7-6-4


VRML, OFF


VRML, OFF

My solution to the 7-6-4 acron was generated by following a similar set of rules to those used by Mason Green in his discovery of the 7-7-3 acrohedron.  These are described here.  

Starting with a virtual heptagon (i.e. a heptagon which is removed from the final polyhedron), surround it with a double ring of squares and hexagons.  A ring of heptagons can be fitted to the exposed top edges of the squares and the exposed lateral edges of the hexagons.  A second ring of squares can now be used to connect the exposed top edges of the hexagons and the adjacent exposed edges of the heptagons. (Part model here).  The remaining exposed edges would now fit a second ring of hexagons.  If these were to be inserted though they would overlap (here).  Hexagons though can be 'creased' across a vertex to vertex diagonal.  The two 'half-hexagons' that result can be thought of as being made up of two sets of three coplanar triangles.  This creasing operation can be performed on the second ring of hexagons such that the exposed lateral edges co-incide and the top edges form a heptagram.   The resulting figure is shown in the left hand image above.  It has 70 faces ... and a genus of 1. 

The coplanar faces can be resolved by replacing the central triangle in each half-hexagon with a tetrahedron.  This has been done (with all the tetrahedra pointing inwards) on the right hand image above.  The figure now has 85 faces ... and remains genus 1.  

7/2-6-4


Co-planar triangles (everted): VRML, OFF


Co-planar triangles (inverted): VRML, OFF


Aplanar triangles (tetrahedra inverted): VRML, OFF

Aplanar triangles (tetrahedra everted): VRML, OFF

The above isomorph to the 7-6-4 contains 7/2-6-4 vertices.  The heptagons in the 7-6-4 acrohedron are replaced by 7/2 heptagrams, and the 7/2-heptagram is replaced by a 7/3 heptagram.  The same co-planarity problems exist as in the 7-6-4 acrohedron, the two minimal isomers exhibiting co-planar triangles are shown top right and top left.  Again the co-planarity can be resolved by the addition of 14 tetrahedra, these have been placed pointing inwards in the lower left image (allowing the external structure to dominate) and outwards in the lower right image (allowing the internal structure to dominate.  My thanks to Roger Kaufman for alerting me to the probable existence of this isomorphs.  

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