Zometool

Article summary

Zometool is a construction set toy that had been created by a collaboration of Steve Baer (the creator of Zome architecture), artist Clark Richert, Paul Hildebrandt (the present CEO of Zometool), and co-inventor Marc Pelletier. It is manufactured by Zometool, Inc. According to the company, Zometool was primarily designed for kids. Zometool has also been used in other fields including mathematics and physics. For example, aperiodic tilings such as Penrose tilings can be modeled using Zometool. The learning tool was designed by inventor-designer Steve Baer, his wife Holly, and others. The Zometool plastic construction set toy is produced by a privately owned company of the same name, based outside of Longmont, Colorado, and which evolved out of Baer's company ZomeWorks. Its elements consist of small connector nodes and struts of various colors. The overall shape of a connector node is that of a non-uniform small rhombicosidodecahedron with each face replaced by a small hole. The ends of the struts are designed to fit in the holes of the connector nodes, allowing for syntheses of a variety of structures. The idea of shape-coding the three types of struts was developed by Marc Pelletier and Paul Hildebrandt. To create the "balls", or nodes, Pelletier and Hildebrandt invented a system of 62 hydraulic pins that came together to form a mold.…

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