This is quite a bizarre question, but this group seems like the best place for it. For a number of years, I've had a hobby of building large snowforts. The structures are built primarily from blocks of snow, and with the help of friends, some of these have reached heights of over 15 feet. I've devoted a website to these creations, and I recommend checking it out to get a better idea of what I'm talking about:
The blocks are made by packing the snow, by hand, into 20-liter (5 gallon) buckets and allowing them to harden. This simple but labourous method has been used right from the beginning, but it has some inherent problems. The first problem is that there's no way to maintain consistency between blocks. One might weigh 15 pounds, the next 30, the next 25, and so on. Variations in the density of the blocks can have a MAJOR effect on the finished structure. As the structure is built higher, the added weight tends to further compress the blocks on the bottom. If for example, the blocks near the bottom on one side are made from lighter snow, they will sag much faster and cause the entire structure to lean in that direction. This problem has plagued many of our projects, and the cause of poor blocks is usually shoddy workmanship, not poor snow. The other problem is the labor involved. If the snow is damp and packy, a block can be assembled in less than a minute. If the snow is dry and hard to pack, it can take up to 2 minutes to make the block, plus 30+ minutes for it to become stable enough to handle. This isn't a problem if there are plenty of helpers, to keep up a steady stream of blocks. But good help is becoming harder and harder to find, and as this winter rapidly approaches, it appears that I'll have only one helper to assist me with these projects. Which brings me to the point of my post: What appears to be needed is some kind of contraption to speed up the production of these blocks, and to produce better consistency. My basic idea is a tall steel frame, with some kind of ramming/compressing device that will pack the snow VERY FIRMLY into the pails. I need something that could assemble a block in about 1 minute, and pack each one to a density of about
35-40 lbs (currently, we can pack by hand to a density of 15-30 lbs). The idea would be to fill the bucket with snow, operate the "ram", top off the bucket again, compress, and repeat until the block is fully assembled. This is as far as I've come with the idea. I'm told that compressed air would be the best way to do this, and this sounds feasible as I have a 200 PSI, twin-cylinder compressor that could be used for this. If anyone could come up with some ideas, I'd appreciate it. If I can manage to construct such a device within the next couple of months, this cherished winter tradition might just be saved for another year or two......