Magnetic Fabricfall of Destiny

An exercise in starting from something incredibly simple and letting it grow into something much more complex. This is just some magnets, fabric, glue, and metal wire, but it allows for plenty of room to play in. Safe for kids and even adults. Provides plenty of opportunities for modification.

I admit that the qualities that I was going for are not so readily apparent and that a larger scale would benefit the project. I would love to do this with at least 20 feet of vertical height and 10 feet of horizontal. Alas, I'm limited by the space I have in my apartment and how much I could put up before my cat would rip it down again.



Song: "Los Peces" by Lhasa

Step 1 Load Up on Fabric

Fabric stores are often selling the last few yards of each roll at a tasty discount. Just a few blocks away from the apartment I was able to pick up a few yards of white satin for $1.20 a yard. It had some frayed edges, but that's cool. I love frayed edges.

Comments

[Tetranitrate]

Looks like your cat cant wait to go nuts on that thing.

[fungus amungus]

He only likes to attack things that are moving. When I was putting this up he'd tear it down about half as fast as I could attach it. Once it was up, he didn't care.

[bedbugg2]

just dont open the window when a wind is blowing lol

[bedbugg2]

i used to attach small neo disk magnets to the bases of toy cars then throw them up onto the ceiling at school, good times

[seedling]

What's the name of the musician/cd title? I love it... So pretty with the sculpture, too.

[fungus amungus]

The album is La Llorona and you can find it here. If you dug this song, you're going to love the album. Well worth seeing live as well.

[westfw]

This is sorta cool. Magnet construction toys for adults (or older children, anyway), sort of.
I think I could get lazy and use a bunch of flagging tape, or... oooh - kite tail material or party streamers (all nice and per-cut, if you DON'T like frayed edges :-)
http://www.stumpsprom.com/catalog.cfm?cat=17250

[fungus amungus]

Those gossamer streamers look pretty cool. The transparent fabricwould be a nice effect. And if you don't like frayed edges I won't hold it against you.

[fungus amungus]

I checked that site out further and I can get 200 yds. of 4" white gossamer for $22 shipped. That's pretty cool and works out to the same price I was getting for cut up strips of the white satin. Thanks for the link! Now if I can just convince someone with a large amount of open space to let me put this up.

[FrenchCrawler]

That's cool. Which has given me another "good" idea. My last one was kind of a "flop" :( and I can't even improve it due to the lack of materials needed to do so. But it did work...

But when I get around to this idea, I'll make sure to give "credit" to the people who inspired me :D

Here's the main idea which was inspired by you (waterfall), http://www.instructables.com/id/EMUI7PED5VEP28785W/
http://www.instructables.com/id/EWMSJWI1BWEP2878DV/

What do you think?

[fungus amungus]

It's hard to make out what's going on in your picture, but I think you're talking about some recirculating ferrofluid waterfall (ferrofluidfall?) with electromagnets to slow it down. Could be interesting. You could have alternating sets of magnets activate so that the fluid is caught and released several times. With four sets of magnets you could have a moving display. Or maybe you could get more elaborate and have a grid of electromagnets so that you can create a display with the constant stream of fluid. This would be possible with a large pan of ferrofluid and no waterfall. A ferrofluid display.

[FrenchCrawler]

That (the ferrofluid "fall") is the basic idea. I figure that if I were to hook up each electromagnet up to push buttons, then you would be able to control the flow.

As for the ferrofluid display idea... It's been done and very nicely too:
http://www.tranism.com/weblog/archives/2006/04/ferrofluid_disp.html
Watch the video (warning: it's a large video) to see exactly how they got it to work.

[fungus amungus]

Wow, Snake is one boring game. And, yup, an array of electromagnets, just like I was thinking. Well, that frees up the time to think of something more novel.

[prank]

really cool. Also, the song in your video was amazing. I'd love to put a small fan in there, maybe blowing straight up our down. What made you want to do this?

[fungus amungus]

I had an earlier version of this in a doorway and it was cool to see it sway in the breeze. Good stuff. As for why? I'm not sure. The idea just popped up fully formed and I went with it. Images of hanging vines and TPing a large tree when I was a teenager came to mind. I just like the idea of entangled bits of fabric that can be easily rearranged on a whim without worrying about knots. And Lhasa is awesome. That album and Gotan Project's "La Ravencha del Tango" were the soundtrack to a trip to Maui a few years ago.