Build kit

The Fractal Machine

The third kit in the Hardware Basics series. A circuit of transistors draws on a 64 × 64 screen by itself — no processor and no program, just logic: the Sierpinski triangle from ten gates, the same triangle from random dots (the chaos game) and the living Munching Squares pattern from 1962. A standalone, free kit. 3,064 transistors.

This kit is free: all lessons are open, no sign-up needed.

What is inside

  1. Introduction
  2. History: patterns that repeat themselves
  3. Lesson 0. Gates from transistors: for those who start from scratch
  4. Lesson 1. Memory: the latch and the D flip-flop
  5. Lesson 2. The counter: six flip-flops count to 63
  6. Lesson 3. The raster scan: the screen dot by dot
  7. Lesson 4. The Sierpinski triangle: a fractal from ten gates
  8. Lesson 5. The chaos game: a triangle from chance
  9. Lesson 6 (bonus). Munching Squares: a living pattern from 1962
  10. Summary
  11. All the parts
  12. Instructions in pictures