Skip to main content
Stesso

Demonstrate Square's Flexibility

0:00
1:03
21.6K views

At 0:00 in

Triangle Tuesday!

Watch on YouTube

What happens here

Begin by presenting a simple square frame constructed from four wooden boards. Hold the frame and apply slight pressure to one of its corners. Observe how easily the square deforms into a parallelogram. This demonstrates the inherent lack of rigidity in a square shape, as its angles can change without altering the length of its sides, allowing it to rack or collapse under stress.

Goal: Show how a square frame can easily deform.

Tools and materials

  • Square Wooden Frame N/A — To visually demonstrate the flexibility of a square shape

What they say

Hide

Why do engineers put triangles in everything? Let's get after it. The square looks really strong, but watch what happens. The boards didn't bend, they didn't get longer, they didn't get shorter. The only thing that changed was the angle at the corners. Because a square can change shape by rotating on the corners. That's why it's not very rigid. But let's add one board in here and change that. Now, just by adding one board, we created two triangles. Now, if this shape wants to

Auto-generated from the video audio.