Quonset Shade structure measurements needed pretty please!

[roostermt]

Hey all!

Kinda startin' over new this year as our old camp, Cock 'N' Waffle, is no more. No bus, no big tents and we're all out of waffles.

I'm looking at a Quonset style shade structure for all of our tents to live under. In past years we had 5 25 x 25 circus tents to rely on. I'm a pretty decent builder and love watching this advacements on this style of structure over the years on the playa...really want to copy some master designs out there.

Thinking around 15x50. I've got 7 tents to cover.

Blah, blah blah....I was hoping to find some schematics for an alternative to The Monkey Hut or Galaxy Hut... or even just the formula to figure out tarp size, PVC lengths,square footage, etc.

Anyone got any thoughts on this one?

Thanks All

[trilobyte]

You don't have to do much looking around here to find an abundance of information on monkey huts. From there you can get some numbers and figure out something that'll work for you. Good luck!

[Elliot]

Welcome to ePlaya!

When I am faced with such a challenge, I often find that I can figure it out with a small stack of scratch paper, a calculator, and rudimentary knowledge of geometry and such from school. It can be difficult top dredge up 45 year old knowledge such as Pi-r-squared and whatnot, but I usually find it doable. Give it a whirl!

The Quanset hut is a marvelous invention. The intricate stamped profile provides impressive structural strength. Several versions are still in production -- often used on farms. They ship in small pieces that stack tightly together. But they are steel -- heavy. And not cheap. Yeah, I see you mean a plastic-pipe-and-canvas Q-hut. That sounds like a grown-up monkey-hut to me.

Now for some potentially useful information. You want a 50 foot long tarp.... I found (in 2007) a marvelous bargain on big strong tarps: Hay tarps. Farmers use them to cover big stacks of hay. I bought a 60x40 tarp for $305. Another 50 buck for delivery to my house from a farm supply store in Oregon. White on one side and black on the other. And strong.

It would be a few bucks more now, six years later, of course.

You might consider using steel tubing instead of plastic. Plastic has a tendency to break all at once. Steel will bend without separating.

Best of luck!

[roostermt]

Awesome. Thanks guys. I will keep searching and compiling info. Much appreciated.

[theCryptofishist]

Kinda startin' over new this year as our old camp, Cock 'N' Waffle, is no more. No bus, no big tents and we're all out of waffles.

This past year I lost my camp and my village. If we go back two years, that's two camps and a village. This can bring on real grief. I love the people I'm going to camp with this year, but they're not my family. (Sorry, guys, honesty here. Maybe you'll be family in September. Stupid fucking aside, sorry.)

I always feel a little excited when I see a quonset hut.

[tamarakay]

You will probably be better off just having a couple smaller ones, and then have one for communal sharing.

(And fishy, I completely understand)

[MacGlenver]

You will probably be better off just having a couple smaller ones, and then have one for communal sharing.

(And fishy, I completely understand)

Agreed. Go for a few smaller structures. So much for easier than manage and smaller forces at work.

[MacGlenver]

You will probably be better off just having a couple smaller ones, and then have one for communal sharing.

(And fishy, I completely understand)

Agreed. Go for a few smaller structures. So much for easier than manage and smaller forces at work.

Yikes, I don't think I was drunk by then last night...

[some seeing eye]

The monkey hut is tough, within the strength of the design if it is small. Scaling up is a risk. For a large area consider a flat shade house design with shade cloth. If you are going to order shade cloth for this year, suggest doing it quickly.

[roostermt]

I do like the 2 structure idea. And thanks for the tips on getting Shade Cloth asap.

The design I want to mimic is a Bob Zook design. It's similar to the smaller Quonset designs but also has rope or webbing over and back between each rib. I have seen these before out on the Playa without any kind of backbone system(top brace that runs the length of the structure connecting all ribs). Good idea? I thinking 7' at the peak and possible 15'-18' at the base opening.

What I'm trying to zero in on is what size of Tarp to purchase to ensure it goes all the way to the ground. I suppose its trial and error at some point.

Also, how long do you think a structure like this would need to be to accomodate 7, 3-4 person tents with extra space between for chill space?

Thanks everyone. It takes a village.

Rooster

[Elliot]

I believe the circumference of a circle is Pi x radius x 2, (which is the same as Pi x diameter).

So the circumference of a half circle is Pi x radius.

Pi is always 3.14.

Your proposed shape is not quite a half-circle, but if we say 8' tall and 16"wide, the tarp needs to be 3.14 x 8', which is 25.12'.

Somebody please correct me if I got this all wrong.

[roostermt]

I hear ya S.S.E. That's kinda what I was thinking.

Thanks Elliot! I suppose I could have figured that one out if I would have been paying attention in Alegbra.

Rooster

[skibear]

Pi is always 3.14.

Somebody please correct me if I got this all wrong.

Actually π or as you say pi is a nonending number!
π= 3.141592653589.... is closer. (too close for govt work)


I saw a 100 page report put out at my work about 1960 full of numbers that show
π out to ten thousand decimal places!!

[Oldguy]

From Wikipedia: " pi = C/d "

Archimedes computed upper and lower bounds of π by drawing a regular hexagon inside and outside a circle, and successively doubling the number of sides until he reached a 96-sided regular polygon. By calculating the perimeters of these polygons, he proved that 223/71 < π < 22/7 (3.1408 < π < 3.1429).[34] Archimedes' upper bound of 22/7 may have led to a widespread popular belief that π is equal to 22/7. Around 150 AD, Greek-Roman scientist Ptolemy, in his Almagest, gave a value for π of 3.1416, which he may have obtained from Archimedes or from Apollonius of Perga .

[BBadger]

Practically, Pi is "about 3". Anything more precise and you don't have enough tolerances built into your design.