The tides exhibit shows the relationship between movement of the sun around the earth and the tides. A servo-motor drives the moon around a rotating earth; the relationship is mechanically fixed at 30:1 using a set of quality gearboxes that drive co-axial shafts to produce the exhibit.

A encoder that tells us exactly where the moon is with respect to the earth is connected to a video server, which shows a video of a slowly rotating tidal ellipse. This exhibit is a complex combination of mechanical equipment and a video display in a case with a semi-transparent mirror. The mirror, made at Mad Systems, reflects a percentage of the light from a video display and makes it look to the observer as if the display is located in space about halfway down the earth globe. The resulting display is a rapidly rotating earth, with the moon rotating around the earth, with the tidal bulge accurately keeping pace with the movement of the moon.