Picture(s) of the day....

[bobins]

That's not a block of concrete.
This is a block of concrete, etc, etc.

A large windowless concrete building - own work

[Rp0thejester]

Mmmmmm. Concrete

I have a feeling I've visited this place in Berlin in the past.


Berlin belastungskoerper
Dieter Brügmann, CC BY-SA 3.0 <http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/>, via Wikimedia Commons

It's a VERY large concrete block.

......The Schwerbelastungskörper (German: "heavy load-exerting body") is a large concrete cylinder located at the intersection of Dudenstraße, General-Pape-Straße, and Loewenhardtdamm in the northwestern part of the borough of Tempelhof in Berlin, Germany. It was built by the bloke with the funny moustache's chief architect Albert Speer to determine the feasibility of constructing large buildings on the area's marshy, sandy ground. Erected between 1941 and 1942 it was meant to test the ground for a massive triumphal arch on a nearby plot.
.......It consists of a foundation with a diameter of 11 m (36 ft) that reaches 18.2 m (60 ft) into the ground and contains rooms which once housed instruments to measure ground subsidence caused by the weight of the cylinder, which was estimated as equivalent to the load calculated for one pillar of the intended arch. On this foundation a cylinder 14 m (46 ft) high and 21 m (69 ft) in diameter weighing 12,650 tonnes was erected at street level.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schwerbel ... %C3%B6rper

Am I right in thinking that it was rapidly sinking and the proposed arch couldn't be built on that ground and that the one in charge at the time wasn't happy..

[bobins]

Although the concrete block sank a bit, I don't think it sank overly excessively. I seem to remember that something else got in the way of 'Germania' being built.....
Somewhere I've got photos of the motorway tunnels that were built under the Tiergarten in Berlin - these were going to be part of the new Germania but there's actually only an isolated section of tunnels there - you access them from a manhole cover and go down a long ladder.

[Gibbo2286]

Although the concrete block sank a bit, I don't think it sank overly excessively. I seem to remember that something else got in the way of 'Germania' being built.....
Somewhere I've got photos of the motorway tunnels that were built under the Tiergarten in Berlin - these were going to be part of the new Germania but there's actually only an isolated section of tunnels there - you access them from a manhole cover and go down a long ladder.

Give it a couple of hundred years and the archaeologists will be calling it the German Stonehenge.

[NewcastleFalcon]

POTD Puddle reflections

Puddle reflection originals No 1

POTD Vapour trails

Vapour trails originals Number One

Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

POTD Seasonal signs

Pussy Willow

Neil

[mickthemaverick]

An interesting light effect from the settng sun which I just captured!

Refrations from our ourtains

[myglaren]

Yeller stuff on my short walk.

First daffodils, only dropped in the ground a month ago.
The ones round the front, the few that came up anyway, were tulips. Mislabelled I expect.

Lots of others have been out ages though.

[NewcastleFalcon]

Wonder if anyone can create this sort of image with the optical properties of a wine glass using a bit of refraction.

https://www.animations.physics.unsw.edu ... glass2.jpg

Could be a contender in the March awards....doesn't have to be the Sydney opera house!

Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

Wonder if anyone can create this sort of image with the optical properties of a wine glass using a bit of refraction.

https://www.animations.physics.unsw.edu ... glass2.jpg

Could be a contender in the March awards....doesn't have to be the Sydney opera house!

Here is an attempt...it can be done, not quite the focus required just yet.

Attempt 1 most things fuzzy

Attempt 2 background too clear wine glass too fuzzy

Neil

[Rp0thejester]

Wine glass to full more like.... won't find a full one in my house.

[NewcastleFalcon]

Puddle reflection version 2

Neil

[CitroJim]

Paggers Church in the pre-dawn

[CitroJim]

Seen yesterday whilst walking into town...

A Band I/III aerial array dating from the days of 405 line TV. Very unusual to see them now; transmissions ceased in 1985.

One oddity is the Band III array is horizontally polarised. Originally it would have been vertical like the Band I 'H'. I suspect it was flipped over for VHF/FM radio once Band III TV transmissions ceased.

This array has been hiding in plain sight from me for many years. I can't imagine the countless hundreds/thousands of times I've been past them!

[bobins]

^^^^^^^

....or it's an aerial for a secret agent to receive their commands from Blofeld