Automata

Sailor's Dream
Crustaecean Keep-fit
Dodgem
Fire Breathing Man
The Machine
Maki Project
The Money Machine
Ride of Life

Fire Breathing Man
I made this while I was artist is residency at Wellington College, Berks. It uses paraffin squirted through a brass nozzle and has small pump to pressurize the fuel. The movement is powered by a windscreen wiper motor and uses and ingenious gear mechanism i pinched off Paul Spooner. He used it to open and close a door on one of his automata. What's clever about it is that it uses one cycle of single direction rotary motion. I made all the gears and these are of the Egyptian kind, basically pegs in a wheel. The automaton was performed at the school's send off do to an audience of boys, masters and parents and since became part of the their collection of artworks (I'd like to thank Peter Vass, the head DT technician at the school for his help and support)