Subbase

We were lucky to finish the brickwork last week while it was still dry. Now we hope to construct the concrete floor, which will be cast on the subbase.

The images of today show the compacted ‘MOT Type 1′ and an indication of the shape or edge of the concrete. We will add to the concrete some black dye to colour it as dark as possible. The triangular line in the floor will be steel, and refers to the string used to create the shape of the ellipse with three foci. I used strings to draw this shape at the beginning to sketch and draw the initial ideas and Robin Hankin created an algorithm to make it possible to model it in 3D. Now its great to see the result of this mixture of digital and tactile way of working.

Today the Project group (Reps of University, Rolls-Royce and CDC)  had a meeting about the opening. Probably somewhere in November but more about that later…

First courses laid

Today we did one of the most important aspects to shape the walls: we set out the curve of the walls again with string and marked it on the concrete foundation. I’ve also recorded this on video and it looks very much like one of my ‘ellipse’ drawings. Steve and Will laid the first course of engineering brick and from there they will try to keep it in line and level. I’m very exited to see the curve of the walls getting shaped up…

Setting out and start digging

Steve and Will setting out the position of the inside of the wall. First they set out the three focus points and with a string marked out the irregular ellipse.
The red line is the inside of the wall (see drawing 5).

Ground level is set out more or less the average level of the grass between the three focus points.