1BB, we had spoke on the phone some years back when you offered to do these with your equipment. I wouldnt mind shooting you an email with a few questions if you have the time to answer them. I am working on trying to get a few of these put up locally but am highly concerned as to the abilities of the local cement guys to properly shotcrete a dome. One idea was to take you up on the offer and be "on the payroll off the clock" so to speak and come work with you for a few days. I have no problems sweating as long as your teaching.

Of course that depends how hard domes are. It may be the local guys could do it, not real sure. How hard is it to put up a dome? How long does it take? And my biggest curiosity is how the heck do you make openings for windows and such?

Hmmn I am thinking the same thing.... Arfcom build party!

The big problem with these is getting financing on these to build them. I checked into, and because it's nonconventional structure, the lenders see it as harder to sell. But I would love to live in a mono dome.

I was looking for pics of generator sheds and in the process I found this page:

http://www.autobestbuysweekly.com/Dome/

It sure looks like an aughful lot of work and I wouldn't want that design in an earthquake prone area for fear the sandbags would just fall in on you but it looks to be a pretty darn near bullet proof design (other then the door)  It honestly reminds me of Sponge Bob's house



Anyways, just sharing the link as I knew I had seen this thread and thought it was somewhat related.

So for those who have done some reading...

What 1 book, video or reference material would you recommend to learn about the basics of dome construction?

I had no idea such a thing was possible until today.  I want one.

you know i got a uncle that builds them.  if you come over for the machine gun shoot this fall you can talk to him.  glad you got your house sold!  now hurry up and get here, my xj needs bumbers

I thought this thread had died!!!! I will build my dome its just going to take couple more years

Ok, so the airform becomes the outer skin of these things?  From what I can tell, the layer directly under it is insulating foam, so do they compress under heavy weight, like a big snowfall?  Do they dent if a tree branch falls on them?



Are there any other downsides to these things?

under the foam is rebar and 6"-8" of shotcrete, so no they won't compress under weight, nor will it dent from a branch.  they are rated to survive F5 tornadoes.

correction; after the airform, the next layer IS foam, then the rebar and concrete....I believe the foam is of a sufficiently high density to be very resistant to most normal impacts (hail, small-med branches, and so on)

Seems like they'd put something on the outside.  I have a hard time believing the bare airform will last forever.  



 

thanks for the correction gtlandser.

iirc, early in this thread 1 big bunker talks about the life of the airform - i don't recall the exact number believe it is a long time.  he also stated that they also have been putting something similar to rhino lining on it.

Assuming the footing is poured how long does it take to do just the dome? Can a guy get one up and all finished in 2 days? Mind you I dont mean the inside, I just mean getting the foam, rebar and concrete up.

I very seroiusly doubth you could hang all the rebar and spray the foam and then shotcrete it by by yourself in 2 days  seems to me the hardest part would be hanging rebar. That is if you already knew how to spray the foam and the shotcrete. I think it would probably take you two days or better to hang the rebar by yourself.

I would say its a two man job at aleast all around.... you cant handle 40' sections of bar alone

So you could break it down to inflate and foam weekend 1, rebar weekend 2 and shotcrete weekend 3?

Interesting idea.  Do you suppose the foam is strong enough to support its own weight for a week?  Would suck to have to keep the blower running that whole time.



 

maybe itself but it would have to support the air form shell also. Pics I saw the blower was on till after the shotcrete was sprayed I think.

I can't let this die...

folks, a lot of these questions are easily answered by reading Monolithic's web page, they have articles describing all of the ones that usually arise here: underground pros and cons, how they are built start to finish, what they cost, etc etc.

bbtt

Tagged, because this thread has a misspelled title and I can never find it, and I don't want the good info here to get away.  I want one of these and would like to ask some more questions once I get spun up enough to ask intelligent ones...

Local news station had a story last month on a DFW-area school (IIRC) building a new auditorium or something like that.

Damn this is some cool shit! I need to go back to the sandbox and raise some capital.

tag

I am bumping because I might be moving and this seems like good information

Any suggestions on a good place to find house plans?

Here

Cool!

Was a rough-guess price mentioned anywhere in this thread?

It was this one:

 

can we get the OP or a mod to edit the thread title for spelling? Or can we get a tack? 9000 views and this isn't a tack yet?

Definitely interested in something like this.  When (if) I can sell my current home.

IIRC Mr. Bunker said it could   be as low as $35/sq ft if you do most of the work yourself.

I know 1_Big_Bunker is busy building domes down south, but I wonder if there any other good builders to get reasonable quotes from?  Hopefully someone like him that isn't looking to retire from the profit off of just one build.

1_Big_Bunker:  Is there anyone you would recommend for those of us who can't build it ourselves, and would want to pay someone to build one?  I live in WV, and googling around doesn't seem to produce squat in my area.  Plus I'd prefer a recommendation from someone such as yourself.

I'm currently shopping for the "perfect" piece of land right now, but I'd like to be able to find a builder that could give me a reasonable estimate on what the damage would be.

I'm currently thinking about something like this:


I think I'd like to get a 40' dome built on top of an 18' stem wall.  I'd excavate down the first 18' and have the well drilled right there.  Then I'd have a bison pump setup installed on the wellhead.  After the dome shell was built I would then carefully backfill against the stem wall leaving a 'normal' looking 40' dome exposed above the surface.  I don't know how to calculate the square footage of the top floor inside the curvature of the dome, but it would have roughly 3774 sq. ft. in the first three floors.  The total square footage will be more than I actually "need", so I'm trying to get a handle on pricing to see if I can afford the shell and floors to get the structure up first.  If I have a shell and floors with utilities roughed in, I can then finish up the rest as I can afford it.  Any help would be appreciated.  Also if any of these ideas are unfeasible/unrealistic I'd like to know that too, so I can revamp plans.  
Thanks in advance for any help!!!

I would submit that it would be difficult to estimate the costs of such a design without first knowing what kind of land you will be working with. As 1BB (and MDI's website) has mentioned, going underground with domes is possible, but not very economical.

You already get most of the benefits of being underground, for much lower cost, with a regular dome. For the money you could spend in going underground, you could just add a higher grade of rebar and more concrete, and still enjoy a larger, more secure dome. I think even some comparative disadvantages of being above ground could be mitigated, like windows. Ok, spend some coin on motorized armored doors . Eye of the Storm on Sullivan's Island basically did that––they have roll-away steel shutters for the hurrican season. That place is entirely above ground, and I can assure you, it is still VERY expensive.

Remember, as MDI and 1BB frequently state, cost estimates are tough, and generally, the savings aren't in the construction, but the energy costs down the road. So, let's assume $100/SF, which I think is way too conservative for what you have depicted, and you're still looking at a LOT of $$$$.

I'd stay above ground.

A dome hunting cabin.  Out in the remote wilderness; perfect BOL, low maintenance, easy to heat, low Sq Ft would mean cheap to build.  
Suddenly the brain gears are turning!

Whoops, I should have clarified!LOL  I'd be doing the excavation myself, and it wouldn't cost me very much (barring hitting granite or something...LOL).  I have easy access to a backhoe and a dozer, and with help from my family it wouldn't cost me much cash-wise beyond the diesel fuel.  I'd prepare the site and have the well drilled on my own dime.  I could possibly pour the foundation as well, but I'm not sure what the contractor would want as far as the ring beam, etc. entails.  I was really looking at the builder coming in and building the dome on a prepped site.

I was interested in building this way because I thought that using a stem wall would maybe ease up on dome costs.  I thought that adding a whole nother level of space per 9' segment of stem wall might lower cost as opposed to a larger diameter dome for the same sq. footage.  I'm a little sketchy on understanding if that is true though.  That's kind of why I am floating this idea first.  I'm interested in having an internal fallout shelter, and I know mass equals protection there.  I agree that thickening the dome's concrete would add more protection, but I was thinking that if the lowest level of a dome were 18 to 20 feet (I'd back fill a little against the exterior of the 'first floor' also) below the surface I'd pick up considerable mass shielding from the soil and upper levels.  The shelter level's only exposure to the surface would be from 'sky shine', and the distance and mass of the upper levels of the dome would attenuate that considerably (I would think?).

Building a dome with very thick concrete walls would raise the above ground protection, but I was thinking that maybe the extra concrete could be put to use in conjunction with plain old dirt to extract extra interior below ground space for a somewhat comparable cost.  I could be wrong though.  I'm not up on my math enough to figure all of that out.

The other thing I'd really like about a 'shelter' level is that no one (besides the builders) need know it even exists.  A guest at my home would only see a conventional (well, at least as far as a dome is conventional!) home.  Two story living space, with a 'basement' that is used for regular storage.

I don't know if it requires extra materials or effort to build the actual dome for burial or not though.  I'm wondering if a stem wall makes the dome any weaker as opposed to the 'dome' shape.  I'm guessing it would be strong enough, but I figured I better ask that too.

I'm with you on the armored windows!  I don't think I could afford motorized steel shutters though.  I was thinking hard about having steel shutter pins/hinges cast into the dome structure around the windows and doors.  That way I could add my own steel shutters at my own pace to help secure the finished structure.  The shutters would be steel, and I would make a faux wood "face" for the outside world to see while they were open.  They would be closed and locked from the inside when "buttoning up" the dome.

I get some strange ideas sometimes, so I figured I'd better hash this out in a "like minded" place.  I built (with some contracted help) my own "barn" one time.  It came out really well.  The funny part was when the contractors (regular house builders) kept asking me questions...  "Why does this place look like kind of like a fort?", "Why are the windows this high?"  "Why did you backfill against the walls up to the window bottoms?" (I sunk the barn, contured the ridge sides with a dozer, and placed the structure so the windows were at chest heigth and they had perfect fields of fire on almost the whole ridge)  "It looks like you are going to be shooting out of these or something?" (they were joking...)  "The lumber doesn't have to be this thick".... "You are overbuilding this you know?"  ( I used full dimension "rough cut") "What would you be storing up there that is so heavy...?"  And on and on....  I'm happy in the knowledge that that 'barn' will be around long after I die.LOL  I sold the place and the current owner plans on turning it into a huge house.  If he knew what he was doing he could throw a heck of a fight from that place!

Anywhoo, thanks for posting that because I needed to clarify a bit about what I was wanting to do.

So you think that it would cost $100 per sq. foot to just build the shell?  I'm not disputing you at all, I simply don't know.  I would need the shell erected, the utilities piped in, and doors and windows (since the dome guy would understand better whatever was required with their installation).  One of my brothers is an electrician and would do all of the normal wiring and HVAC later, and I have an uncle who can do the plumbing and help me with the carpentry.  If I had the concrete dome portion constructed I could (with mostly family help) complete the rest at my own pace as money allows.  I own my own home now (small mortgage and low bills otherwise), have a good federal job (not likely to get laid off), and would attack the interior construction with a vengeance.  

Another question: I'm a little cloudy with the construction of the actual floors. Besides the lowest level, would a four story structure typically have poured concrete floors?  If so, does that significantly increase construction costs?  I presume that steel I-beam supports of some kind would be necessary for supporting the upper levels?  I would probably (depending on cost) want the dome builder to pour/construct the floors.  That would help me out considerably, and I'd feel safer with someone knowing dome construction handling that anyway.

Again, thanks for replying, and for any other help from anyone else too.  

   

That's a pretty cool project you have there Variable556.

If you want, I will work up some numbers for you to give you a VERY good idea what it costs to build that with a basic floor plan, and doing it yourself. Off the top of my head I would say around $125,000 without the shelter items. Also, your 2nd floor will have 1002 square feet with 6'3'' head clearance. More SF but you will be hitting your head.

I figured it out with the 18' stem wall and a 20' dome. Basically you will be 38' tall.

I will say that the shell will cost as follows doing it yourself:

Airform.........$15,000
Floor...............$4,000
Foam..............$9,000
Rebar.............$7,000
Shotcrete.......$6,750 if you want it 6'' thick and $4,500 @ 4'' thick and this is mixing your own
Misc...............$8,250 This is about $5,000 too high, but I like even numbers

Total...........................$50,000 for the shell

Should take four men about 3 weeks to build working 50-60 hours a week. That is mixing your own shotcrete. Buying off the truck will cut your time down to two weeks or so.

I will answer all my emails later today. I see I have a lot of them.

1BB knows his domehomes like the back of his hand.

What's the best trade to get started building domes?

Plenty of construction trades seem relevant, concrete prep and finish, electricity, interior systems :S

This thread is cool as shit, and it is being tagged. I will have one of these someday.

Okay, I will pick up where I left off.

I am going to give you an idea as far as what it will take to finish off the inside if you do it yourself. Since I am not sure what your floor plan will be, I have copied the one below and will use it as a starting point. I also picked one that was rather "BUSY" inside or crowded so we have plenty of wiggle room. I'm sure yours would not be this busy on every floor or you would have no need for several floors, so your open areas will be bigger, and material use MUCH less per floor, but again, that's fine and all that happens is you spend less money.

Now that the shell is up you will want to paint it. I use an epoxy based paint. The problem is the dome HAS to sit about 45 days BEFORE the primer can be sprayed on. If you don't wait, that's fine, you can do it all over again in about 4 or 5 years when it peels off. Your choice. After the primer is sprayed then the epoxy paint can be applied. This stuff will cover about 300sf per gallon in a dome. You will have 4775 area feet over the dome shell. So, you need about 16 gallons and I can't remember the EXACT price, but it was around $50 a gallon.

Don't skimp on paint. This paint is the best. I mean it cleans up like your counter top. ANYTHING that gets on your wall, wash right off including oil. You can wash your walls with a fire hose and I am not kidding.

Now that I expalined that, the rest is easy, but I did want to make a point of how important it is to do the painting right the first time.

Okay, now onto what it costs and how I came up with those figures using the floor plan below.

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The above floor plan has about 142 feet of running walls in it. You I am sure will not have that much at all, but again, if you don't, great you just save money is all, but at least you have planned for worse case. Also, if the bride wants a really really nice kitchen, you know you have the funds to do it because you have maybe 90 to 100 feet of wall. Take the above plan and multiply it by four as you have four floors, and you get the figures below.

Here is the list of materials and the cost for ALL floors combined with an extra 20% added to them and rounded UP to the nearest $50.

Paint and primer from above.................................$1,600
2x4 Studs.............700 @ $1.77 ea.......................$1,250
2x12x16..................170 @ $14.79 ea..................$2,550 You won't need this many, but it covers 2x8's and any other misc 2x whatever
Decking 4x8............150 sheets @ $15 ea...........$2,250
Drywall 4x8............850 sheets @ $3.86 ea........$3.300 Includes ceilings for three floors
Kitchen complete................................................$12,000 And no this does not include a stove, refrer, or anything like that
Bathrooms.................4 ea @ $2000 ea...............$8,000
Doors, front and rear.................$750 ea.............$1,500 These are a great door and the best, but very plain
Windows..................12 ea @ $525 ea................$6,300 These are triple pane windows and the best
Flooring................................$3.50 psf...............$13,200 For three floors only and not the shelter
Misc....................................................................$50,000 Nails, glue, caulk, lights, ceiling fans, things like that

Total....................................................................$81,950
Shell....................................................................$50,000

Grand total............................................................................$151,950

I was off by $25,000 as I said above, but then again, you have A LOT of wiggle room here. You total living area including shelter is 4776 square feet giving you a cost of $31.82. If you are going to build NOW is the time as building materials haven't been this cheap for many many years. Pretend it is the stockmarket buy when it is low and sell when it is high.

I have no idea about your well or how deep you are going, or a septic, so this right here will give you an idea what it costs building it yourself. It sounds like you have some good help there with the family.

If you want to make the shelter NBC rated, wood decking won't cut it. You need concrete over you. That means steel trusses for support. I am not sure what they are going for as they are each built for the job, but with the wiggle room you have in this budget and MAYBE adding a few grand to it, you can get them and have at least a 4'' floor above you. Plus a concrete floor at your "BASEMENT" level will be more real to someone than a wooden floor.

I want to write more about the AC and heat, as well as some ideas about the shelter. I wanted to go over what would need to be done when the dome shell is built. That is also why I added in the extra $5000 in the shell budget.

I have a few calls to make right now, so I will check back later if I have time. I hope this helps and gives you an idea of what you can get and the cost. I know it is quick and generic, and over priced, but you get the idea.

BB1.  You were talking about painting the airform.  What other finishes have you used on the exterior of the air form?  I was reading somewhere on the MDI website about a special formula they had used for stucco.  Have you tried something like that?  How'd it work out?

Can you recommend anyone around south west New Mexico to do the slab and airform?

Well, with so much of the work done yourself or for cheap from friends and relatives....this is starting to look more achievable all the time!

HOLY COW!!!    YOU ROCK, SIR!!!

I'm a bit dumfounded and overwhelmed with all of the good information you have provided me.  It will take me a while to sit down and intelligently digest all of that!  Thank you!!!!

First of all:  This is awesome news, because it does definitely appear that this is feasible for me to pull off.  It will take a while (still trying to find the consarned land!!!) to get a good running start on this, but I am now locked on this being what I want to do.  The wife is even excited and gives the whole idea a big "green light".  That in itself was a major miracle to me.LOL  The sheer logic of a dome even won her over eventually.

You are exactly right on my not needing such a busy floorplan also.  I only want two bedrooms and two baths on the "1st" floor, and two bedrooms and one bathroom on the second floor.  Good call on the kitchen also, the Mrs. wants a much bigger kitchen than we have now.LOL  The bottom two levels would be finished at my leisure over a longer period.  The "basement" would be half conventional storage and half "mancave", while the shelter level would be pretty spartan and be mostly open space stuffed full of preps/stores, etc., and just a few small enclosed rooms otherwise.

The well is a hard number to figure around here.  WV is a crap shoot for table depth.  My fathers well is only about 90', one of my brother's is 160'-ish.  I could possibly have a spring, or in another area I could end up drilling for China.  Septic shouldn't be too bad of a problem.  Until I have the property and start digging/drilling I won't know those numbers yet.  My ideal location around here would be a reclaimed strip mine site.  This state has plenty of them.  Unless a reclaimed mine site is situated close to an urban area (for "strip" mall building LOL), they aren't all that desireable to the average joe.  I on the other hand specifically want such property.  HIghwalls and nice flat long narrow benches are great for shooting distance on, and are pretty defensible too.LOL  The resulting ridgetops also become nice peninsulas with a view to build on providing they are accessible.  Depending on the site you pick the highwalls can even give you a preview of what the surrounding strata generally is.

Regarding heat:  I have wondered about that one too.  I would probably skip the in floor heat to save some money and opt for regular natural gas heat/central air.  I'd probably want an additional source via a small wood/coal stove in the structure somewhere as a backup.  I'm sketchy on that one.  Natural gas is very common here, and a lot of acreages have free implied gas rights.  My last property (before the one I own now) had 200Mcf per year free for one house.  I like NG, and would probably only want a heat/cook stove of some sort as an emergency backup in case the gas well failed.  Coal is dirty, but it is common as dirt and mighty cheap around here so I'd likely want that route for emergency use.  It doesn't exactly grow old, and a fella could lay in quite a stockpile with little trouble.    

Besides finding the right spot of land (it took me two years to find the "perfect" place for what I wanted last time), I guess my biggest obstacle will be finding a trustworthy domebuilder with a profit margin I can afford.  I'm going to print all of this out and start generating a project binder.  If you ever come up this way I'll be wanting a quote from you for a dome raising if at all possible!  Now that I have a good idea of what the dome will cost to build, I will only be at the mercy of the dome contractor's profit percentage on whether I can pull this off or not.  If you never get up this way, hopefully some other guys will get good at it, and make it around here.  I'm going to make it a priority to keep frequent tabs on this thread and watch what develops!

Now I need land!

Also:  Any Rad math guru's out there who can help figure out what the PF (Protection Factor) would be for such a dome?  The below ground distance to the shelter level and construction methods involved should give a better number than just what you'd get for a fixed overhead slab thickness for a conventional basement shelter I would think.  Alpha and Beta are definitely out, Gamma is all that would be left.  Gamma ray intrusion would be from overhead only ("sky shine" and decaying emitters on the shell surface), and distance would attenuate that somewhat I would think?  I believe the inverse square law applies regarding emitter distance (similar to that of sound).  The below surface distance plus the domes concrete in the outer shell (6"), the concrete of the "basement" floor (shelter ceiling–– appr. 4-6"?) and the additional mass involved with the conventionally constructed interior above should give a decent protection factor.  I'm just not educated enough on the individual nuances of that science to peg what the actual PF would be.  Regardless, I would venture it would be sufficient for this area.  Still I'd like to figure it out.

Well I'd better quit typing before my brain melts...   Thank you for the help 1_Big_Bunker!!!  If you are ever up WV way–– the beer (or whatever you drink!) is on me!!!

I sure hope so!!!  What you posted before was certainly valid, I just failed to clarify.  

I've always wanted to build a shelter, but it's such a hassle planning so many different things.  Folding it into the bottom of a dome just seems like it would greatly simplify the issue.  With my idea you'd lose the "cheap" earth mass over a regular shelter that gives an excellent "PF", but it ain't so cheap when you start burying complete seperate structures and have to allocate for them seperately.  I'm just trying to figure out a way to combine the two.  Granted, my eggs would be in one basket, but it'd be a darn sturdy one...  

Jesus said to build our house upon the rock.  I'd like to think he maybe meant to build our dome there...  

Maybe there could be a standardized Arfcom "Survival Forum" version???

When did you plan on starting to build this?

I can tell you this, any dome builder is going to charge you $125,000 or more just for the shell. They tend to rape people because there is no one to compete with them. Plus their attention to detail is poor at best. Most write it into their contracts that the shell is not the finished surface and only for the dome shell. What happens is that costs you more to have stucco or some crap put on to even up the walls. When I do, we clean up the walls while the shotcrete is still setting. It is A LOT more work, but man it looks great, and the people like that.

I will say this, most families cook us steak dinners or something on that order a couple times a week to keep us happy, They see and are thankful that we take the time to do it the way we do building their home. I tell the men that this is our name on this building for 100's of years or more, so how do you want to be remembered.

I won't promise anything, but depending when you want to start, I might be able to help you out. I said before I would help any on here build a dome for free, but no one took me up on it. Now i am pretty busy, and I don't have a lot of time, but we will see. I and a couple men could swing by and take a few weeks vacation from the job site. They can keep on going without me and a thre men. Oh, and I wasn't hinting about you cooking steaks for us either. I just thought about that after writing this.


I was giving your shelter some thought, and I am not sure what you want to do, but here is my thinking.

I would have a small augment added to the dome that is about 10' wide, and about 12' or so long, and 7' to 8' high. This will be my mechanical room. Trust me, you don't want NBC filter fans running all the time inside your living area. You also don't want anything that supports life outside the shelter where you can't protect or fix if needed.

In the picture below you can see what I am talking about as far as the augment or small cave like section off the dome. It will all be part of the dome and airform, so there is no chance of anything failing or leaking. The rebar, foam, and shotcrete will all run together from the dome to this small cave.

Now in that cave, you can see what I would do. I would have a battery bank with an inverter, and a diesel gen set. The gen set would be liquid cooled and have a water to water heat exchanger going to your water heater. When the gen set runs for an hour or two everyday, it will heat your water for showers, and laundry. I would have small point of use under sink water heaters for hot water in your kitchen sink and bath room. They are cheap, and an inverter can handle them with no problem, again, trust me I know. Have an inverter that is 5.5kw or so. Later upgrade to dual inverters so you have 11kw or as I like to look at it, a spare. If one craps out, you have another.

I would look at a gen set around 12kw. This way it will charge your batteries, and do the laundry or cook at the same time. Running the dryer is all you would need the gen set running for. The washer will run fine off the inverter and battery bank so long as you don't have golf cart crap batteries. I would also get 110v cook top stove. Use electric and not gas. I myself would not use anything that uses my air.

The gen set would draw its air from inside the dome from the basement area so it can't be heard outside. Exhaust will be run outside the dome of course. I would go an buy old milk line pipe which is SS and hook that to my exhaust and run the SS pipe underground and into a 55 gallon plastic barrel, and then into another one, and then up outside. It will be very quiet and never heard. Just make sure you have about 15-20 feet of SS pipe in ground before it gets to the plastic barrels, and the exhaust will be cold and won't hurt the plastic. If you get a bigger gen set, make a longer run, again, trust me on this one. Also drill holes at the bottom of those barrels and have sewer rock under them for drainage.

You will also need to vent the room with air to keep the gen set cool. What works great is to just have a fan hooked to a plastic pipe that runs underground about 100 feet and sucks the air out of the small cave and cools it in the ground and pumps it back into the cave on the other side. Kind of like recirculating the air inside your car. I also have my exhaust for the shelter running through that cave as well. So when my NBC fane runs, it sucks air in from the basement or wherever inside the dome shell and into the filter and then out on the far side of the shelter at the 9 and 6 oclock positions. Then it flows across the shelter and into the top right bedroom through a vent in the wall, and then through another vent in the wall between the middle bedroom, and once again through the wall on the far right bedroom, then into the bathroom and back into the mechanical room and out the shelter.Basically the air flows counter clockwise from 9 oclock around the dome, through the bedrooms, then the bath and into the gen room. That air will help keep things cool as well.

If you noticed, we are taking all air from inside the dome itself because that air will have little dust and dirt in it so your filters will last longer. Just make sure you crack a window an inch or so on the down wind side of trouble and do it on the 2nd floor. Also, the windows I am talking about lock in the open position at like 2'', 6'' and 12'' so you can open your window without worrying about someone opening it all the way and getting inside your home.

I know people will piss and moan about having fuel inside the place, but hey, I have lost count of how many farm house had 265 gallon fuel oil tanks in their basement to heat their homes in the winter. We did ever since I can remember and I never seen a place burn down because of diesel fuel, but I sure as hell have from burning wood, but no one thinks twice about wood stoves. I am not saying it hasn't happen, because I'm sure it has. I just saying diesel is not like gas and pretty hard to lite with a spark or something like that. We had both, fuel oil and wood heat. You had the oil in the basement so it wouldn't start to thicken up back when winters were cold. Again, if it supports life you better have control over it.

You will also see that the hot water runs are very short, and all drains can run into one besides the toilet. The washer, sinks and tub will have one common drain. I would have my water pump breaker and main feed coming into the shelter before it goes to the rest of the house. You better be able to control your water and if the breaker trips for some reason, you don't have to leave your shelter to reset it in the panel up stairs.

The shelter will have about 7000 useable cubic feet of air in it. An empty shelter will have 10,064, but I am guessing you will have at least 3000 of that occupied with food, beds, a bathroom, kitchen, people and so on. With 7000 cf you have about 64 hours of air in it for one person or about 16 hours for four people before the CO2 levels climb to an unsafe level of around 2%. Each person needs at least 102 cubic feet of air an hour to keep the shelter comfortable as far as CO2 and moisture is concerned. I use a figure of 110 cf an hour. You need around 10 cf a minute flowing through your shelter to stay safe for people only, and most fans are putting out around 225 cf a minute of filtered air. In 35 minutes you can change out the air in the whole shelter.

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The fuel tank is something I would have made if it was me. I would also make it out of SS with SS angle iron welded from top to bottom every couple feet on the front and back to add support and keep the tank from deforming or pushing out at all. The one I have in there is 10'x9'x1' which will hold 675 gallons. That is enough fuel to last you close to a year with a 12kw gen set running 1.5-2 hours a day. Figuring it takes 1.5 HP per KW and a gen set averages a half pint of fuel per HP per hour. A 12kw will be about 18hp and use 9 pints of fuel an hour under full load. This is a little high, but a good rule of thumb to start with. You will need to actually run it and see for yourself, and then plan accordingly.

You also need to addressed garbage. I would have a garbage disposal for scraps of food. For other things like cans or what not, I would have a small room built at the 6 oclock position for storage of food, and also washed out and cleaned containers that have been used. Flatten the cans and store them until they can be removed. That room will also serve as extra support for trusses or whatever you use. That is also why I said you will need an air vent at the 6 oclock position because if there is a room there, you want to be on the other side of it in the living area as well as air flow through the kitchen. make sense?

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I think I have wrote enough for now. We can talk about the floor, trusses and pouring concrete if you want later on, but this is enough for now. I have to get to work as I have some paper work to get done today.