On a Planetary Scale is a fun up-cycle artwork by Gregory Cohen the owner of Lofty Pursuits.
The scale was a penny fortune scale, possibly from the late 1930’s. These were common across the USA. At one point the scales across the united states generated over ten million a year in revenue, in 1930 dollars, one penny at a time. This one once offered fortunes in the top window and your weight in the small window for just a penny.
The mechanism was not salvageable. This was probably a barn find (judging by the chicken feathers we found inside the machine.) It also appears that someone else tried a restoration, since parts were missing from the scale when we got it.
This was inspired by an experience Greg had as a child. The Hayden Planetarium had, and might still have scales that tell you your weights on different planets. When Greg was 10 years old, these kept his attention for seemingly hours, much to the joy of his mother.
Get on the scale, turn the knob, see your weights on other planets and our moon. Fake quotes from fictional and real people are there to be like a tour guide to the solar system, and possibly the galaxy.
The upgrade was accomplished by putting in a Load Cell, the electronic component of digital scales. This was attached to an arduino, that passes the data to a Raspberry Pi 4 that controls both screens. The art was assembled by Greg who also wrote the program the machine runs.
The best part was interfacing a 90 year old knob that was designed to do analog interaction to a modern computer.
2024
