Airform for My DoubleDome House

Hi,

I’m making an airform for my doubledome house. My LR3 build.
Airform size is 800 square meters and consists of 107 pieces.







19 Likes

This is Wow. Very Wow.

I have so many questions, I don’t know where to start. It looks incredible. Do you have to run a fan constantly to fill it?

Yep, it needs to run constantly. But apparently, the glue I used for stitching parts together was losing its grip after 2 days and the last picture is the outcome :D. Now I’m sewing it all together, to make a new attempt.
The overall design of the house I made in VR, with Meta Quest 2 using Gravity Sketch software.

Steps for the airform creation:

  1. exported shape from Gravity Sketch
  2. refined it with Instant Meshes
  3. opened it in Blender and made tiles using Seams to Sewingpattern plugin
  4. exported it as SVG
  5. I made a program which opens the SVG and converts color-coded placement marks to numbered marks and also added a sewing overlap outline
  6. exported every part as cutting panes to gcode using Lightburn lines to cut in one layer and lines to draw with pen in other layer
  7. Made another program which makes gcode conversion to use pen with my LR3 build (shifts toolhead position and replaces M3/M5 command with servo control)
  8. made tiles with my LR3

In conclusion, I was using mostly freeware software (Lightburn is paid software) to make the airform :slight_smile:

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What is going to happen next? Put plaster on it? I can’t really imagine where it’s going to go… :smiley:

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Shotgrete is the next step :slight_smile:
at first, a thin layer, then fiberglass reinforcement and thicker layer.

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Fabulous project Marko I hadn’t even thought about - where in the world are you located - as @jeffeb3 said, there are so many questions -

The construction process I understand very well, but things like insulation and ventilation and finishing are interesting, to say nothing of cutting the panels on an LR!

I’m from Estonia.
The concrete dome will be covered with compacted earth as thermal mass, and all this will be covered by a water treatment layer and insulation layer (Closed-cell polyurethane). and the top layer will be again eart. So My house will be a green hill in the summer and a sledding hill in the winter :D.

For my two huge windows, I plan to use double-layer ETFE instead of glass. And I will add slight negative pressure to avoid moisture, fogging, and flapping.

All the ventilation air will be treated at first with a thermal heat exchanging system (DIY tube-in-tube version) and then it gets through the thermal mass which preheats or precools the air further.

Immediately behind the windows is the inner bed area, where I will grow various plants for food and to improve the air quality. In addition, they are also responsible for graywater treatment

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This build just gets cooler by the minute! :heart:

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Oh. I missed that this was a form. That makes more sense now.

Oh. Yikes. I guess it’s good you found that out before adding the first layer. I hope the next version works better.

That LR is a beast. It is cool to see it drawing on the tarp. What a huge machine.

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24 hours after applying the glue, it was so strong that when tearing, the fabric tore next to the glue spot, not over the glue. And 48 hours after sun exposure, the glue tore like toilet paper from perforation :D. A week’s work was lost, but yes, luckily the worst was avoided.

I am proud of My LR, and also of the fact that I am probably the designer/tailor of the biggest bra in at least little Estonia, if not in Europe :upside_down_face:

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I hope you’re planning on having turbine vents on the roof.

Yes, I plan to make as passive a house as possible, so my target is not a smart house, but a dumb house, so it should exist without energy input, while growing food and providing a warm room and fresh air.

I think this house need a small “tunnel” entrance just in between the two “domes”
If you get the picture I have in my mind… :smiley:

Truly amazing work, I amazed by the sheer bravery you need to just imagine and start such a gigantic project!
This is also what sets apart the LR and other hobby CNC machines, the LR can and will help you build kayaks, saunas, and even houses now… Is there a single DIY machine out there that can do this?

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Yes, about the “sheer bravery” - My home was burned down about 2 years back. We got out of the burning house at 2 AM, lucky that the whole family was intact. The neighbour called and asked what happened and how he could help. And the first time in my life I needed to ask for underwear because all I had was gone.

…On the other hand, this delivered once in a lifetime opportunity to do stuff as I want it to be and this is what I’m building now. And believe me, it is scary sometimes, when You are not sure You know what to do next, and You are not sure that You are heading in the right direction, as there are no visible tracks to follow. But anyway it is the greatest adventure of my life going on now :wink:

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I think you and your family are incredibly courageous and resilient I wish you all the best with this amazing project. I am fascinated, please post updates even after the project moves beyond the ‘Lowrider’ phase.

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The one time I refrain from posting stuff like this someone else does. I am proud of you. :heart:

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That is incredible and sure out of the box thinking :heart_eyes:. I have seen quite lot where cnc’s are capable: formula parts to spaceships parts and guns to scientific machines, doors to surfboard and everything what can imagine. But this is something I have never seen before and never had imagination something like this. If I visit in Estonia again I would like to see that :grinning:

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Don’t hurry then, I’m sure it takes more than a year :).
And thank everyone for the good words, I will post updates from time to time when I have some updates on the project.

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Video of Sewing the airform
Screenshots from Blender:



Screenshots from Gravity Sketch







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This is the current state of my project. The first layer (about a inch thick) of concrete is ready.

The next step is fibreglass reinforcement and then I will cover it all with a tarp to survive the winter and will continue with the next concrete layer in the spring :slight_smile:

This is how concrete looks under the airform ( I made a test hole for that)


And this is one of my working days :slight_smile: 240923_cam1.mp4 - Google Drive

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