I'm looking for help with terminology:
I'm a glass artist / PhD researcher aiming to use a modular, geometric approach to making. I've been looking to use repeated polyhedra (with regular polygonal faces) as a modular substructure to hold more complex 'decorative' units.
With so many options, I've initially limited myself to the convex deltahedra - and have been exploring how these can be put together. Rather than close packing, as is possible with the octahedron/tetrahedron, I'm interested in more loosely packed structures and formations. I found that I can create a wide variety of helical formations from pairs of the convex deltahedra. (Screen grabs of a two example CAD models below)
With not having the correct words/terminology to describe these, I'm having trouble finding relevant work to read - or any areas of applied maths which might be relevant. I think that this is part of Topology - but is there a more specific area I should be looking at? And are these helices a form of packing - as the structure is only repeated in one rather than three dimensions? The closest thing I've found, is the Boerdijk-Coxeter helix - which does seem to relate to spherical packing.
Also are the radius and vertical offset the only characteristics which I need to specify in order to designate the underlying helix, or do I need to consider other characteristics?
Any pointers greatly appreciated.