Wulff Net
The equal-angle stereographic net, with great and small circles at your chosen interval for plotting orientations.
The equal-angle stereographic net, with great and small circles at your chosen interval for plotting orientations.
Choose Wulff Net from the list. It opens with the usual size already set.
Pick the paper size, the grid and the orientation. Customize holds colours, margins and more.
Download the ready PDF, or print straight from the page at 100% scale.
A Wulff net is the stereographic projection of a sphere onto a plane, and its defining property is that it preserves angles. Two directions 30° apart on the sphere are 30° apart when measured on the net, wherever they fall.
That is exactly what you want when the question is "what is the angle between these two planes?" — which is most of crystallography. It is not what you want for counting how orientations cluster, because equal-angle projection distorts area; that job needs a Schmidt equal-area net instead.
A plane is plotted as the great circle where it cuts the sphere, or as the single point of its pole; measurement is done by rotating an overlay about the centre.
Every sheet here is free, adjustable and prints at exact scale.
A Wulff net is equal-angle: it preserves angles and is what you use to measure between orientations. A Schmidt net is equal-area, which preserves density and is what you use for statistical plots of many measurements.
2° for careful measurement, 10° for teaching and quick work. The heavier every-10° lines stay emphasised at all three settings so the net remains readable.
Print the net, pin a sheet of tracing paper through its centre, and rotate the tracing paper over the fixed net to bring points onto the great circles you need.
