Dymaxion House as installed in Henry Ford Museum

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Dymaxion House was developed by
inventor and architect Buckminster Fuller to
address several perceived shortcomings with
existing homebuilding techniques. Fuller
designed several versions of the house at
different times all of them factory
manufactured kits, assembled on site, intended
to be suitable for any site or environment and to
use resources efficiently. A key design
consideration of the design was ease of
shipment and assembly.
Fuller created the term Dymaxion, a
portmanteau of the words dynamic, maximum,
and tension,
[1]
to describe many of his
inventions.
1 History
2 Description
3 Criticism
4 See also
5 References
6 External links
The Dymaxion was completed in 1930 after two years of development, and redesigned in 1945. Buckminster
Fuller wanted to mass-produce a bathroom and a house. His first "Dymaxion" design was based on the design
of a grain bin. During World War II, the U.S. Army commissioned Fuller to send these housing units to the
Persian Gulf.
[2]
In 1945, science-fiction writer Robert A. Heinlein placed an order for one to be delivered to Los
Angeles, but the order was never filled.
[3]
The Siberian grain-silo house was the first system in which Fuller noted the "dome effect." Many installations
have reported that a dome induces a local vertical heat-driven vortex that sucks cooler air downward into a
dome if the dome is vented properly (a single overhead vent, and peripheral vents). Fuller adapted the later units
of the grain-silo house to use this effect.
The final design of the Dymaxion house used a central vertical stainless-steel strut on a single foundation.
Dymaxion house - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dymaxion_house
1 of 4 7/14/2014 3:29 PM
Interior of Dymaxion House showing structural
details. Visible are the partially assembled
aluminum ceiling, struts and exterior skin as well as
single central post which supports the entire
structure and carries utilities and plumbing.
Structures similar to the spokes of a bicycle-wheel hung down from this supporting the roof, while beams
radiating out supported the floor. Wedge-shaped fans of sheet metal aluminum formed the roof, ceiling and
floor. Each structure was assembled at ground level and then winched up the strut. The Dymaxion house
represented the first conscious effort to build an autonomous building in the 20th century.
It was a prototype proposed to use a packaging toilet, water storage and a convection-driven ventilator built into
the roof. It was designed for the stormy areas of the world: temperate oceanic islands, and the Great Plains of
North America, South America and Eurasia. In most modern houses, laundry, showers and commodes are the
major water uses, with drinking, cooking and dish-washing consuming less than 20 liters per day. The
Dymaxion house was intended to reduce water use by a greywater system, a packaging commode, and a
"fogger" to replace showers. The fogger was based on efficient compressed-air and water degreasers, but with
much smaller water particles to make it comfortable.
Two Dymaxion houses were prototyped one indoor (the
"Barwise" house) and one outdoor (the "Danbury" house).
No Dymaxion house built according to Fuller's intentions
was ever constructed and lived in. The only two prototypes
of the round, aluminum house were bought by investor
William Graham, together with assorted unused prototyping
elements as salvage after the venture failed. In 1948,
Graham constructed a hybridized version of the Dymaxion
House as his family's home; the Grahams lived there into
the 1970s. Graham built the round house on his lake front
property, disabling the ventilator and other interior features.
It was inhabited for about 30 years, although as an extension
to an existing ranch house, rather than standing alone as
intended by Fuller. In 1990, the Graham family donated this
house, and all the component prototyping parts, to The
Henry Ford Museum. A painstaking process was used to
conserve as many original component parts and systems as
possible and restore the rest using original documentation
from the Fuller prototyping process. It was installed indoors
in the Henry Ford Museum in 2001 with a full exhibit.
Since there was no evidence of the crucial internal
rain-gutter system, some elements of the rain collecting
system were omitted from the restored exhibit. The roof was
designed to wick water inside and drip into the rain-gutter
and then to the cistern, rather than have a difficult-to-fit,
perfectly waterproof roof.
There was to be a waterless packaging toilet that deftly
shrink-wrapped the waste for pickup for later composting. During the prototyping process, the idea for the
packaging toilet was quickly replaced by a conventional septic system because the packaging plastic was not
available. Other features worked as advertised, notably the heating, and the passive air conditioning system,
based on the "dome effect."
Dymaxion house - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dymaxion_house
2 of 4 7/14/2014 3:29 PM
U.S. Patent 2,220,482
(http://www.google.com/patents
/US2220482), Prefabricated
bathroom, by Richard
Buckminster Fuller, issued 1940
The inhabitants of the much-modified version of the house said that the
bathroom
[4]
was a particular delight. The bathroom consisted of two
connected stamped copper bubbles, built as four nesting pieces. The bottom
piece is fully plated in tin/antimony alloy and the top half is painted. Each
bubble had a drain. No area had a radius of less than four inches (10 cm), to
aid cleaning. The commode, shower, bathtub and sink were molded into the
structural shell in one piece. One bubble contained a step-up ergonomic
bathtub and shower, high enough to wash children without stooping, but
just two steps (16 inches / 40 cm) up. The oval tub had the controls
mounted on the inside left of the entrance to the oval tub. The other bubble
was the bathroom proper with commode and sink. The ventilation for the
bathroom was a large silent fan under the main sink, which kept odors away
from people's noses. All lighting was totally enclosed. To prevent fogging,
the mirror faced into the medicine chest, which was ventilated by the fan. A
plastic version of the bathroom was available intermittently until the
1980s.
[5]
The large wrap-around windows and lightweight structures were popular
with the children, who crawled on the windowsill, and twanged the bicycle-wheel-style main struts.
Criticisms of the Dymaxion Houses include its supposed inflexible design which completely disregarded local
site and architectural idiom, and its use of energy-intensive materials such as aluminum,
[6]
rather than
low-energy materials, such as adobe or tile. Fuller chose aluminium for its light weight, great strength, and
long-term durability, arguably factors that compensate for the initial production cost. Aluminum was also a
logical choice if the homes were to be built in aircraft factories, which, since World War II had ended, had
substantial excess capacity.
The Wichita House was a project Fuller accepted during World War II as an attempt to produce cost-effective
dwellings for everyone. The project continued to develop the technological concept of the Dymaxion House,
now incorporating a round floor plan instead of a hexagonal one. The reactions to the prototype were
extraordinarily positive; nevertheless it was not produced industrially.
[7]
Fuller, a consummate perfectionist, felt
he could improve the design and was dissatisfied with the prototype. He refused to begin production rather than
allowing the "unfinished" design to be used.
[8]
Autonomous building
Lustron house
Futuro house
Dymaxion car
Dymaxion map
Geodesic dome
Prefabricated home
Yurt (similar dwelling shape)
Dymaxion house - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dymaxion_house
3 of 4 7/14/2014 3:29 PM
^ Sieden, Lloyd Steven (2000). Buckminster Fuller's Universe (http://books.google.com/books?id=rG__1rhIzE0C&
pg=PA132&dq=Dymaxion+dynamic). Basic Books. p. 132. ISBN 978-0-7382-0379-9.
1.
^ "Buckminster Fuller: Dymaxion Deployment Unit" (http://web.archive.org/web/20090416134505/http:
//www.gsd.harvard.edu/studios/s97/burns/p_fullerd.html). Web.archive.org. 2009-04-16. Retrieved 2013-08-25.
2.
^ Patterson, William H. Robert A. Heinlein: Learning Curve, Volume 1, p. 371. Macmillan, 2010. ISBN
0-7653-1960-8
3.
^ U.S. Patent 2,220,482 (http://www.google.com/patents/US2220482) Prefabricated Bathroom, Richard Buckminster
Fuller, Issued Nov. 5, 1940
4.
^ Dymaxion Bathroom (http://www.bfi.org/about-bucky/buckys-big-ideas/dymaxion-world/dymaxion-bathroom) 5.
^ Advanced Manufacturing Office: Aluminum (http://www1.eere.energy.gov/industry/aluminum) 6.
^ "Dymaxion House" (http://users.design.ucla.edu/~djvmc/24/bucky/house.html). Users.design.ucla.edu. Retrieved
2013-08-25.
7.
^ "Black Mountain College Museum +Arts Center - IDEAS +INVENTIONS: Buckminster Fuller and Black
Mountain College" (http://web.archive.org/web/20090115004344/http://blackmountaincollege.org/content/view/45
/60/). Web.archive.org. 2009-01-15. Retrieved 2013-08-25.
8.
The Dymaxion House on ArchDaily (http://www.archdaily.com/401528/ad-classics-the-dymaxion-house-
buckminster-fuller/)
Henry Ford Museum (http://www.thehenryford.org/exhibits/dymaxion/index.html) has restored the
prototype and installed it in the museum.
Time-The Dymaxion American (http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,875527,00.html)
Chu, Hsiao-Yun (2009). New Views on R. Buckminster Fuller. Stanford University Press.
ISBN 0-8047-6279-1.
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Dymaxion_house&oldid=605196158"
Categories: Prefabricated houses Buckminster Fuller Geodesic domes
Modernist architecture in the United States
This page was last modified on 21 April 2014 at 20:10.
Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may
apply. By using this site, you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Wikipediais a registered
trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., a non-profit organization.
Dymaxion house - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dymaxion_house
4 of 4 7/14/2014 3:29 PM