Foldable Dymaxion Puzzle Globe

thingiverse

Created this to get a hands-on idea of folding and unfolding world maps such as the Dymaxion projection, since it was hard to imagine how they would wrap around a sphere. Can be used as an educational toy or simply as a cool object to play with. Every piece can be printed flat without supports, but for better resolution, print them vertically, which will require supports as shown in the pictures. Uses standard polypanel connectors. Tried a version using a relief/topographical map of the globe, but the variation in surface height made hinges unreliable: Some areas (sea floors) were so low that there wasn't enough hinge to keep them attached and they just fell off; Other areas were so high (mountains) that the hinge wouldn't rotate. Included GlobeBools_Complete, which is a set of "slicers" that can be used in a boolean operation on any sphere to create your own version using a different globe mesh if you like.