor. The wish for them to finish the remaining animations is very real.

victorbjorklund

2 hours ago

Don’t most of these have ”names”? At least I would assume they have names so people know what they are talking about.

cestith

an hour ago

I’ve had this book for a few years. It’s nice to see it in this format.

mklyachman

3 hours ago

Honestly, I miss old-style internet sites like this. Nothing fancy, just good niched out information. No 300 MB loads for something that should be simple.

jjkaczor

3 hours ago

As a "wannabe" DIY engineer/maker and also in the 3d-printing hobby world, this is a wonderful resource...

warpech

an hour ago

I was expecting a new HTTP status code

pkilgore

2 hours ago

414 is just 1 with extra steps.

amelius

2 hours ago

Can these be generated automatically from a small set of primitives?

herodotus

3 hours ago

I would love to see good animations of a differential gear and a detente escapement.

ThatOneSong

an hour ago

It reminds me of a YouTube channel where I found the best song ever made.

Does anyone know

bilsbie

3 hours ago

This would be cool AI training data.

colinhb

3 hours ago

It is already in current training data. Both the book and website.

mohamedkoubaa

3 hours ago

Now imagine if each of them got the ciechanow.ski treatment