How to Build a K'nex Ball Machine

Why?

Why?

Building k'nex ball machines is not only fun, but is also a great pastime! It is very educational and is great for those wishing to become engineers. It promotes critical thinking, ingenuity, and style. With k'nex you can explore the basics of engineering, learn basic principles, and apply these principles to reach design solutions to problems. They are awesome!

Buy K'nex

The most important step of building a ball machine is obviously to buy k'nex.

Where can you buy them?

However, I would not suggest buying them anywhere but Ebay. All the other options cost a LOT for a little.

• Ebay
• Amazon
• Target
• Walmart

Buy K'nex

My suggestions:

• Buy in bulk - with bulk you get way more for your money
• Don't get tricked - it's common for k'nex shoppers to think they find a good deal when there are way better deals out there.
• Buy lots that have specific parts - some sellers have no clue what their k'nex are worth and will sell you high-priced items (like k'nex balls) for cheap prices.

Design Structure

The structure of your ball machine is another very important step. It should generally have something unique about it, rather than just building with a rectangular structure every time. Pictured below is one of Shadowman39's structures from one of his ball machines.

Design Structure

Design Lift

Your lift is what carries the balls back to the top, making the machine perpetual.

When making a lift:

Create Lift

Make sure to:

Don't:

• Build before structure
• Make tiny or part-consuming lift
• Use same lift every time

• Build in a way so you can make it tall
• Have something different, even if just slightly adapted.
• Have fun!

Create Elements

Elements are anything that the ball goes through to get back to the lift at the bottom.

They include everything from wheels to stairs to loops. I suggest building the elements after the structure is done so you can fit them in the best places. Pictured are 6 of the 16 original elements in my newest ball machine.

Create

Elements

Test!

Test!

After everything is put together, test, test, and test again! Don't just assume that the machine will work (because it won't!) Have all the balls run through the paths for up to 30 minutes. You need to make sure the ball machine has a very low probability of failure which helps with the videoing process and makes it cooler when showing your machine to other people.

Make a Video

The final step is to make a video! Rather than just videoing the whole thing from a distance, you should video different paths from different angles. You can use a phone, but I suggest using a camera. It is key that your video is high quality and put together well. If you want to check out my videos, visit Hudson's K'nex Productions and watch my newest video, The Two Towers (pictured).

Make a Video

Conclusion

Conclusion

I hope you enjoyed the process of building a ball machine and really put your mind to work. This guide hopefully helped as building a ball machine can be tedious at times. Please check out Hudson's K'nex Productions to see my elements and ball machines if you're interested.

Thanks for reading!