YouTube makes me laugh

Years ago, I started a YouTube channel. Unlike a lot of people, I didn't start it to post regular updates or to make a million and become an 'influencer'. You'll never hear me say "Smash that like button and click subscribe because it will really help me out," because quite frankly I don't give a damn if you like it or not. Never have, never will. None of my videos are monetized. I have a love/hate relationship with YouTube and the videos that appear in my search results. I love the fact that you can find a video about anything you care to search for, but I hate the fact that the people who post them have to pander to the YouTube algorithm and you end up seeing titles like "You're using your chisel incorrectly!!!" or "My toolchest is better than your toolchest!!!" Of course these titles are designed to provoke a response and unfortunately they work on most people. I'm afraid they just provoke a two word response from me and the second word is 'off'.

I started my channel simply because at the time I was writing blogs on the Lumberjocks woodworking forum (sadly now gone to the dogs) and occasionally I felt that a short video would explain things better than I could with text and photos. Therefore, a lot of the videos would not mean very much to anyone who happened to stumble on my channel without reading the rest of the blog of which the video was just a small embedded part. I don't visit my channel on YouTube very often, but today out of curiosity I did and suddenly found myself laughing.

One of the projects I blogged about was a massive Labyrinth game for two players that I designed and made. You can see it in my projects if you want to know more about it.

I'm sure you've all played a Labyrinth game at some point in your lives, so you'll know that the object of the game is to get the steel ball bearing from one end of the maze to the other without it falling down any of the holes. When it does fall down one of holes, you need a mechanism to raise the ball bearing from the lower level back up to the top level to put it back into play. This is how the mechanism finished up looking on the game.

There are hidden ramps on the bottom layer of the labyrinth that guide the ball through a hole and onto a platform inside the big box on the end of the game. The player moves the sapele knob to the right about 6mm and that lifts the ball back up to the top layer of the labyrinth. The slider has a return spring that I stole from one of my wife's plastic skirt hangers (she still doesn't know) that returns the slider back to it's starting point.

Here's a crap video of the mechanism in operation with the covers removed.

When designing this mechanism, I needed to work out where my pivot points needed to be and I did this using a scrap piece of MDF, some card, some sewing pins and two McDonalds coffee stirrers (no-one can ever call me a cheapskate).

I recorded a short video of this principle working so people reading the blog would understand how I converted 6mm of linear motion into 90 degree rotational movement. Here is that video:

Well 12 years on, would you believe that video has had 437,000 views? No, me neither. It has attracted comments from a number of engineering students, DIYers and God knows who else. Here are some of the comments people have posted underneath the video. I'm afraid I'm a bad YouTuber and just ignored most of them, but I thought it would be fun to entertain you with what I really wanted to say at the time when each notification appeared in my inbox so I've added that under each comment. FYI, the spelling errors are as they appeared in the comments under the video and not as a result of me losing the plot.

Commentor: What's the name of the theory you are proving? 
Commentor: "What is the name of that mechanism?"

Me: No idea, let's call it Susan.

Commentor:  "Thanks for this.  I was having a hard time coming up with a way to rig a pedal control to a potentiometer and this was just the illustration I needed to see."
Me: "Glad it inspired you."

Commentor:  "Definitely will use this in my miniature gate deco project! Thanks!"
Me: "Whatever one of them is."

Commentor:  "I call this motion amplifier - like we electrical engineers have signal amplifier - little movement (signal) produce big movement (signal) - it can be used to detect small movement in buildings (due to earth quake) by applying this principle on the buildings foundations (fixed points) and lose ends (top of buildings) and then linking them by a wireless device - the activation uses what is called differential signals between the fixed and lose ends. I can design those kinds of intelligent systems."
Me: "I'm happy for you, really I am."

Commentor:  "this is 100% useful video for those how are creative and making something new & homemade tech on there own "

Me: "Thank God for that. I'd be disappointed if it was only 78% useful."

Commentor: "Good idea. Im looking for a full 360 myself!"
Me: "Aren't we all my good man?"

Commentor: "Sir your system made a big help for me ......big big help .........thank you"
Commentor: "Really nice example, well thought out. Thanks"
Commentor: " Thank you for the idea"
Commentor: "Oh Yea"
Commentor: "Lol I actually need this"
Me: "Hey, it's what I do."

Commentor: "I would like to be able to move a weight from center of rotation to the outer circumference between 1:30 and 3:00 oxlock ostions."
Me: "Yeah, good luck with that. You might want to learn to type first."

Commentor: "Instead of the linear movement powering the rotational movement could you use the rotational to power the linear AND could you have it move a duplicate beam in the OPPOSITE direction? I'm trying to make a locking device the when a lock is turned 1/4 is a circle, it moves two rods out in opposition directions to lock a lid."
Me: "Sounds like it MIGHT be a step too FAR for you. Have you tried FLOWER ARRANGING instead?"

Commentor: "How would I convert a horizontal push to a vertical pull without pulleys?"
Reply from other commentor: "You could use 2 racks and a pinion, one rack horizontal and when pushed causes the vertical rack to come down"
Reply from other commentor: "a simpler mechanism is the "bell-crank lever". you would just need an L-shaped lever for your case"
Me: "What's wrong with pulleys?"

Commentor: "I wish I was smart enough to come up with these myself"
Me: "So do I my friend, so do I"

Commentor: "Can you help me to use this principal on my equipment?"
Me: "You can get arrested for that and the word is 'principle' not 'principal' "

Commentor: "Unfortunately that's reciprocating to oscillating"
Me: "There's no flies on you, is there?"

Commentor: "did you find any?"
Me: "Any what?"

Commentor: "nice. just a V shape"
Me: "If you say so. Maybe I should call it Winston Churchill"

I know it isn't nice to think bad thoughts about stupid people, but damn the above comments made me laugh. Just thought I'd share my silly giggling with the masses. Who knows what great things some of these commentors have gone on to do with their lives. Then again, they might be working in McDonalds. If so, I've run out of coffee stirrers. Any chance you could get me some?