TWF-06 HOMESTEADS

[Bethar]

Actually Bethar, I was thinking about why fubarnii would build different sorts of rooves, especially when you consider that most settlements in our world have similiar rooves in them. I think the answer is competition between engineers and craftsmen, showing off their ideas and brilliance. I imagine that fubarnii would have a much greater diversity in structures because of this.

That is a good point.  Though presumably if you are a fairly lowly Fubarnii who was not a roof builder you would have a fairly basic design because that is all you could afford to hire someone to do.
Has anyone mentioned domes?  Hemispherical, onion domes, geodesic?
... I've just made myself very unpopular with Brandlin, haven't I? ...

[Rick]

Has anyone mentioned domes?  Hemispherical, onion domes, geodesic?
... I've just made myself very unpopular with Brandlin, haven't I? ...

Ah, well. Brandlin's already started playing around with ping-pong balls, wonder how long it'll be before he notices that a ball from a ball-pool fits into a pringles tube with only a little filling-in around the edge? My guess is he'll never completely like them, lol!

[Brandlin]

geodesics and such like sound fun and on the surface look easy to do - accurately cutting the regular shapes is easy on the laser and that's one of the things you struggle to do by hand. The problem is joining the plates. Simply edge gluing them wont be very strong. you need some sort of bracing system - a bright idea for which hasn't popped into my head yet.

domes - easy enough to make approximations of domes from sheet plastic... just a framework and some sections shaped like orange segments. It takes a lot of styrene for the shape though so it low on my list.  I've been looking at those expanded polystyrene balls you can buy in craft shops too, but they're quite expensive for what you get and the sizes are all over the place...

whats an 'onion dome'?

ball-pool = ball swamp? hmm a feel a trip to Ikea coming on.

btw i know what i'm buying you lot for christmas!

[Klute]

Onion domes are shaped oddly enough like onions. 



Made LOTS of grp moulds for those things.

[Emberbreeze]

Just a though about gluing complex shapes. When the laser cuts the thicker card, it cuts more of a V than a || and as such could give you a nice glueing surface if you 'folded' a shape at that point. Not sure I'm being clear there.

[Rick]

I was looking around for ball-pool balls when I was doing some planets for 2 clubs' starship game, needed a few. Some of my friends that have kids took them and a bag to a "play-zone" ball-pool, amazing how many of those balls ended up in the bag 'by accident' lol! Also, ELC were happy to sell me a few loose balls from split packets - just gotta ask.

I think the fubarnii would be perfectly capable of building round, segmented or onion domes, not so sure about a geodesic dome though. Didn't Mike say a little while ago that the Casani were fond of domes/rounded rooves?

[Brandlin]

Ah ONION domes (doh!) I was thinking of the onion layering thing... duh!

emberbreeze - you're right the melting rather than vapourising of the styrene does cause a slight V shape. I'm not sure i'd rely on it as accurate enough to predict the angle when you join edges together. Forexample the last set of cuts i had were done after the laser lenses had just been cleaned, and the cut was much cleaner than some of the others i have had.  I

rick - i'm sure the fubarnii could build any shape they wanted and had the desire and money to. unfortunately I need to build stuff to a reasonable price point and consuming a lot of styrene in the internal structure of a dome wont look like value for money no matter how clever the design

[Brandlin]

I went shopping to the super market today.

I'm considering making the homesteads to fit 3 different sizes of Heinz baked bean can.
They come in 200g and 415g sizes and a larger can that i forget the weight of.

I had been avoiding cans as there are so many sizes but i wondered about using a specific brand...? Not sure whether this is a common grocery item beyond he UK though... probably not.

The other thing about these cans is they are all ring pull, so they don't leave a dangerous ragged edge from the can opener...

They're robust..will glue with CA, and are repeatable. But, they wont be cutable so intersecting them in a kit bash way wont be easy...

What do you think?

(oh and I also bought 4 tubs of ben and jerry's on buy one get one free in sainsburies! hurry get yours now!)

[Brandlin]

just checked the heinz web site and their beans come in

150g, 200g, 415g, 840g

While they wont intersect, they will stack! so the smaller squat tins could be fitted on top of the 840g tin for example.

[Brandlin]

I am rethinking the tin cans.

The 150g and 215g sizes are almost exactly the same diameter as a pringles tube so offer little over that size apart from being harder to cut and customise.

I've also just shredded my finger on the sharp inside edge (despite the fact that these are ring pull cans), so will have to seal the ends - taking more plastic than i expected and pushing up the cost.

Finally, the ridges that they press into the can to give it rigidity isn't hidden by the stucco and on the bigger cans the ridges are deeper.

So, I'm back to the drawing board for these ... everything is determined by the starting item...

I'm currently thinking Starbucks coffee cup for a small slope sided hut. Buut not sure what else to add... i suppose i could try a number of different starbucks cup sizes...?

[Klute]

McFlurry tubs ??

[Brandlin]

that's a top idea....!

have to lower my standards to go into micky-D's

[Carcharoth]

I think there is still mileage to be got from pringles tubes...
If you could have one or two rooves that are flexible enough to sit ontop of a variety of cups/tubes and a bunch of interesting pop-out windows and doorways etc then that would give enough flexibility for people to use what rubbish they can find.
I've got an (empty) coffee cup in front of me that I'm sure would work well with some of the pryngul components with very little work.

[Rick]

Sort of a universal components sheet (or 2). You could have allsorts on there, sell it as a conversion set.

[Brandlin]

McFlurry tubs ??

OK so I finally have one and its a dinky little paper cup shape and ideal for a simple homestead!  Thanks Klute. When I finally get things running again that's a free kit for you!