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FEATURE MACHINE BUILDING, FRAMEWORKS & SAFETY
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Feature
WHEN PRECISION IS KEY
Although its products tend to be used in a variety of industrial
machinery, in a recent application SKF’s solutions – including
sprockets, chains, Y-bearings and bushings – have been used in the development of a ‘marble machine’, a musical instrument designed to play music using falling steel balls
that he admits is completely impractical. “A guitar is a good tool to make music, a marble machine is almost the worst possible solution you can have,” he commented. So why would anybody spend so much
O
time developing such an imperfect musical instrument? To an extent, it is because he sees the machine more as a piece of art than a piece of engineering. The marble machine resembles a Victorian spinning loom, but one that is filled with 2000 ‘marbles’ – which are, in fact, steel balls. With his early prototype becoming an online hit, Molin created a more sophisticated second prototype, which is operated by turning a cranking handle. This lifts the ‘marbles’ to the top of the machine. From here, under gravity, they fall through various mechanisms. Some of the marbles fall onto vibraphone keys to play specific notes; others fall onto percussion pads. Molin now plans to build ‘Version 3’ of the
marble machine. As soon as it’s perfected he’d love to incorporate it into his stage show and take it on tour with his band, Wintergatan.
ENGINEERING RIGOUR In order to create ‘tight’ music, he knows that the marbles must be controlled to an accuracy of one millisecond. Developing a mechanism that plays music with such accurate timing is, however, a tall order. Part of Molin’s journey has been to adopt engineering principles more rigorously – and this has been with the help of SKF and others. Molin is a novice engineer who posts a
regular YouTube video in which he freely shares his ideas – as well as progress and setbacks. Often, viewers will help him solve problems. The ‘fame’ generated through his posts helped to attract SKF’s attention – and ensure their assistance. Roger Emlind, an experienced
16 DESIGN SOLUTIONS MAY 2024
ver the last seven years, Swedish musician Martin Molin has developed his ‘marble machine’ – a musical instrument
engineer who is more used to dealing with typical OEM clients, is the main link at SKF.
BEHIND THE SCENES Molin’s ‘art first’ was an untraditional approach to machine design; plus, Emlind is more used to dealing with trained engineers. This meant that the bearing engineering needed to be done implicitly. His main role has been to respond to Molin’s requests for insight and guidance. Other than the ‘marbles’ – which are standard
SKF steel balls – the machine plans to use several SKF products including sprockets, chains, Y-bearings and bushings. The Y-bearing helps Molin to position a shaft accurately and easily using just two bolts. The bushing allows for a simpler shaft design and more generous shaft tolerances when attaching a shaft to the flywheel – and, at the same time, secure the positioning and minimise vibration. Emlind has also provided plenty of expertise and rigour to the process – such as when he carried out some detailed calculations on Molin’s Huygens drive solution.
USING 17TH CENTURY SOLUTIONS Molin’s slightly innocent approach means that he stumbles across potentially revolutionary solutions to his problems – such as the Huygens drive, devised by 17th Century Dutch physicist Christiaan Huygens. “I’m planning on using the Huygens drive to smooth out power input – using gravity,” he said. This was devised as a weight-driven way of powering clocks, and helping old telescopes track stars across the sky. It is unlikely that any modern engineer would consider using such a mechanism in a contemporary machine. He is also using two large flywheels to convert his slightly imprecise
hand cranking into a regular flow of marbles through the various parts of the machine.
ON THE ROAD? The latest – and hopefully final – version of the marble machine is now being developed. While there is no working model, Molin is working out how to refine separate parts of the machine – such as the flywheel and Huygens drive. Eventually, he hopes to fit all these together into the final Version 3 of the machine, and go on tour. After this seven-year labour of love, Molin
is still enthused with the idea of reaching the end. “I want to finish the machine in order to show what happens if you don’t give up on your dreams,” he commented. SKF supplies a wide range of innovative solutions to help machine builders create their ideal solution – whether an industrial machine or, as we have seen above, something a little out of the ordinary!
SKF
www.skf.com
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