Project Brief

"Develop a tensegrity structure, and hold up a can of soup 10 inches above a horizontal surface."

Tools and Materials Used

Popsicle sticks
Rubber bands
Strings
Wire

1) Structural Study

I approached this obstacle by studying the tensegrity structure in hopes of discovering opportunities to modify or add to the basic form to create an innovative method of aggregating tensegrity structures.

Individual Members

One Tensegrity Unit

Aggregated Structure

It was unable to withstand the weight of a can of soup.

Variation

I was unable to find a way to aggregate this unit keeping true to a pure tensegrity structure.

Tension Material Differences

Rubber band was a good material to quickly and more easily set up a tensegrity structure, but the stretching of the material makes it unsuitable for supporting much weight.

String as Tension Material

String worked best out of the three tension materials (rubber band, wire, and string).

There were many failures in attempting to put together a basic tensegrity structure using rubber bands. Using different materials for the tension member did not make the task any easier either. After many hours of trying new approaches, I came to the conclusion that a pure tensegrity structure would be impossible to achieve given the resources, time constraints, and design requirements of suspending a can of soup 10 inches above a surface.

Instead of trying to aggregate tensegrity units in a way where it can support a can of soup, I built a scaled up version of one basic tensegrity structure.

2) Final Product

Individual Members

Setup

Final Product

Can Test

Joinery Detail

The final design was fully hashed out, and it had some flaws as well. The joinery were not the most stable, but was able to hold the can of soup.

Joinery Detail

Layers of popsicle sticks were put together to strengthen the compression members, and the wire holds the pieces together.

Joinery Detail

One set of popsicle sticks is joined to another set with a brace on the side to prevent the joint from overloading.

Suspended Can of Soup