Flapping Buckyball (truncated icosahedron)
[version 3.1-5, a union of "truncated" icosahedral nets]

In this version, watch the pentagons, which switch positions after each cycle of open-close-open-close. The nets here are generated from a common from an icosahedral net that has been truncated. Each of the 12 spaces resulting from the truncation offer 5 sites at which a pentagon can be attched. In this particular sequence, choices are made that are uniform, in order to be somewhat elegant (we hope). An animation of the 5 resulting nets is at the bottom of this page.

Grab it, turn it, spin it with the mouse. Double click the figure to stop the animation. You can hold the RIGHT mouse button down and drag it HORIZONTALLY across the frame to sequence through the frames.

(Please be patient while the applet processes MUCHO compressed data.)