A huge camera or sky projector: any ideas?

alex ph · Joined: 16 Mar 2013 Posts: 1614

This quest is fun and pleasure thanks to your input, fellows! For me it is not solved yet, there are some facts contradicting the idea it was a boiler. As long as the thing has not officially become an art object, with a confusing explanatory note attached to it, we have some time to complete the series of ideas and doubts.

The lens I took the object with was not MF. I had only my cellular phone with me, so the introduction ows to its copromised power.

dickb · Joined: 04 Apr 2008 Posts: 821

alex ph · Joined: 16 Mar 2013 Posts: 1614

Dickb, thanks for this new piece of information! So, they seem to be pretty convinced that was a room sealed boiler. By now I've found nothing on its use in industrial context, only a dozen of well illustrated pages and manuals concerning its use in private houses. And they do not correspond at all to the mystery thing.

jamaeolus · Expire: 2015-08-20

I still think solar observatory. Maybe to track sunspots? There is no way you are getting enough energy through the glass pane for a boiler.

visualopsins · Expire: 2025-04-11

Glass pane? Getting enough energy through no problem. Smile

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=solar+furnace&t=ffab&iar=images&iax=images&ia=images

The altitude azimuth adjustments may not be for celestial objects at all.

I want to attach a dish but can't see how if it was done.

From https://interestingenergyfacts.blogspot.com/2010/05/solar-collector-facts.html

alex ph · Joined: 16 Mar 2013 Posts: 1614

So, Jamaeolus and Visualopsins, you both think one of the missing part was a reflective dish?

I think to find a contact in the web site of the Olympic village project and to write to them in the week-end asking why they diceded it was a boiler. Unless some new suggestions from technically assured participants come in the meantime.

alex ph · Joined: 16 Mar 2013 Posts: 1614

I did not give up and wrote just after our exchanges to the agency which holds the site and to an architectural office which realized a preliminary exploration of the territory. Sadly, none of them replied in the weeks passed.

RokkorDoctor · Expire: 2025-05-01

I could well be wrong (it may be art Wink

), but I suspect something entirely different.

Doesn't look old enough to me to be 1930's, not enough riveting, too much welding, not enough decay on the exterior surfaces. The construction details & dimensions are all wrong for it to be any sort of solar energy collector, no space for a (missing) dish anywhere.

It also doesn't look to me to like something that projects celestial light/information onto a screen , but rather like a detector that is either looking at that window, or targeting the window.

If it is difficult to find info on something (esp. if the authorities don't answer to queries), it is usually because of political / defence / security sensitivity.

My guess is: 1950's, something to do with France's steps on the way to becoming a nuclear power.

One possible explanation:

https://nuclearweaponarchive.org/France/FranceFacility.html

and in particular:

"Centre d'Etudes de Vaujours-Moronvilliers
Located 17 km northwest of Paris at Vaujours in the Seine-Saint-Denis, this Centre was created in 1955. It performs explosive and high pressure research. It is equipped with shock tubes and high pressure light gas guns."

This may be something to do with that, or it may be a posable detector that can look at or through the "glass window" at whatever what was happening behind it.

In any case, my money would be on an experimental installation used by either France's defence research, or nuclear research.

RokkorDoctor · Expire: 2025-05-01

alex ph · Joined: 16 Mar 2013 Posts: 1614

Ha, that's a good inspiration! I doubt the authorities wished to pass one type of secret equipment for another, a banal one. That sounds too cool, like a spy film. But some doubts of the initial destination of this machine are still there.

I passed recently by the site. The preparatory works continue to build the Olympic spot. I had a short talk with a site guard who was present there and I aked him if he new something about the device. He could not add nothing specific beside the fact that the device was carried there from another point of the construction spot. So, its spatial orientation must have nothing to do with the original placement.

RokkorDoctor · Expire: 2025-05-01

Yes, definitely a large fan/blower.

This thing was meant to project a strong blast of air at the target in the middle of the round shield (possibly with water injection to simulate driving rain).

Looked on Google maps which still has it shown parked next to Bd Anatole France and took a screen grab.

Playing around with contrast a bit you can just about make out the stator-fins of the venturi flared fan inlet:

stevemark · Joined: 29 Apr 2011 Posts: 3773 Location: Switzerland

Probably parts of the structure are missing, and what we see now is only the "backbone" of the original instrument.

Look for instance at the Hogg Horn which was used for early satellite communication with the "Echo" type ballon satellites:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f7/Horn_Antenna-in_Holmdel%2C_New_Jersey_-_restoration1.jpg

S

alex ph · Joined: 16 Mar 2013 Posts: 1614

You are certainly rigth. I thought about the rear part missing, but the image you link to suggests it could be also a huge front part.

When I passed there a couple more times, I tried to find someone who could tell a bit more about the device, but with no success.