In this episode we do a deep-dive into German Engineer Rudolph Gantenbrink's exploration of the mysterious "air shafts" in the Great Pyramid, reading at length from
his website where he meticulously records every detail of the project to use a robotic crawler to drive a camera up the shafts and inspect them up close, block by block, culminating in the discovery of the now infamous "secret door".
So many interesting features were discovered by Gantenbrink and his "Upuaut" robot, most of which were so overshadowed by the "door" that these other details are rarely reported. We remedy that with this show.
(All the pictures below come from Gantenbrink's website,
www.cheops.org)
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| Settling of the shaft blocks |
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| "Dixon's Rod" |
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| An illustration showing the partially completed shaft block, which the robot could not pass |
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| Block assembly where one of the King's Chamber shaft ends on the exterior of the pyramid |
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| Entering the "Mankiller" tunnel |
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| Cleaning the access to exterior shaft point |
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| The 100 year old wheeled "battering ram" |
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| Installing the protective cover over an exterior shaft exit |
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| Recessed niches in King's Chamber shaft. You can see the laser dots on the wall, inside the niches |
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| Ventilator blower |
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| Upuaut 2 entering a shaft |
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| Lateral displacement of a shaft block |
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| Static forces damaged the floor block of the shaft, making a giant "tank trap" step up to the next block |
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| The infamous "door" |
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| Close-up of the copper rods, with circular "seals" discoloration |
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| Graphic showing shaft block arrangement |
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| Shaft block assembly |
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| Shaft block assembly, showing how the builders changed block sizes to keep the assembly from sliding down into the chambers |
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| Strange vertical shaft seam(it looks tilted from the robot's perspective) |
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| Dixon's "hook" |
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| Black mark on the shaft wall, with horizontal chisel marks across it |
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| Double vertical black mark with chisel marks |
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| Object with two holes in it, beneath Dixon's Rod |
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| Wooden square rod trapped beneath Dixon's Rod |
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| Dixon's Rod curving to the right where it is jammed against the wall. To the left is the square rod, with a mysterious boxy shape barely visible at the far end of it |
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| Very rough block surfaces |
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| Horizontal "Scratch lines" along the block wall, just above floor level |
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| Remnants of mortar glue stuck to shaft wall |
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| More glue in a different area |
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| Floor groove |
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| A second floor groove |
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| Graphic depicting saw being used to clean the sides of casing stones |
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| Groove beneath casing stone seam |
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| Broken piece of copper rod from the "door" |
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| Fine Limestone natural veins visible in cieling |
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| Remnants of gypsum on copper rod |
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| Bottom right corner of the "door" |
