[GBC] The Akiyuki Project (2010 - 2020)

[RohanBeckett]

He has a tendency to use this part a lot:

https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=424

Not sure what grey is... either an axle connector, or pin connector?

 

[rskamen]

Hi all,

I am back from my travels and working on my Ball Factory. About halfway through now. I have been timing every module as I go and so far, everything is running properly. I do need to order balls (white and orange). Does anyone have suggestions as to what to order and where to get them? The original TLG balls are hard to find and extremely expensive.

[Chipstertrain]

"Does anyone have suggestions as to what to order and where to get them?"

Personally I bought a couple of boxes of these and have never had a problem with any of the modules I've built and a lot cheaper than genuine Lego balls.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Quercetti-2530-100-MARBLES/dp/B00TWFXCEA/ref=sr_1_3/260-4786638-4357214?ie=UTF8&qid=1543938769&sr=8-3&keywords=quercetti+marbles

Hope this helps

Chip

[Ankoku]

The best way to order official LEGO balls is via a LUG bulk order it seems. The price difference between that and Bricks and Pieces is huge.

You can currently get orange ones from Bricks and Pieces.

https://www.lego.com/en-us/service/replacementparts/sale

Just use element/design number: 72824

UK price is £0.90, which is over a dollar per ball, so not cheap.

LEGO tends to close Bricks and Pieces down over Christmas. I am amazed it is still open now to be honest, so if you are going down that route, buy soon.

[Juroen]

Almost time to start with the EV3 parts.

Edited December 5, 2018 by Juroen

[Frequenzberater]

That is looking really promising! 

[Lego_GBC_NL]

That amazes me!  Nice progress, looks like you're really gonna finish it! Always wondered how people manage to reverse engineer these complicated Akiyuki machines... just by looking at the video and available pictures? 

Did you find out what the gray parts are? Tried to find it myself yesterday, but without any luck. What about the EV3 program file? I thought that 9v system received the program from Akiyuki...

Edited December 5, 2018 by Lego_GBC_NL

[Juroen]

7 minutes ago, Lego_GBC_NL said:

That amazes me!  Nice progress, looks like you're really gonna finish it! Always wondered how people manage to reverse engineer these complicated Akiyuki machines... just by looking at the video and available pictures? 

Did you find out what the gray parts are? Tried to find it myself yesterday, but without any luck. What about the EV3 program file? I thought that 9v system received the program from Akiyuki...

Yes indeed, just by looking at videos and pictures.  I think I have seen the videos hundreds of times.

Still no luck on the grey parts though, but I’m not in a hurry.

I think 9v system lost the file. I have asked him already but he couldn’t find it up to now.

[goggel]

On 1/20/2016 at 8:37 PM, Phoxtane said:

Apart from the mechanics the hard part would be the inverse kinematics software to run on the EV3s to get the smooth motion that this robot arm can manage.

What helped me a lot was downloading the video, playing it in vlc with reduced speed and taking screen caps. Scrolling through the pictures is much easier than watching the video that often.

Edited December 5, 2018 by goggel

[rskamen]

On ‎12‎/‎4‎/‎2018 at 11:00 AM, Chipstertrain said:

"Does anyone have suggestions as to what to order and where to get them?"

Personally I bought a couple of boxes of these and have never had a problem with any of the modules I've built and a lot cheaper than genuine Lego balls.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Quercetti-2530-100-MARBLES/dp/B00TWFXCEA/ref=sr_1_3/260-4786638-4357214?ie=UTF8&qid=1543938769&sr=8-3&keywords=quercetti+marbles

Hope this helps

Chip

Thanks for your information. It seems everyone is  out of stock on these. I did find a seller on Ebay that has one box, brand new, unopened, selling for $6.00US plus $6.00 shipping. I ordered them and will try them out. Worst case, I will have to source TLG balls, but I thought these would be worth a try. Working on module 9 now, the Ball Lifter. 

[Ankoku]

Yeah, I downloaded the Ball Factory vids and it helped a lot. I have spent more time looking at them in VLC than I care to remember. Even using video software to try and get the clearest frame captures.

@Juroen I would email Akiyuki and see if he has it. I am amazed at the progress you have made! Well done! Remember to take internal photos. The sort of ones where you will never get the view again without disassembling it. Oh and link your post in this thread, so show you are serious about what you are doing. People are far more receptive to such things when they can see that someone has already put in a lot of work.

@rskamen You really need to get yourself a BrickSafe account so we can see better sized images.

[9v system]

heres the program https://bricksafe.com/files/gbcbuilder/akiyuki/bc01-4.ev3

 

[9v system]

@Blakbird, @Courbet, @Lego_GBC_NL and anyone else who has built the crane loader, 

mine keeps breaking the long chain the moves the cams on the slider piece, when i move it by hand there is very minimal friction on it, what parts should i check for friction?

[doug72]

I gave up trying to build this, its over complicated and always thought the chain would be a weak point.
I have now built a swing loader instead that performs the same function of lifting ball carrier off the train & back on again.

Edited December 10, 2018 by Doug72

[Lego_GBC_NL]

6 hours ago, 9v system said:

@Blakbird, @Courbet, @Lego_GBC_NL and anyone else who has built the crane loader, 

mine keeps breaking the long chain the moves the cams on the slider piece, when i move it by hand there is very minimal friction on it, what parts should i check for friction?

@9v system, when I built this back in 2016 I had similar issues with the Crane Loader. Must say that in my build it was not the long chain that kept on breaking though, but simply lack of power when moving the crane. Same as @Blakbird I spent some hours trying to find the friction problem, but unfortunately without any success  I could literally move the whole thing in a smooth way using only my little finger, without any real strength/pressure, but once the train wagon/motor had to provide the power to do all the moving, it just didn't work. It did get it moving, but way too slow and not very nice to look at. In the end I decided to use the extra motor/mechanism designed by @Blakbird, he provided a video and LDraw file for it, which was posted somewhere in this thread. At least this worked and I was glad I didn't build the whole module for nothing  See video below.

So I really couldn't tell you which parts to check for friction or how to solve this issue. In fact, after more than 2 years I'm still curious myself...

@Ankoku, footage of the Bucket Wheel Tower starts around 4:35 (in case you're still planning to build it). Must say this module ran quite smoothly without any problems, but perhaps you see it differently... 

 

 

[Ankoku]

When you run it with your finger, are you going at the same speed it would normally run at?

[Lego_GBC_NL]

30 minutes ago, Ankoku said:

When you run it with your finger, are you going at the same speed it would normally run at?

Yes, more or less at the same speed, think a bit faster was even possible. No friction at all...

Same as with the Ball Factory, if built correctly, it can be easily operated manually.

[Ankoku]

Some of the friction with the Ball Factory was due to the instructions being wrong. Changing the dropper to being the correct way round, made a big difference.

It is an interesting one though, to feel such smoothness, yet it fails.

Is it worth checking the strength of the drive without the machinery attached? e.g. if the wagon seems to be unable to power it, let the wagon dock and feel with your fingers if it is unusually weak for some reason?

[Lego_GBC_NL]

2 hours ago, Ankoku said:

Is it worth checking the strength of the drive without the machinery attached? e.g. if the wagon seems to be unable to power it, let the wagon dock and feel with your fingers if it is unusually weak for some reason?

Due to lack of space and spare parts I decided to take apart the complete train module last year, so I'm unable to do any tests/checks at this point in time.

Some Akiyuki GBC modules I might rebuild some day as the building processes are simply awesome and I certainly learned from some mistakes made during the 1st builds. On the agenda to rebuild are the Ball Factory, Invisible Lift and Train Module. However, the new 2018 Train Module also looks amazing, so that's most certainly also an option (especially when seeing all the great mods/additions made by others!). 

[Ankoku]

I will be doing Hockey and Fork to Fork in the coming month. Invisible Lift, Tower and Stuck Ball in the coming year.

[Juroen]

Wauw, people building 4-5 Akiyuki modules in one year. I will be quite happy to finish at least one... 

[Lego_GBC_NL]

24 minutes ago, Juroen said:

Wauw, people building 4-5 Akiyuki modules in one year. I will be quite happy to finish at least one... 

Yes, but you're reverse engineering a module (and one of the more difficult ones). Some of us (like myself) are "just" (re)building based on completed instructions and fully tested modules, so there's a huge difference 

[Juroen]

 

Just now, Lego_GBC_NL said:

Yes, but you're reverse engineering a module (and one of the more difficult ones). Some of us (like myself) are "just" (re)building based on completed instructions and fully tested modules, so there's a huge difference 

Apart from reverse engineering and building with complete instructions, bricks aren’t cheap..

[Ankoku]

Working on the Ball Factory took a lot of time.

Building something like the Catch & Release module only took a few hours. Cost wise, since I use a lot of LEGO I already own, it only cost me £16 in BrickLink bricks. The other modules are no different. I collect all the bits I already own, then order the stuff which is missing.

[Frequenzberater]

Me personal, can not overcome myself to dissassemble a well running module. I love to collect those masterpieces. 

Result is, that I have build more than ten modules in the last twelve months. Think Iam officially addicted :D

 

Right now Iam waiting for the parts of akiyukys train system V2.