A Family Adventure


Tyson, Emilie & Isaac

Radiant cooling and hangar progress

September 15, 2019
Emilie Phillips

Mid-September update on the hangar.

Looking out the taxiway towards the runway

Most of the site work is done. The site crew had to import crushed stone and bigger gravel for the taxiway and apron. Without it, the trucks kept sinking into the sand. We are waiting until after the outside of the building is done before we pave. They dug up the yard between the house and the hangar to put conduit for utilities. We had a slight change of plans when Jerry convinced us it was possible connect a water line to the hangar.

Waterproof membrane beneath slab

Then Ike and his crew installed the insulation under the slab, the piping for radiant heat in the slab, and finally poured the slab itself. A funny thing happened, though, one night after the insulation and the waterproof membrane were installed. It had rained the day before, leaving a thin layer of water on the waterproof membrane. Overnight it cleared up, and the air cooled to ~44F. In the morning, we found ice on top of the insulation.

As best we can guess, the water radiated it’s heat up through the clear air to space. The insulation underneath protected it from the ground’s heat. Apparently this is a reliable phenomena in the desert. Folks in the middle east used to use it to make ice above freezing.

Previous hangar build stages listed in the full build story.

Photos

Written September 18, 2019, updated August 23, 2020

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Comments (2)

  • Biggest thing I noticed in these photos is… you have big trees at both ends of the runway! Interesting note about the ice.

    Reply

  • There are only actually big trees at the south end of the runway. The north end drops of into a swamp. On hot days, the lower powered airplanes do have to be careful to out climb the hill.

    Before going west, I had read books on mountain and canyon flying. They kept emphasizing how difficult the airstrips are. That many are one way. And that the last go-around point might be before the runway.

    That didn’t sounds scary after having learned on a one way strip where late go-arounds put you in the trees. Going into the trip, I really wasn’t sure if the strips would be super easy for me, or if there was something else that made them hard.

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