More Tube Hotels
Eric Hunting
Now a hotel in Mexico has copied this idea with a few nice alterations.
http://www.tubohotel.com/welcome/
This brings to mind the Snail Shell system of N55;
http://www.n55.dk/MANUALS/SNAIL_SHELL_SYSTEM/SSS.html
And an experiment done some years ago by Australian Antarctic researchers in adapting rotomolded HDPE tanks into polar shelters by adding a door and a formed-in layer of PE foam;
The Snail Shell was pretty cool but a bit too small for anything but a fun experiment. It lacked any insulation and the tiny manway was difficult for most people. Still this picture (http://www.n55.dk/MANUALS/SNAIL_SHELL_SYSTEM/SSSquintus.jpg) was worth that whole project.
The tank huts were much larger and much more sophisticated and insulated well enough to withstand Antarctica. But, while much easier than a lot of shelters used there, they were still rather unwieldy without some lifting equipment and a little too hermetic, leading to condensation and ventilation issues.
Suppose you rotomolded a tube with integral insulation as the tank huts used but more like these hotel cabins in form, with integral mounts for bed/floor decks and other fixtures inside, a recess to mount door/window frames of wood or aluminum like the Mexican hotel cabins, and on the outside some wheel ridges and recesses for plastic chock-blocks and tie-downs. I'd make them a little bit longer than the 8' or 2.5m long hotel cabins to provide a larger front standing space -maybe 3m.
In a relief context, these would be pretty versatile. You would be able to pack a tough quick-deployed highly insulated, extremely weather-resistant shelter into a rolling and stackable package made of mostly recycled materials using a simple mass production fabrication process. You could install integral LED lighting and shelving and pack flex cell solar power, supplies, and other deployable gear in the open volume and under the bed deck. With both ends framed, you get cross-flow ventilation with openable screens and windows and quick mounting of heat pumps or mini-stoves. They would be very easy to transport because they are lighter and smaller than ISO containers, could float, be dropped by air (maybe even parachute), and could be dragged by people or trucks using a rick-shaw-like frame (remember the draggable water containers?), and could be deployed in side-by-side stacks. The design could also incorporate accordion fold laminate paper shades on the ends and arch, dome, or cone shaped shade roof units to group clusters or rows. The tubes could also be specially made for certain uses, like toilets, showers, dry storage or water storage tanks, kiosks, kitchens, and centralized power/communications units. For instance, turning a unit vertical, adding a portal, and partitioning the upper 1/3 of the height would make a nice simple solar shower, the upper section serving as a tank with a heat absorbing lid. Or a larger public shower installation could use a stack of three units, with the upper unit as water tank and the two lower ones as walk-through shower rooms with shower hear rows along the top. After the initial emergency situation, these structures could be endlessly re-purposed or recycled whole to make other products locally.
In the non-relief context, I think these would also make for economical vacation cabins suited to winter climates, homeless shelters, capsule hotels at airports, worker housing, storage and work sheds, guest rooms, garden pavilions, yoga huts, farm animal shelters, kids play-houses (personal space capsule?), kiosks, giant composters, marina float modules, and telecom vaults. While the basic shelters would use the tubular profile to let them roll for transportability, the profile need not be round for other applications. For instance, it could have a box, hex, octagon, flat bottomed circle, or even the classic pitched roof house profile and these could be made in short stackable self-sealing sections for custom lengths and easier handling. So the production capability could be justified by these many non-relief applications.
Eric Hunting
erich...@gmail.com