After working out three or four different ways of driving a tapping toe model I've spend a bit of time putting together a working prototype. The first layout I tried was the simplest design from the previous blog post where a pendulum lifts a drive pin over half its travel. 

To test how it worked I've started off with just the feet. The left hand foot in the picture is hinged at the back. A drive pin is connected to the foot and rests on the horizontal arm sticking out from the pendulum. When the pendulum swings left of centre the foot is lifted.

That's as far as I got. It turns out that this movement looks just right. The slight 'dwell' between taps works nicely. The slightest movement of the box sets the toe tapping impatiently.

So to finish off this post, here are a couple of nice pictures of the shoes and how they fit on the box. You know, I think it actually works as a model in its own right.