We have been experimenting with paper models for a few weeks now in tandem with developing the circuits. These angular forms have been made out of fairly heavy weight paper and card so we have been able to physically enclose the circuits within them and use them as prototype noise machines for installations we had. One of the forms that worked realy well (and looks like it has landed from outer space) is the truncated tetrahedron.

Truncated Tetrahedron

This shape consists of 4 hexagons and 4 triangles. The shape works for our means as it has panes so the circuitry and component fixtures (such as pots/ldrs) etc can be easily placed on each side. Whilst creating this from paper was relatively simple, a process of drawing out the flat net and simply folding this up. Translating this into wood and metal is significantly trickier.

The first problem was working out the internal or Dihedral angles of the shape (shout out to Vince Clarke who managed to work this out!) which were 109 and 70 degrees and getting these to work with wood.

Wooden Prototype

This is the first wooden prototype laser cut from mdf. After lots of trial and error we got the angles to work and the sanding just correct to mean that the shape worked together. Next step is to investigate metal panels and how these could interlock with the wooden faces.