Descending Ashtray

We have been making great progress towards completing the Labyrinth game. I had hoped to complete all major structural elements tonight, and we are pretty much there. There has been a lot of head-scratching around the “ball return” mechanism of this game. We threw out many, many ideas, but eventually settled on the simplest one, and I am glad we did.

It’s probably easiest to explain by taking a look at the actual Labrinth game:

As you can see, the object is to follow the line throughout the game, eventually ending at the number “60″ at the bottom-center. In our conception of the game, successfully navigating the maze would result in dropping your ball through a hole at number 60, and following a tube down to a position on the green closer to the hole than if you had failed to reach 60. Here’s how our version looks from above, with the top removed (I really like the metal strapping look).

Andrew came up with an ingenious method of securing the hose to the game surface, completing the circuit. Now a ball drops through the game top, down the hose, and ends up next to the golf hole. Awesome!

With the game top attached, the ball will exit about where Andrew is standing in this photo:

Other, non-winning balls will simply roll out on the opposite side and have to putt around the box.

It’s getting hard to capture the whole picture of this thing with my camera. I took a lot of these pictures while on a ladder. The long side is 8 feet long now, with the platforms Bruce and I made last night added. Only about 15 things remain on my punch list. I think we will easily be finished on Monday, though I am still unsure if I will be able to seal this thing in time.

And of course, I am now starting to wonder what I will do with this piece when it’s all done. Sell it on eBay? Find an indoor mini-golf course that will give it a home? Any bars interested?