Uses for quonset huts
08/16/09
Lightweight prefabricated structures made of galvanized iron and semicircular arched ribs are called quonset huts. The design of quonset huts is based on the Nissen hut developed by the Navy in 1941. Quionset huts were named after the place where they were first manufactured, Quonset Point. Quonset huts do not require skilled labor to be put together and can be shipped anywhere in the world. Quonset huts were made for the military but were sold to the public after the war ended to be used as commercial buildings.
The Navy developed the Nissen hut in 1941. The company hired to build quonset huts improved on the Nissen hut by using corrugated iron and arched ribs on the building. The two ends were covered with plywood which had doors and windows.Another way the Nissen hut was improved was by adding interior pressed wood lining, insulation, and a one inch tongue groove plyood floor on a raised metal framework.
The original Quonset hut was sixteen feet by thirty six feet and could be put up in one day with a team of eight men. Quonset huts were modifed to a standard size of twenty feet by forty eight feet with a ten foot radius that created seven hundred twenty square feet of usable floor space. Four foot overhangs at each end to protect the entrances against the weather were sometimes added to quonset huts. Other sizes included a forty feet by one hundred feet warehouse model of the quonset hut. The interior space of quonset huts is open and flexible.
Manufacturing of quonset huts stopped in 1959. But because the quonset huts are so portable and adaptable, they are still in use in some places today. Many quonset huts served as homes and businesses after production stopped. Large universities and colleges that had an influx of students resulting from the GI bill used quonset huts on campus. They are not used often today, but they are still around.