The Pyramid Project
The Pyramid Project |
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Daily News - May 2008
09 May 2008 Visitors Galore! Today we had our fair share of visitors starting in the morning with a big flock of birds (Golondrinas)...
Later on it was a pleasure to welcome our first visitors from the Czech Republic - Honza Svarc and Miroslav Vavra...
If you are coming to Iquitos then please feel free to visit the pyramid - we are receiving some excellent project ideas from our visitors on a daily basis now. Yesterday Hank from Holland, a friend of Arie Taal the Dutch floating island expert, introduced the idea of us using Styrofoam instead of plastic bottles. Another recent idea from our friend Dave Lewis in England is to contain the bottles in water tight plastic bags used to carry liquids by the soda industry. This would mean that the outside space between the bottles may also be displacing water giving us much better lift
Additional Buoyancy With all the weight of iron added on the North East corner we have been adding more buoyancy today. The guys complained that the water was cold and so the management jumped in too. They were right it was cold today!
Wilder having fun! Today the South East corner was finally connected and we'll share photos of this early next week.
08 May 2008 North-East Iron Advancing
So far the iron joints are spot welded. Now, with the electricity raised to "Industrial" standard the welders will be revisiting all the joints to weld them more thouroughly
The canal is advancing too (The walkway is temporary)...
05 May 2008 Topa Arrives The last of the Topa arrived today which means we can finish building the rafts. There are 13 rafts left to build which completes the 100 used to float the pyramid for the first 4 phases of the project. Once the plastic bottles are used to float the pyramid the Topa, which is not just very buoyant but is also a light and strong building material, will be recycled and utilised to hold down the plastic bottles Thanks to Filipe and his family for the work they have done in providing Topa. It takes them 8 days to get the Topa here and they practically live on bananas for the trip! The last of the rafts will go in the South-East corner pictured below
02 May 2008 End of the Week Update The North-East corner now has balsas ready for the scaffold...
The scaffold being built...
The North-East corner being prepared with iron ready for vertical advancement...
The Canal (West). This carpentary is proving difficult, hence slow!
01 May 2008 Day of the Worker Today was a Bank Holiday here in Peru and a celebration of "The Worker". Rather than taking the holiday, the pyramid workers decided to take double time and press on. Thanx guys! Here a local community centre were out on the street celebrating
The centre belongs to Luis Gonzales Polar Zuzunaga, the grey haired man pictured below on the right
The centre produce some beautiful art and concepts. They are associated with martial art, Brazilian style, and the members are very fit. Every Saturday at 8pm they practice the Capoeira, a martial arts dance, on the Boulevard to a crowd of spectators
Pyramid Progress With the holiday it has not been possible to get our Electricity supply upgraded - this will be Monday hopefully. However progress is being made and the view from the Boulevard pictured below shows how Iquitos can see the pyramid progressing
All the main iron beams are now in position on the West side up to a height of 8.147m. Yesterday we bought all the scaffold for the North side and tomorrow this will be built. We are hoping to receive more wood on Saturday so we can finally get the outer square wall completed on the South-East corner, (right of picture). We are also waiting for more balsa wood so we can finish the base
Here you can see the Northern connecting wall being built
Here the "Western Canal", "Boat Entrance" or as it is now being called "The Pyramid's Spine" is being built. (The diagonal woods in the photo are temporary). When the pyramid is floated using plastic bottles this canal will be under water and boats up to 2.33m wide will be able to enter the pyramid's swimming pool. We hope to finish this tomorrow so another photo of this to follow
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