View allAll Photos Tagged Structural
And old building with apparenlt serious structural issues, York, England.
York’s old town is known for “The Shambles,” an old area of narrow and sometimes-curving streets lined with very old shops and businesses. (The appearance in places is “Harry Potteresque,” something that shops are now promoting.) They seem to take pains to maintain the very old and slightly off-kilter appearance of the shops, but this particular building is a standout!
And, no, your screen is not melting. This building actually looks like this, leaning precariously to one side, with the walls of the lower floor appearing to be badly distorted and cracked. I did not enter the building, nor could I find a name for it (though the sign says that ghost tours meet there), but I can only hope that there is some interior reinforcement not visible from the street!
G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.
The River Witham in Lincoln at the theorised location of the Stamp End causeway, a putative crossing point of the Witham by the Jurassic Way near Stamp End. Although no structural evidence has been found, the quantity of objects of a votive nature retrieved from the Witham near Stamp End strongly supports the proposition that such a crossing existed. These finds have ranged in date from the later Bronze Age to the 11th century. The nature of such a barrier is not known, but in the 10th century it is likely that the causeway was revived and used as a water control site. The causeway is referred to in documents of the 15th century (eg, murum lapidium-stone wall, calcetum-causeway or street).
Stamp End is the area of river Witham to the east of Broadgate, presumably with its eastern limit in the locality of modern Stamp End. The name is first recorded in the mid-15th century and has been associated with the Friars of the Sack.
The River Witham is a river almost entirely in the county of Lincolnshire in the east of England. It rises south of Grantham close to South Witham, passes Lincoln and at Boston, flows into The Haven, a tidal arm of The Wash, near RSPB Frampton Marsh. The name "Witham" seems to be extremely old and of unknown origin. Archaeological and documentary evidence shows the importance of the Witham as a navigation from the Iron Age onwards. From Roman times it was navigable to Lincoln, from where the Fossdyke was constructed to link it to the River Trent. The mouth of the river moved in 1014 following severe flooding, and Boston became important as a port.
From 1142 onwards, sluices were constructed to prevent flooding by the sea, and this culminated in the Great Sluice, which was constructed in 1766. It maintained river levels above Boston, and helped to scour the channel below it. The land through which the lower river runs has been the subject of much land drainage, and many drains are connected to the Witham by flood doors, which block them off if river levels rise rapidly. The river is navigable from Brayford Pool in Lincoln to Boston, with Locks only in Lincoln, at Bardney and at the Grand Sluice. Passage through the Grand Sluice lock is restricted to short periods when the tidal levels are suitable. The river provides access for boaters to the Witham Navigable Drains, to the north of Boston, and to the South Forty-Foot Drain to the south, which was reopened as part of the Fens Waterways Link, a project to link the river to the River Nene near Peterborough. From Brayford Pool, the Fossdyke Navigation still links to the Trent.
.
.
Art washes away from the soul, the dust of everyday life.
- Henri Matisse
.
.
Sculpture group Shoal Fly By (2003) by Bellemo & Cat at Docklands, Melbourne's precinct centre.
.
.
NO GIFS AND ANIMATED ICONS, PLEASE!
Another from the Tamron 28mm lens test, looking at the beauty of temperate zone trees in winter. This is an Oak tree, almost certainly an American Red Oak, Quercus rubra, but without the leaves or acorns, one cannot be certain. Many species of oaks, both indigenous & introduced, are present in Limousin. Oak is the most durable of all temperate hardwoods, and also one of the strongest, and has been used for both structural and decorative purposes for many hundreds of years.
1980 Mamiya ZE, f2.5/28mm Tamron lens, X2 yellow filter. Rollei Retro100 @200, In Diafine, 5+5mins at 21C. scanned @ 2400dpi on Epson V500.
This is my take on the PacWest Center (also known as the Icecube Building). It’s a great comp for black and white processing because it’s already black & white (Okay, it’s black & silver). While the lone tree growing out the side intrigues me I have to admit I like my contact William Walsh’s version a lot better: www.flickr.com/photos/54241790@N03/6943024393
Belém Cultural Centre, Lisbon Portugal
The Cultural Centre of Belém (CCB) is located in Santa Maria de Belém, near the riverfront west of Lisbon. It is the largest building with cultural facilities in Portugal. The CCB has 140,000 m² of construction area and was prepared in a very short period (1989–1992). The client of the project was the Portuguese State. Completed in 1992, it is the work of architects Vittorio Gregotti and Manuel Salgado; the interior was planned by Daciano Costa. The CCB was initially built to accommodate the European Presidency, but adapted to provide spaces for conferences, exhibitions and artistic venues, such as opera, ballet and symphony concerts, in addition to political and research congresses, high security meeting halls, and a 7,000 m² exhibition area. It has already hosted important events like the summit meeting of the Heads of State of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE).
The decision to construct the CCB occurred in January 1988, as part of the Portuguese government's need to accommodate Portugal's European Union Presidency in 1992. The facility would also serve as a core facility for cultural and leisure activities after its term, and serve as a venue for conferences and exhibitions. An international architectural competition was held and six proposals were invited to submit a preliminary project, out of the 57 submissions. The final proposal, submitted by the architectural consortium of Vittorio Gregotti (Italy) and Atelier Risco at the time led by Manuel Salgado (Portugal), was designed to include five modules: a Conference Centre, a Performing Arts Centre, an Exhibition Centre, Hotel and complementary equipment zone, but only the Conference Centre, the Performing Arts Centre and the Exhibition Centre were initially constructed.
Starting in July 1989, the buildings along the waterfront were demolished and many of the infrastructures were re-established. By January 1992, modules 1, 2 and 3 were completed and ready to accommodate the institutions, administration, communication centre and security of the European Union Presidency. A year later the Conference Centre and small auditorium and the Exhibition Centre were opened to the public. By fall of the same year the main auditorium was inaugurated.
Its designed, aligned with the Jerónimos' Monastery, intentionally fronts the Império Square, and consists of structural blocks with courtyards and "patio-squares" that interconnect the three principal structures. Each centre is separated by transversal "streets", that link the building's interiors which are extensions of the city of Lisbon's historical urban structure. The centrality of the main building extends the urban fabric to the interior creating a public space. This architectural style can best be interpreted by Santana and Matos (2010) who refer to as the "patios-squares" versus the "narrow streets" a conflicting dynamic structure.
Location : Putrajaya, Malaysia
Related Image:
The Wawasan Bridge is one of the main bridges in Putrajaya, the Malaysian federal administrative capital. This futuristic cable-stayed bridge which has a sail ship appearance, connects Precinct 2 on the Core Island to the residential area of Precinct 8.
The concrete bridge is a combination of cable backstays and structural steel tie back. It is a dual three lane carriageways of 18.6m width each, comprising 3 x 3.5m width lanes, 0.5 m hard shoulder, 0.5m marginal strip. The median is 4 m wide and walkway cum cycle track width is 5.1m giving a total width of 37.2m at the centre of the bridge.
Tensegrity is een samentrekking van tension en structural integrity. Het verwijst naar de integriteit van structuren gebaseerd op een evenwicht tussen trek- en drukbelastingen. De trekkrachten worden opgevangen in flexibele staalkabels. De drukkrachten worden opgevangen in staven van staal.
Day 258 - 35mm Ilford HP5+ pushed to 1600 on a Nikon FE with Nikkor 50mm f/2 ai-s lense. Metadata describes how image was uploaded.
Nikon D7100 | AF-S DX VR Nikkor 18-105mm f/3.5-5.6G
Müngsten Bridge, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany.
Tech. Sgt. Ryan Atoigue adjusts a light attached to his helmet while participating in structural fire training Oct. 20, 2014, at Dover Air Force Base, Del. Atoigue's helmet indicates that he is a firecrew captain with the 436th Civil Engineer Squadron. (U.S. Air Force photo by Greg L. Davis/Released)
Greg Mitchell Photography and Tactile Photo are exclusively represented by Hammond Art Consuting Services: for consultation, design, delivery and installation on commercial, healthcare and hospitality projects, please contact Alan Hammond at (916) 205-3925 or visit their website at www.hammondartconsulting.com
The Pukamani tutini sculptural poles (intricately carved ironwood poles inspired by traditional Pukamani ceremonies) display at the Australian Garden, Flower Dome, Gardens by the Bay.
Urbex Tip #47: Sagging Ceilings
When exploring a building, if you should come across a ceiling that is bulging or sagging significantly in some way...go elsewhere.
Conversely, if while exploring you should come across a place where the ceiling has in fact already given way and there's a rather large tree growing up through the hole...setup your tripod and take a picture; somebody might think it's cool.
This concludes today's urbex tip. :-)
Swift Meat Packing Ruins, Fort Worth, Texas.
Night, mostly full moon, xenon flashlight.
And today's word is "Tessellated".
As in the construction of the glass roof over the British Museum Great Court, London.
This brilliant design by architect Norman Foster and structural engineer Buro Happold, is "the largest covered square in Europe, bigger than a football field. The glass and steel roof is made up of 4,878 unique steel members connected at 1,566 unique nodes and 1,656 pairs of glass windowpanes making up 6,100 sq. metres of glazing; each of a unique shape because of the undulating nature of the roof."
The sad, but colourful autumnal change
Now showing Exif if you are interested, though i'm still shooting large fine jpeg. Like the seasons, i'm slow to change. When the weather gets a bit raw....
Please click the image or press L top view it in Flickr's lightbox.
You may also want to have a look at it in original size.
Dubail, UAE.
.
If you liked my work, take a look at my Instagram gallery, where I share some of the things I've been doing (travels, music, lifestyle) and where I post other pictures that are not yet on Flickr as well as some edits:
.
In case you want to use any of my pictures just send me a message so we can talk about it.
.
Any favourite, like or share is appreciated and would greatly help me in my photographic journey. Thanks a lot for your support.
+++ DISCLAIMER +++
Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based historical facts. BEWARE!
Some background:
The Gloster Glaive was basically a modernized and re-engined variant of the successful, British-built Gloster Gladiator (or Gloster SS.37), the RAF’s final biplane fighter to enter service. The Gladiator was not only widely used by the RAF at the dawn of WWII and in almost every theatre of operations, but also by many other nations. Operators included Norway, Belgium, Sweden, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania or Nationalist China, and while the RAF already opted for more modern monoplanes, Gloster saw the opportunity to sell an updated Gladiator to countries which were not as progressive.
Originally designated Gladiator Mk. IV, the machine received many aerodynamic refinements and the motor was changed from a draggy radial to a liquid-cooled inline engine. The latter was the new Rolls Royce Peregrine, a development of the Kestrel. It was, in its original form, a 21-litre (1,300 cu in) liquid-cooled V-12 aero engine ), delivering 885-horsepower (660 kW). The engine was housed under a streamlined cowling, driving a three blade metal propeller, and was coupled with a ventral radiator bath, reminiscent of the Hawker Fury biplane’s arrangement.
Structural improvements included an all-metal monocoque fuselage and stabilizers, as well as new wings and streamlined struts with reduced bracing. The upper wing was enlarged and of all-metal construction, too, while the lower wings were reduced in span and area, almost resulting in a sesquiplane layout. The total wing area was only marginally reduced, though.
The fixed landing gear was retained, but the main wheels were now covered with spats. The pilot still sat in a fully enclosed cockpit, the armament consisted of four machine guns, similar to the Gladiator. But for the Glaive, all Browning machine guns were synchronized and mounted in the fuselage: one pair was placed on top of the cowling, in front of the cockpit. Another pair, much like the Gladiator’s arrangement was placed in the fuselage flanks, below the exhaust outlets.
Compared with the Gladiator, the design changes were so fundamental that Gloster eventually decided to allocate a separate designation – also with a view to the type’s foreign marketing, since a new aircraft appeared more attractive than another mark of a pre-war design. For the type’s virgin flight in late 1938 the name “Glaive” was unveiled to the public, and several smaller European air forces immediately showed interest, including Greece, Croatia, Turkey, Portugal and Egypt.
Greece was one of the initial customers, and the first of a total of 24 aircraft for the Hellenic Air Force was delivered in early 1939, with 24 more on order (which were never delivered, though). The initial batch arrived just in time, since tension had been building between Greece and Italy since 7 April 1939, when Italian troops occupied Albania. On 28 October 1940, Italy issued an ultimatum to Greece, which was promptly rejected. A few hours later, Italian troops launched an invasion of Greece, initiating the Greco-Italian War.
The Hellenic Gloster Glaives were split among three Mirae Dioxeos (Fighter Squadrons): the 21st at Trikala, 22nd at Thessaloniki and 23rd at Larissa. When Italy attacked in October 1940, the British fighter was, together with the PZL 24, the Greeks' only modern type in adequate numbers. However, by late 1940, the Gloster Glaive was already no longer a front-runner despite a powerful powerplant and satisfactory armament. It had no speed advantage over the Fiat Cr.42 nor could it outfly the nimble Italian biplane, and it was much slower than the Macchi MC.200 and the Fiat G.50 it was pitted against. Its agility was the only real advantage against the Italian fighters, whose reliance on the slow firing Breda-SAFAT 12.7mm machine guns proved detrimental.
Anyway, on 5 April 1941, German forces invaded Greece and quickly established air superiority. As the Allied troops retreated, British and Hellenic forces covered them, before flying to Crete during the last week of April. There, the refugee aircraft recorded a few claims over twin-engine aircraft before being evacuated to Egypt during the Battle of Crete.
Overall, the Glaives performed gallantly during the early period of the conflict, holding their own against impossible numerical odds and despite the fact that their main target were enemy bombers which forced them to fight at a disadvantage against enemy fighters. Italian claims of easy superiority over the Albanian front were vastly over-rated and their kill claims even exceeded the total number of operational fighters on the Greek side. Total Greek fighter losses in combat came to 24 a/c with the Greek fighter pilots claiming 64 confirmed kills and 24 probables (about two third bombers).
By April 1941, however, lack of spares and attrition had forced the Hellenic Air Force to merge the surviving seven Glaives with five leftover PZL.24s into one understrength squadron supported by five Gloster Gladiators Mk I & II and the two surviving MB.151s. These fought hopelessly against the Luftwaffe onslaught, and most aircraft were eventually lost on the ground. None of the Hellenic Gloster Glaives survived the conflict.
General characteristics:
Crew: two
Length: 8.92m (29 ft 3 in)
Wingspan: 34 ft 0 in (10.36 m)
Height: 11 ft 9 in (3.58 m)
Wing area: 317 ft² (29.4 m²)
Empty weight: 1,295 kg (2,855 lb)
Max takeoff weight: 1,700 kg (3,748 lb)
Powerplant:
1× Rolls Royce Peregrine II liquid-cooled V12 inline engine, rated at 940 hp (700 kw)
Performance:
Maximum speed: 405 km/h (252 mph; 219 kn) at 4,400 m (14,436 ft)
Cruise speed: 345 km/h (214 mph; 186 kn)
Stall speed: 60 mph (52 knots, 96 km/h)
Range: 373 mi (600 km; 324 nmi)
Endurance: 2 hours
Service ceiling: 10,600 m (34,800 ft)
Rate of climb: 2,982 ft/min (15.15 m/s)
Time to altitude: 10.000 ft (3.050 m) in 3 minutes 20 seconds
Armament:
4× 0.303 calibre (7.7 mm) M1919 Browning machine guns in the fuselage
Provisions for 6× 10 kg (22 lb) or 4x 20 kg (44 lb) bombs under the lower wings
The kit and its assembly:
The fictional Gloster Glaive started quite simple with the idea of replacing the Gladiator’s radial with an inline engine. But this soon did not appear enough for an update – the Peregrine hardly delivered much more power than the former Mercury, so I considered some structural updates, too. Most of them comprised the replacement of former fabric-covered structures, and this led conceptually to a kitbash with only some Gladiator fuselage and tail parts left.
The basis is (once more) the very nice Matchbox Gloster Gladiator, but it was heavily modified. As an initial step, fuselage, fin and stabilizers (all OOB parts) lost their rib-and-fabric structure, simply sanded away. A minor detail, but it changes the overall look of the aircraft a lot, making it appear much more modern.
The fuselage was left without the OOB radial, and instead a leftover Merlin front end from an Airfix Hurricane (ca. 1cm long, left over from one of my first whif builds ever, a Hurricane with a radial engine!) was added. The lines match pretty well: the side profile looks sleek, if not elegant, but the Gladiator fuselage turned out to be wider than expected. Some major body work/PSR was necessary to integrate the new nose, but the result looks very good.
The liquid-cooled engine necessitated a radiator somewhere on the airframe…! Since I wanted the nose to remain slim and streamlined I eventually placed the radiator bath under the fuselage, much like the arrangement of the Hawker Fury biplane. The radiator itself comes from a late Spitfire (FROG kit).
The exhaust was taken from the Hurricane kit, too, and matching slits dug into the putty nose to take them. The three blade propeller is a mash-up, too: the spinner belongs, IIRC, to an early Spitfire (left over from an AZ Models kit) while the blades came from a damaged Matchbox Brewster Buffalo.
The Gladiator’s fuselage flank machine guns were kept and their “bullet channels” extrapolated along the new cowling, running under the new exhaust pipes. Another pair of machine guns were placed on top of the engine – for these, openings were carved into the upper hull and small fairings (similar to the Browning guns in the flanks) added. This arrangement appeared plausible to me, since the Gladiator’s oil cooler was not necessary anymore and the new lower wings (see below) were not big enough anymore to take the Gladiator’s underwing guns. Four MGs in the fuselage appears massive – but there were other types with such an arrangement, e.g. the Avia B-534 with four guns in the flanks and an inline engine.
The wings are complete replacements: the upper wing comes from a Heller Curtiss SBC4, while the lower wings as well as the spats (on shortened OOB Gladiator struts) come from an ICM Polikarpov I-153. All struts were scratched. Once the lower wings were in place and the relative position of the upper wing clear, the outer struts were carved from 1mm styrene sheet, using the I-153 design as benchmark. These were glued to the lower wing first, and, once totally dry after 24h, the upper wing was simply glued onto the top and the wing position adjusted. This was left to dry another 24h, and as a final step the four struts above the cowling (using the OOB struts, but as single parts and trimmed for proper fit) were placed. This way, a stable connection is guaranteed – and the result is surprisingly sturdy.
Rigging was done with heated sprue material – my personal favorite for this delicate task, and executed before painting the kit started so that the glue could cure and bond well.
Painting and markings:
The reason why this aircraft ended in Greek service is a color photograph of a crashed Hellenic Bloch M.B. 152 (coded ‘D 177’, to be specific). I guess that the picture was post-colored, though, because the aircraft of French origin sports rather weird colors: the picture shows a two-tone scheme in a deep, rather reddish chestnut brown and a light green that almost looks like teal. Unique, to say the least... Underside colors couldn’t be identified with certainty in the picture, but appeared like a pale but not too light blue grey.
Anyway, I assume that these colors are pure fiction and exaggerated Photoshop work, since the few M.B. 152s delivered to Greece carried AFAIK standard French camouflage (in French Khaki, Chestnut Brown and Blue-Grey on the upper surfaces, and a very light blue-grey from below). I’d assume that the contrast between the grey and green tones was not very obvious in the original photograph, so that the artist, not familiar with WWII paint schemes, replaced both colors with the strange teal tone and massively overmodulated the brown.
As weird as it looked, I liked this design and used it as an inspirational benchmark for my Hellenic Glaive build. After all, it’s a fictional aircraft… Upper basic colors are Humbrol 31 (RAF Slate Grey) and 160 (German Camouflage Red Brown), while the undersides became French Dark Blue Grey (ModelMaster Authentics 2105). The result looks rather odd…
Representing a combat-worn aircraft, I applied a thorough black ink wash and did heavier panel shading and dry-brushing on the leading edges, along with some visible touches of aluminum.
The Hellenic roundels come from a TL Modellbau aftermarket sheet. The tactical code was puzzled together from single letters, and the Greek “D” was created from single decal strips. For better contrast I used white decals – most Hellenic aircraft of the time had black codes, but the contrast is much better, and I found evidence that some machines actually carried white codes. The small fin flash is another free interpretation. Not every Hellenic aircraft carried these markings, and instead of painting the whole rudder in Greek colors I just applied a small fin flash. This was created with white and blue decal strips, closely matching the roundels’ colors.
Finally, after some soot stains around the guns and the exhausts, the kit was sealed with matt acrylic varnish.
Modified beyond recognition, perhaps…? The fictional Gloster Glaive looks IMHO good and very modern, just like one of those final biplane designs that were about to be outrun by monoplanes at the brink of WWII.