The Kraken

The Kraken a legendary giant sea monster, many armed cephalopod looking like an Octopus or squid, is the name I've given to my model of my own design, I built it during November.

It is based in the well known "Octopus Fairground Ride", so popular in fun fairs for so many years, the original ride was fixed in a permanent 45 degrees and rotates as well as the eight arms moves in an upward/downward fashion, each of the 8 cars freely spin with the ride's movements, this ride is a classic theme park.fairground ride and is enjoyed by guest of all ages, and continues to thrill riders today.

My model stand in a horizontal position instead.

The eight rotating arms and whole structure, rest on top of a tower, built in a large and heavy bridge that can tilt up and down to bring the ride at the 45 degrees angle as in the original Octopus, a low voltage motor and gearing system with very low speed, based at the end of the platform provided the power for this movement.

A second motor was needed to power the arms to swing up and down and rotate in the opposite direction, this demanded the greatest challenge as many other system that I built, all failed, I was frustrated and almost gave up, however at last, a totally new design that could be accommodating inside the tower and be powerful enough, provided the driving force for this second movement.

Then a third motor fixed on the bridge will drive the large quadrant pinion to rotate the ride.

I did encounter many problems in the building of this model, mainly in moving the heavy arms up and down, at the end it was successful and worked well for a long time until it was dismantled.

Lets take a ride in The Kraken...

Built in 2007