chain reaction ribbon-cutting machine
For the grand opening of Artschmart, we knew we wanted to do something special, and what better way to celebrate a new space than with a ribbon-cutting? We decided to make our own ribbon-cutting machine to do the honors. There is a great linkage called a scissor mechanism, so that was the starting point. If you want to see how a mechanism works, or make your own, I highly recommend spending some time watching the animations by Thang010146 on Youtube. He has made a library with thousands of animated mechanisms, and it is a really helpful reference when you are trying to build one. He has some basic ones, and some that are just strange and wonderful and fun to puzzle out.
the first working scissor mechanism, using my own super sharp scissors, eeeek!
My eight year old helped to test it out in the workshop, and it worked, but it was a little scary! When you pulled the string, the mechanism came out with the scissors on the end, kind-of like one of those punching gloves from an old cartoon, which seemed a bit dangerous (I made sure everyone was well out of the way before my kiddo pulled that string!) For the next version, I splurged on a pair of giant scissors and fixed the scissor mechanism in place. I also raised the mechanism up higher, out of reach of curious kiddos, to make it safer. I also added a ribbon for them to cut. When the ribbon is cut, the hammer drops, pulling a string that upends a tin can full of confetti.
new and improved scissor mechanism
Once I had the scissor mechanism worked out, I needed a way to activate it, so I started on switches. Since the theme of the chain reaction was a celebration, I decided to add some balloons and see if I could use them to trigger a switch. There are some coin-operated art machines at Artschmart so I thought it would be fun to use one of the arcade tokens for the conductive part of the switch, and the balloons rising up for the movement that would trigger the switch.
So far, so good! But now I needed something to tigger the balloon switch that started the scissor mechanism, and I decided to repurpose a conveyor belt that I made for a previous project (a pom-pom factory that I built as part of a residency at a local preschool). I collected some tin cans and rigged up a counter-weighted box mechanism that could collect them as they fell off the end of the conveyor belt. After a few cans fell into the box, it would fall down and pull a string that could release the balloons. My four year old helped me test it, many, many times!
My four year old helping to test the conveyor belt
The final piece of the puzzle was figuring out how to start the chain reaction machine, and I decided to make it coin-operated, too. I have a giant penny that I bought from a magic shop years ago, and I rigged up a switch that it could trigger. The day of the ribbon-cutting, we set up the machine on the sidewalk, and a great crowd of people came to watch the show
Drumroll please . . . .
It wasn’t perfect, but it was a lot of fun, and a really lovely group of people came out to celebrate this playful, silly, and wonderful new venture. Artschmart is officially open!
