Moraine WorksNorthwest Wisconsin

Latches

A catalogue of connections meant to come apart on purpose — and of the four things every one of them is made of: the button you press, the catch that holds, the spring that returns it, and the detent that makes the click.

136
mechanisms
7
families
122
live models
136
rows you can open
The actuator
L1 · L3 · L4
What the thumb touches — push, twist, lever, slide, squeeze, pull.
The catch
L2
The geometry that actually carries the load.
The spring
L6
Where the return energy sits, and what a year of parked load does to it.
The detent
L5
Where the click comes from — and it is not the same part as the catch.

Why things stop clicking

A latch can hold perfectly and still be considered broken, because the click is a different part from the catch and it wears out first. These are the five physical sources of a click, ordered by how fast each goes quiet.

So if the click has to still be there after ten thousand cycles, buy a snap-through dome or a sprung ball — and do not build the click into the same piece of plastic that does the holding.

The catalogue

Open any row marked model and drag the Stroke slider: that is the mechanism operating, not an exploded diagram. Each part is a different colour, which is what it would look like printed in two or three filaments and assembled.