The Old Parachute Dome Discussion

[MrBeardy]

I should probably take the fact that this thread has been sleeping since last August as a sign, however, now granted a ticket and taking the dome back out for another playa adventure, I thought I would see what I get here. Last year was clearly a magical year for weather, so the old spinaker sail and partial tent that I used to cover the dome(which did awesome btw) was clearly not put to the real playa test. I plan to bring it all out again(it was a jerry-rigged cover for sure), but I am curious if there is anyone or a camp that cares to share their love for the parachute cover. I know what size to get and hoping to get one of rip-stop nylon to give it some girth strengthwise. Also last year I wrapped rope around the conduit to create a web like effect in the spaces between then, to limit flapping. Other creative ideas, hope, wishful thinking and magic is appreciated. See you dusty ladies and gents in just a few short days...woot!

[img]http://i49.tinypic.com/331prf8.jpg[/img]

[img]http://i48.tinypic.com/2uqhx6d.jpg[/img]

[tisha2]

i'm afraid it isn't a happy story, but we found that the material used to make parachutes also transfers heat. got hot as hell in there during the day. kind of kills the shadey-space effect. what did work well was zip tied burlap (washed and dried to get rid of loose ends which could = moop), or another loose weave heavy muslin. or camo netting. or shade cloth.

[MrBeardy]

Yeah I experienced the same heat effect with the sail cover unfortunately. I tend to be cruising during the day as that seems to be my favorite time on the playa, but my campmates may think otherwise so it is worth considering. The burlap isn't a bad idea, I know they sell huge rolls of the stuff at hardware places, so perhaps saran-wrapping with that and then using rope or something to hold it in place could work for shade. Not too worried about dust, as I will have a truck bed to retreat for some shut-eye if it gets hectic and it stays pretty cool with reflective window covers. I'll keep in mind the MOOP factor there as well, thanks! Other ideas welcome!

[MrBeardy]

For the burlap cover how did you go about form fitting it to the dome shape? Each triangle, wrap, pentagon pieces, or D, other.

[captain mcguiver]

I have a collection of parachutes, of the 30' variety, my yellow and white chutes do NOT block much IR or UV at all They may look nice and cover unsightly U-haul logos but they don't do much in way of cover at all. The green one is pretty ripped up and probably makes the best playa friendly cover.

The huge 150' parachute likes to grab pieces of cars and RV's and throw them into the sky. In 2001 as part of the Lustmonkey's camp we built no less than six geodesic domes. We huddled them together in a hive, decorated each one individually ant then wrapped ALL the domes with the 150' tank parachute. I don't remember it being that hot, but we didn't stay in camp much. We did find the same people in it every day enjoying things like our giant kiddie pool filled with stuffed snakes. Must have been ok for them.

I returned in 2004 with a bunch of virgins and tried to use the parachute to cover a bunch of cars and an RV. All it ended up doing is breaking things, killing the RV Air Conditioner, and keeping camp really hot.

[melodiousdirge]

Last year I had some young folks stay across the street from me at 7:30 & Journey, and the first or second day their parachute/1V setup was completely smashed by a wind storm. I'm glad I helped them stake it down so I didn't wind up wearing their entire dome. After seeing that I'm pretty glad I went with the vinyl arrangement.

For making a fabric cover the easiest I found was to cut out pentagons and hexagons with a 'slice' missing that could be pulled together to make a slightly conical section before seaming it into the rest of the cover.

[MrBeardy]

We were camped right there too, luckily that didn't happen to us too. 3 ft rebar was essential and will be this year too. That dome is epic and that cover is out of this world! Nice work! Did it take an industrial sewing machine for those seems?

[melodiousdirge]

Thanks! I used vinyl cement with a ~3" overlap or so to make the seams. It was very time consuming to make the cover but I'm pretty happy with the result!