Talk:Spirograph

Pre-Spirograph drawing toy

I have an early 20th C. device (it shows up in a Sears catalog of 1908) called "The Marvelous Wondergraph". It has no gears but uses a rotating disc for the paper and a reciprocating arm with adjustable pivots to hold a dip pen. When cranked it produces designs just like a Spirograph. --Saxophobia 13:39, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for that information. I looked it up and included sourced information in the article. Interesting. SilkTork ^{✔Tea time} 15:56, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

My brother and I would spend hours playing with our MAGIC PATTERN drawing set in the late 1949-1951. It was identical to the much later SpiroMatic and Spirograph toys. All the kids in my Newark, NJ, neighborhood had them. They were THE Xmas present to ask for, helped along by ads on the Dupont Television Network. Erniejpdx (talk) 20:48, 30 March 2019 (UTC)

I think you mean the Dumont network. 2601:545:8201:6290:D81D:AC37:9BB1:FDF7 (talk) 13:52, 25 February 2024 (UTC)

Inventor ?

On the Polish version it is said that spirograph was first invented and patented by Bruno Abakanowicz, on English and Polish versions of this man entries it is confirmed, but on English version of spirograph page he is not mentioned. What is the truth? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.206.105.125 (talk) 19:23, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

It appears that Abakanowicz did make an instrument he called a spirograph which was used for measuring curves. He did not, though, make the toy. I have done some research and included sourced material in the article. SilkTork ^{✔Tea time} 15:56, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

Wrong figure?

The figure in the math basics section looks wrong. r is the radius of a small circle, but in the figure r is defined as the distance from the center of a large circle to the center of a small circle. I don't have a drawing software to fix. Can anybody fix that mistake? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.188.234.114 (talk) 23:27, 9 October 2011 (UTC) I also noticed this error. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.151.60.196 (talk) 08:21, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

I think the above two comments and this one can be removed. "... in the figure r is defined as the distance from the center of a large circle to the center of a small circle" is no longer (if ever) true. The current diagram correctly indicates r to be the radius of the small circle. Rick314 (talk) 02:23, 28 March 2026 (UTC)

And the photo is not the original toy. The original toy was in rings which also had outside circumferance teeth. Corkboard tacks were used (in cardboard) to hold the ring down so the plate-circles could be rolled around the outside too. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.144.71.174 (talk) 18:25, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

I don't have the knowledge to fix it, but I want to say that I think the math section of this article may be the most awesome thing I have ever seen on Wikipedia, ever. Carlo (talk) 17:03, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Resonance cascade?

The image is marked "resonance cacade" - what is this? Oli Filth^{(talk|contribs)} 15:54, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

I notice a similarity in pictures in this article and in the article Runcinated 6-simplexes but I am not skilled enough in goniometry to formulate an explanation. 83.85.143.141 (talk) 13:01, 27 December 2016 (UTC)

Spirograph images are hypotrochoids, with curved "sides". Polytopes (like the runcinated 6-simplexes) though have straight line segments. Andy Dingley (talk) 15:51, 27 December 2016 (UTC)

I did overlook that difference. Thanks. My parents bought me a Spirograph round 1972. 83.85.143.141 (talk) 16:11, 27 December 2016 (UTC)

Date Inconsistency?

The text states the Spirograph was developed between 1862-1864 and that the inventor exhibited it at a 1965 toy fair. I’m guessing the development was actually between 1962-1964?--jqubed (Talk | Contributions) 02:40, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

Joseph Jopling's prior claim (1823)

Here is a link to the 1823 book by Jopling. There are numerous websites offering the PDF "free", but it isn't available on Internet archive. I prefer to avoid Google, but I couldn't find another source which allowed some viewing. https://books.google.ca/books?id=fWUUAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA1&source=gbs_toc_r&cad=3#v=onepage&q&f=false The Septenary system of generating curves by continued motion By Joseph Jopling Humphrey Tribble (talk) 07:02, 3 January 2022 (UTC)

Official Website is down

Official Website link is https://www.kahootztoys.com/spirograph-home.html But this website seems to have gone down sometime during 2021. I checked archive org and confirmed that 2 snapshots in 2021 April, are of a temporary page which redirects to playmonster .com Since this is just an online store rather than a "home page for spirograph", I don't want to replace it with the new website's link. If anyone does not have a better source link in the lines of home page or some thing similar, I will remove this external link in the coming weeks. --Guyver (talk) 09:09, 11 August 2022 (UTC)

Inside/Outside Ring Math (and Sampling)

The outer-ring equations would be useful to post as well since they apply to the actual toy as much as the inner-ring equations do but I am not an experienced Wikipedia editor. The inner-ring curves are given as x(t) = (R - r)*cos(t) + p*cos((R/r - 1)*t) and y(t) = (R - r)*sin(t) - p*sin((R/r - 1)*t). With the same initial conditions of pen as far to the right as possible, the equations for the outer-ring curves are x(t) = (R + r)*cos(t) + p*cos((R/r + 1)*t) and y(t) = (R + r)*sin(t) + p*sin((R/r + 1)*t). Given the inner-ring equations, the outer-ring equations can be derived by inspection -- The center of the the small circle moves counterclockwise with radius (R + r) instead of (R - r). Instead of losing 1 rev per rotation around the ring (R/r - 1) because the small circle turns clockwise as it moves around the ring counterclockwise, it gains one rev (R/r + 1) because both motions are counterclockwise. And because the small circle rotates counterclockwise instead of clockwise the pen is (+p*sin()) instead of (-p*sin()).

If interested, I wrote an article for the The Derive Newsletter #125 (March 2022, for users of the Derive computer algebra system, on page 42) titled "Spirograph Figures with Sampling". The article has different initial conditions and definition of "t" than the Wikipedia page, so different resulting equations. Further math then uses sampling to get the pretty pictures shown in the article. But all that probably isn't appropriate for the Wikipedia page. Rick314 (talk) 23:47, 27 March 2026 (UTC)