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It's a little-appreciated fact that fans are chiral (ie, they come in left-handed and right-handed versions). Don't believe me? Lend your favourite fan to a friend, and watch them try to open it the wrong way, messing up the spokes. This has two downsides: first, the fact that your friends will infallibly open your fans the wrong way and damage them, and second, it makes fans uncomfortable to use with one hand or the other. My favourite fan, for instance, is right-handed, which means I can't fan myself with my left hand and write with my right hand. This sucks. Fortunately, I have an idea for an achiral fan, but I need some help with choice of materials and a few details of construction.
[Just so we're all on the same page: I'm talking about Japanese folding fans, IMNSFHO the best kind. Following the Wikipedia article I've just linked to, I'm going to call the paper bit that moves the air the "leaves", the things that hold this in place the "spokes", the thing around which the spokes rotate the "axle", and the heavy bits at the end of the leaves the "guards".]
The basic idea is to use thinnish wire for the spokes instead of slats of bamboo. Then the leaves can rotate freely around the spokes, allowing them to open in either direction. I've come up with a solution to the problem of attaching the leaves to the guards, but this still leaves the following problems:
- Attaching the spokes to the axle. You could maybe beat the ends of the wire flat, then punch a hole through, but if the metal's soft enough to be beaten like that it's probably too soft for use as a spoke. You could maybe attach the spoke to some sort of rotating block, but how? Remember that any such block would have to be less than a millimetre thick.
- Making the guards. Bamboo's ideal for this, but where do you get it from? And how do you work it? Are there any other good materials you could use?
- Decorating the fan. I'm thinking Chinese characters, because they look cool. Specifically, I'm thinking of using the kanji for "kanji". Self-reference in the finest tradition of Douglas Hofstadter :-)