Crinkle Crankle Wall

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crinkle_crankle_wall

by vyuh • 7 years ago

214 56 7 years ago

en.wikipedia.org

doctor_m2• 7 years ago

If only crinkle-crankle software were equally justifiable...

If we take the meaning of a "crinkle crankle structure" to be something like an "economically self-supporting structure", then it's justifiable by definition. The question then becomes: What, in the realm of software engineering, fits this description?

Lisp, perhaps?

tantalor• 7 years ago

Dependency injection

doctor_m2• 7 years ago

If crinkle-crankle walls protect fruit, then I suppose the analogous software might run on some Apple device that's unnecessarily expensive, technically lagging, and probably beautiful. Hard to justify economically, but still attractive.

arethuza• 7 years ago

This made me Google "crinkle crankle ha-ha" - unfortunately I could not find any references to such a wall existing.

pure-awesome• 7 years ago

This article references both:

https://davidburr.co.uk/rooftops/winter18/files/basic-html/p...

0xcde4c3db• 7 years ago

A ha-ha is (typically?) a retaining wall, so I wouldn't expect the mechanical advantages to apply in the same way. I imagine it would also complicate the excavation/infill.

geerlingguy• 7 years ago

I believe the oldest exterior wall of the St. Louis Zoo (on the north side, along where the 1904 World's Fair bird cage was relocated) was modeled after this style. I think it's more than one brick thick, though, so it probably wasn't done that way to save on brick, just to echo the style.

pubby• 7 years ago

That was my first thought too. You can see it on google maps here: https://www.google.com/maps/@38.6369944,-90.2886515,3a,75y,2...

brianberns• 7 years ago

I don't think it's physically possible to make a wall like this that's more than one brick thick (without using an absurd amount of mortar).

bitslayer• 7 years ago

In modern standards a straight wall is much easier to build because you can just measure once for each row and stretch a string to match the bricks against. A curved wall requires a level placed against every brick to make sure you are still going straight up. I expect older walls actually trusted the mason's skill without going through all that. The Wiki photo certainly looks true.

MagnumOpus• 7 years ago

In modern standards

Even in ancient times masons had pieces of strings and plumb-bobs to level vertically and horizontally.

The more likely constraint is that before the 20th century the farmer couldn't afford masons to lay orchard walls, but did it himself...

azepoi• 7 years ago

The dutch wikipedia page mentions their use to protect fruit trees from the wind and add sun reflection. You run the wall east-west and place the fruit trees in southern bends of the wall.

irb• 7 years ago

I grew up in Suffolk, where I knew of several examples, and I never realised that they were a particularly Suffolk-specific thing: according to the article, twice as many in the county as the rest of the UK. I would be interested to know why.

bencollier49• 7 years ago

TFA mentions that Dutch engineers brought over to reclaim bits of Suffolk from the sea introduced the walls.

roel_v• 7 years ago

I wonder if in modern times, now that labor is so much more expensive than bricks, it would still be economical. Building a brick wall costs (here in Western Europe) around e40/m2 in labor, and e25 in material for a cheap brick. So building this crinkle crankle style would only have to add about 50% in building time. I think building this is much slower than that though - I don't even know how I'd go about it, other than with a laser level, which would be really inconvenient (compared to using a string like is normally done). Then again, it would be inconvenient and frustrating, but would it be slow ?

superhuzza2• 7 years ago

You're likely right, it's probably not very economical nowadays. Especially given the wider range of materials than be used to build a wall or fence.

KSteffensen• 7 years ago

Aestethics still apply though and it looks nice.

Pet peeve: Why isn't anyone building brick houses anymore?

jhncls2• 7 years ago

In those times, most would be happy a wall looked straight, and vertical enough to not fall. Also, a circular wooden object (a spool, wagon wheels, ...) could help to maintain the forms. The Dutch Wikipedia mentions many variants formed from straight segments. Probably the labor cost would have been about the same, and workers happier because of the variation involved.

jhncls2• 7 years ago

While this type of wall mainly exists in England and the Netherlands, it is amusing how the English Wikipedia's main arguments are about saving bricks and possible military advantages, while the Dutch Wikipedia tell these walls are meant to protect fruit from weather conditions. The fruit would typically be planted at the south side. One of the ideas is that the bricks both protect against wind and keep giving some warmth after the sun has disappeared.

PhasmaFelis• 7 years ago

You should update the English Wikipedia with that!

Cytobit• 7 years ago

Does the shape of the wall affect either of these uses? Otherwise, wouldn't it be off-topic to start listing general facts about walls for agriculture?

riffraff• 7 years ago

for the saving bricks, yes, since it's more robust than a straight line single-brick wall, and cheaper than a multi-brick one.

I imagine for heating, it's that the trees get exposed to more irradiation by sitting in the focus of the curve rather than in front of a line.

jessriedel2• 7 years ago

Based on this comment, I think the idea is that if you plant trees within the bend of a wall, they are shielded and heated from more than 180 degrees.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21564553

You only get this benefit for tree right along the wall, which is not much agricultural area. Seems like a strained justification.

Someone• 7 years ago

https://archive.is/20120908073039/http://www.parksandgardens..., referenced from the English Wikipedia page says:

”crinkle-crankle wall

A wall with serpentine curves for growing fruit”

So, at least one English source agrees with the Dutch description.

kparaju• 7 years ago

Found pictures of this kind of wall in UVA too! Pretty neat.

https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~evans/pictures/serpentine/

gopalv• 7 years ago

while the Dutch Wikipedia tell these walls are meant to protect fruit from weather conditions

Might also have a historic quirk to it.

"The fruit wall appears around the start of the so-called Little Ice Age, a period of exceptional cold in Europe that lasted from about 1550 to 1850."

https://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2015/12/fruit-walls-urban-fa...

Scarblac• 7 years ago

It's also funny that the words crinkle and crankle derive from Old English and are obvious cognate of Dutch _kronkel_. But the Dutch engineers didn't call it a kronkelmuur?

DragonCot• 7 years ago

For those who wish to see it on Google Maps... https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@52.3095596,1.5174271,3a,75y,2...

wmorein• 7 years ago

There is one of these in Cambridge MA (or was until recently when someone crashed their SUV through it): https://boston.cbslocal.com/2019/05/15/cambridge-mass-car-cr...

SamBam• 7 years ago

I had seen the results of that accident, but was amazed by the video at all the people saying that the area is a magnet for such accidents, and that the brick wall itself had been hit many times.

I mostly walk and bike in the city, but that whole neighborhood has wide, straight, clearly-marked roads. It's like you're out in the suburbs. If people have trouble there, how do they deal with some actually-confusing intersections, like Newton Corner, Inman square, or Columbia Road in Dorchester?

appleflaxen• 7 years ago

So is it the case that it brings the cost of the wall down from

2N (two brick depth for strength) to

sqrt(2)N (for a hypothetical 45 degree angle)

gweinberg2• 7 years ago

I don't think so. I don't think you need anywhere near a 45 degree angle, and making the wall double thick won't really solve the fall over problem in the first place.

brianpgordon• 7 years ago

Funny-named type of wall? This reminds me of the ha-ha wall:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ha-ha

pottertheotter• 7 years ago

I like this. My neighbor is a billionaire and I think I'll replace my fence with one of these so I can see his property better. It's very nice!

whamlastxmas• 7 years ago

Wouldn't he just add a fence right at his property line if it bothered him at all?

boomlinde• 7 years ago

Compare to the ”crinkle crankle” layer of corrugated fiberboard which has similar properties (higher rigidity per mass)

gweinberg2• 7 years ago

Wouldn't it be easier to make with straight zig-zag sections than with wavy curves?

jfoutz• 7 years ago

I don't think you'd get the protection from lateral forces on the straight sections. Just a little bit of curve transfers the cross force down the whole curve.

The gist is, if i push on a brick in the middle of a flat part, the force has to be resisted by the width of the single brick. but if i push on any part of the curve, that's got to lift the adjacent next level up bricks as well, which in turn have to lift the next level, and on and on.

It's been a long, long time since i studied static forces though.

equalunique• 7 years ago

My first thought was the irregular shape of the walls affects the way automobile noises echo off of it, potentially contrubuting to slightly quieter streets.

davidw• 7 years ago

Split rail fences are sort of similar

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Split-rail_fence

diestethrowaway• 7 years ago

Eladio Dieste made some very interesting brick buildings using similar techniques in the 20th C: https://www.archdaily.com/890362/the-intricate-undulating-br...

https://morphocode.com/eladio-dieste-reverence-to-the-laws-o...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eladio_Dieste

carapace• 7 years ago

Crinkle Crankle Wall

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