This project started with some idle chatter with some guys I used to work with. Eric had this idea for a "slinky machine", which would essentially become an escalator on which a slinky continuously descends. Years passed and I occasionally teased Eric about it. Eventually, I figured he'd never build it and it was fair game for me to do it. I started with a slinky from Walmart and experimented with how high and how wide the steps needed to be for a slinky to descend. 10 cm of height and width per step seemed to be enough.