Geodesic dome building
 

Anyone ever built a geodesic dome ? (quite big!)
Any advice to offer ?

Requirement is for once-a-year assembly, short use, and then on-site
storage for the remainder. So it needs to dismantle and re-assemble,
but doesn't need to be especially portable or robust. Budget is of
course negligible.

I never thought I'd get to use the phrase "I think you should build a
yurt instead, it's so much more practical", but this seems to be
fitting the bill !

"Andy Dingley" wrote in message
...
Anyone ever built a geodesic dome ? (quite big!)

No

Requirement is for once-a-year assembly, short use, and then on-site
storage for the remainder. So it needs to dismantle and re-assemble,
but doesn't need to be especially portable or robust. Budget is of
course negligible.

Scafolding poles?

Regards

Philip

"Andy Dingley" wrote in message
...
Anyone ever built a geodesic dome ? (quite big!)
Any advice to offer ?

Requirement is for once-a-year assembly, short use, and then on-site
storage for the remainder. So it needs to dismantle and re-assemble,
but doesn't need to be especially portable or robust. Budget is of
course negligible.

I never thought I'd get to use the phrase "I think you should build a
yurt instead, it's so much more practical", but this seems to be
fitting the bill !


Plenty of info on the net. You need to find a supplier of free wood. Short
bits only are needed for the frame of each piece, so hopefully there must be
someone to whom the short bits are useless. The covering for each section
again can be offcuts, but I would expect availability to be less.

mrcheerful

"Andy Dingley" wrote in message
...
Anyone ever built a geodesic dome ? (quite big!)
Any advice to offer ?

Requirement is for once-a-year assembly, short use, and then on-site
storage for the remainder. So it needs to dismantle and re-assemble,
but doesn't need to be especially portable or robust. Budget is of
course negligible.

I never thought I'd get to use the phrase "I think you should build a
yurt instead, it's so much more practical", but this seems to be
fitting the bill !

Out of interest, why a geodesic dome, rather than, say, a big tent or an
inflatable building?

Colin Bignell

On Thu, 06 Jan 2005 03:31:56 +0000, Andy Dingley
wrote:

Anyone ever built a geodesic dome ? (quite big!)
Any advice to offer ?

Requirement is for once-a-year assembly, short use, and then on-site
storage for the remainder. So it needs to dismantle and re-assemble,
but doesn't need to be especially portable or robust. Budget is of
course negligible.

I never thought I'd get to use the phrase "I think you should build a
yurt instead, it's so much more practical", but this seems to be
fitting the bill !

A friend has made two over the years:
http://www.chaos.org.uk/~markt/domes.html
is his collection of links.

C

Andy Dingley wrote:

Anyone ever built a geodesic dome ? (quite big!)
Any advice to offer ?

Requirement is for once-a-year assembly, short use, and then on-site
storage for the remainder. So it needs to dismantle and re-assemble,
but doesn't need to be especially portable or robust. Budget is of
course negligible.

I never thought I'd get to use the phrase "I think you should build a
yurt instead, it's so much more practical", but this seems to be
fitting the bill !



Just make up loads of indentical al plates and sqaure section rods, and
bolt it all together.

Andy Dingley wrote:
Anyone ever built a geodesic dome ? (quite big!)
Any advice to offer ?

Requirement is for once-a-year assembly, short use, and then on-site
storage for the remainder. So it needs to dismantle and re-assemble,
but doesn't need to be especially portable or robust. Budget is of
course negligible.

I never thought I'd get to use the phrase "I think you should build a
yurt instead, it's so much more practical", but this seems to be
fitting the bill !


Not very helpful but . .


A Tipi is much easier to put up than a yurt and creates a more beautiful
space. Mine is 20ft diameter and about 20ft high at the apex

N

On Thu, 6 Jan 2005 08:33:20 -0000, "nightjar"
wrote:

Out of interest, why a geodesic dome, rather than, say, a big tent or an
inflatable building?

Because geodesic domes are perfect and can be built for no money (tm)

The reality, the more I look into it, is of course somewhat different.


As far as I can see, no-one has built a wooden framed demountable dome
without using non-wooden joints. I can provide the timber cheaply,
but making it portable as well is going to cost either time or money.

For a panelled dome, most of those actually constructed (especially
'70s housing in the USA) weren't geodesics (pin-jointed sticks) but
had turned into stressed-skin structures without anyone realising.
These were also stressed-skins with built in failure lines, and sure
enough a lot of them failed!

There's also a range of geometries to choose from - pure Bucky Fuller
shapes are far from the best. Humans can't make such efficient use of
hemispheres or pure dome sections, so distortions like Zomes are
certainly worth looking at for a permanent structure.

As to the tent alternatives, then I'm inclined that way myself. I'm
thinking of a large "bender", based on tensioned bow frames, maybe in
carbon fibre tube. These also work as open-fronted "stages" more
easily than a geodesic.

--
Smert' spamionam

Colin Bignell wrote
| Andy Dingley wrote
| Requirement is for once-a-year assembly, short use, and then
| on-site storage for the remainder. So it needs to dismantle
| and re-assemble, but doesn't need to be especially portable
| or robust. Budget is of course negligible.
| Out of interest, why a geodesic dome, rather than, say, a big tent or an
| inflatable building?

Tentwise, if the requirement is during the winter season then a circus big
top might cost comparatively little to hire. Or the Welsh National
Eisteddfod have a purpose-built tent they only use I think once a year.

My other idea is polytunnels.

Owain

On Thu, 06 Jan 2005 03:31:56 +0000, Andy Dingley
wrote:

Anyone ever built a geodesic dome ? (quite big!)
Any advice to offer ?

Some friends and I built one to camp in at an early Womad festival. It
was about 5m across and made from bamboo poles and ripstop nylon (We
were living in Bristol and airballoon offcuts come for free). Great
fun, took a couple of hours to put up

Anna

~~ Anna Kettle, Suffolk, England
|""""| ~ Lime plaster repairs
/ ^^ \ // Freehand modelling in lime: overmantels, pargeting etc
|____| www.kettlenet.co.uk 01359 230642