Why a dome ?
The unique relationship between a dome's surface area and its interior volume benefits both manufacturing economy and the solar heating equation.
Richard Buckminster Fuller
Bucky and I exhibited our domes at the University of Massachusetts in 1978 (polaroid photo). Mine was the detailed wood frame, Bucky's "Fly's Eye" is off to the right.
I am still inspired by his speeches and books, and by his boundless enthusiasm. I wish he were alive now for the internet interconnectivity he predicted.
In 1954 Bucky was granted a US Patent for his "Geodesic Dome", which was identical to the one built by Walter Bauersfeld in Jena, Germany in 1922.
To Bucky goes credit for teaching the world a new way to build.
Sadly, though, there is a fatal flaw with geodesic math itself which ruins much of the economy it sought to begin with.
"Geodesic" math is a spherical sub-division of Plato's 2,400 year old 20-sided solid, the icosahedron. Although subdividing major triangles yields a minimum number of different sizes which benefits manufacturing economy, the icosahedron-based grid restriction results in undulating strut rows, clumsy riser walls, box-outs for sliding doors, and impossible windows.
Geodesic domes do not work.
