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When someone mentions Southern California, the first
thing you think of is igloos, right? No? Well, it should be,
because our scout troop has been building and sleeping in igloos every
winter for years in our local mountains. And since we had an
excellent snow year, we had a chance to try out different techniques to
see what is best for our local conditions.
The weather was perfect: 60 degrees during the day and
bright sunshine, 29 degrees at night with a slight breeze. The roads
were clear and dry all the way up to the parking area, but you cross the
road, climb up on the snowpack, and easily step over the 4' tall
gate. The snow had softened and consolidated to a perfect
consistency for cutting snow blocks. The sun melted them together,
and then at night they froze into a solid mass that easily held half the
troop standing on the roof. Here's what we tried and how it worked. |
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Last year's (2004) weather was brutal. A storm
dumped snow and wind on us all night long. But we were snug as a bug
all night in the igloos, and proved they were much more stormworthy than a
tent, which would have been miserable (we had no idea it was storming
until we poked our heads out in the morning). We determined to find
out how to build them more efficiently.
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The weather was MUCH better this year, so we could
afford to experiment a little, since our survival did not depend on their
completion. We wanted to find the limit on how big they could be
made, and so we drew some 12' circles in the snow and started cutting
blocks. The blocks are cut with a piece of aluminum plate with bent
sides and a hand hole that resembles a cookie sheet. Stab it in the
snow three times, and tip the resulting snow block toward you.
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We stacked the blocks around the circle, staggering the
seams and overhanging them in on the inside, bracing them against its
neighbor on the side.
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The first sign of trouble came when we realized how
high the roof was going to be on an igloo this size. We had
quarried the snow inside for blocks, and now would have nothing to
stand on. But being the intrepid engineers, we pressed on. |
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After the walls are about 5' high, cut the doorway in as
low as you can.
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Click to go to
Igloo Engineering Part II. |
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