Kaden says:
Ever hear about Rolamites? The only "basic mechanism"
invented in the
20th century, they came out of Sandia Labs in the mid '60's.I've prototyped a few variations, and they're *damned*
fascinating… almost like alien technology, or something that fell through
that rip in the space-time continuum that leads to the parallel universe.A guy
named Don Wilkes developed them, and they're pretty
freakin' cool. A
couple of rollers tracked into a spring metal band, and Bob's yer
uncle:
stored energy
with (no shit) frictionless constrained movement,I remember reading about them in PopSci when they were first
developed, then promptly forgot about them, what with being 9 years
old and all. They popped back into my mind last night
while pondering
the Zen of primary mechanisms.They currently seem to be *somewhat* popular in force sensor
mechanisms, and there's ongoing research into using 'em in
prosthetic
joints, but for all intents and purposes, they've fallen
through the
cracks, Makerwise.
Reader comment:
Brandon says: here's a rolamite letter scale. I'd have to say it's probably the most beautiful scale i've ever seen.
