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An 18 mile round trip on the trike and I had hands on experience of the calf dome at a nearby farm. Having laid out a ring of poles in the lawn the real thing looked about half the size in the the open air. It was certainly no smaller than those offered today because it was about a foot [30cm] taller than I was. Standing right next to it seemed to make it shrink. It certainly didn't look remotely like 14' across! Though must have been.
That is loose hay resting on top, the black mark is not a crack but a scrape and somebody has started to paint it by the look of it. A search of aerial views, by year, shows it has been in place for at least 5 years. Methinks it looks much older than that. Or perhaps it has been pressure washed against the manufacturer's advice. I ran a GRP sports car for ten years and it never visibly deteriorated even when I took time to paint it. The car lived permanently out of doors.
The external joint ribs of the dome were about 6mm [1/4"[ thick. I'm thinking these stiffening/joining ribs could be reduced in height slightly for cosmetic reasons. The shutter supporting arcs will help to reinforce the center segment. Using many more clamping bolts than standard would bring them much closer together with no real loss of overall strength. The idea of longitudinal ribs is quite interesting because they act as natural gutters to carry rain away downhill to the "tail end" of the dome.
The active farm dome I saw had a bolted, galvanized channel surrounding the arc of the open doorway. A 4" wide flange right around the base would be ideal for bolting on a laminated plywood ring for a rotation track.
Most of the visible marking here seems to be green algae. The structure itself looks fine. NO worse than my large GRP satellite dish which has been exposed to all kinds of weather for a couple of decades. Brand new roofs in the countryside get covered in algae and lichens in only a couple of years.
I now have prices from two of three dealers I contacted each supplying different makers' products. I should have the final price tomorrow and can then decide how to proceed. These domes are available in green by some makers. Which is fine for an "invisible" garden dome but it will have completely different thermal properties to a [much preferred] white one.
The third dealer quoted me a figure of half the previous two but now has to contact the manufacturer to confirm. Three days without a firm price does seem excessive.
Whoops! While poring over the igloo brochures I finally found some specs. The Holm&Lau Igloo dome weighs 485lbs or 220kg total weight! Eek! That's over 160lbs per segment. Ouch! I don't think this is [remotely] manageable by me working alone. Grr!!
[Later it occurred to me that I could ask a local farmer with a big bale, telescopic loader to lift the completed dome onto a prepared and wheeled base ring. I just wonder if the loader would go through our front gates.]
The choice now seems to be between a metal turret or a Pulsar 2.7. I really don't think the Pulsar is remotely big enough for my needs. Back to the drawing board.
The third dealer quoted me a figure of half the previous two but now has to contact the manufacturer to confirm. Three days without a firm price does seem excessive.
Whoops! While poring over the igloo brochures I finally found some specs. The Holm&Lau Igloo dome weighs 485lbs or 220kg total weight! Eek! That's over 160lbs per segment. Ouch! I don't think this is [remotely] manageable by me working alone. Grr!!
[Later it occurred to me that I could ask a local farmer with a big bale, telescopic loader to lift the completed dome onto a prepared and wheeled base ring. I just wonder if the loader would go through our front gates.]
The choice now seems to be between a metal turret or a Pulsar 2.7. I really don't think the Pulsar is remotely big enough for my needs. Back to the drawing board.
Click on any image for an enlargement.
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