What if you could take apart a V8 engine, explore an aircraft's landing gear, or see exactly how a walking robot works?
Without touching a real machine.
Meet Teardown, a free, open-source Claude Code skill that transforms mechanical systems into interactive 3D simulations.
And the results look seriously impressive.
Instead of creating another static 3D model, Claude builds an entire interactive laboratory where you can disassemble machines, control individual mechanisms, and watch the physics unfold.
Here's what Teardown can do:
Interactive 3D models: Rotate, zoom, and explore machines from different angles.
Exploded views: Take mechanisms apart and examine individual components.
Working animations: Watch gears, pistons, actuators, and mechanical linkages move.
Live measurements: Monitor joint torque, mechanical loads, movement, and other parameters.
Independent controls: Isolate subsystems and experiment with their behavior.
Automated demonstrations: Generate guided tours and animated videos of the mechanisms.
And the fascinating part?
The 3D geometry is generated programmatically using Three.js.
No prebuilt CAD model required.
The project includes three complete examples:
V8 engine: Explore pistons, cylinders, and the four-stroke combustion cycle.
Cessna 337 landing gear: Watch the hydraulic mechanism retract the wheels.
Strandbeest: Explore the remarkable walking mechanism inspired by Theo Jansen's kinetic sculptures.
But here's what makes Teardown technically interesting.
Instead of animating dozens of components independently, Claude builds a mathematical model that controls the entire mechanism.
Take the aircraft landing gear.
One actuator moves a rack by 201 mm.
That rack drives a 32-tooth gear with a module of 4 mm, producing a pitch diameter of 128 mm.
Half the gear's pitch circumference is approximately 201 mm.
So the rack's movement corresponds to a 180-degree rotation.
And the gear, landing gear legs, animations, charts, and instrument readings all follow the same underlying calculation.
One mathematical model. An entire machine moving in sync.
That's the difference between making a convincing animation and attempting to simulate how a mechanism actually works.
Of course, there's a catch.
The quality depends heavily on your reference material.
The creator experimented with generating a pangolin, an armadillo, and a scorpion without providing proper anatomical references.
The results? Three rather primitive models.
But give Claude technical drawings, dimensions, and real mechanical specifications, and things get considerably more interesting.
Want to try it?
Install the skill:
npx skills add elvarofficial/teardown -g -a claude-code
Then install the required dependencies:
cd ~/.claude/skills/teardown
npm install
npx playwright install chromium
Open Claude Code and run:
/teardown
You'll need Node.js 20 or newer. Video rendering also requires FFmpeg, with Python 3 used for sound generation.
The skill is free and MIT licensed. Claude Code usage may still consume your subscription allowance.
And here's why I find this project exciting.
We're moving from AI that explains how machines work to AI that can build interactive environments where you can actually explore those explanations.
For engineering education, robotics, product design, and technical visualization, that's a fascinating direction.
Imagine turning an engineering textbook into an interactive mechanical laboratory.
Instead of just reading about how something works, you could take it apart and see for yourself.
Try the interactive demos:
https://visual-learning.app/
Teardown on GitHub:
https://github.com/elvarofficial/teardown
Created by: Elvar (@elvar_official)
#ClaudeCode #Teardown #3DSimulation #MechanicalEngineering #CreativeCoding #AIAgents
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