Morning all.....
Still unfortunately having fun and games with the motor - just how something so small and plastic manages to sound like a bag of spanners is beyond me - but thought I'd bang up a couple of videos of the "finished" item.
http://www.musicodes.co.uk/orrery99.html
I say "finished" - I'm still waiting for the official power wall-wart, which hopefully is a little more attractive than the once-white alternative strapped to it at present. I've also cut the audio - you'd have kittens if you heard the racket that the motor is kicking up.
Until the replacement turns up, there's obviously little point in calibrating for speed - not that I know how to do it anyway. The subject (i.e. achieving a speed of 6.8 rpm) is mentioned briefly in issue 1, and refers to more info being in a later edition - I've either missed it, or it's in #52.
(By all means have a look, but frankly I can't face ploughing my way through 51 magazines - with no index!)
The same applies to positioning the planets - there are references to this in issues 1-4, but they seem contradictory (or ambiguous) in places.
Of course, there is a third option, which is me being dense.
(You choose, but don't let me know, thanks!)