Building the SD.Net Bunker (RAR)

[Knife]

Yeah, figured there would be a centralized fan, water purification, and and other utilities. But also, I figured that individual blocks would need relays, and smaller distribution centers.

[Mr. Coffee]

Yeah, figured there would be a centralized fan, water purification, and and other utilities. But also, I figured that individual blocks would need relays, and smaller distribution centers.

Oh, for sure. Depending howyou got about putting the habitat units together a lot of the interior walls can just be hollow 2x2 stud frames and drywall and you can plenty of whiring, piping, and ducting for individual room/area usage no problem.

[Crossroads Inc.]

Ok, so I just realized something... Saltmine, saltmine....

Won't they Fckup attempts to grow plants and food? seeing as SALT is going to be seeping constantly into the soil and on the plants? AND encrusting machinery over time and everything else? I mean look how corroded things get at sea from Sea salt, this may be even worse. Now Im all for the open ,easily dig-able and nice dry area. But we'll have to come to grips with how all that salt would muck things up.

Also, still working on some pool ideas, have been a bit unmotivated, but should have something by morning.

A word on 'government' I was thinking we may want to look back to some of the old colonies from the new world. Many of them lived in isolation for years on end in primitive conditions, often with fewer then a 1000 people. Now granted many of them were fundis and puritans, and we don't want to mimic that road, but we could look to see if there are some lessons they learned we could use.

[Knife]

Type of government would probably depend on a lot of factors, and not just personal preference. Say, if we organize into groups, workers, tech group, security, something else; you could organize into a council where the 'leaders' of each sat on a board. You could do it by berthing, elect a 'hall magistrate' and each one sits on a board.

[Broomstick]

Ok, so I just realized something... Saltmine, saltmine....

Won't they Fckup attempts to grow plants and food? seeing as SALT is going to be seeping constantly into the soil and on the plants? AND encrusting machinery over time and everything else? I mean look how corroded things get at sea from Sea salt, this may be even worse.

Keep in mind the sea is salt plus water - if you don't have water around the salt is essentially just a rock we occasionally grind up and sprinkle on our food.

If you seal the salt floor, then add dirt on top of that, you can get a viable growing medium. Or you could use hydroponics. We've been talking of hydroponics, and there are some systems that are pretty well enclosed and don't use a lot of water for the volume of plants produced. I've mentioned composting toilets for use with any areas we choose to grow stuff in dirt (which we may want to do). We might want to seal off the habitat we mostly live in - salt mines can be dry environments, and we may want to humidify the air we normally breathe (this has also been mentioned up thread) but we don't want excess moisture getting out into the mine area because that is what will cause problems. So closing off the habitat will help keep salt out and moisture in. Of course, it wouldn't be totally sealed off, we do want some air exchange, and we'll probably want to go in and out to some degree but not constantly.

[CaptainChewbacca]

Maybe a spa carved into the rock. Salt chambers are all the rage for health tourism in Europe these days.

[Crossroads Inc.]

So I did some thinking last night about what we have planned and what we still have need to layout. There is a lot of work to be done here, its good to see someone else contributing (nods to Knife) but I feel we have living accommodations down rather well. Obviouslly all suggestions are welcome, but there is a great deal we need:

Right now I feel top on the list is working out a "where" to all this. it is very hard knowing just what to prepare for, what to pack, what to bring, without knowing a good idea of over all space and a rough layout of an existing area that we would have to work with.

Food is the main concern, not just storage, but 'production'. Take pasta for example... Would we want to just store 10 years of pasta? Or would we make our own? And if we did, would we have a "farm" with cows for milk? Chickens for eggs? Wheat and Grains can be grown in hydroponic bays, but other items? Without knowing how much space we have, we can't be sure if we could afford using space for something like a "farm" or even if something like that is workable for a decade.

Also Re-Reading the thread, there was early discussion about what tech to bring and how much we want to take with us. Would we want to take more modern items? Easier but high maintenance? Or more lowtech items? It was mentioned there is a 'simple' and small nuclear reactor that could be used ( I looked at it earlier and it seems ideal for our needs) so electricity won't be too bad if properly used. But all sorts of other 'high tech' items we wan't to start to consider.

I'm off to work right now, but I plan to start looking a online machine shops for ideas on what we would need and such. Also... Still trying to design a gym and swimming area but not feeling happy with what I have. For other rooms, especially now that Knife is also contributing, a list of "Pods" we need.

Workshops Pod,
School Pod,
Storage Pods (data, seeds, knowledge for the future)
"Fun" Pod, a sort of multi-use center, things like sports, games.

Anyone else who has ideas on Pods fee free to add to the list.

[Zaune]

Small thought regarding the growing of crops. Is there any reason we couldn't dig a large pit, fill it with soil and roof it over with Plexiglass? It would reduce the power budget somewhat, though in some scenarios we might need to supplement it with lamps anyway, and provide psychological benefits as well.

[Zed Snardbody]

Id like to play the gun nut card and recommend a shooting range/armory and reloading workshop.

The range can also double as a bowling ally in a pinch.

[Crossroads Inc.]

Id like to play the gun nut card and recommend a shooting range/armory and reloading workshop.

The range can also double as a bowling ally in a pinch.

Secruity would have to be very tight, we may even have to rethink rights on guns for the duration. Supporting of self deffense that I am, last thing we need is someone going postal while in the vault and going on a shooting rampage.

Curious, as resident gun nut, what your thoughts would be on that or what you would have in mind?

[Broomstick]

Food is the main concern, not just storage, but 'production'. Take pasta for example... Would we want to just store 10 years of pasta? Or would we make our own?

Store some - we want some packaged rations that require minimal work to make edible.

However, if we have the power and capacity for deep freeze, I'd suggest freezing whole grains for long term storage and then processing them ourselves. This gives us more flexibility in regards to how we use the food and structure our diet.

And if we did, would we have a "farm" with cows for milk?

Cows are large space hogs and for dairy require a fairly high quality diet. Goats, on the other hand, are smaller and will happily eat kitchen scraps (not garbage, of course, but food prep scraps and maybe some leftovers).

Chickens for eggs?

Sure. And fish in the "aquaponics" area that combines hydroponics and fish farming.

Wheat and Grains can be grown in hydroponic bays, but other items?

Actually... wheat and most other grains don't grow particularly well in hydroponics set ups. Either we store 10 years worth of grains, or we set up for underground dirt-farming. Which is possible, but will require much more space and in a salt mine you have to have a reliable way to keep salt out of hectares of dirt while allowing adequate drainage. I'm thinking that, if we have a humongous salt mine to store shit in, storing ten years worth of grain in sealed containers may actually be the most feasible and cost effective solution.

Hydroponics is for fruits and vegetables.

Keep in mind, too, that for fruits and vegetables that are fruiting bodies (as opposed to roots or greens) somebody has to pollinate the flowers in order to get production. This will be tedious at best.

I don't think cows are workable, actually, and maybe not even goats. Chickens, fish farm, rabbits, guinea pigs... that about the limit of livestock.

[PeZook]

Storage is easy ; We just dig another chamber. Farming is not, requires power, expertise and lots of manpower, but brings us a degree of self-sufficiently, and keeps the necessary skills alive.

If we can trust Q that yeah survive for 10 years and you're scott-free, I'd go for storing the food with some small scale supplemental farming. If not, we'll want as good a farming setup as possible.

On guns, that one's easy: keep them locked up until needed. A scheme where opening the armory requires consent of two officials should work well. People should be trained in basic marksmanship, but otherwise they'd have basically no need to carry the guns around the vault.

[MKSheppard]

My analysis of the RAVEN ROCK (Site R) complex, assuming that the map that's found on Global Security/FAS is accurate, as is the scale given on the map:



(RED) Broadway One/Two: 24 ft wide by 1,100 ft long = 26,400 ft2 each for a total of 52,800 ft2.

(LIGHT BLUE) Broadway Interconnector (2 of them): Each 30 ft by 150 ft long = 4,500 ft2 each for a total of 9,000 ft2.

(GREEN) Hall A/B/C/D/E: Each 36 ft wide by 340 ft long = 12,240 ft2 each for a total of 61,200 ft2.

(DARK PINK) Inter-Hall Connector (11 of them) = 24 ft wide by 96 ft long, 2,304 ft2 in each connector for a total of 25,344 ft2.

(DARK BLUE) Industrial Water Reservoir: 24 ft wide by 580 ft long = 13,920 ft2

(DARK BLUE) Domestic Water Reservoir: 24 ft wide by 240 ft long = 5,760 ft2

(YELLOW) West Power Plant: 24 ft wide by 170 ft long = 4,080 ft2.

(BROWN) East Power Plant: 24 ft wide by 200 ft long = 4,800 ft2.

So it appears that SITE R has the following capabilities:

WATER:
2.5 Foot Reservoir Depths: 49,200 ft3 or 368,016 gallons
5 Foot Reservoir Depths: 98,400 ft3 or 736,032 gallons
10 Foot Reservoir Depths: 196,800 ft3 or 1,472,064 gallons

TOTAL SQUARE FOOTAGE USEABLE:
157,224 ft2.

You'll wonder why I didn't analyze the tunnels and other parts of the complex.

Reason is those areas are essentially unusable -- you need area set aside to have a airlock system and quarantine areas along with spare moon suit storage to enable movement in and out of the complex during hazardrous outdoor conditions.

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In more practical terms; I would heavily suggest building your modules on these dimensions:

26' L * 15' W * 15' H
Floorspace of 390 ft2 and is a cube of 5,850 ft3. Can fit into a 24 x 24 tunnel with 4.5 feet of 'sway' on the tunnel in any direction.

26' L * 26' W * 26' H
Floorspace of 676 ft2 and is a cube of 17,576 ft3. Can fit into a 36 x 36 tunnel with 5 feet of 'sway' on the tunnel in any direction.

Remember; we have no idea what will happen. Will it be a nuclear war? Will it be a mega-quake? So we can't build to take full capability of our actual floorspace. We have to include sway space so that the modules can flex during the event, reducing damage.

As it is, each Hall in Site R can handle about 10 of the big modules; giving us an installed capacity of 50. That's 33,800 ft2 or 878,800 ft3 that we can work with for the main living areas etc, leaving a lot of room for us to store bulk food, bulk ammo etc in the other areas of Site R.

Speaking of bulk ammo and food; that's something that will have to be handled by each VAULT individually and with careful planning. Keeping stuff underground tends to ruin it. So you have to plan your move-ins carefully; with at least one or two dry runs before the actual move in about 6-9 months before the event.

The Dry Runs/Move In will have to be also planned carefully. Let's put ourselves into the shoes of Joe Schmuckatelli; world class nature photographer and nature hiker. While out in the woods of the SHENNANDOAH VALLEY, he runs across an old mine that's surrounded by lots of trucks.

He uses his DIKKON 500mm F/1.4L II lens to take clear photographs of the trucks and their cargoes. When he gets back to the world, he looks up the markings on the boxes and finds that they're BULK AMMO markings.

He contacts his sheriff/police department, and it snowballs from there until we're up to our assholes with Feds from FBI/DEA/ATF etc.


-----------------------------------

As for the Coal Mine Option -- analyzing the Upper Big Branch Mine:



That purple-y thing is a 10,000 ft long coal seam thats about 1,000 ft high or so.

In crude floorspace; that's about 10,000,000 square feet. The only problem is the ceiling is only about 5 feet or so -- the height of a coal seam. So we'll have to raise the ceilings a bit before it's livable.

What makes the mine so attractive is that we have more than enough space to set up whatever we want inside the mine; leaving huge expanses of the mine just empty, to sucker urban explorers vandals into getting lost.

[Broomstick]

I think we'll want a few areas wider than those corridors, but with the corridors already excavated expanding the usable volume might not be that much of an issue. Any volumes excavated would need adequate shoring up, which is one reason I've been opting for vaults and arches for the open area - it's a strong way to build.

housing modules could simply be slid into those tunnels, though. I tended to design square, but the squares could be "unfolded" into long, narrow arrangements.

[spaceviking]

I would suggest that this complex include a large astro turf field and a track; people may not want to get all their excise on treadmills for 10 years.

Also how about the option of expanding living space during the time underground. Supplies will take up a huge amount of space; which means there should be a large amount of space opened up five years in.

[aerius]

I would suggest that this complex include a large astro turf field and a track; people may not want to get all their excise on treadmills for 10 years.

And a Thunderdome, or at least a UFC Octagon so that we can work out our disagreements.

[LadyTevar]

As for VAULT 101, I will investigate repurposing an old mine in Maryland/Virginia. I'm sure we can find one of the appropriate size that can be opened up with additional "mining" by a dummy corporation.

Best part is, the dummy corporation might not be a dummy after all. We could actually turn a marginal profit on the mining that opens up larger rooms for our use in the run up to 2016.

I've bee waiting for someone to mention the sheer number of abandoned coal mines throughout the Appalachia region, not to mention the number of limestone caves. There is an active aquaculture raising artic chad using mine water, as well as a thriving mushroom industry.

[Zed Snardbody]

Id like to play the gun nut card and recommend a shooting range/armory and reloading workshop.

The range can also double as a bowling ally in a pinch.

Secruity would have to be very tight, we may even have to rethink rights on guns for the duration. Supporting of self deffense that I am, last thing we need is someone going postal while in the vault and going on a shooting rampage.

Curious, as resident gun nut, what your thoughts would be on that or what you would have in mind?

As much as it pains me I think a secured armory is the way to go. Those of us that do want to shoot for recreation can do so under the oversight of a range master and have our weapons locked up in the armory after, similar to how military bases treat the private weapons of solders that live on base.

As far as the range set up a basic 5 to 10 lane 25 meter long range for pistol and rifle would let pretty much anyone practice basic marksmanship. In addition I envision an area in a bay up to about 200 meters deep to practice long distance shooting to practice hunting and the like for when the door gets opened.

I don't reload personally, but from what I've looked into all you really need is a work bench about the size of a standard office desk the press and dyes and scales nothing to space intensive and this lets you reload the the cases that are fired on the range or in the field. Maybe a 2 or 3 bench set up to surge if we need it but honestly one bench plus spare parts should do, this could be stowed in any of the general work areas, only the actual primers and powder would need to be secured, and this could be kept in the armory.

[Broomstick]

OK, here's my take on the messhall:



The two dining vaults - arches and vaults because of the space to be spanned - can easily seat 150-200 people, and probably 300 in a pinch with a little crowding. They're currently configured to allow space to set up a serving line or buffet table at one end of the big rooms.

A bit better view of the kitchen/food prep/storage areas:


Bathrooms are to the left in this view. Each cooking unit has six burners, a grill area, and two stoves. In the main food prep/cooking area there are 4 sinks and 4 refrigerators. I suppose we could put microwave ovens, blenders, and various other kitchen appliances on the counter space next to the sinks. There are storage shelves above each station. The dishwashers are in a separate room to help contain noise, with ample shelving above for storage, or dishes waiting to be washed. The cold storage room is on the right, with the dark flooring and heavy door. Between that and the cooking area is the "cold prep" area with counters and sinks and refrigerators. There is also a storeroom visible on the right.


And a close-up:


In addition to another view of the main cooking area, cold prep, and store rooms this also shows the "front" of the serving area which can either be used for line service or as a "snack bar" outside of normal meal hours, with drinks and various snacks available. There is space next to the storeroom for serving and/or bus carts, or any other carts and crates needed to move things around.

I'm hoping any professional cooks we have aren't laughing too hard at my layout.

[CaptainChewbacca]

Its a good layout at first glance, but your kitchen is all cooking and washing surfaces. There's no 'prep' areas near the stoves. I would put flat surfaces between the cooking units so that you can put bowls, knives, pans, etc.

The dining hall setup looks great.

[Broomstick]

OK, revised kitchens:

[Crossroads Inc.]

Awesome work on the underground Messhall (as always), I don't much about cooking either so don't feel bad if it needs a few redesigns, it "looks" pretty awesome and that is always a good start.
Perhaps we should PM Sir Isodore, he's the most well known cook on SD.Net after all and might have some insight.

A note on other things, I have started thinking looking into the "life support" of the Vault and feel we need to star looking into things like industrial Air / CO2 and industrial[/url=http://www.roconsumables.com/USP.html]Water[/url] filters for a population of 200 to 300.

[fnord]

If a treepod-like system were used (in conjunction with / backup to actual plants?), would pumping the scrubbed CO2 collected to a greenhouse (eg Broomstick's hydroponics) be a) worth the energy demands and b) worth the hassle?

I'm not sure of the relative volumes involved, or whether pumping in CO2 into a concentrated volume would create a breathing hazard in the greenhouses, just throwing it out as an idea.

[Crossroads Inc.]

Gentlemen! BEHOLD I bring you, POOL!


This is the smaller version, finally did something I kind of like here, wanted to get a "roman bath" feel to it so added lots of arches and pillars and such
But still tried to keep it simple, sauna, showers, spa and pool. All in compact area. Don't know how good it is design wise, but wanted to get something out.

Also I don't think CO2 will be that big a problem. Our populations per vault will be rather low given the amount of available space.

[CaptainChewbacca]

Interesting look, but how big is the pool?