What is this rotating map thing officially called?

November 19, 2020 2:27 PM

Doing a project in which I make a model that consists of 3 rotating cylinders all which are wrapped in one of three pieces of a map. The toy is part of a museum exhibit and you are meant to rotate the three pieces until the map lines up properly. What is this called? The person who originally came up with the idea to do it saw it first at a historical museum in Italy somewhere. I know, super specific. Link to image. Help!
posted by leafmealone to Media & Arts (4 answers total)

I have seen things similar to this on large scale playground equipment. The piece is called an activity panel. Usually it's a tic tac toe game but I could swear I've seen it before with 3 rotating columns lining up to make a bigger image.
posted by phunniemee at 2:40 PM on November 19, 2020

Ok, a little more specific: playground activity spin panel returns a lot of results similar to this.

I'm assuming from your question you're looking for something to call this? I'd go with spinning map activity panel.
posted by phunniemee at 2:43 PM on November 19, 2020 [1 favorite]

Are you thinking of a cryptex?
I associate them with numbers / letters / locks / encryption, but... maybe another avenue to explore.
posted by Acari at 6:58 PM on November 19, 2020

I have installed something very similar to this in a museum. If they have a proper name, no one on the project knew what it was. We more or less called it a rotating-mix-and-match-thing.

In the case of your map, maybe you want to call it a rotating puzzle?
posted by keeo at 5:41 PM on November 21, 2020