I originally thought about combining bubbles with sphericons when I saw the interesting single surface of a solid sphericon. I wondered if a bubble, which is under tension, would produce the same straight-sided surface that was typical of the solid. I found out that is does not even come close, as you can see on my bubble page.
My first sphericon was made of fairly thin steel wire, with a 6" square center, and two semicircular arcs attached to the square at opposite corners. I wrapped the corners and soldered it, but it was kind of flimsy.
However, I couldn't dip the whole thing at once, since it was too big to fit into my bubble solution all at once. I had to make a smaller one. I went back out to the shop, and found some 12-gauge copper house wire. I stripped this down to bare copper, and set about making some smaller models which I could dip all at once in the solution that I had. I soldered the connections together instead of wrapping them, making quite nice connections.
Most people who see this one after seeing the solid one mention that they understand the shape much better seeing the wireframe one. You can actually see how the edges fit together.
After playing with rolling it and dipping it in bubble solution, I came upon another design. This one still had two arcs at 90 degrees to each other, but only had two sides of the central square. I built it by making a shape that looked like a circle cut in half, the halves moved apart, then the halves connected by straight lines - kind of an elongated circle, or almost an oval. I then basically held each of the semicircles and twisted them 90 degrees against each other. This one rolled like a regular sphericon, but also made a very interesting bubble!
I had now made two very different-looking wire frame models that both rolled like a regular, solid sphericon. Were there others?
The short answer is yes. I have found one, and I am sure there are others. This one is very different, interesting, and is quite simple. It is basically the two arcs connected to each other by a rod connected at their centers. It looks like two ship anchors connected 90 degrees from each other. While this version doesn't make a bubble (there are no closed loops), it rolls on the table quite nicely. It can also be easily displayed by hanging two of its points on a pair of boards or cans or whatever with a gap between them, like those executive tightrope walking toys.
But, what about other media? See my variations page.
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