John writes:
John writes:
"I made two of these M&M feeders for Christmas presents. I cut the gears out on the band saw, then sanded them to the line with a 1" strip sander. They were such a big hit. You get 3 M&Ms per turn of the small crank. It is made of solid cherry. And yes the Ball jar screws into the top. Turns out a Ball jar has 4 threads per inch, the coarsest thread I can cut."
I asked him if he had any problems with the M&Ms jamming. (Based on my marble machine experience, I know this can b a problem). His response:
"Well, I had some problems with that until I removed all the really odd shaped ones, broken ones, and real the small ones. I took a lot of experimenting to get the size of the holes right, 13/16" dia x .650" deep with a chamfer."
You can generate gear shapes using my gear template program or my free online gear template generator
See also: Michael Schultheiss's smarties dispenser
Back to my Woodworking website
