Mark Wardle
Marble Steps
Copyright © 1998 and 1999 by Mark Wardle
The Rolling Ball Web
An Online Compendium of
Rolling Ball Sculptures, Clocks, Etc.
By David M. MacMillan et. al.
Mark Wardle is an Australian educator and consultant specializing in computer curricula, multimedia, and the Internet. He is also an accomplished woodturner, and has built an exceptional wooden rolling ball sculpture entitled Marble Steps.
His home page on the web is at: http://www.gsat.edu.au/~markw/homepage/mwardle.htm
Marble Steps is made entirely of wood, including the wooden bearings for moving parts. It uses glass marbles. In the first image below, the box at the lower left is a "treasure chest" which collects Australian dollar coins when the machine is operated as a coin-operated device. The coin both releases the first marble and then iteself rolls through the sculpture, ending up in the chest. The sculpture contains a reservoir or magazine of marbles at the top, loaded by hand. When a marble reaches the bottom, it triggers the release of the next marble from the top. Wardle indicates that the sculpture includes a ferris wheel, a rocking bird, some unequally spaced track which causes the balls to slow down (linearly) and increase in rotational velocity, a marimba, and a tipping bucket.
Note: Some web browsers do not display images with full fidelity. For best image quality, save these images to temporary files and view them with an offline image viewing program. Please note that even when saved to files the licensing terms and the disclaimers stated in the Legal Matters section of this document still apply to these images.
Mark Wardle
Marble Steps
Copyright © 1998 and 1999 by Mark Wardle
Here are twelve more photos of Marble Steps, courtesy of the artist. Click on the thumbnail images below to open a new browser window with a larger version of the image.
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With the exception of any material noted as being in the public domain, the text and encoding of this document are copyright © 1998 by David M. MacMillan. The images and additional text are copyright © 1998 by Mark Wardle
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Version
1.3, 1999/09/09.
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