Over the Thanksgiving break I went to a Chuck-E-Cheese-esque (Dave and Busters-like? A gaming arcade with a play area for kids) place and played a coin pusher for a few hours. Specifically an Andamiro Star Wars game https://andamirousa.com/product/star-wars-coin-pusher/ , though I also played an Avengers one from the same company. I thought to myself "that was pretty fun, I wonder how much a machine like this costs".
The answer seems to be about $15,000 for smaller models, with the Star Wars double machine being around $30,000. Which, you know, makes some sense considering it's a capital investment for a real business, and if I dropped $30 or so into it across two hours it'll hopefully break even in a year or so.
Anyway, I've got a bunch of Arduinos and motors and LEDs lying around the house, along with a big bag of coins, and some leftover pie tins and cardboard, and various knives and hand tools. I've taken them all out of storage and they're sitting all over the floor.
What are the odds that they (or some additional metal/plastic/wooden pieces I go out and purchase) get arranged into a vaugely coin-pusher state by April 5th, 2026? To be honest it should just be a weekend project to get something working, but it's already been a weekend and all I have so far is a mess and a soldered motor shield.
What counts as a coin pusher? It has to, at a minimum, have a coin pusher platform that does an approximately sinusoidal sweep motion while on, and at least one "standard" drop entrance (so you can't put your coins directly on the platform with 100% accuracy with your hands).
Some background: I work as a Mechanical Engineer and am reasonable as a programmer. I rarely complete projects, and most of the motors and motor controllers were from when I thought I was going to make a drilling robot that would slide along dimensional lumber and drill holes for me, like a portable CNC. Did not make a portable CNC. I have been diagnosed with autism and ADHD, but come on, who hasn't.
I will not bet in this market, but feel free to start up a side market regarding how many hours and dollars I throw at this, and I'll insider trade on that. I would guess I'm at like 5 hours, or more. I spent 1 at Lowes looking at metal before deciding I'd go McMaster or Pie-tin instead. I spent about 2 unpacking my soldering stuff, soldering, and cleaning up my desk afterward. I spent maybe 2 more unpacking my various motors and shields and microcontrollers and looking up part numbers and just figuring out what combinations actually made sense to try.
1,000