So the next several weeks Arachne and I are going to be working on a parade float for a parade that hits the city in the spring.

This will make us a little scant on Tuesdays and Thursdays particularly, and that means we have to do real life stuff on other days which means we may be a little scant over all...

But, I was wondering if I could get a few suggestions...

All of the floats are tied to specific time periods, ours is from 1849-1900.
Our float for this year is actually going to be a fair.

Arachne and I are assigned to build a ferris wheel for the float.
It doesn't have to hold people (we're using bobble headed children about 1-2lbs each) it will probably be about 9-10' tall overall.
We have a pretty good idea of how to make the wheel itself, but I'm still struggling over how to make it go...

I have a couple of ideas of motors to use but I am still looking for suggestions:
1. An electric wheel chair motor (which I think would be ideal but very expensive).
2. A lawn mower engine, but I don't know if I can get it to go slowly enough.
3. A garage door opener, which I think goes slower than a lawn mower engine and is electric so may be easier to work with...
4. Also, we thought about bicycle power, but the thought of peddling that hard for the 3 mile parade route seems rough and I don't know how many gears it would take to make the peddling less strenuous...

Ok, so does anyone have any other ideas?

This sounds like something from the Discovery Channel.

Hmmm... What would MacGyver do?

Is that the only moving part on the float? If there are others, you can just piggyback off their power or create a solution for it to run all.

As for speed, that is easy enough to control with gears. If you go with a lawnmower you can weld a gear to the drive shaft, connect it with a chain to a larger gear underneath the ferris wheel which then connects directly to the ferris wheel. I don't have the math available to give you ratios but I'm sure it wouldn't be hard to figure out the idle speed of the motor and step it down accordingly.

The simplest solution is always the best and most reliable solution!

The problem with a lawnmower engine is that they don't like to idle for long periods of time, then there's the cooling problems of an air cooled motor, and exaust fume removal problem.
I would look into a DC motor that you can run from a deep discharge 12v battery. (an RV coach battery would work well) Assuming decent bearing on the Ferris Wheel axle, you won't need a whole lot of power to turn the whole thing.... I'd be more than happy to help you out with the specs...

Cool, thanks guys!

It looks like we may actually have a line on a wheelchair motor, I think that will work. It can be powered with a 12V battery and it has no exhaust.

Now I just have to get the bearing method worked out. We may end up just stringing the metal axle through the stand and apply generous amounts of lubricant... I think this will work as long as I line the hole in the stand with a smooth medium. (This sounds dirtier than it was supposed to, sorry...)

If you need any lubricant, let me know. I have TONS.

I think there are several officers who are more than happy to oil things up. Or so I've heard. I wouldn't know, I always bring my own.

OMG, yay, its over!

So, the parade is finally over, and it was great! Our float turned out wonderful, we actually won the trophy for the best float in the whole damn parade!!! Yay us!

So, as for the motor suggestions. A week before the parade they found a rotisserie motor for a grill and said, "oh that will work" they spent three days of me telling them it wouldn't work while I had a working wheelchair motor in my car...

So, they finally got mechanics setup to hook the rotisserie to wheel (with a day to spare) and the rotisserie broke... hahahahahaha, bunch a morons trying to use a rotisserie that will spin a 40 pound roast to turn the 120 pound wheel... hmmm, who ever would have thought that it wouldn't work...

So, I guess the joke was on me, because if you look at the picture below, you'll find the new motor attached to the wheel...
Yes, the dapper gentleman cranking the wheel is me...

When was there a parade?

That is a nice hat, man.

A few more pictures of our glorious float, "The County Fair."

The first picture is of Arachne and I standing next to our Ferris wheel creation.

The rest are of the float going by.

(If I can find some I'll post a couple pictures of the actual kids in the wheel --they were very creepy looking paper mache heads).

OK, just a couple more pictures. For some reason this merry-go-round didn't get into any of the picture of the float moving, so here is one of it at a stand still... and you have to check out the close up of the Giant (15 foot) pig that is on top of the tractor (the tractor was used tow the float).

When was there a parade?
That is a nice hat, man.

Pilsner... dude... the Springtime Tallahassee parade was yesterday, downtown... 250,000 other people were there...

Looks awesome.

Pilsner... dude... the Springtime Tallahassee parade was yesterday, downtown... 250,000 other people were there...

Wow...I didn't know Tallahassee had 250K people.

Your costume worked well; did spider design it?

Yeah, 250k people in Tallahassee was news to me too.

The news caster said that there was an estimated 250k people and that a third of the hotel rooms in Tallahassee we being used by Springtime visitors and parade visitors.

I still think she was using some sort of fuzzy math, myself... like the kind they teach at FSU... I mean, don't get me wrong, it was the same fuzzy math I took (that must be why I didn't think it was odd when I heard it...)

Float looks great! Is that a woman's coat? ;)

Not a woman's coat. Arachne actually made it for me. Its modeled from the coat worn by Tristan in the movie version of Stardust.

It is actually a remarkable replica, but the picture is kind of too far off to tell.

Heehee, I stand corrected!

I feel so awesome. I clicked on it and was like, "... what is up with the Stardust coat?" GO ME!

Great work on the float y'all, and congrats on the win! It looks awesome.

Looks amazing! Thanks for sharing pics. :D

Very sweet float. Good job!! Great pics also.