We’ve been merrily building away at modules, and so far, most of them are straight! Our portable world is over 40′ long in a perfectly straight line! But, to make a typical curved module, based on the specification that was decided upon, a 90° curve creates a module that consumes a 44″x44″ area, or, is 62″ from corner to corner. Making the module itself curved helps, but a full 90° is still pretty ungainly. Enter the “half curve” or 45° curve:

 The 45° module is much smaller, and a little less awkward to move around. It’s also a lot more flexible when it comes to laying out the modules for a show.

Since we don’t really care much about running in circles, perfect symmetry is not an issue, as far as the final layout is concerned, so I’ve added the 6″ straight track at each interface that’s required by the module specs. That allows designing the 45° module so that it can be used alone to create a “dog-leg.” Or, the module can easily be flipped, creating an offset, and still meet the module specifications of a minimum 12″ straight track in the S-curve.

Of course, any number of straight modules could be inserted between a pair of curves, creating a “long curve” or a “long offset” situation.