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Nubee question: polarity

PostPosted: Wed Dec 29, 2010 1:28 pm
by Analog Kid
Ok, just brought home my first Geomag Pro set (only magnets could make me put down a Lego set after decades of addiction). Read the little booklet, and built a pyramid.

Here's my question: is there anyway to determine the polarity of the Geomag components by inspection? If I build a structure that has non-neutral spheres, how do I know which bars to flip? It doesn't seem correlated to the Geomag logo (which is in opposite directions on each side of the piece anyway). Each piece has a number and letter at opposite ends, but I'm not seeing consistency in that either.

A related question: is it possible to build a triangular pyramid with the internal bracing described in the instruction booklet, where all spheres are neutral? I've got inner spheres neutral, but I'm still hot on the points.

Thanks!

Re: Nubee question: polarity

PostPosted: Thu Dec 30, 2010 11:11 am
by Peter Jepsen
Hello Greg and welcome to the Geomag Forums. I know well what you mean, I haven't touched my Legos now for years after I got my first set of Geomag.

You can only determine the polarity by feel, not by inspecting the molding of the bars. You'll have to feel the repulsion/attraction of the individual bars in a construction to determine which ones to flip. Use a loose sphere to determine which connections are already neutral (the sphere won't stick).

Regarding your last question, at any point where you have 1, 3, 5, 7 etc.. bars meeting on a sphere, you can't arrive at neutral. There'll always be one left over (ie. 2 North/1 South, 3 North/2 South) so any point with an uneven number of bars meeting can never become neutral.

Re: Nubee question: polarity

PostPosted: Thu Dec 30, 2010 10:55 pm
by Analog Kid
Thanks-- I'd noticed the odd number of bars thing, but didn't know if it was a function of the number of bars at a node or in the design. There are 4 sets of 3-bar nodes, 12 total. I've been swapping bars around looking for a combination that closed the outer loops, so you just saved me a lot of hair pulling.