Solo [ED]A Gear a Gadget II

[Crylon Stonecraft]

15 Summer 521 Rising on another day among the Demesne, Crylon made his way down to the mill. Today he had been asked to swing by the place by Sona, the woman who ran the mill. He was interesting in learning more of her trade, and so they two often worked together on various tasks and things and Crylon tried to assist where he could or follow along where he could not. Today Sona seemed a bit busy, rushing about the mill. Though she saw Crylon after he arrived she did not come over, and so rather than interrupting her work Crylon moved off to the side and waited. As expected once she was freed from her work in a few chimes Sona came over of her own volition, waving a bit tiredly at Crylon. "How stone arm, how you you. I'll tell you how I am, tired! I swear, some god of random bad luck is out for me. We've had two broken parts in the last forty eight hours, and several rushes for supplies for an urgent repair." Clearly letting off a bit of steam Sona settled into a somewhat calmer mood after explaining her frustrations, before smiling and patting Crylon on the arm. "That is not good Sona. How can help? You said needed me? Is need fix something?" Sona shook her head, making herself clear right away. "No, not that. I've got that handled. But along with that, someone dropped of an item, a gadget, and said they couldn't get it working. Not sure if its broken or what, but it looks simple enough. A clock, sitting over there. A bit on the big side, but simpler ones do tend to be a bit bigger. So could you check it over and make a diagram? I don't need you to fix it, not sure you could, though it would be one less thing if you could... But if you could at least diagram it inside and out I should have a better idea of what is wrong. Could you do that Crylon." With a pat on her arm back Crylon nodded, meeting the woman's eyes in assurance. "This, I can do. Leave for me." Checking the clock once or twice Crylon tried to lift it, and while finding it a bit heavy felt it was light enough to lift. Being careful with it the Isur slowly hefted up the clocks weight and then headed towards the tower. Inside was his desk where he did most of his writing and diagramming, and where he had the proper tools and supplies for such a task. He also had paper and things for writing there along with his magical desk, and so felt he would be better off trying for doing the work there. Sona, clearly understanding what he was doing and glad to have the clock out of the way waved at the Isur's receding back before turning back to her own work. As such Crylon made his way up into the tower, feeling more comfortable surrounded by its solid stone and stout nature. It was not Isur made but was still a fine building, and he was glad his work space had been moved there for him to do his writing. He mainly used it for designs of an architectural nature, but he saw no reason it could not also be used for those of a gadget. WC: 567

[Crylon Stonecraft]

Having managed to move the clock up to his room Crylon quickly set about his preparations. First things first was clearing his work space of other items, drawings, have formed idea, and other such materials. While he did not have any active projects going on for design the Isur liked to keep himself both busy and well honed, and so did not let his Architectural nature fade away from disuse. With that done Crylon maneuvered things about so that he could see the clock while standing at his desk, not forcing him to look away each time he went to write but allowing him to just look up and down from his paper to the clock. With that done he began sketching the outside of the clock, the possibly simplest part. First he drew it from the front, taking out a piece of parchment and slowly drawing out its face. It had a box like shape, solid looking, with a glass face at the top. This smaller box had metal dials pointing in different directions. A longer narrow hand and a shorter stubbier one... And around the face counting to twelve were numbers, with twelve at the top. He also noted lines, one on each of these numbers and halfway between each, all of this overlay-ed on a circle. In this way, looking at it from a different perspective, it was a circle with notches on it at and between each number, and then a number atop each odd notch. This seemed outwardly to be the time telling mechanism, though at the moment it was not moving. Slowly he sketched each of these points, one by one as he detailed them in his head. The face. The body. The glass face. He kept at this till he had a simple if stylized depiction of the front of the clock, enough he felt for a first step. With that done Crylon headed over and turned the box at and angle, so that the front and one side could be seen. With that done he returned to his paper and began sketching again. This one was smaller and less detailed as there was not as much going on for the sides, though he did notice two hinges where the clock likely opened at. Noting these clearly he kept at his work, noting the box and the third dimension as best he could though not without having to draw the box over lining the lines. Returning to the clock again Crylon kept at it, turning the opposite way to show the front and the other side. Here he once more depicted things, but found it went even faster than the previous side. After all this side was completely bare, not even with the hinges like the other. WC: 464

[Crylon Stonecraft]

All the other sides done Crylon finally turned the clock around, facing the back towards him. As with before his depiction was simple, and done quickly as it also did not have many details going on. The only odd thing was a small hole on the back, though Crylon was unsure what it was for. With a rush of drawing Crylon finished off the back end, finishing up the outside of the clock. With those elements done Crylon finally moved over to the clock and opened the door. What he saw within was a mishmash of wood and steel, and immediately confused him. However as with all tasks that at first seemed insurmountable, Crylon knew that if he broke it apart into bits he would be able to measure and understand those parts. By chunking a task into such easily digestible pieces the Isur knew he could work out a plan of things and do things step by step. What at first look seemed utter nonsense at close inspection made sense... This part connected here... And this part to this... And then... Working out the lines one by one he tried to figure them out piece by piece, drawing each in turn. This part was a bit tricky, since drawing the actual detail on each gear was near impossible and if it was possible would require ages. On the other hand he did not want to be inaccurate... Settling on a middle ground he worked to get the sizing and spaces right, without getting the exact nature of the gear correct, instead simply making a note of the type of gear face for later use. With that decided Crylon headed to top of the clock, and began his diagram there, working within a simple box shape to depict the outer surface of the casing. However by the third gear he once more noticed the problem. He could show all of the gears from the front, but in doing so detail was lost. The gears while all flush from the front, were not spaced that way from the side. Some were near the front of the case, others more in the middle, and others near the back. Heading back to the clock and sticking his head inside he could see that he had beegn drawing them out wrong. This took some more thinking as Crylon worked out how to properly draw the parts. Not from the front... And not the side as the box only opened from the front... Then perhaps... In chunks? Drawing a series of smaller boxes below the main box he had began, Crylon noted the positioning of each of these. Rather than trying to do them from the side he had thought of it as slices of the box. One slice of the box was all the gears in line with that slice of the box. The next was a slice a bit further back within, and contained all the gears at that depth. And this continued left to right going further into the clock box, until finally all of the gears from the perspective of the third dimension laid in one of the boxes. With a sigh Crylon began work on depicting this, trying his best to make it clear for Sona. WC: 546

[Crylon Stonecraft]

Having worked out a method, Crylon began his work in earnest. In this method he would note each gear twice. Once in the main box where it laid as one looked at it from the front. And then a second time in each of the slices of box, looking at it as it ran in the third dimension. This he felt was the simplest method to capture such a three dimensional diagram, particularly as many of the gears were in the same depth as another and so in truth it did not take a large number of these slice boxes to complete. Starting again at the top Crylon drew one gear, a large one that matched the clock face, though was deeper within the clock. After that was two more than nearly overlay-ed the clock, but in looking closer were on different distance layers. From looking at them they seemed to have some kind of linkage to the main clock face, but not directly. He thought this might have been some kind of difference, which would account for the likely varying speeds of the clock hands, but he could not be sure without confirming with Sona. He did though understand how a clock normally worked, having seen them before, and knew the hands moved at varying speeds due to one being a chime and another a bell. How exactly that worked though he was a bit fuzzy on. With those done Crylon moved on to another set of gears, noticing several clustered near the first main one. How they all interacted though he did not understand, hoping that once he showed the final diagram to Sona she would understand. Below that was a rod, which seemed to run through a few gears. This ended a the back wall, and after once more running over to check as he did when confirming the placeholder of the dimension of the gears, he realized it matched up to the hole on the back. He was unsure what this did, but clearly something went in through this whole and turned this internal rod, which worked other gears. Beyond this the machinations was lost on him, not quite understanding what was going on. What did that turning rod do? Did it feed into something? After thinking on this Crylon realized that in order for the clock to work it needed to be wound. Which meant it had to be fed manually energy from the outside. Perhaps with something being inserted then in that hole in the back, and then turned? This would explain to Crylon why it was there, it was how the clock was powered without having to open the entire clock and take things out. With a smile Crylon let out a sigh, glad he was able to work out at least one aspect of the clock. Admittedly an obvious one, but one all the same. WC: 483

[Crylon Stonecraft]

Moving on from that point the feed rod as Crylon called it, he continued his diagram to the next point. However looking things over he could see beyond this not many were left, and he had most of them mapped onto the diagrams. This connected here... And this to here... And below that was this one connecting as so... But beyond that nothing. Putting some finishing touches on the last fear gears Crylon felt some satisfaction from his progress. What had seemed impossible when he first opened the clock was now chunked and dealt with. Taking a break for a chime to stretch and to let the ink dry on the paper, Crylon slowly took up the papers and one by one checked over his diagram. With one slice in one hand and the main box in the other he ran through each one by one. This went here, and fed into here... Which attached to here this way... One by one he worked through, until he confirmed he had not missed any gears and the entire inside of the clock box was done. Satisfied at his labor he closed the box, set the pile of papers aside to neatly stack them, and then binding them together with some twine took his load back tot he Sawmill. That was namely the clock and his papers he had been working on. This was a tricky load, but with vigor Crylon made his way back down the stairs, out of the tower, and back to the sawmill. At this point several bells had passed, something Crylon did not notice till he left the building and saw the suns position. Regardless he continued his work, and made it back to the sawmill to fins Sona was still there. Once more he had to wait awhile for Sona to get to a good stopping point, until finally she was ready to check things. First things first the gadgeteer opened the clocked, looked inside, and made a sound in her throat. From there she headed to Crylons stack of papers, checking his work one by one. By the time she was finished Sona was chuckling, leaving a puzzled look on Crylon's face. "Uh... So did you find... Issue?" Shaking Sona continued laughing, smiling a mirth y face at the Isur. "A problem. Oh just a minor one. Did you not notice a lack of anything but gears in there. Like, a place to store the power? Did you not notice anything missing." Crylon shook his head, not understanding where things were going, but realizing he had missed something obvious to Sona. "No, is not seen clock inside before. So not sure." With a smile and a pat on the Isur's arm Sona shook her head still smiling. "I see. Well let me tell you, this petching thing is missing one of the most vital parts. Without it, this thing is a dud. Its missing the painspring Crylon. That feeds the entire thing. You wind the clock, which tightens the mainspring, and then over time it feeds that power slowly into the mechanism. But see here, where it should connect. Thing is clean gone. Maybe next time before spending so long looking at what is there, focus also on what is not. That, as in this case, can be just as important." Nodding while trying to look a the clock, Crylon realized his mistake. And looking closely, he could now see the missing piece. Still, Crylon reasoned, it was still a valuable lesson and he had learned a good bit. WC: 594

[Alric Lysane]

Your Grades

Crylon Stonecraft

Skills

Body Building – 1
Cleaning – 1
Drawing – 5
Gadgeteering – 4
Logic – 3
Socialization – 3


Lores

Gadgeteering: Clock Blueprint
Gadgeteering: Diagnosing Problems With Gears
Gadgeteering: Winding Powered Mechanisms
Insurmountable Tasks: One Step At A Time