Back to Tensegrity Tetrahedron
From: Spencer W Hunter
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.geodesic
Subject: Re: Tensegrity Tetrahedron
Date: Thu, 20 Oct 2005 20:39:40 +0000 (UTC)
Bob Burkhardt wrote:
>Ref: http://www.intergate.com/~bobwb/ts/synergetics/photos/tetra.html
>Here's a design prototype I put together when I was looking at
>putting together a tensegrity mast for Phil Earnhardt. I think it's
>buildable with inelastic tendons, but for the elastic tendons which I
>think would be appropriate for Phil's mast it looked like it was too
>unstable. It was very easy for the central cluster to pop out one of
>the faces.
>Bob
This looks very similar to my "basic unit" in the Zigzag-Strut Tensegrity at:
http://www.u.arizona.edu/~shunter/zigzag.html
See particularly the image:
http://www.u.arizona.edu/~shunter/tetra.jpg
The minor difference is that I used a loop of twine at the center instead of the single tendon shown between c1 and c2. I'd be a little surprized if the structure were to be stable as illustrated.
An equally similar structure turns up in Motro's _Tensegrity_ book, Fig. 7.6 on p.194. There a single tendon is used, but the tet is distorted as described in the Zigzag-Strut Tensegrity file to the point where c1 and c2 intersect and connect to the opposing tet edges, p3-p4 and p1-p2, respectively.
--
Spencer Hunter, Tucson, AZ.
gopher://www.u.arizona.edu:80/hGET%20/%7Eshunter
