US3722153A — Structural System (Baer, 1970) [CA949279A]

Stephen C. Baer / Zomeworks Corporation — Filed May 4, 1970

Google Patents (CA): https://patents.google.com/patent/CA949279A Google Patents (US): https://patents.google.com/patent/US3722153A

Bibliographic data

Field	Value
US patent	US3722153A — issued March 27, 1973
CA equivalent	CA949279A — filed May 3, 1971; published June 18, 1974; Expired
GB equivalent	GB1354521A — filed May 4, 1971; published June 5, 1974; Expired
Title	Structural system
Inventor	Stephen C. Baer, Corrales, NM
Assignee	Zomeworks Corporation, Albuquerque, NM
Priority date	May 4, 1970
US filed	May 4, 1970 (Appl. No. 34,163)
US issued	March 27, 1973
US classification	52/81, 52/648, 52/DIG.10 (static structures, polyhedron)
International class	E04B1/32 — Arched/vaulted/folded structures with faceted surface

Abstract (US3722153A)

A structural system in which the structural members are interconnected so that they are parallel to the lines of the star of the faces of an icosahedron. The system includes structural members parallel to the lines of the star of the vertices of an icosahedron and also includes structural members parallel to the lines of the star of the midpoints of the edges of an icosahedron.

10 Claims, 15 Drawing Figures.

What this is

This is the 31-zone structural system described in the Zome Primer (Zomeworks Corporation, August 1970). The Primer referred to it as “Patent applied for… assigned to Zomeworks Corporation.” The filing date (May 4, 1970) is three months before the Primer’s publication — the patent was in process as the book went to print.

The 31 lines of the icosahedron star are:

6 A-lines — through icosahedron vertices (paired opposite vertices)
10 B-lines — through dodecahedron vertices / icosahedron face midpoints
15 C-lines — through icosahedron edge midpoints

Structural members parallel to these 31 directions can be assembled into zonohedra — convex polyhedra whose faces are all parallelograms in parallel pairs (zones). Any zone can be stretched, shrunk, or removed without altering the geometry of other zones. Multiple zomes cluster through shared skew hexagon faces.

Prior art cited

Cundy & Rollett, Mathematical Models, Oxford Press, 1961 — pages on zonohedra and Archimedean solids
John Borrego, Space and Structures, MIT Press, 1968
Dome Book 2 (1971, distributed by Random House) — the publication that documented Drop City constructions
US3468082A (Hadley, 1969) — sphere-shaped structure
US3611620A (Perry, 1971) — rhombic hexahedra blocks for making rhombic dodecahedra and triacontahedra (contemporaneous, cited)

Relationship to other Zomeworks work

This structural patent preceded all the thermal patents by 25 years. Its commercial analog was Zometool — the 31-zone ball-and-stick modeling system that Jose Baer described as “possibly his father’s most significant work,” adopted by scientists for quasicrystal and symmetry demonstrations. The structural logic of the zome — faceted parallelogram faces, clustering through shared zones — is also what allowed the Baer House to have the south-facing geometry that made the DrumWall possible.