Craft-stick CoinStruction

CoinStruction sets were introduced several years ago with the gimmick of using coins as the construction elements, held together by a variety of clips that were the only elements, aside from instructions for the models, inside the boxes.

At four bits for a package of fifty, pennies are cheap, if you are looking for sturdy little disks, but even then, kids might abscond with them. Using dimes & quarters, recommended for some structural positions in the instruction I have, seems to just cry out for filching.

Besides, I felt that they made unattractive models. They looked all fuzzy from the density of clips, and the coins esthetically detracted, rather than enhanced.

I bought a set when a local store had them on clearance. Partially because I thought I shouldn't condemn them without giving them a fair try, partially because I thought the little clips ought to be good for something, even if their advertised purpose was dumb.

My actual experiments with building with coins impressed me little, and I set the CoinStruction set aside for potential use as clips - and more or less forgot about them.

The other day, I ran across a building toy called TomTecT, from the Kapla folks. Consisting of Kapla-like sticks and clips to hold them in various relations to won another. Intriguing.

Eventually I recalled CoinStruction, tracked it down, and explored various options for the sticks. I experimented with various things, including 100% post-consumer recycled Popsicle sticks, and concluded that most worked just fine, but that the latter would make the best cheap bridge components, in their commercial bulk guise of "craft sticks." About as cheap as pennies in the local dollar store. Cheaper for a box of a thousand at the craft store, but my calculations were that 50-100 would do my bridge.

They did.

I like the result.

So basically, with the clips from CoinStruction, using four of the six different shapes, and a small package of craft sticks, I have a fine new construction set.

Not an emulation of TomTecT - the CoinStruction clips differ greatly in geometries available. But good fun anyway.

As many bridges as I have built with a good many different type of construction set, I learned something new about bridge engineering from building with Craft-sticks+Coinstruction: in general, our models tend to be too strong, at best letting us only explore a single type of structural weakness at a time. CS+C modeled some new weaknesses in joints and gave me some new insights.

Good Block Play.

Most s vezemi

With my limited Czech, and some help from the Czech-German dictionary I keep next to my desk, most s věžemi is "bridge with towers." I downloaded the page this picture was on from the Czech Anchor site quite some time ago, where it won 1. misto (first prize), for Miroslav Koutný, in a contest. Well deserved - it may be the nicest bridge built with Ankerstein that I have ever seen, especially if one gives extra credit, as I do, for it being built with Set 6, and without hard-to-find/expensive metal bridge parts.

So it was a good build to celebrate my having been told that my leukemia is officially in remission.

Earlier today I had a nice walk in sun-dappled woods, up hill & down, taking (3-D) photographs like mad. I logged a Geocache, too. First such almost-hike since before I went to the doctor last fall with swollen ankles, beginning my cancer odyssey.

And on celebratory topics, thank you to whomever has been using my Amazon-hosted Block Play Store, to buy expensive software packages. Commissions (buy anything on Amazon, at no extra cost to the buyer), even if not yet received, are generally happy surprises - and these may have contributed to my quick recovery from chemo.

Anchor Stone builders will find more cause for celebration on that same Czech Anchor site: new since my last visit are theme constructions for Jules Verne, the Three Musketeers (Tři mušketýři), and pirates!

Check them out on the red buttons, or just browse the site randomly. There are lots of inspirations for good block play.

K'nex Bridge in 3D

This bridge is from the K'nex Building Bridges set, which progressively explores a dozen bridge designs. Some of the later ones are more impressive, but I was more interested in making a stereograph than a bridge.

If you look at these images with a stereo viewer or by merging the two images with a free-viewing technique, it will be in 3D, ala the View-Master many of us enjoyed as kids, and some of us still enjoy.

No big whoopee, but this is my absolutely first stereo pair, so I am kind of pleased.

I used my regular camera, moving it to the side between exposures to create the divergent points of view.

The Manfrotto Modopocket may be my favorite camera accessory. For the stereograph (3D image pair), I put a metal ruler with a non-slip cork back on the table with the ends weighted, put the Modopocket against the ruler, and displaced it to the side along the ruler to create spaced parallel images for manipulating into a stereo pair.

For more on 3D photography, you might start with DrT's website.

Much fun.

And another way to enhance what was already good block play.

Addendum [12/24/09] - In my confusion, I had originally referred to the technique for viewing my image pair as using the "cross-eyed technique," which Dr T was kind enough to gently point out was wrong, since that requires a reversed stereo pair. I have corrected both the terminology and the link above.

Ankerstein Leuchtturm

Just before I shut down & went to bed last night, I discovered new plans for Ankerstein Set 6 on Burkhard Schulz's Anker Bauvorlagen.

The downloadable PDF booklet contains three excellent plans, "Brücke - Uhr - Leuchtturm" (Bridge - Clock - Lighthouse), by a longtime friend of this site, William Seppeler of Anchor Stone Constructions.

The plans demonstrate yet again (cf the Czech Anchor site) that not everything that could be done with Anchor blocks was discovered by the Richter designers a hundred years ago. They also show that one of the key benefits of example designs is seeing ways to use components that one might not come up with on one's own.

Another benefit is of course inspiring one to build.

I began construction before the sun came up this morning.

The third plan, which suggests a harbor entrance watch tower (perhaps Italian?), is particularly compelling. I especially like the stairway turning through the building, and the sandstone arch halves used in two different orientations. And there's just enough of a bridge to win priority over the Bridge design for now.

There is a small error in the level c diagram, where a red stone at left is marked "15" but should be "19." Easily corrected when it becomes evident at the next level or blatantly obvious at the one after.

I'm not sure if this is the designers last hurrah for Set 6, since his blog has long since left me behind for bigger sets, or if we can hope for future revisits to an old favorite.

My biggest desire in plans is to see more single-box plans (actually, the only ones I've seen have been photos not plans) for the "A" boxes that are officially intended to extend a given set to the next level higher - a 6 plus a 6A makes a Set 8, add an 8A for a Set 10 - but for those of us that more often want quicker Block Play, that means that the smaller sets, the lower numbers, get satisfactory use, while the higher numbers sit neglected.

For just those rare occasions when I might be willing to tackle a three-box Set 10 construction, I can't justify an 8A, but I'd be delighted to have the opportunity to build with the different stone mix and new (to me) stones found in box 8A. That would provide a nice new and different building experience, within the familiar style and linseed-chalk-sand scent of a firm favorite among construction sets.

If you are new to Ankerstein, most folks seem to recommend starting with Set 6, except for smaller children who are better off with a Heinzelmännchen. I think that for many, set 4, followed by expansion Set 4A, to make a 6 plus a few extra stones, may be a better approach, albeit for more money and with boxes that don't conform to the 6A, etc.

If there is a better place to buy them than The ToyHouse, I don't know of it, and I'd say that even if I hadn't gotten a few freebie stones and printed materials. Woof. Please mention the Block Play blog.

Always great to be stacking Anker stones again - noting that if I hadn't had them out a few days ago, it would have taken a lot longer to get myself to try building this.

Good Block Play.

Thanksgiving Bridge

I am often thankful for bridges, and often thankful for building toys. They are good therapy.

Holidays are stressful, so I have been doing a lot of the things that help me cope. Block Play is an important part of that, and I have been building quite a few small constructions - with Lincoln Logs or Tinker Toys. Haven't much felt like photographing and blogging them though.

This afternoon I thought I would see if I could build a bridge with the Roy Toy Deluxe set. 100% American made, and located in Machias, Maine, Roy Toys seemed a better choice for Thanksgiving than one or another of the other classic American toys, now somehow made in China.

My inspiration for the bridge was a blurred & almost indecipherable image I grabbed off the Internet a while back, showing an instruction sheet from some old construction system. Maybe Miniature Timbers? Or maybe an older set of Frontier Logs.

By the time I got it working with the Roy Toy pieces, it had strayed a long way from the long-unconsulted inspiration - which is how inspiration is supposed to work.

The bridge turned out well, I believe, though there were some photographic issues, which aren't entirely rectified in the image above. At least it shows that you can go a long way from the provided examples with this set.

I hope your Thanksgiving is, or has been, a pleasant one.

We'll be leaving soon to join my brother, sister-in-law, and mom. It may be Thanksgiving dinner with a Spanish flavor, since he owns a group of Spanish food stores, and has written a Spanish cookbook. Or maybe it will be more French, to go with his latest venture. Or maybe it will be more toward family tradition. He's an excellent cook, so it will turn out well, whichever option.

I'm taking along a couple of pocketable building sets. Maybe I'll sneak off for a bit like I used to at grandma's house.

Good Block Play.

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I'm not going shopping on Black Friday, not at home, not on Amazon - but Amazon would like me to link to their Black Friday weeklong deals, and pay me a small commission for any business I send them. Might help me buy something new to blog.

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Punch Bridge

This is mostly an Ankerstein construction, but the bridge is not, and that is mostly what this post is intended to be about.

In their Golden Age, many Anchor Block sets were available with metal bridge parts. Many of the online plans feature bridges.

I have various old metal bridge parts in various sets. They look old and bent and rusty. They go well with the old weathered and worn stones in those sets. They don't fit in quite so well with the new stones. I prefer to build with new stones.

One can buy lovely new reproduction bridge parts from my favorite Ankerstein source, The ToyHouse. I hope to do so eventually, shortly after winning Lotto.

In the meantime, I wanted to build more bridges. I wanted to do it in a way I could commend to my readers as readily available.

One technique is based on plastic models. I may come back to that. I have posted a picture previously.

But the other day I ran across a paper punch in Big Lots that could help me make bridges out of cardstock. If you are handy with a craft knife, you can probably build better bridges than I built. But my punch technique does work, as you can see above, and I will be using it to build more bridges. I need to get some gray cardstock that will photograph better.

Aside from that, I have been building, with Tinkertoys, Lincoln Logs, Roy Toy, and K'nex, and will be blogging some of what I have built.

Mostly bridges. I like bridges.

Good block play.

Tinkertoys & Froebel's Peas

There is an evocative feel to Tinkertoys, for adults who played with them as children. A tactile memory. A pleasure.

These may not be the colors of the Tinkertoys I best remember from my childhood, but they are the size and they have the feel.

At my grandmothers house, between the two upstairs bedrooms, there was a space that was more than hallway or landing, and less than a full room. It had a south-facing window, a chair, a small table, just enough space for a child or two to play on the floor, and a set of Tinkertoys. I played there a lot, retreating from the noise and hubub of the living room and kitchen, faintly audible voices drifting up the stairs. Tinkertoys.

Tinkertoys were invented in 1913. The story of how the inventor got the idea from watching his children play with spools and pencils on the floor has been widely repeated since Tinkertoys achieved their first success. Personally, I wonder how one makes the leap from a pencil in a spool hole to the eight holes around the circumference of the spool. That would be the more interesting story.

But again and again in reading about inventors explanations of their great breakthrough, one is stricken by how uninformed the poor inventor must have been to not be aware of prior art, yet somehow through sheer luck and fortitude invent something just sufficiently different from prior art to be patentable, and to not infringe on existing patents, if any.

Okay. They make good stories.

We don't really know that Charles Pajeau was aware of Froebel's Kindergarten, and in particular Gift 19 (the later supply-oriented "gifts" are now often called an "occupations" in contrast the earlier equipment-oriented gifts). But the Froebel Kindergarten movement was still very active in America, with a lot of activity in the Chicago area, and I suspect I recall, Pajeau's hometown of Evanston.

But whether by direct influence, subconscious suggestion, or simply prior development, we must consider Gift 19, "Peas Work," to be the precursor of Tinkertoys. As these images support, again taken from Wiebe's Paradise of Childhood, 1869, 1896, 1907.

Froebel's Peas appeared in a world prior to canned or frozen vegetables, or year-round availability of fresh, so when they spoke of "peas" they would generally be understood to be referring to dried peas. These, when softened in water, could have wires or sharpened thin sticks poked into them, and two- or three-dimensional structures created.

Tinkertoys are a better idea, and it is not surprising that "Peas Work" has been all but forgotten, and no longer plays a role in our kindergartens.

Tinkertoys would go on to be a major player for several decades, until eventually bumped down a notch by K'nex, but even yet surviving in a sturdier, larger version. There are also imitators, smaller, larger, and in-between.

Long time Block Play readers may find today's bridge familiar - it is similar to a K'nex bridge I did a while back, but less complex. Which is a major part of its appeal.

I am particularly pleased with the unit blocks as bridge piers & abutments. Unit blocks are so useful, and I find they complement Tinkertoys a particularly pleasing manner. I suppose with standard-sized unit blocks, the new larger size of Tinkertoys would be in similar proportion as my smaller blocks and smaller Tinkertoys.

Good Block Play.

Ankerstein Bridge

How better to celebrate my second cataract surgery yesterday (and patch off today) than with a nice Anker Bridge?

I know I've built this before, and thought I had blogged it before, but a quick search doesn't show an earlier incarnation. Either way, this is what I am posting today, so enjoy.

This is from the manual that comes with the current Anker Set 6, and is built with the stones from that set.

I like bridges.

Good block play.

Seeking the imperfect

The biggest challenge of building something in miniature is usually the choice of what to omit. It is simply not possible to build an exact replica in miniature - especially with simple construction toys. How much can you leave out and still have a satisfactory model of the original?

I can get stuck in the planning phase forever, trying to figure out how to make a model better. This is one of the reasons I mostly build from plans, not freelance. And I am always on the lookout for new plans.

This week Andy Harris's Lott's Bricks Gallery added a page on Lott's Kindergarten Blocks, which I immediately scanned for plans, zooming in on the image at right.

Now what was cool, and the impetus to my building and blogging today, is that I immediately recognized that top & center in the plan sheet is an easily recognizable model of London's Tower Bridge. Okay, I was looking at the larger versions, not the thumbnails, but still ...

The point is, at the detail level this doesn't look at all like Tower Bridge (do a Google image search), but it doesn't matter. Maybe I am more bridge oriented than most people, but I still think some of my readers will have recognized my model, and even more would agree that it is an acceptable representation after looking at the pictures.

I don't have any Lott's Kindergarten Blocks, but Ankerstein fans will recognize them as being reasonably close to the simpler Ankerstein sets (more obvious in the Lott's Set 2 at left than the Box 1 above).

So I built my Tower Bridge out of Ankerstein rather than Lott's. And out of perversity, I built it out of Ankerstein Set 4A rather than choosing a set or combination of sets more able to replicate the Lott's Box 1 contents.

My model is roughly the same size as that on the Lott's plan, but I have had to use different colors and multiple smaller blocks to represent larger blocks not in the 4A assortment.

Successfully achieving the imperfect is good block play.

Bridge G7

Mr Seppeler requested a picture of his bridge design G7.

I am still having trouble building at home, so I packed my new camera and my Kleine Gernegroß set off to a nearby park.

I hope the results are satisfactory.

Good Block Play.

Bridges & towers

For several days I have been working on bridges out of K'nex. First, I built the odd looking thing at right from a 1997 K'nex "educational" bridge set. The bridges of that set seemed to have been designed from sketches of different bridge types, not from real bridges - which may be why K'nex came out with a larger, more accurate, and much more expensive "Real Bridges" set. It surely inspired the name.

After building that bridge "by the book" (or at least "by the card"), I more or less duplicated it using longer K'nex rods, and omitting that truly odd support structure.

I continued to fiddle with it over the next several days, which included an excellent "research" (more accurately "inspiration") trip to a lovely Pratt truss on the Snoqualmie Valley Trail - the former Milwaukee Road Cedar Falls to Monroe railway line, converted in that segment to a hiking and biking trail.

I like the results (top). This version is about five feet long.

Today, I decided I had had enough K'nex, and it was time for some fischertechnik, so I brought out the Universal set again, and built this nice communications tower (left).

I've fiddled with a few short bridge trusses out of fischertechnik, and am just about ready to do something substantial. It may have to be a mixture of yellow and gray - a bridge in the process of being repainted?

Whichever direction I take with it, I am sure it will be Good Block Play.

Just as these projects were all Good Block Play.

Odd Jobs

Usually I show current activity in my blog posts, but this is a bridge I designed and built a few years ago, from Eitech parts. It illustrates the use of adjustable length parts to solve a design problem, where using a standard length part would have severely disrupted the curve of the arch. Adjustable length parts in construction sets have been around at least since Richter's Anker bridge set of 1895, and are still a regular component in sets from Eitech and Merkur and perhaps others.

But in this bridge, as in the Engino bridge I built yesterday, I find the adjustable parts are not entirely satisfying.

First, the parts represent bridge members that would be under compression (forces push on the ends - the member must not collapse), but the parts have the appearance of tension members (forces pull on the ends - the load might instead have been handled by a cable). When you look at the tower crane in an image from the Engino box, the upper, diagonal usage of the expansion parts looks reasonable - a cable would work here; while the lower, vertical usage as a kingpost is more doubtful, though not as bad as the bridge. In the adjacent suspension cable car (have I identified this correctly?), the parts look fine to me - such vehicles typically use lightweight components where they can.

Second, I am not completely comfortable with the use of adjustable "building blocks." A good portion of what a construction set should provide is exercise in solving problems with standard elements. Deviating from this, whether by adjustable parts such as this or the provision of new ad hoc parts designs (Lego is especially egregious), reduces the "puzzle pleasure" and may also reduce the learning value.

If a child is playing with a set that has only limited positions for fastening parts together, meaning that only certain choices for two sides of a triangle can provide for an appropriate third side allowing for a right triangle, he or she may not rediscover the Pythagorean Theorem, but they will at least have some context for recognizing that the Pythagorean Theorem relates to the real world. Will they get this, if they have solved all their triangle problems by simply readjusting the expandable part?

Further, are we then teaching them how to create and adapt and problem solve within constraints, or are we teaching them that the world will adjust itself to their needs and expectations?

Block Play, at whatever level of literalness or metaphor, is importantly an exercise of balancing constraints with versatility.

A construction set, if it is to be both enjoyable and educational, needs to balance those demands of constraint and versatility. Each constraint can have both pros and cons, and each versatility can have both pros and cons.

The Eitech sets, the Merkur sets, and the Engino sets, with or without the expandable parts, provide a variety of trade offs of constraint and versatility. Each, I believe, provides more pros than cons, and each is a worthy candidate for good Block Play.

Engino 60

I surely made little happy noises when I first saw the Engino 60, while browsing the Internet. A construction set showing lots of different models is special. It was de rigueur in the classic era, but is rare now.

Most manufacturers now seem to want you to build just one or two models, then buy a new set from their line. Though it may actually be that the variety sets just don't sell well in the mass market. Fortunately there are exceptions available, like fischertechnik, K'nex, even Lego, at their low-end, though sadly not in Lego Technic.

The smaller Dual Mini-Packs from Engino each include instructions that show how to build two models from that set, plus a different large model by combining all four sets. The Engino 60 includes the part packages and instruction booklets from all four Duals combined in one box, in a sort of "buy three, get one free" deal.

That gives twelve step-by-step instructions total, plus 48 additional models shown assembled, to give the 60 model total. Confusingly, these are shown only on the box, and with a different color scheme for the parts. We must hope that the promised downloads from Engino Toy Systems will soon be available, with correct colors and clearer detail.

No parts lists are included. To tell whether I had the right parts, I kept the four bags of parts separate until I built models from each. You can compare your contents against my parts list. My totals differ from the prescribed counts only in one extra for the Arachnid, but my parts selection and count there seems correct, and that makes the total of Engino 60 come out correct at 221.

The parts image here is in roughly the same order as my list, top to bottom, left to right. The "beam8" is duplicated to show the two different socket faces; the sides have no sockets.

The parts go together well, with most connections form, robust, yet readily parted for disassembly. Some combinations between specific different types of connector are a little wobbly, and removing the pivot from a socket can be difficult - connecting or reconnecting the variable angle piece will aide in separation. For other difficult separations, a beam can be used as a tool, using the end socket since it is a side-slide connection, not a push-in.

Most connectors have an eight-point star shape to the base of the shaft, with a similar shape in the throat of the socket. This maintains alignment in 45 degree intervals, either solidly if the connector is connected in the flat face of a beam, or as a rotatable detent, for most other connections. The omission of the star on one side of the hubs allows wheels to rotate smoothly.

The connector head is 5 mm, halfway between fischertechnik's 4 mm and K'nex' 6 mm, and of similar shape, and indeed there are other similarities to those systems as well, though without seeming that Engino is a copy of either.

The models can be big, for a reasonably compact set - the scorpion is 31" long, and the robot is 13" high. This bridge, from a picture on the box, is 27". It was a bit challenging, since the image was small, in the wrong colors, and had some parts wrong, so that I had to do quite a bit of puzzling out. But I think it looks great.

All-in-all, I'd say Engino is good Block Play.

Mixed Media

Today I did some Lego, Brio Builder, Wedgits, and more Lego.

Often several small projects are better than one big one.

The Brio Builder tip-loader is quite a contrast to the recent bridge -- as well it might be, since I had to choose a project that could be made with what wasn't used in the bridge.

That had the side effect of making it more "block play" in some ways, albeit blocks held together with friction connectors. I think the Brio is working very well for me.

The all-black Wedgits sure don't photograph well, but I find them much more relaxing than the multi-color sets. If I had known I was going to be taking this picture, and what else would be in it, I might have chosen all-white instead.

[created 12/8/05; modified 5/13/07]

Bridge & Blocks

There used to be Ankerstein sets with metal bridge parts, and I hope someday the new company restores bridge elements to the product line.

I've given some thought on and off to adding bridge spans to my Unit Block emulations of Anker structures from the time of my first such efforts.

One of my ideas was using Brio Builder (like oversized erector sets of wood) to make a bridge. Unfortunately, I have real head problems about rummaging about in the attic. But I managed to overcome that for the Legos, and after a few days, went back for the Brio.

Between what was in the attic, and some more I got with money from some train stuff I had on consignment, I think I managed to make a passable looking bridge, even it if may be a bit big for the blocks.

I hope to follow up eventually with more substantial abutments, with more involved block building, but in the meantime, I am happy to know there is at least one bridge solution for these blocks.

And working with the Brio is very nice as well.

Bridge

Nothing fancy today, but it's been a while since I posted, and it seemed time.

I'm building here with a subset of the hodge podge of various cheap wood 30mm sets I've written about before, with a design from an oddball stone block set as inspiration.

Nothing terribly special, but I'm quite sure that was the point.

No sense of obligation to the starting design either. Again, I think that was my objective.

And a bridge again. I do like bridges - even when, as here, they end up looking vaguely like one of our cats.

Corbelled Cantilever Bridge

Yes, it is a little tentative in the middle, where the weight of the cantilevered blocks is right at the limit of the corbel counterweighting.

Still, it is providing a clear span of four blocks in length.

And it is a bridge, and bridges are fun.

Sun blocks

When I finally got together the set of Unit Blocks to do the Walker stuff, that also meant I finally had a set of blocks large enough and stable enough to be used outside on a wobbly table.

So I dragged the wobbly table out of the garage, set it on the grass under the cherry tree, and built the bridge from the Walker book, with a few modifications, of course.

My assistant seems far more interested in a bird in the apple tree.

Ankerstein Bridge

Starting with the first plan in the Anchor #8 (6A) plan book, this bridge goes a little further.

It is the largest Anker Stone project I have built yet, and probably the shortest lived large structure: I lost my footing trying to get a better camera angle in tight confines, and my fall knocked down much of the bridge.

I usually leave things up for a day or three and I am a bit disappointed that this one was so short lived. But not nearly as much as I am delighted with having built it, and at least I did get a few pictures.

There will be another bridge another day.

Mula and Kapla

The left-hand and center parts are Kapla, the right-hand part is Mula.

I found out about Mula Sticks just after Ikea dropped the product, so missed out on the cheap pricing -I believe it was $6.99 for 150 sticks versus Kapla's ~$65 for 200 sticks and a booklet of designs.

Kapla are better, but that much better?

The Mula are exactly the same thickness as Kapla, roughly the same width, but less consistent. The length is unfortunately a couple of millimeters shorter, which not only doesn't match Kapla, but is shorter than 5 Mula sticks side by side.

Consistency of longer dimensions being exact multiples of shorter dimensions is a vital part of and block construction set having maximum versatility.

Kapla are a very nice pine, with gorgeous grain patterns. Mula seem very much like Basswood, with barely visible grain in most pieces.

Kapla is probably worth paying double what it costs to get Mula now, especially if you don't have the booklet. I think maybe I am glad that Mula isn't still available at the local Ikea store - paying 7 times more per stick for Kapla would not be easy.

The design is from the Kapla "Green Book." I liked the bridge aspect.

[Recommended: L'art Kaplaby Tom Van Der Bruggen]