Fully 3D Printed Mobiles
Kinetic Sculptor and Mathematician Collaborate
These 3D printed mobiles are the result of a collaboration between Marco Mahler, a kinetic sculptor specializing in mobiles, and Henry Segerman, assistant professor in the Department of Mathematics at Oklahoma State University.
These mobiles come out of the 3D-printer completely assembled as shown in the photos. They are made of separate loose pieces connected to each other. The balance points for these mobiles were calculated to 1/1000th of a millimeter (1/25360th of an inch). The models for some of these mobiles were drawn up “by hand”, others were created utilizing scripts that we wrote. Some of the mobiles, like Mobile 4.2, are designed with a very small increase or decrease in thickness from one part to the next, something that is not possible to do with conventional handmade mobiles. Utilizing scripts also allows for designs that would be very time consuming to make by hand, such as the Quaternary Tree (Level 6), which has 1365 pieces.
We met via Twitter (At the time, Marco lived in Portland, Oregon, and Henry in Melbourne, Australia) in early February 2013 when Henry was looking for suggestions for a motor for one of his 3D printed kinetic sculptures. A conversation ensued about the possibilities for making 3D printed mobiles. After about 300 emails, several conversations over Skype, hundreds of lines of code, and a number of test prints and trial-and-error experiments, the result is the collection of mobiles that is now available through our shop at Shapeways (a 3D printing service company). After an extensive Google search, it appears that these are the first fully 3D printed mobiles in the world.
