Labyrinth Toy - simple mechanism, no strings attached (literally) by IvanC87

Last crawled date: 3 years, 3 months ago

My third product design project: a classic labyrinth maze toy, built from scratch in SolidWorks.
The tilting mechanism of a traditional labyrinth toy relies on strings tied to board to hold the X/Y frames in place and limit the tilt angle. With the re-design mechanism, tilting movements of both X/Y frames can be regulated / limited by axle supports formed of simple shapes.
The whole assembly contains the following:
1 x Container (Outer shell)
1 x Motion Ring (X-tilting frame)
1 x Main Board (Y-tilting maze board)
4 x Spacer Rings (to create clearance gaps between the tilting frames)
1 x X-rod (longer rod to control the X-tilt movement)
1 x Axle-support (an X-tilt movement triggering device, to be slided on to the longer rod, positioned close to the centre of the container)
1 x X-rod short (shorter rod to control the Y-tilt movement)
1 x Cap (to restrict the axial movement of the longer rod inside the container)
2 x Knobs (cover the exposed ends of the rods)
Ball bearings are not included of course ;)
The maze is designed for a 8mm dia. ball bearing. They can be bought from eBay at cheap, say pack of 10 for £2.
Print with supports at places where holes exist.
100% infill recommended, particularly applied to the rods (I broke some of those even they are printed at 50% infill)
Recommend a resolution of less than 0.2mm to get better clearance tolerance, otherwise you may need some sandpaper to smooth out the hole / rod surfaces or create larger clearance even.
The caps and knobs were designed to create tight-fit so no glues are required (however, use it if the knobs / caps are loose on the rods)
Highly recommend Wood PLA for the classic appearance.