9 ms·
The Skysphere
- carl_ 11y agoCool idea, terrible website.
- ChuckMcM 11y agoNot exactly a "cave" if its up on top of a tower :-). Looks like a fun sort of observation tower. Wondering how it fairs in a lightning storm.
- techaddict009 11y agoSorry for it. Edited the title to tower now :)
- presty 11y ago> Wondering how it fairs in a lightning storm. "I thought about this some time ago, lighting takes tge path of the least resistance, so theoretically it will just travel straight down the main column and into the earth" From his facebook https://www.facebook.com/theskysphere https://www.facebook.com/theskysphere
- ChuckMcM 11y agoThere is that, but there is the whole 'coil' thing. Generally conductors have something called the 'skin' effect, which is that as they conduct the electrons move along the outer surface. So the skysphere's outer surface forms a ring where the current will move out to the edge, and then back to the center before going into the ground (or more literally coming from the ground but that is not important here). The change in current in the outer rings will create a magnetic pulse inside the ring that is proportional to the change in current, per Ampere's law. And for conductors that are inside the sphere part, they will experience a very large change in magnetic flux, which will then induce an electric current in any conductors they have inside of them. It is entirely possible that every piece of electronic equipment inside the sphere will be destroyed by the resulting EMP. Or simply magnetized. But I'd really want to compute flux lines based on the lightning hitting the top, splitting down for four 'rings' (Kirkoff's law) and then going on down via the center into the earth.
- pothibo 11y agoThe Tui gave his Kiwi status away!
- suvelx 11y agoHah, yeah. I was wondering where it was, thought it could be NZ, but Ireland and Scotland look pretty similar. It was the Tui that confirmed my suspicions.
- allsystemsgo 11y agoLooks more like a cool piece of architecture. The "tech" isn't outlandish. Nifty though.
- buckbova 11y agoIt's like giant mcdonalds playground equipment with furnishing and lights. I wouldn't say time well spent, but to each their own.
- CmonDev 11y agoBy the end of 3 years it is no longer high-tech.
- VLM 11y agoI LOLed a bit at the low cost on this and the authors treehouse. Its kind of like cheap ham radio antennas, where the wire to put up a 160M dipole is only $10 but it costs $3M to buy a piece of land big enough and unregulated enough to put it on. Aside from that, cool project. Where I live people would make the windows open/removable and call it the worlds most expensive and outlandish deer hunting tree stand.
- VLM 11y agoI was slightly disappointed to discover he built it on the ground, was looking forward to seeing him handle pieces up in the air. Could be done, although obviously harder / more interesting job. I'm sure the last thing he wants is suggestions but rotating the floor would be interesting, also folding and unfolding the floor and stuff would be interesting, and probably help with wind load calculations.
- presty 11y agothis is really cool. and I can see him recovering the $ just by airbnbing it