Domes are amazing structures and just in case your not aware of exactly how fantastic domes are then here’s a few amazing facts:
Domes are the most efficient structures known to man, they use less material, are lighter and stronger than any other type of building bar none.
Domes use much less material than conventional buildings but are miles stronger. For example my dome is made from 16-gauge aluminium there are no support beams across the 24-foot diameter, only the skin is used for support. To enclose the same volume you would need 30% more material and loads more structural metal/wood in a square building. If you built any other structure using only the skin as support it would simply fall down!
Because domes have at least 30% less surface area than other shaped buildings it takes at least 30% less energy to heat or cool them. Yes the same size building with the same volume and the same thickness insulation takes at least 30% more energy to heat or cool just because it’s not dome shaped. Long thin building and building with extensions perform worst of all.
Domes are naturally hurricane resistant. Tract style buildings generate huge amounts of turbulence when high winds pass over them, causing massive low-pressure witch sucks the roof off. High winds can pass smoothly over a dome because it has no corners and flat surfaces to cause turbulence high pressure air presses the dome down towards the ground.
Domes are not a new invention. The Pantheon, one of the most impressive buildings in Rome, was built in A.D. 117-125 it’s made from an early type of concrete. Igloos may have been around far longer but it’s impossible to tell as the Inuit community was isolated from the rest of the world, and believed themselves the only people in the world until the beginning of the 19th century.
Domes only become super strong when they are fixed to the ground. Try this simple experiment: Cut a ping-pong ball in half to form a dome, you will notice that each half is floppy and distorts easily. Now glue one half to a flat peace of cardboard and see how much stronger it becomes.
Domes have acoustic qualities like no other building. If you lay on the floor in the centre of a dome when you talk it sounds like you have your head in a large metal pipe, if you stand at on side of a dome a person standing opposite can hear you whisper from the other side of the room.
Buckminster fuller, the inventor of the geodesic dome designed geodesic spheres that when filled with warm air could float around the earth housing hundreds of people. They would be half a mile in diameter and a rise of just a few degrees in temperature could make them float like huge airships.
Some of the largest buildings in the world are domes; London’s millennium dome and the Eden domes were record breakers when they were built. The Miyazaki Ocean Dome in Japan is known as the world''s largest indoor water park (300m-100m-38m). The Georgia Dome is the largest cable-supported domed stadium in the world it covers 8.9 acres and covers 1.6 million square feet on seven levels. The 290-foot high roof is composed of 130 Teflon-coated fibreglass panels - covering 8.6 acres.
I’ve got one… And it’s great!
[ comments 5 ]
posted by
Nicole
15/12/2006 04:17:54
Domes are the GREATEST things
posted by
Colin
24/12/2007 08:14:28
They are highly addictive.
Build one and you`ll be hooked too :)
posted by
greenfingers jeremy
24/03/2009 00:42:59
I don't have one but i have been addicted to their allure from the beginning. - soon to be proud owner of a geodesic greenhouse -
posted by
John T
06/12/2009 12:10:01
My dome is almost ready and I hope to connect it all together for the first time ever in time for the Blue Moon later this month. Am hoping to put together a festival of sorts - Domehenge - here in West Cornwall where domeheads can come together and talk of domes and related stuff. Bring instruments!! Not a rave and not Glastonbury but better IMHO. Interested?
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