Progress of the Mechanical Duck

Neck is ready to paint

12/3/2016

The neck
mechanism is
finished & works.

Four operating
strings:
Beak, upper neck,
center pivot &
lower neck.

Head & neck
are carved and
ready to paint.

Upper Neck Construction

8/27/2016

The upper neck is roughed-out and works!

One string bends the upper neck downward, a second string swivels the upper neck back & forth and a third string opens & closes the beak.

After building most of the prototype for the upper neck I realized the overall size was too small.
I was able to arrange to measure a frozen duck specimen with feathers at the Burke museum (thank you Carl Sander & Robert Faucett) and revised the design to actual duck scale.

Other design changes were made to reflect what I learned building the prototype.

Duck Neck Design

10/19/2015

The duck's neck is now ready to build.

I've been thinking about and sketching neck ideas since the 80's. Over the years I've come up with a variety of solutions and made a few simple mock-ups to see how they work. After rejecting the ones that are overly complex or simply wouldn't work, I've arrived at a design that's ready to try. We'll see how reality impacts.

Strings bend the top of the neck downward and the bottom of the neck upward with a pivot in between the halves.

The design allows for many configurations of a real duck.

Completed Wing

10/24/2013

The Wing is finished! Here's a video to show it in motion.

There are two control strings: one to open & close the wing and one to make it flap.

The feathers are made from Kozo rice paper. I had to add an additional primary feather to the first section to fill out the spacing.

It was a challenge to get the feathers to open & close smoothly without binding or hitting eachother. Each one had to be cut to avoid obstacles yet remain large enough to operate smoothly and look right.

Turns out the wider the feathers are, the easier they work.

Wing painted

8/25/2013

The wing is painted and the temporary aluminum levers have been replaced with finished brass versions.

Next I'll attach rice paper feathers to the feather shafts and shoot video.

Underside

Closed

Open

Feathers on Wing

8/7/2013

Wing closed

Well it took a while to get here... but now, as the Wing opens the feathers individually spread.

Each part had to be remade one or more times. The angle when closed and the angle when open both need to feel right. The earlier version didn't open far enough.

Underside

Wing open

Springs are always a challenge. They need to be strong enough to do the job, but light enough to operate easily.

Next: brass levers and paint. Then I'll shoot some video.

Working Wing Model

3/7/2013

I've now completed a working wing model, the basic foundation of the wing. The model closely follows the bone structure and movements of a real duck's wing when closed and opened. There are two movements and control strings: one to open the wing and one to make it flap.

The "elbow" joint took the most effort, having to both fold and turn simultaneously - I think it took three tries. I'm hoping I'll be able to reduce some of the wing's thickness after the next step.

Now its onto the feathers: As the wing opens the Primary and Secondary feathers unfold evenly over each other with the Tertial feathers covering over.

I've been concerned from the start about the collective friction from all the feather's individual springs. We'll see what happens...