Shopping list

1 leg
-about 15 m of PVC PIPE.
ROUNDWOOD fitting in pvc pipe (40 cm)
-rope.
-glue (wood-plastic)


(10 pivots)
-40 screws
-40 cm round wood.
-40 Screw in-hooks
-10 Long bolt fitting the hooks, 50 nuts to close



I'll start with one leg and a frame, if that works, I'll make the other 5


To make the frame:
2 boards of +/- 205x50


Some beams spanning 40 cm (x8?) more screws..





The gears and axes:


Something that can to this and is about 50 cm long


Rather thick (5/10 cm) wooden plates to make the gears, I'll have to work out the respective sizes.

wintery intermezzo

We had a lot of snow (by Dutch standards) this past two weeks. I had shoveled all the snow in the backyard into one big heap and it kind of looked like a dragon.

So when I had the time, I took one of the kitchen knives and started carving.

I was very happy with the result. (Painted it's Eye light blue). Now after two days of thawing it has been reduced to a shapeless lump. Alas my dragons are not built to last.

It did give me a clear idea of how big Yoris will be, as Yoris would be about twice the size of this rather large dragon. My son Tim (5) without any knowledge of English gave the best possible description of this dragon: "Cool!"

construction draft.

This would be the construction, but I'll have to think of something for the neck gear..

Else the beams connecting to it, will have to go through the axis..

Lengths of the legs and positions on the frame..

This might be a bit technical, and boring, but I need these values to be preserved and this is the easiest way. With these lengths the animaris draconis will be two meters high at it's highest point in the cycle:

	HindLeg (poot1) axis-m0: 5.25 cm m0-m4: 37.23 cm m0-m1: 11.4 cm m2-m4: 24.14 cm m2-m1: 18.57 cm m2-m6: 13.3 cm m1-m6: 28.33 cm m4-m7: 16.27 cm m6-m7: 28.58 cm m4-m9: 29.08 cm m7-m9: 35.53 cm m7-m9: 35.53 cm m9-m8: 11.41 cm m10-m8: 27.27 cm m9-m11: 20.28 cm m11-m12: 16.51 cm string: m10-m12: 58.8 cm m10 is at 70% of m0-m4
	middle leg: (poot3) axis-m0: 5.49 cm m0-m4: 47.85 cm m0-m1: 11.76 cm m2-m4: 34.76 cm m2-m1: 20.19 cm m2-m6: 14.32 cm m1-m6: 30.67 cm m4-m7: 10.39 cm m6-m7: 36.74 cm m4-m9: 34.39 cm m7-m9: 38.23 cm m7-m9: 38.23 cm m9-m8: 4.69 cm m8-m10: 17.74 cm string: m3-m10: 53.2 cm m3 is at 70% of m2-m4
	front Leg: (poot5) axis-m0: 5.66 cm m0-m4: 49.25 cm m0-m1: 12.13 cm m2-m4: 35.79 cm m2-m1: 20.76 cm m2-m6: 14.7 cm m1-m6: 31.51 cm m4-m7: 10.7 cm m6-m7: 37.82 cm m4-m9: 35.39 cm m7-m9: 39.36 cm m7-m9: 39.36 cm m9-m8: 3.38 cm m8-m10: 22.33 cm string: m3-m10: 59.3 cm m3 is at 70% of m2-m4
	NECK: (poot7) axis-m0: 3.52 cm m0-m1: 10.12 cm m2-m1: 11.6 cm m4-m5: 94.55 cm m1-m5: 94.87 cm m2-m6: 100.04 cm m5-m6: 11 cm

frame dimensions: 204.16 cm x 48.92 cm

point A: 89.79,29.09	point E: 160.26,24.55	point I: 26.11,41.07	point M: 6.8,8.69
point B: 175.58,43.12	point F: 108.08,39.5	point J: 5.95,35.41
point C: 192.79,35.44	point G: 127.97,35.26	point K: 52.38,19.07
point D: 159.75,10.05	point H: 23.04,9.5	point L: 32.4,3.15

Thinking further on the gears

I revisited the mechanism and started calculating..
Also I left out four smaller gears for two larger ones, this will decrease the amount of drag from the gears.
Since three red gears have to move as one and there positioning is crucial, I had to calculate the sizes and positions of the connecting gears exactly. Also I found it esthetically pleasing to have the neck-bob at about half the standard gear speed.
The ratios had to be determined, so that the number of 'teeth' on each gear would be an integer, else the gears cannot connect.
After two hours or so I came up with 4 standard gears of 40 teeth all having the same speed (the red ones and the yellow one). 
A gear (purple) scaled 240% giving 96 teeth, with a speed of 41.667% of the standard for the neck.
A gear (cyan) scaled 325% giving 130 teeth (and a speed of about 30%), connecting the standard gear with the neck gear.
A gear (fuchsia) scaled 275% with 110 teeth (and a speed of 36.4%) connecting the two aft standard gears.

This is math at it's finest. You can actually create something in advance, and know it will work perfectly. Just to be sure, I simulated the gears in flash and found something out.
I'll have to revise my scetch of the body shape (background, grey) a little bit, because some of the gears were sticking out.

in this detail of the standard gear stuck between the two oversized ones, you can see how needly everything fitted and why I felt like da Vinci for working it out in advance.. (Or maybe Hannibal from the A-team, saying: "I love it when a plan comes together!")