Four-Bar Origami Vertex

Summary

The design is based off of thick-folding principles and four-bar linkages. These carefully designed four-bar linkages provide the needed offset motion while maintaining one degree of freedom. The sector angles in this model are 120, 100, 80, and 60 degrees. This model shows that 4-bar linkages can be used to help thick materials fold in large origami patterns. Vertices can also be combined to create larger origami tessellations.

Any four angles that add up to 360 can be used to create a vertex using this technique.

Origami in Engineering - Thick folding

While paper can be folded many times over itself without causing problems, engineering materials (such as metal, plastic, etc.) cannot. In order for these materials to fold, they must move to stack on top of each other while still being connected.

Visit the BYU Compliant Mechanisms Research (CMR) labs page about origami mechanisms to learn more.

Printing Instructions

Any filament should work. We've used PLA for simplicity.

Note that some assembly is required to allow them to move (shown as white tape in the photos).

Learn More

This design was developed by the Compliant Mechanisms Research Group (CMR) from Brigham Young University (BYU). Follow us at @byucmr on Instagram, @CompliantMechanismsResearchGroup on Facebook, or visit the BYU Compliant Mechanisms Research (CMR) website to learn more about compliant mechanisms.

Technical Information

For in-depth technical information, see the following publications:

Lang, Robert, et al. "Rigidly Foldable Thick Origami using Designed-Offset Linkages" ASME 2019 International Design Engineering Technical Conferences and Computers and Information in Engineering Conference. American Society of Mechanical Engineers Digital Collection, 2019.

To learn more about compliant mechanisms in general, see the BYU Compliant Mechanisms Research (CMR) website or these books: Compliant Mechanisms, Handbook of Compliant Mechanisms

Intellectual Property

The downloadable 3D print files provided here may be used, modified, and enjoyed for noncommercial use. To license this technology for commercial applications, contact:

BYU Technology Transfer Office

3760 Harold B. Lee Library

Brigham Young University

Provo, UT 84602

Phone: (801) 422-6266

https://techtransfer.byu.edu/contact