What? A Recumbent Polar Bear?

This is the beginning of what I call a recumbent polar bear. He is a real gamer. He sits in a recliner his hands  moving joysticks, his feet pumping pedals, and his head moving side to side peering at a yet to be built LCD screen. I am showing you this stage of the process to show you how things come together sometimes. I have already made a quick prototype of the bear, just to scale the whole project and determine the degree of motion to be added to the character. The trick now is to prepare for implementation of the mechanical motions. You need to plan ahead. This photo shows my polar bear before carving features.  Having surfaces square and parallel is sometimes essential when creating mechanisms so they must be configured before shaping.

The bears hand will move joysticks. The small hole on the top of the hand is for the protruding portion of the joystick. The pin showing is the axis of rotation. There is a brass plate set into the arm, with a hole in it to support the pin, allowing it to spin freely. The movement will be imparted from a rod extending from the bottom of the hand down through the arm of the chair.

The feet move in a similar manner, but movement is imparted through a foot pedal from below the floor. The head will swivel on a rod that rises up through the lounger.

​Of course now comes the challenging part. With the constraints of the mechanism parts defined, the job now is create a passable, recognizable bear, hopefully exhibiting a little gamer attitude! We'll see how it goes.