From: The Butterfly (salsbury_at_bootstrap.sculptors.com)
Date: 05/12/98
Date: Tue, 12 May 1998 11:46:45 -0700 Message-Id: <199805121846.LAA08587@bootstrap.sculptors.com> From: The Butterfly <salsbury_at_bootstrap.sculptors.com> Subject: Re: Been kinda quiet, lately...
-Date: Wed, 22 Apr 1998 16:11:30 -0500
-From: Horkheimer <hork_at_execpc.com>
-> > What about natural wood or engineered reinforced wood or other recyclable
-> > materials, maybe cardboard!
->
-> for something a couple miles across?
-
-Here I was just throwing out ideas, you know brainstorming. They have built a
-lot of amazing things out of wood or carboard, I am sure they could do
-something, but steel is probably the best mentioned so far.
One of my big interests is in cardboard for inexpensive domed
housing. While I was at the U. of Buffalo, we designed such a beast. It was
going to be deployed in 3rd World countries, specifically Honduras. The one
we designed had about 450 sq ft. of living/sleeping space, with an
adjoining several hundred sq ft. for cooking area. It had a 13-14' vaulted
ceiling at the apex, and a poured concrete floor w/ 2.5' riser wall. The
total cost for this would have been less than $1000, and construction of
the dome part (not the concrete) was about 1-4 hours, depending on if you
had 4-1 people working on it. (4 hours for 1 person, 1 hour for 4...)
Currently looking at Corulite material. It's a lightweight,
recyclable corrugated plastic material. Think of it as "plastic
cardboard". It's very cool, very tough, and totally waterproof. (Also comes
in lots of fashion colors! ;^) )
If you're interested in this kind of stuff, I might recommend the
domesteading mailing list. Mail domesteading-request_at_sculptors.com and use
Subject: subscribe
-The nice thing
-about this wood idea if you were a writer of historical fantasy or if you were
-like C.S. Lewis you could say some sort of Atlantis like city built a large
-balloon out of some special wood and goldbeaters skin or rice paper, were this
-society lived up in the clouds. But we are engineers here, so I will stop on
-this possible kids story.
-
-Donald
-Horkheimer
I have a sci-fi book someplace around here talking about spaceships
made of wood. I've heard wood (oak, I think) bandied about as re-entry
shielding for space shuttles. Apparently, wood handles heat better than
steel and maintains better structural stability.
--
Pat
___________________Think For Yourself____________________
Patrick G. Salsbury - http://www.sculptors.com/~salsbury/
Check out the Reality Sculptors Project: http://www.sculptors.com/
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