Ready to Blow up some LEGO creations!

Nestor does not play well with others.
He doesn’t play well at all.
His favorite pastime is blowing up LEGO creations.

Here is an example of what Nestor is capable of.
This creation is called Stalker and it was created by Misterhaan.
But Stalker is being stalked!
Look out Stalker!
Look out for Nestor!

Look out Stalker! You are being stalked!

This animation was made using LDraw, POVRay and a Matlab script that generated a set of POVRay files each with the parts individually spinning and moving away from the blast center. Add a flash of light in a few images, and voila! Explosion!

You can find this video on Youtube as well at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Pmz8soKdko.
Share it with your friends!

Geneva mechanisms were invented in Switzerland for use in clockwork so that the hands of a clock would snap rapidly to their new positions rather than move smoothly across the face of the clock. They are also used to advance movie film in film projectors and are responsible for that clicking noise that film projectors make.

Here is a rendering of a Geneva Mechanism designed from LEGO parts. This rendering was made using MLCad in the LDraw package in conjunction with L3PAO and POV Ray.  Below the mechanism in operation.  This process will be described in detail in a future post.

The building instructions are straightfoward and can be downloaded in this zip file.

I am looking into using such a mechanism in a LEGO laser scanner, which can be used in instrument or robotics applications.

A smaller LEGO Geneva Mechanism created by Leo Dorst of the Intelligent Systems Laboratory in Amsterdam can be found here, although I have not been able to get it to work myself.