The Sway of the Arch Design
If a child born and raised in the United States is asked to draw a house, more likely than
not, there is going to be quite a few hard right angles in it-just like the typical home found
throughout the country.
Ask Kent Thieman of West Des Moines, IA to draw his home, expect to see lots of curves
and arches because his humble abode is a Monolithic dome.
The earliest form of monolithic dome structures could be considered to be the igloo. The
dome-like shape of the igloo exhibits the two major advantages of a dome-shaped
structure: great strength, and good insulation. The strength is due to the natural might of
the arch, and the insulation is due to the minimal surface area of a spherical section.
"Based on the fact that Mr. Thieman already understands the many positive qualities of the
arch design, it's not surprising that he chose SteelMaster Buildings when he wanted to cover
the front entrance of his home and create a covered patio on the back."
For more than 29 years, SteelMaster Buildings, which is located in Virginia Beach, VA, has
manufactured, designed, and supplied pre-fabricated arched steel structures to 40,000
customers located in every state of the United States, in 40 countries, and on seven
continents around the world.
With all of the companies out there that make steel buildings, what led Thieman to choose
to buy from SteelMaster?
"I learned about SteelMaster buildings from magazine ads," says Thieman. "I chose steel
because of durability, and I chose SteelMaster because of the website."
Wickum says that there is a difference in SteelMaster buildings than others that exist in
the marketplace-quite a few differences, actually.
"Our buildings are affordable, especially because people that want to construct it
themselves can-they were designed with that in mind-and that saves money on hiring a
contractor," says Wickum. "SteelMaster also uses a top-of-the-line steel that is made
through complex chemistry resulting in an unheard of tensile strength. We use a mill that
produces metal where the tensile strength is so strong that no one else in the world has it.
Also, every one of our buildings is mill coated with Galvalume Plus steel coating which
provides a dry-coated, maintenance-free finish that also keeps the building cool in the
summer and easy to heat in the winter. Best of all, all SteelMaster steel buildings include
lifetime engineering and a 30-year warranty backed by its factory and the ArcelorMittal
Dofasco steel mill."
Thieman purchased both of his SteelMaster products in the fall of 2010, and chose to hire a
contractor to do the projects.
"The most difficult part of the project for the contractor was getting the SteelMaster arches
joined to the dome so that rain would be diverted," says Thieman. "The completed projects
look like I expected them to look. We like the arched appearance. We chose to make both
asymmetric, that is one side of the arch is higher than the other. The covered patio has a
table, four chairs, a BBQ grill, and several planters. We like both the front entrance and the
back patio very much."
In addition to structures like those purchased by Thieman, SteelMaster's steel and metal
pre-engineered buildings are designed for a broad range of residential and commercial
applications including homes, farm buildings, garages, workshops, agricultural storage,
Quonsets, airplane hangars, RV storage, roofing systems, carports, military buildings,
commercial warehousing, and industrial storage as well as a wide variety of custom building
applications including athletic facilities, retail stores, churches, bus stops, smoke shacks,
doggie dorms, and correctional facilities.
For More Information about Arch Building Visit SteelMasterusa.com