Oakland Discovery Center

Materials: -Foam core or cardboard -A plastic cup, or bottle -Jumbo straws -1/4'' dowel -Bamboo skewers -Material and accessaries to create the scene to be animated Tool: -Utility knife -Hot glue gun -Wire cutters/ pin nose pliers We made automata several different ways in the past and eventually settled on this one, which we call diving board automata. The main structure consists of some sort of container with a  piece of foam core sticking off the top like a diving board. The container can be a cup, yogurt container, soda bottle or any other shortish food containers which serves to hold the crank shaft. The diving board holds the mechanism and the scene to be animated. This is a distinct advantage over micro automata because the mechanism is easily accessible if it needs repair or adjustment.   First poke 2 holes in the bottle about 2/3 of the way up. Wood screws work well for this as you can use them to drill into the plastic ...

Materials: • Wide clean plastic cup or clear solo cup. • A straw • Skewers • Bottle caps • Foam core • Tape Tools: • Scissors • Hot glue gun • A wood screw • Phillips screw driver or pencil Automata meaning self operating machine typically consisted of a clockwork statue or scene and were first created centuries ago in Europe and Asia.  They were in many ways the direct ancestor of what became electro mechanical robots.  For our purposes automata are a good way to explore machine's function of converting one form of energy and motion into another.  They are also a way to teach simple mechanical problem solving skills. Micro automata were the first in our series of attempts to simplify cardboard automata. The basic idea was to avoid building the box by putting the mechanism inside a clear plastic container.  Mechanically they are very simple. They have a input shaft with a crank coming out the side and an output shaft coming out the top with a ...