Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Wooden Esses

Well, it's been quite a while since my last post, but hopefully this model will make up for it somewhat. This is a wooden model of my design "esses", which I posted about a couple months ago. I came up with the design while fooling around on Great Stella one day, but later realized that it is the inner structure of George Hart's "Compass Points" model. It was also discovered by Robert Webb, the creator of Great Stella. I should also mention what a help George Hart was in helping figuring out how to build this model, and if you like this model you'll love his geometric sculpture.

It's made with 1/4" red oak plywood faces, stained darker on the inside and coated in three coats of polyurethane. The corners were made from pine 1x4 boards cut into triangles, which were then glued into five-sided pyramids. The faces are attached to these pyramids with brass wood screws, which look very nice with the red oak. But enough boring design stuff, the rest of this post will be a gallery of photos of the model. Enjoy!





8 comments:

Elise said...

wow, I didn't see that one of the inside corner. That's really cool! It seems like it would have taken a long time to do.

Rose said...

that is really really really really REALLY amazingly fantastically awesomely sweet. XDD good job, nate!!!!!

Anonymous said...

Fantastic construction. I too am a fan of George Hart. Did you handsaw the pieces or do you have access to a band-saw (or something else?).

Looking forward to seeing more of your constructions. (-:

Oh. And BTW. If you haven't already, you might like to persuade your father to invest in some Zome for you - which I'm sure you'll LOVE. Failing that, there's virtual Zome (search for "vZome" - it's free and a quick email to the author and he'll send instructions to enable full-functionality).

Unknown said...

You know. You should post something again for once....instead of researching. Okay??? Okay.

dhaux said...

do you have a template for this
or could you send me some numbers
really cool trying to build one my self

dhaux said...

have not heard from you could you
please give me some pointers on the
wooden esses. i have tried to construct some paper models but failed. will try one more time.thank you doug...

Unknown said...

Nate,

This piece looks like it was quite labor intensive. It looks absolutely beautiful! Am I correct in that it was designed from a stellated dodecagon?

-Mark

Nate said...

Mark --

You're close -- it's actually based on a stellation of the rhombic triacontahedron. It does have very prominent dodecahedral symmetry, however, and I have seen a similar model that was based on the small stellated dodecahedron.

dhaux --

Sorry for not noticing your comment sooner; I seldom update my blog! If you haven't had any success with paper models, it sure isn't any easier to build wooden ones. I would recommend starting with the platonic solids and going on from there. Wooden models are far more work-intensive and expensive-tool-intensive. Good luck!