I was wondering if anyone has any good ideas for covering a 17' ft dome. I don't want to use a parachute cause I am going to be out on the playa and want something that will be more sturdy and actually provide shade. My other thought was to sew something out of silver tarps and shade netting but then doing all that flat stitching by hand is going to take for ever! Thank you...
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Re: Covering a dome
Tue, July 27, 2004 - 3:11 PMHas anyone tried gluing or plastic welding silver tarp ?
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Re: Covering a dome
Thu, June 2, 2005 - 9:30 AMWeld it. You can rent the use of a big welder at a truck tarp place, or hand weld it.
Lots of work.
Andrew
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Re: Covering a dome
Wed, July 28, 2004 - 8:59 PMUse bungie balls and/or bungie cords to attach a layer of tarps to the the dome struts. Overlapping the tarps a bit makes a decent seal. -
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Re: Covering a dome
Thu, July 29, 2004 - 2:56 PMHow does the tarps do as far as breathability? I it going to cook me in the afternoon when I am trying to take a nap?
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Re: Covering a dome
Fri, July 30, 2004 - 8:26 AMAs long as air can go through from the sides, it is an improvement over being in the sun by far. The only problem is if you seal the dome completely. Then it will get hot inside. I've used wind turbines on top of domes to help cool them. I cut a triangle of plywood large enough to sit on top of one of the top triangles in the dome. Then I cut a hole in the triangle and mounted a $18 wind turbine on top. It works pretty well, but leaving gaps on the downwind side for airflow is still better.
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Re: Covering a dome
Mon, August 16, 2004 - 10:05 PMUse Relectix, buy 48" x 50' at a home improvment store, and buy the metal tape that goes with it. Cut it on site to fit, and tape seams. Your dome will stay cooler in theday, and warmer at night. Have fun. My 3rd year with this delux set-up, I'm adding a small AC unti this year.
Love,
Trust -
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Re: Covering a dome
Wed, June 1, 2005 - 4:24 PMone of our big domes needs a new cover this year (23' 3v).
a while back I found a site with a pattern for covering these domes.
I want to grab either some canvas, billboard vinyl, whatever and sew together a custom cover, including a few cutouts for breeze.
doesn anyone ever recall seeing a pattern for a dome cover?
also, on the reflectix - was the reflection annoying to neighbors?? -
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Re: Covering a dome
Thu, June 2, 2005 - 9:34 AMI've seen a 100 patterns, google to find em'. Neighbors??? Annoying the Neighbors??? Didn't know there was such a thing on the playa less generators.
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Re: Covering a dome
Thu, September 8, 2005 - 5:56 PMWhen I made the dome covers for the karma Chickens' 23 ft dome last year, i used awning cloth and 90% shade cloth. To cut the pieces, just bolt together some of the struts of the domeand cut whatever combination of triangular pieces that the size of the fabric allows.
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Re: Covering a dome
Wed, September 14, 2005 - 10:55 AMI just covered my 22 foot dome with marine vinyl sewn together with a Singer sewing machine. I basically created five very large triangular shapes that, when sewn together, fitted the spherical shape pretty closely. Although some math was used to get started, I ended up clipping the pieces to the assembled dome for final fitting.
We clip (using office binder clips) decorative fabric on the inside. THese look nice and provide additional shade.
Its much better than a parachute. Its water and wind proof. The lower edge can be rolled up to catch breezes while keeping the sun off, or lowered for warmth (at night) and to keep dust out. I've got a swamp cooler attached which does a very good job of keeping the interior cool and comfortable during the day.
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Re: Covering a dome
Mon, February 20, 2006 - 6:46 PMI am new to all of this. What i want to try do do is find a cover for a dome that is a good cheap insulator for heat, light, sound and water. Any suggestions? -
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Re: Covering a dome
Sat, May 6, 2006 - 9:10 PMI am gettingmy covers made in china by a company that makes inflatable structures. I am getting 3 - 32 ft diameter covers and 1 - 55 ft diameter cover with shipping for a total of 11 grande.
They will be made of vinyle.
We'll see if they fit. I guess thats really up to me though and how well the patern I designed for them is.
Ill let you all know within a month how they come out!
Peace
Mate'
Earth-Tribe.net -
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Re: Covering a dome
Sat, May 6, 2006 - 9:12 PMBTW - andrew please show me the links to the "million dome patters" you so easily found on google...
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Re: Covering a dome
Mon, May 8, 2006 - 6:58 PMvinyl is pretty yucky
was there no other option within your budget?
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Re: Covering a dome
Mon, May 8, 2006 - 7:03 PMvinyl billboards can be had for free or cheap. Some students of mine used some billboard vinyl to make an inflatable structure. They used PVC cement (the kind for pipes) to glue the seams it worked very well with no sewing. -
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Re: Covering a dome
Thu, May 18, 2006 - 9:16 PMNot our budget. Canvas was way expensive! This is thick ripstop vinyl. Different that the billboard stuff.
Great thing is when we are done with the covers we can just pay and have them sent to mexico for burning!
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Re: Covering a dome
Tue, May 23, 2006 - 12:28 AMhopefully your cover is completely opaque otherwise it will be a solar oven. I had some cheap silver tarps one year that let some light through got cooked in there. -
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Re: Covering a dome
Sun, May 28, 2006 - 2:57 PMwhen covering anything at bman, the 2 layer strategy is key, and there needs to be a way for air to get out from between the layers.
The swedish tyvek snow camo tarps which became omnipresent last year are a good way to go-- tie one of those over your main tarp and experience an amazing level of coolness. Some pics of those tarps in my profile... -
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Re: Covering a dome
Mon, May 29, 2006 - 2:24 PMThat sounds smart!
Do you have a recource for purchasing these at reasonable price? From the looks of them ill bet they cost a pretty penny.... or not? -
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Re: Covering a dome
Sat, June 3, 2006 - 1:01 PMI’m thinking of sewing up a cover also, but I’m not sure yet, since I can see that one dome leads to another and tarps may be the most versatile approach. But…
An on the note of tarps...
Last year we covered our 23' dome with a large silver tarp. The method we came up with for fastening it down worked flawlessly...
Drive rebar staples into the playa, one at the center of every strut along the bottom. before seating each of these down snug, we clipped a large carabineer type snap link to it. Each one was then hammered down snug.
The tarp was then placed over the dome and fit into position, folding to fit around the doorway. Then we ran ropes, starting by tying to one of the snap links and crisscrossing the dome in a star pattern, snapping into the rope into the other links as we threaded it around. Then we could work out all the slack from one end to the other and tie it off. The dome is held to the playa and the cover is held to the dome all at the same time.
After this, the Artic camo net went over and secured at several spots. The difference that camo netting made inside the dome was truly amazing. I highly recommend getting one. The two layer approach is the only way to go.
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Re: Covering a dome
Sun, June 4, 2006 - 3:21 PMwww.majorsurplusnsurvival.com/Mer...t.mv
Swedish snow break up net at Major Surplus and survival. Can't tell if they are $18.33 for three, or for one.
Important note: the measurements in the description are dead wrong. They are =not= 16' x 20'. I think the actual measurements are more like 14' x 16'.
Cheers,
Bruce :-)
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Re: Covering a dome
Sat, September 23, 2006 - 6:25 PMWhere can I find vinyl billboards? -
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Re: Covering a dome
Tue, September 26, 2006 - 5:10 PMfind out where the maintanance yard for Clear Channel or other company in your area that services billboards is located go there and ask for old billboards. Maybe get a cute girl to do it for you that sometimes works better. -
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Re: Covering a dome
Tue, September 26, 2006 - 6:38 PMThanks for the tip. The cute girl approach should work is actually a really good idea... except when I carry the 80lbs of vinyl away they might start asking questions!
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Re: Covering a dome
Sat, August 12, 2006 - 5:03 PMHi j.dill. Don't think we'vemet, but we have some friends in common... about the dome cover... my camp last year built a 24' dome (3v, 5/8) that we made a custom tyvek-cover for. Tyvek HomeWrap (tm) is a DuPont material used to wrap homes with for insulation and weather protection. It's available at Home Depot. It's waterproof, UV resistant, and breathable. We cut out shapes from the 10' rolls of Tyvek, and used tyvek tape to patch the shapes together to form a custom fit skin. It worked well to keep the dome cool last year. Downsides are it's very noisy in the wind if you don't have something to cover it with and hold it down, also there are annoying dupoint logos all over the thing. We put a $100 Korean, cotton parachute over it to solve both problems. Good luck. -J
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Re: Covering a dome
Tue, August 29, 2006 - 8:57 AMsew it.. Canvas or whatever. You can sew the five triangles then sew them together. It is really not so hard. Check out the pics on my tribe page....... -
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Re: Covering a dome
Sun, January 14, 2007 - 6:11 AMas nutty as it sounds we built our dome [20-25 ft 3 freq conduit] in a park.. tp make a cover, i threw fabric over it, stapled it, took it home and sewed it where the staples indicated. retarded sounding but it managed to take is through at least 4 yrs. muaha. but if you are set on style ans hit.... um don't listen to me.
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Re: Covering a dome
Sun, January 14, 2007 - 6:12 AMand i used crappy t-shirt material . mesh like - the less the wind argues with the fabric the better.
AND we have never had a collapse... nuthin in all those years!?! ghetto works.
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Re: Covering a dome
Tue, March 13, 2007 - 12:02 PMWhat about straw bales and mud? -
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Re: Covering a dome
Sun, April 1, 2007 - 4:24 PMYeah, for a permanent dome installation I've been thinking similarly. Water will be an issue, though. The normal concept for straw and mud is good boots, good hat, meaning big wide roof and tall foundation. So like you'd want to have a dome with a (thin?) waterproof cover over your dome with the mud and straw. that might work well actually, allow some breathability for the mud and straw while keeping it dry, also helping avoid the really hot at the top where all the hot air collects issue with domes.... hmmmm :-)
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