mrsbrown: (Default)

Wooden ropewoods from 16–22 Coppergate, York

This was in the Norman section of the York Archeological Trust's picture collection.


I think it means we have evidence for tent ropes with wood, instead of knots.

mrsbrown: (Default)
After I posted all those tent posts on Sunday I discovered that Wordpress will show you statistics like how many people have viewed your site and where they've come from and what google search terms they used to find it.  Its as good as getting lots of comments on a LJ/DW post!

so tonight I wrote two more posts!

[personal profile] doushkasmum 's new geteld pattern

the Innilgard tent design and construction


I'm currently writing the instructions to erect the Innilgard tent, so I'll be putting those up soon.

My day

Jun. 13th, 2010 07:00 pm
mrsbrown: (Default)
Today I had sjkasabi's LG all to myself!  Like most 6 week old babies, she slept, had her nappy changed, enjoyed some undressed time, did some crying, and some drinking.

The drinking part was hardest - I wasn't sure how to deal with a bottle, but we worked it out well enough for her to go to sleep again.  Even if it wasn't really enough milk to keep her asleep.  At least she was happy when Sjkasabi got home.

And this morning my achievement was updating my tent blog.

I wrote a post about my new rectangular tent.
and about how we built the dining tent
and a bit about the soldier's tents.

When I finally write the post about erecting the Innilgard tent (useful for them too) I think I"ll have my tent blogging up to date.

Unless you think I"m missing something?

mrsbrown: (sca baby)
[livejournal.com profile] maxlu179 posted pictures this evening of his new tent. It's a lot like the soldiers tent we made for my children a few years ago, but his seems to be more taut than ours. Also, a bit bigger, which is sensible.

Also, as [livejournal.com profile] sjkasabi predicted a while ago, the next step in tent making is to sew it by hand. I think he did.

Here are the pictures I have of the soldier's tents.

mrsbrown: (sca baby)




It's from [livejournal.com profile] majea's post about travelling to Beni Mellal and finding the Festival of Horses en route.

Also

Jan. 14th, 2008 12:06 am
mrsbrown: (Default)
I came home, mucked around with my camera and posted a bunch of photos of tent making.
mrsbrown: (Default)
Skiving (sp?) off from my exam and writing stuff to you instead.

1.  This morning I found the energy rating site for air conditioners.  Yes, as Alan Pears says, air conditioners might be cheap for the consumer, but they mean the government, and ultimately, the tax payer, has to pay up to $6000 to provide the electricity infrastructure to run it.

I struggle with air conditioners.  I hate the heat as much as the next northern european descendant, but I know it's only hot enough for me to want air conditioning for about 10 days a year.  In my house, when I get my act together, I'll get ceiling fans and/or an evaporative cooler.

Also, if you only have electricity connected to your home, they are the most efficient way to heat it.  Efficient reverse cycle air conditioners produce about the same amount of greenhouse gas for heating as gas heaters, yes even in nasty brown coal burning Victoria.  The problem is that when we have them, we use air conditioners for coolingin summer, which is when we have a problem with electricity demand.

I like the idea that if you have air conditioning you should install PV panels to power them.  It's a good match, producing maximum electricity when you most want cooling.  I guess if you can't do that, you should pay the premium for 100% accredited greenpower

2.  It's really nice having a laptop.  I'm lying on the couch to do/avoid my exam.  Unfortunately, I'm also right next to the new tent.

When I was newly pregnant with Rose and feeling sick, I spent quite a lot of time in company with my other new tent (which I'd link to but Flickr is down).  I said at the time that the smell of new canvas and fresh enamel paint would probably have a bad association for me for the rest of my life. 

It's happened before.  When I was queasy with Sneetch, I spent 3 days at work drawing the most amazing 3D image using an inadequate drawing package.  It's a fabulous drawing, but I can only look at it for about 10seconds before I start feeling queasy.  Bleurgh!

I was right about the tent smell.  Although it's a funny bad association.  There's the queasy feeling, which is bad, but is right next to the sense of achievement I have in designing and participating in making something that looks and is so fabulous.

3.  Been thinking about Steven Covey's Circle of Influence, and Circle of Concern.  One of my growths through being a parent, and a single person and stuff was realising how much of my energy and arguments were about me worrying about stuff in my circle of concern, instead of my circle of influence. 

After a comment I made yesterday, and some conversations my friends have managed to avoid having with me lately, its probably been a good time to revisit it.  Actually, I think Hornblower had some influence there too.  Anyway, its all about taking responsibility for the stuff I have direct control over, and letting other people work out for themselves that they need to do stuff too.

Hmmm, does Douglas Adams count as a guru too?  I use his concept of SEP a lot. Not so much the invisibility field, but dividing problems into mine and Somebody Else's.  OTOH, I might come off a bit flippant when I do that at work.

4. We're off to the zoo this arvo  I wonder how Rose will manage with her Daddy on stage and her not allowed to be with him?  Maybe we'll spend the whole time looking at the Hippos or something.



mrsbrown: (Default)
There's a bit of demand out there for a "tent making workshop". I'm happy to be involved in one, but there are a number of steps to take before ordering, cutting and sewing canvas.

This is the first step and will take at least a week, if not longer. That's good, because it gives me a week (or longer :) ) to put together the instructions for the second step.

Go and look at tent pictures. I prefer looking at medieval pictures, there are lots at http://home.adelphi.edu/~sbloch/sca/tents/pictures/ If you have lots of time, you could take a look through http://www.bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts/searchMSNo.asp. There is also an existing tent here - http://www.greydragon.org/pavilions/basel.html

You can also go and look at pictures of tents other SCA people have made. There are lots of pages on the web that will tell you about how other people have made their tents. I don't have any I particularly like - google it and share your findings in the comments section .

While you're looking start to think about the constraints on your design:

  • How big do you want your tent?

  • What do you want to put in your tent?

  • How many people do you have available to put up your tent?

  • How much space do you want to take up with your tent?

  • How much time do you have?

  • Where can you store it?


Also, how much money do you want to spend?

A bell tent sized to fit a double bed uses 30-40m of fabric. At commercial canvas costs of $15-$20, that's $450-$800 for canvas alone. Rope is about $100, timber for poles and leather for grommets can be another $50-$200, depending on your scrounging ability. Your tent can cost about $600-$1100.


You also need to think about what styles and time periods you like. Do you have a particular persona you'd like to match with your tent? If you wear mostly Viking, maybe you should be looking at Viking tents.

I have made bell tents, like this one.



It has a central pole, stormguys to hold up the pole and wall guys to hold out the roof. The walls are pegged at the ground. It was designed to fit a double bed and canopy (2.4m above ground level) on one side of the centre pole, while taking up as small a land area as possible. It needs a circle of 9m diameter to put it up. Notice the slope of the roof?

The next tent is one of the first ones I was involved in making. It also needs a 9m diameter circle, but has a lot less internal space. It fits a king single on one side of the centre pole. The slope of the roof of this tent is shallower, so the guys go out further.



Double bells are just bell tents with a rectangular insert and an extra pole.

Homework:

Find a picture of the tent you'd like to make. Work out the floor area/diameter you want and what proportions you would like for the height of the walls/roof
mrsbrown: (Default)
I now have 3 glorious days to fritter away doing stuff on the following lists. The things I could do today are green, the stuff I was going to do yesterday are purple

Festival preparation;
  • proof soldiers tents
  • cut out big tent
  • spend a day sewing the big tent
  • work out what I'm going to do about clothes for festival - I've been feeling frumpy lately
  • work out layout of our tentage and book for festival
  • Book Binka into a kennel
  • secret project

Domesticity
  • supermarket shopping
  • reorganise my budget

Mothering
  • hem T's other uniform
  • hem T's blazer sleeves
  • get the 2 books on the booklist we weren't able to get
  • Shop for a guitar for Z
  • be home at 3.30 to greet children returning from their first day of school
  • Nag G to complete the things he said he wants to do (I'm his mother, it's my job
Renovating
  • book a termite inspection
  • decide which company should replace my back fence and tell them
  • organise to get a new back door
  • Go to the house of noodles and bears and work on their bathroom

Stuff for me
  • shop for work clothes
  • Buy the 2 Kerry Greenwood novels people have been talking about and read them
  • design and make some clothes for work

In other news, Max is back - again. We heard the miouw at 12.30 last night, after G and I had a conversation about how rejected we felt that we weren't the sort of place that could keep a cat (Max is our third). He's a maniac, all three bedrooms have stories of being kept awake for the 2 hours between 5am and 7am. We've also given up on him being an inside cat. If we give him open access to outside we figure maybe he can work out how to come inside again within 24 hours. It seems to be working.
mrsbrown: (Default)
I think I've had a productive day.

I have designed and worked out cutting layouts and canvas quantities for our new tents. We are using the tents from this picture for our design.

[livejournal.com profile] mr_bassman and I are having one of the large, tall ones. Like this:


And if you look carefully, you can find 2 soldiers tents like this one


I'm particularly proud of that picture, I had to teach myself to use 3D Autocad for that.

I also had someone over to measure my asbestos for removal, persuaded 2 children to go to school, and emptied 2 boxes from the Family room.

I shall now retire, virtuously, to bed.

tents

Jun. 27th, 2004 11:18 pm
mrsbrown: (Default)
Starting to think seriously about tents - making, designing without waiting until two weeks before festival.

I'm searching for soldiers tents - so the kids don't have to share with us.

Here are some things I found.

http://home.adelphi.edu/~sbloch/ma/tents/pictures/de.machinis.html

http://www.contrib.andrew.cmu.edu/~nh0g/tent.html

http://www.past-tents.demon.co.uk/frame.htm

I also did a CAD drawing of our bed, put the tent centre pole about 50cm away from the bed and drew a circle to include the bed, with a bit of leeway either side. It would be 5m in diameter. When the pole is about 10cm from the edge of the bed, the tent is 4m diameter. For tents 3.3m, 3.6m and 3.9m, the resultant rope diameter is 8.8m, 8m and 7.4m. That's based on a tent with a shoulder height of 1.8m => is that too high?

Here is a link to the drawing I did. )
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