The Grand Solution

Flip it upside down!!!

A Very Important Development!

Through the first half of the process of working on our current idea, we had a frustrating and nagging problem. The arms' resting position was not straight, as we desired, but curled to one side due to gravity. The motor struggled to smoothly provide a full range of movement, as the arm required more force by the motor as it neared full extension/straightening, but less as the arm fell down to one side due to gravity.

Through testing, we found that by simply flipping it upside down, the gear mechanism provides opportunity for both speed and range with gravity helping instead of hindering. This is because the desired state when upside down is where the arm is straightened out whereas with the regular upright alignment the arm is at rest when curled in a spiral, due to gravity. This solves the mechanics and programming issues for the most part.

 

In terms of form, the strings are beautiful left dangling naturally from the arms, like hair flowing. This adds another layer of depth, in that greater range in motion affects the string differently than greater speed, allowing for further control of mapping. When the mechanism is upside down, it also solves the issue of string tension, as gravity keeps the hanging strings tight enough... now imagine with fiber optic wire flowing from leds in the "base" structure outward!!!

If suspended from the ceiling it could assume the archetype of a chandelier as a sculpture.
:)