Origami has served as the inspiration for a number of engineered systems. In most cases, they require nonpaper materials where material thickness is non-negligible. Foldable mechanisms based on origami-like forms present special challenges for preserving kinematics and assuring non-self-intersection when the thickness of the panels must be accommodated. Several design approaches for constructing thick origami mechanisms by beginning with a zero-thickness origami pattern and transforming it into a rigidly foldable mechanism with thick panels are reviewed. The review includes existing approaches and introduces new hybrid approaches. The approaches are compared and contrasted and their manufacturability analyzed.

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Consideration of a product’s manufacturability is a vital aspect of product design. When considering manufacturability of panels for origami-adapted products, there are trade-offs between panel design approaches as well as thickness-accommodation techniques. The use of bent sheet metal for panels shows promise as a panel design approach that mitigates several of these trade-offs. This paper describes a process that can be employed to use sheet metal in designs of origami-adapted mechanisms that utilize specific thickness-accommodation techniques. The process is demonstrated for a square-twist mechanism designed using the hinge shift technique for accommodating thickness in origami patterns. A Miura-ori mechanism is also shown in sheet metal. The characteristics of these bent panel approaches are discussed and compared to other approaches for designing panels for manufacturing. The use of bent sheet metal panels allows for mitigation of several trade-offs and shows the applicability of origami-adapted design to sheet metal.

This work introduces a type of motion termed “conceal-and-reveal” which is characterized by a state that protects a payload, a state that exposes the payload, and coupled motions between these two states. As techniques for thick, rigid origami-based engineering designs are being developed, origami is becoming increasingly more attractive as inspiration for complex systems. This paper proposes a process for designing origami-based conceal-and-reveal systems, which can be generalized to design similar thick, rigid origami-based systems. The process is demonstrated through the development of three conceal-and-reveal systems that present a luxury product to the consumer. The three designs also confirm that multiple origami crease patterns can be used to initiate viable approaches to achieving conceal-and-reveal motion.

Applying an origami pattern to thick, non-paper-like materials is a challenging task. Though many techniques have been developed to accommodate thickness in origami, creating 3D models of such thick-origami mechanisms is complex. The time and knowledge required to manually model an origami mechanism can impede the exploration of the design space and creation of robust designs. This work presents data structures based on origami that can be used in the automation of thick-origami mechanism design. These structures are described and an example computer program that implements them is investigated. The program automatically generates all the necessary 3D CAD part models and an assembly model for a user-specified origami crease pattern. Models resulting from the program for several crease patterns are demonstrated with a discussion of the advantages and limitations of the system. With further development of the data structures and program, this framework has the potential to help mitigate some of the barriers to more widespread use of origami-based design.