Building My Yurt

The Yurt in Stanislaus - Rain!

2010-05-31T12:37:00.000-07:00

Setting up the yurt frame on a nice level area.

I finally got another chance to take the yurt camping, this time in the Stanislaus National Forest near the Hwy 120 entrance of Yosemite National Park in California. My dad and I searched for hours, driving down national forest roads, to find the perfect spot to set it up. We encountered a lot of steep terrain which was not ideal to set up the yurt, since it needs to be as level as possible. If the ground isn't level, then the roof will end up pushing down more on the khana downslope, causing uneven stresses on the frame. We were also looking for a spot with flat ground (not bumpy) and cleared of vegetation. We finally found a spot near Camp Mather, off of Evergreen Rd.

A close up of how the roof poles rest on the tension cable.

Unfortunately, before we got everyone together at our campsite, it was already past midnight. We spent the whole day looking and didn't get everything together to start building the yurt until after dark. So we slept in tents and the next morning, we started building. We had plenty of time, and spent about two hours putting it up. Even though we tried building the yurt on a spot as level as possible, the ground was still slightly at an angle, but what can you do? We built the door downslope so that our heads when we sleep inside the yurt would be away from the door.

All done! The door is rolled up.

Close up of the rolled up door.

We also tried a new way of rolling up the door. It was pretty simple, in fact. All we did was roll up the door from the outside, and then unfold the roll at the top so that some of the velcro was stuck to the velcro of the walls. This small amount of velcro (about 3-4 inches) was strong enough to hold up the entire rolled up door. It worked well, and we didn't need any ropes to cinch it up as we originally thought. Also, the Sierra Nevadas are a really dry mountain range with few bugs, so we were able to keep the door open all day and the only bugs that crawled into the yurt were a few large ants. If we end up taking the yurt anywhere else, I will consider making a screen door insert.

Our camp spot in the forest.

Now, as the title of this post suggests, it rained on the yurt while we were camping. It didn't rain really hard, but it did drizzle for a few hours, and there were interspersed periods of heavy rain that lasted 1-5 minutes. I was very excited when it rained because this meant I would be able to see how the yurt stood up to the water, and if the canvas was really as water resistant as I've heard. My mom was relaxing inside of the yurt at night while it was raining and she said the sound of the rain on the roof was very relaxing. The rain drops that hit the canvas balled up and rolled off. The canvas soaked up very little of the water. The area where the most water was actually soaked up by the canvas was at the roofline where the canvas was stretched tightly around the end of the roof poles at top of the walls. Some dirt got splashed up off the ground and hit the bottom band of the yurt wall. But since this section was made of vinyl, it was easy to wipe off. The walls also got wet, but the water just rolled down and never soaked in. The next day was sunny and warm, so the yurt dried out completely.

Setting up the cot inside.

Another thing we tried for the first time is sleeping on a cot in the yurt. This was actually really nice and made it feel like a house or cabin in the woods rather than a fancy heavy duty tent. Sleeping on the ground still makes you feel a bit more like you're camping in a tent, but the cot was great. It also added the benefit of putting stuff under the cot which freed up floor space.

A window cover halfway on.

Since it was hot during the day, about 75 degrees and sunny, we wanted to keep the yurt as cool as possible, which was hard since it was in the direct sun around noon. We tried covering the south facing windows with the window covers I just finished before we left on the camping trip. This worked pretty well, and kept the yurt a lot cooler than if the windows were open to the sunlight.

Finally, as we packed up, we noticed that the ground underneath the yurt was really moist, probably from all the rain and the recently melted snow in the area. The vinyl floor and the vinyl bottom band of the walls were very wet when we were packing up the yurt and some parts were covered with mud and wet soil. This shows the importance of the vinyl bottom band, because it doesn't allow the water in the ground to be soaked up by the canvas of the walls since vinyl doesn't absorb any water. It was very easy to take a rag and wipe down the mud/water from the vinyl floor and bottom band when we were packing up, ensuring that the yurt was packed away dry.

Yurt Window Covers

2010-05-21T20:56:00.000-07:00

One of the last things I just finished on the yurt are the window covers. Since I sewed the clear plastic directly into the wall cutting out the canvas material, I had no way to cover the windows unless I made covers. I thought about different ways to attach the window covers, like heavy plastic zippers, rope and grommets or velcro, and the velcro won. It also made the most sense to attach the window covers on the outside of the yurt, which at first sounds inconvenient, but its not actually that bad. Attaching the window covers on the inside would be nearly impossible since the khana are in the way between you and the canvas wall and windows. If you want to open up the window covers to let in light in the morning, you have to go outside. Also, if somebody walks by, they can just yank open a cover an look in. But so far, I haven't encountered any weirdos in the middle of the forest that have done that. And usually in the morning when I need a bathroom break in the woods, thats also a good time to open up the covers to let some light into the yurt.

Close up of the velcro that attaches the window covers.

I started by sewing the hooked part of the velcro strip onto the canvas wall bordering the windows. Then I measured out a slightly over-sized piece of canvas which would be the actual cover, and hemmed the edges. Finally I sewed the fuzzy soft part of the velcro strip around the edges of the canvas cover. I chose to put the hooked side on the yurt wall because it is easier to clean if the wall gets dirty. The covers have a better chance of staying clean.

The first step is to get the window cover aligned with the window.

I started experimenting with different ways of attaching the covers over the windows. Since they attach with velcro, you can slap then on almost any way you like. The best option I found was to put the window cover on completely, and then peel back the cover until you expose enough of the window to let in as much light as you want.

The second step is to stick the window cover onto the window and press the velcro together so it sticks.

A window covered by its cover.

Peel back the window cover until you have enough light coming through the window.

This is what a half peeled down window cover looks like from the inside of the yurt.

The Yurt at Cache Creek

2010-03-15T22:09:00.001-07:00

We set up the yurt for a single night of camping, something we normally wouldn't do because of the 1-2 hr set up time, at the Yolo County Cache Creek campground when we went camping with the vwcamperfamily. John LaTorre was going to be there, the guy who lent me the industrial sewing machine, so we thought we'd set it up and show what I sewed with his machine.

This time, we were able to set the yurt up on semi-level ground. That made the shape much rounder and the wall was less saggy then when we set it up in the desert. We also finished partially sewing on some velcro for attaching the window covers. Here are some pictures:

The yurt set up with the door flap closed.

Two strips of velcro that hold the window covers on (but only partially)

The vinyl bottom band is tucked under the khana. Canvas doesn't touch the ground.

Inside the yurt, with the ground cover all wrinkled up.

We hung the lantern from the crown by a rope.

The yurt at night. The rest of the windows are covered by the window covers.

Maiden Yurt Voyage: Have Yurt, Will Camp

2010-03-08T21:16:00.000-08:00

Yurt on the roof of the baja, heading into the mountains!

The day had finally come when all of the months of work on my yurt came to a finish (not exactly) and we were able to pack it up and take it to the mountains on its maiden yurt voyage. I know, I could of taken it somewhere easy and simple, like the local campground or something, but as with most of the things Romy and I seem to do, we go big or go home! So there we were, driving the baja over to the Eastern Sierra.

Driving off-road in the Inyo National Forest to find a perfect spot to set up the yurt.

We picked a spot east of the Owen's Valley, in the Inyo National Forest, just outside of Death Valley National Park. We found an off shoot road from CA 168 out of Big Pine which headed into Death Valley, called Death Valley Rd, and it was off another off shoot road where we drove the baja off road into a canyon and found a nice place to set up on the top of a ridge. We were situated at about 5,500 ft with an awesome view of the Sierra Nevada mountains across the Owen's Valley. Before we left on the trip, I had visions in my head of setting up the yurt in the valley near Mammoth Lakes, CA, but it had too much snow. That's why we headed farther south instead.

Setting up the yurt near Death Valley National Park.

Nicole and Romy found a section of a ridge that happened to have large flat spots in between desert scrub plants (I don't know what they are called). We needed to find a place that had at least a 12 foot diameter circular area clear of vegetation. We ended up having to pull a few plants out of the rocky and dry soil to clear one of the largest spots we found, but made an attempt at replanting them elsewhere. So hopefully we didn't kill any plants! The baja couldn't drive up the ridge, so we had to carry the pieces of the yurt up a steep hill. It was worth doing that in order to have the awesome view that we were able to have being on top of a ridge.

Marcel holding the yurt wall as it is attached to the roof.

There was a steady wind blowing from the east as we worked to get the yurt put together. It took us about 2 hours to put it up, which was slow compared to how fast we were able to assemble it in the park. It was hard to get the yurt completely flat and level of the ground and perfectly round. I don't think we were ever able to achieve the round-ness and I also think we constructed it slightly less than a 12 ft diameter. But it was close! Consequently, I felt like the walls of the yurt were slightly sagging or bunched up in areas. However that didn't effect much except the aesthetics, so as the sun went down, we crawled inside and started up the lantern for light, and propane heater for warmth.

The yurt, finally all built!

Romy, Marcel, and Nicole relaxing in the yurt.

The yurt retained a lot of heat from the propane heater, which we nicknamed "the sunflower" due to its shape. We left the door flap cracked open for ventilation. We had it running the whole evening, but turned it off when we went to sleep, and turned it back on in the morning. Nicole and Marcel brought a bunch of 1 liter bottles of home brewed beer, which we drank merrily each and every night of camping in the yurt. Mmmmm. My favorite was the blonde ale.

Cheers! Enjoying a home brewed beer in the yurt.

When the sun went down behind the mountains, we were able to see a lot of stars in the sky. We hung a Coleman lantern from the crown by a short rope, so we had a soft light source inside the yurt, and it looked really cool from outside. I wasn't able to sew window covers yet, however I will have to finish them this week! The wind steadily blew all night, but inside the yurt it was quiet and peaceful. When we finally went to sleep, I liked laying and staring at the roof. There was enough light outside from the moon that you could see the roof poles and the star shaped crown rain cover through the roof making a cool pattern.

The yurt at night, lit up by our Coleman lantern inside.

After having the yurt up for only two short nights, we had to break it down and go home. Putting it up for the first time and camping inside of it was really exciting and made me feel great after all of the hard work building it. I feel like I'm done, but there are still a few things here and there that I have to finish off, like the floor, and the window covers. But nevertheless, its ready for another camping trip soon!

Inside the yurt, with an open crown.

Yurt Almost Done!

2010-02-18T20:10:00.000-08:00

Before my sister, Nicole, left we put up the yurt at the park to see how well everything we sewed went together. This post will mainly be pictures, since they explain a lot more than what I could say in words.

Romy setting the pieces of the yurt out in the grass. It really helps to have a step ladder.

The redwood crown.

Romy pushing the roof canvas on top. Its actually pretty heavy!

Alright! Romy gives thumbs - the roof fits and the roof band is tight.

A close up of the roof and roof band. You can see some of the rope loops hanging down - that's where the wall will attach.

Unrolling the yurt wall. You can see all of the windows are sewn in. The wall is 36ft long.

Nicole attaches the wall to the roof using the loop-rope system. The wall must be attached from the inside of the yurt by design.

The roof had to be pushed up while tying the wall to the roof.

The wall wraps around the door frame and is tightened with rope.

The wall is fully attached. The bottom band isn't sewn on yet, that's why the wall is just short of the ground. The bottom band will be made out of vinyl which will not absorb water and rot.

An outside view of the yurt. You can see the two sizes of windows.

The roof line and a window.

You can see in this picture how the walls attach to the roof. The loops of rope interlock with each other as you feed them through the grommets. The wall is not supported by the tension cable, as many popular designs call for.

Close up of the rope loop system.

You might notice that the yurt doesn't yet have a door flap and the wall doesn't reach all the way to the ground. I still have to complete the bottom band, which will extend the wall to the ground and connect to the vinyl floor (still have to make the floor to!) with velcro. I have to finish this all in the next two weeks because that's when the maiden yurt voyage will be to the hot springs near Mammoth Lakes!

Sewing the Canvas Wall

2010-02-16T15:17:00.000-08:00

This past weekend, Nicole flew here to Oakland to come and help me sew the canvas wall of the yurt, and help me finish the canvas roof. It was really nice having a second person help measure, cut, and handle the fabric because the canvas is sooooo heavy, and the wall canvas in particular was a little stiff, making it hard to handle. Sometimes, we needed a third person (Romy), to help align and push fabric through the sewing machine. We worked all day, and late into the night sometimes too. It was really fun work, even though sometimes we got frustrated, broke a few needles, ran out of bobbin at the worst times, etc. But the sewing machines never let us down!

I used a 13oz water, mildew, and fire resistant canvas, which was dyed turquoise for the walls. The roof canvas was also a natural 13oz canvas, but was only treated for water and mildew resistance. The fire resistant coating makes a huge difference in the way the fabric looks and feels (and smells). The turquoise fire resistant canvas is stiffer and kind of shiny. The natural canvas is more flexible and easier to handle in the machine.

I also bought a 20 gauge clear plastic "fabric" for the yurt windows. It was really clear, and cost about $10/yd. There is no need to go any heavier, unless you are making large windows. I limited the width of each window to about 2.5ft so that the windows didn't take too much of the weight of the walls. We made 5 windows total, two of them were long (spanned almost the whole height of the wall), and two of them were medium length.

Cutting out the fabric behind the window.

To sew the windows on the walls, we first sewed the plastic onto the side of the fabric which will be the inside of the wall. Once it was sewn in place, we cut the back of the fabric away, exposing the window. In the picture above, you can't see the plastic window, but its there, believe me! We left about 2.5 inches of scrap so that it was easy to fold it back to make a nice border around the window. The corners were left exposed (they had no border), but we decided that it can be covered by a small triangle shaped trim I'll sew over it later.

Sewing the flaps into a nice border around the windows.

We also placed brass spur grommets at the top of the wall every 7.25 inches. Why 7.25in? I don't know, I just made that number up. I thought that spacing would be good to support the wall. The total amount of grommets was about 60, I think, supporting a wall 36ft long. I used 1/2inch spur grommets (#4), which required a special tool. The tools, called a die set, and hole puncher, are specific to the grommet size, so you will have to buy the same size tools and hole puncher as you do grommets. I ordered my tools and grommets from Sailrite.

Me and Nicole (my twin sister) with a finished window. You can also see the grommets.

Once the windows and grommets were done on the wall, that was about all that needed to be done (for now). So next we moved on to finishing the roof. We first sewed together the final seam which completed the cone shape of the roof. Then we cut off the scraps which hung over the sides to make the roof circular. Then we sewed a roof band along the circumference of the roof to make a tight roof line. On the inside of this roof band, we sewed a series of rope loops which were spaced at 7.25 inches, the same as the grommets. The loops of rope fit through the grommets at the top of the wall to join them together.

The rope loops sewn on the underside of the roof, along the circumference.

Just getting to this point took us almost two days. The wall was still not completely done, because we still had to sew on the bottom band, a strip of vinyl or plastic material (not canvas) which will be in contact with the ground and be tucked underneath the khana (the wooden part of the wall). This band is there because you don't want the canvas to be in contact with the ground because it will absorb water and possibly start to rot. Plus we didn't make a door flap yet. But at this point we were really excited to get the yurt built to see if what we sewed so far was okay or not.

Fitting the Canvas Roof

2010-02-13T21:35:00.000-08:00

The yurt roof cover being fitted.

It finally got sunny outside and dry enough to take the yurt out and fit the canvas cover that I made almost one month ago. It started out flat - a bunch of 36" wide strips of canvas sewn together, so that when brought to a cone shape, there would be just enough overlapping material to cover the roof. I used Paul King's book and his 12 foot yurt patterns, although I didn't like following his measurements. If anybody is making their yurt roof canvas following his pattern, be aware that some dimensions are missing, and that you will have to make some of the strips considerable longer (he only marks the shortest dimensions). WARNING! Make sure you look hard and think about each strip before you cut. I almost screwed up.

Don't look at my butt!

When fitting the roof material, you have to allow the shortest section to come right above the door. That's where the fabric comes and overlaps. That's where we pinned the overlapping flaps together with safety pins so that we could keep the roof on tight. It helped that it wasn't windy at all. It turned out a very nice, sunny, warm, and wind-free afternoon. We got lucky!

Romy pinning some of the canvas in place.

You might also notice that there is an excess of fabric hanging off the sides. Not all of this is needed, but I am going to save about 8" to make a roof band. The band will have two layers, one to protect the side of the yurt when it rains, and the other flap to attach the yurt wall canvas to. I decided to go with the method that Colorado Yurt CO uses, which is to attach the yurt wall canvas directly to the roof instead of the khana (lattice wall). This makes the roof line tighter because there is an even weight always pulling down on the roof. The grommet work and ropes that connect the wall canvas to the roof canvas will be hidden by the flap of roof band that also serves to protect the the top of the walls from rain.

Inside the yurt.

After pinning everything, I also had to mark out where the crown was, so that the fabric all bunched up on the top could be cut away, allowing a nice hole for the crown. I will later integrate a bug screen in the crown so that we can keep the crown 'open' but keep the bugs out. I will also make a removable rain cover for the crown, which can be thrown over the crown to keep the rain out (or keep extra heat in).

The characteristic rainbow arc, created by the seams of the roof canvas.

If you use the strips of canvas pattern, made popular by Paul King, you will find these beautiful rainbow arcs that are created by the seams in the canvas, where each strip was connected to the next. If your seams are tight and straight, it looks awesome! Some yurt companies make custom roof covers which have an insert of heavy duty clear plastic instead of one of the canvas strips, so it looks like you have a rainbow of sky!

Jenn noting some measurements/dimensions.

When we built the roof this time, almost all of our poles fit how they should, so we got it in the circle shape better. Our roof angle ended up being 35 degrees exactly. The canvas roof cut off angle ended up being between 110 degrees and 112 degrees. Paul King suggests 117 degrees in his pattern, but this must correspond to a roof angle closer to 30 degrees or so. Since we had a slightly higher angled roof, our cone must be tighter, hence the smaller cut off angle.

Canvas material all bunched up over the crown.

At the park that we built the yurt, Robert's Regional Park in Oakland, the rangers and the managers already know us! The first time we came there, last month, the rangers and other park patrol people kept talking to us wondering what we were doing. But when we fit the canvas, they didn't bother us, except for the one manager on his golf cart (he didn't bother us, he just came to talk to us). He came as we were packing up, and was upset that he missed seeing the yurt up with the roof. He really liked the yurt, and told us that next time we come, we should let the rangers in the office know so that they can take pictures and put it up on the park website! Haha, my yurt will be famous!

Marking the crown.

Starting to Sew

2010-01-14T18:09:00.000-08:00

I am now starting to sew the canvas cover for the yurt. I am using a 13oz Sunforger canvas for the roof. It is all cotton that has been treated for water and mildew resistance. The color is natural. The roof should be light in color to let in the sun and also the lighter the color, the longer it will last against UV (since it reflects more light away instead of absorbing it if it was a darker color). I needed 34 yards for the roof, and the roll is 36 inches wide. I ordered the natural canvas from Kronke Co. in Hayward, CA. It was very convenient that they weren't too far away, because I went to their store to pick up my order instead of shipping it. Plus, the guy there was really nice over the phone.

34 yards of Sunforger canvas, 36 inches wide.

I also bought thread from Kronke Co., as it was convenient to just get everything together. To sew heavy duty material like a 13oz canvas, you have to use heavy thread as well. I bought a V92 weight polyester thread which is bonded. Make sure you buy the bonded stuff, because that really increases the strength. It feels thicker than normal thread, and it almost feels like there is a layer of wax or something over it, making it smooth. I bought 4 spools which were 4oz each.

Two spools of V92 polyester bonded thread.

The sewing machine also must accept at least a No. 20 size needle. John, who let me use his industrial sewing machine (THANK YOU JOHN!), also gave me a set of No. 24 size needles, which I have been using with the V92 thread. It has worked fine so far. In addition to the industrial sewing machine, I bought an old White brand home sewing machine on craiglist for $25. I really love it! It is teal, chrome, and black. I think it must be from the early 70s. The home sewing machine was able to accept the No. 24 needle as well as the V92 thread. Before I started sewing, I made sure to oil the machines.

Today I began sewing the roof together. It involves sewing long strips of the canvas together, and then making a cone shape. I only got to sewing three strips together, because it took a long time. Each strip was about 16 to 18 feet long, and each seam involved three length-wise stitches. I made french seams, which are strong and water resistant. I am using the pattern provided in Paul King's book, The Complete Yurt Handbook, although I double checked all his measurements (they check out).

Starting a French Seam on my home sewing machine.

When I used scrap fabric as a test, I learned that the home sewing machine can only punch through two layers of the canvas. When I added a third layer, the belt which drives the machine started slipping. But that was okay, because I didn't want to over work the machine, since I did have the industrial sewing machine too. The problem with the industrial one is that it is VERY hard to control. When you press down the foot pedal, the machine goes crazy - it sews very fast and hard. It has a motor which weighs 50lbs or more, and can seriously drive an air compressor. The machine can probably sew through metal! Not really, but it is a crazy machine. So first, what I did was sew the two canvas pieces together in two layers with the home sewing machine to start the french seam, since I was able to better control it. Then I took the fabric to the industrial machine to finish the seam, which involved sewing through four layers of canvas. Since the two pieces were already together, it didn't matter how crazy the machine got on me, at least I didn't have to line anything up. All I had to do was hope to sew in a straight line.

Completing the french seam with the industrial sewing machine.

So that's it so far. My sister is coming to visit in February and we will have a yurt canvas sewing party. The goal is to finish all of the sewing and have the cover completely done by the time she leaves. I think we can do it!

A close up the a completed french seam.

Yurts Are Hyperboloids

2010-01-12T20:28:00.000-08:00

Today, Mark turned me on to the connection between yurt walls, and a hyperboloid, which is a 3D geometrical surface. But what is special about the surface is that you can create it, although it is curved, using only straight lines!

A hyperboloid 3D surface. Source: www-lm.ma.tum.de

This is exactly how the walls of a yurt are put together! The individual long khana pieces are not bent, although it creates a round wall. Compare the 3D surface to the yurt:

The yurt.

On wikipedia, it says that since the hyperboloid shape can be built with straight beams, it allows minimization of wind cross-section while retaining structural integrity with minimal material.

Other structures which are made of the same shape are cooling towers.

A power plant cooling tower.

Yurt Frame Raising

2010-01-07T19:06:00.000-08:00

The day has finally come - This morning I finished making the door frame, the last piece in the wooden frame of my yurt. Now that everything is done, Romy and I were ready to take it to the park and put it up to see if everything worked. The park we chose to go to was Roberts Regional Park, just a mile or two up the hill from where we live. It has a nice flat field cleared out surrounded by redwood trees.

Packing up the yurt on the baja roof rack.

The whole yurt frame fit nicely on the roof rack. When we got to the park, we unpacked and walked the pieces of the frame onto the grassy field. The first part of the set up was getting the khana sections stretched out and connected together and connected to the door frame.

Jenn is stretching out the khana sections and connecting them to the door frame.

Romy is connecting khana sections together with rope.

The khana sections connect to each other by rope. They slightly overlapped each other so that they could form a stronger link. The khana connected to the door frame with rope also. If this was a permanent yurt, the pieces would be bolted or screwed together. The rope, surprising, worked really well. I guess, why wouldn't it? That's how the yurts are traditionally put together.

A close up of how the khana sections overlap and are tied together.

After the khana sections are connected, the next step is to band the khana into a circle. This was tricky, because every time we moved one part of the circle to fix it, another part went out of shape! We spent a lot of time trying to get this right, because if the yurt frame isn't in a perfect circle, then the roof poles will not sit right. When it looked all in place, we measured out the diameter to see if we had set it correctly to 12 feet. Amazingly, it was just 2 inches shy of 12 feet.

We finally got the walls of the yurt into a perfect circle.

Next it was time to raise the roof! It is a Mongolian yurt building superstition that the roof must be raised from within the yurt. You can NEVER pass a pole over the walls (or you will have bad luck with your yurt, or maybe bad luck in general). You have to have them inside and raise them upwards. So that's what we did. The roof poles are connected to the walls by a cable that remains under tension, which is tied around the circumference of the yurt and rests on top of the walls.

The yurt roof and crown stands with less than half of the poles in place.

A close up picture of how the roof poles connect to the tension cable on top of the khana walls.

All of the roof poles are in place.

In addition to the tension cable, which serves dual purpose to hold up the roof poles and keep the khana from spreading outward from the weight of the roof, there is also a belly rope I weaved through the wall towards the bottom to support the khana there too. The final test to see if the roof poles and crown are properly seated is to hang from the crown. This was by far the scariest and the most fun part about the frame raising! But no matter how much we tugged down on the crown, it didn't want to come down lower. We didn't measure the angle of the roof, but to me, the roof seems to be sitting at slightly too sharp of an angle. I designed it to sit at 32 degrees, but it seems more like 35 degrees.

At first conservatively, Romy hung from a rope slung over the crown.

Then Jenn was hoisted up and hung directly from the crown. Weeeeee!

Romy hanging from the yurt crown.

After having lots of fun hanging from the crown, we took more measurements which we will need to started making the canvas cover. We didn't find any odd things, which is good. Everything was just as it was designed to be! Some tricky things that happened when we were putting up the roof poles, was that some of them seemed too short. But Romy later discovered that they weren't really too short, but the yurt was not in a perfect circle. Also, some of the roof poles that seemed short were not coming out of the crown at the correct angle. Once we shifted them left or right, they reached the tension cable with no problem. Here are more pictures from the frame raising (and even more here):

Its a bit dark, but this is another view of how the roof poles connect to the walls.

View of the crown from inside the yurt looking up.

Jenn really happy that the yurt went up smoothly! Success!

Second & Third Khana Sections Finished

2010-01-05T21:55:00.000-08:00

It took a day each to finish, and now all of the three khana sections have been completed. I would suggest wearing gloves when you work with the rope. For the first hour, I didn't have gloves on, and I started to get blisters on my hands from constantly pulling the rope tight. Then I found some leather gloves, and they made everything less painful, but I felt a little more clumsy due to the loss of feeling in my hands.

As I was starting the third khana section, the gas in my Bic lighter ran out. I had another lighter (generic from Ace Hardware) which I used to melt the ends of the strings, but the flame sucked. It was small, not as hot, and generally weak (even though it still had a lot of gas in it). I didn't think that there would be such a difference between cheap-o lighters, but apparently there is. It was perfect timing that Romy was coming back from school just as I was getting sick of the generic lighter, so I called him and asked him to pic me up a Bic on his way home. When he brought it home, I was soooooo happy because the Bic was 100 times better!

The first khana section completed.

The second khana section completed.

The third khana section completed.

The two khana sections that attach to the door are mirror images of each other and use the same piece dimensions. When I was cutting all of the pieces, I just doubled the amount I made. However, the middle section (the second khana section) is slightly different. It has no 'corners' because part of it will overlap the other two sections when you join them together. I will post a detailed picture of this soon, when I raise the frame for the first time.

I think the pictures I provided here are detailed enough to go off of if you wanted to make your own. The dimensions are all in Paul King's book, however I think the photos I took are better than his hand drawing (its tiny in his book, and has an error). But I must warn you, there is one mistake in my third khana section! Can you spot it!?

Putting Together the First Khana Section

2010-01-03T21:08:00.000-08:00

This morning I was sooooooo excited to see that the varnish dried on the khana pieces earlier than I expected. So that meant that I could start tying together the khana pieces into the three khana sections which make up the wall of the yurt. I used Paul King's book as a guide. My friend, John (who has his own tent and sunshade making business) let me know about an error in Paul King's diagram for the khana. It was a good thing he let me know about it, because I was kinda confused when I saw the wrong version in Paul's published book. I used the corrected version.

Basically, the error in Paul King's book is that he shows only 14 full-length pieces, when there should really be 16. Here is John's erratum sheet that he sent to the publisher (click on it to see a larger version):The long khana pieces go together criss crossed. I used 1x2 inch douglas fir for the khana pieces. They are joined with a nylon braided polyester cord 1/8" thick string. There are 8 full length pieces in each direction for each khana section, and for my yurt, I need to make three sections. In addition, there are also progressively shorter and shorter pieces that need to be included to make the ends square. The following pictures are a step-by-step guide to how to put a khana section together. As I mentioned in my previous posts, the holes where the string goes through to connect khana pieces together have already been drilled prior to today, and I also cut each piece to size, sanded them, and varnished them.

Step 1: Push the string from the top to the bottom and out. Sometimes it helps to fashion a 'needle' out of a stick or something similar. Knot the end and burn it with a lighter so that the end of the string doesn't unravel. I used synthetic string, but if you are using natural fiber, you shouldn't burn it.

Step 2: Pull the string hard and tight so that the knot on the other end seats. Make sure the two khana pieces are aligned how you want them to be.

Step 3: Keeping the string tight, use pliers to help tie the knot at the top. Try to make the knot as close to the wood as possible.

Step 4: After tying the knot, cut off the excess string. Finish it by burning the end so that the string doesn't unravel.

I had this vision this morning that I would finish all three khana sections today. In one khana section, there were a total of 76 'joints' and 152 knots to tie and burn! Needless to say, it took me all day to complete just one khana section, even when Romy helped me for an hour or so! That means I still have two more days to go making the sections, and one more day to make the door frame.

The start of putting a khana section together. This is a view of the corner.

My dad thought that the khana might not bend enough to create a circle without the pieces breaking, so I tested it out. It bends really well, and the actual pieces don't bend as much length-wise because they are at an angle. I was happy when I saw that! Anyways. . . here are some more pictures I took over the course of the day (and night).

Romy helping to make the khana sections.

Me making the khana sections. It is getting towards evening. Romy took this picture from the balcony above the garages.

The completed khana section. Its dark outside so the picture blurred a little.

Me holding up the khana section when it is all folded up. Its not as big as I thought!

I look all tired! But the first section is all done. Yay!

Done Varnishing the Khana

2010-01-02T19:47:00.000-08:00

After inhaling a bunch of fumes, I finally finished varnishing all 85 pieces of khana which will make up the three sections of the lattice yurt wall. Since I had so many pieces and not much space in the garage for them to dry, I built a small functional drying rack. The weather here has been playing games with me. The weather report said it was going to rain for the whole past week, so I felt hesitant to start varnishing with all of the possible humidity. But then I said, what the heck!? I will just varnish in the garage and if it takes longer for the khana to dry, so be it, at least I will get it started.

About 2/5ths of all of the khana pieces drying on the rack I built.

It turned out to be nice, sunny, and warm during most of the days this week. It only rained at night. I varnished with spar varnish, normally used for marine or boat applications. I applied one thick coat. I didn't want to put more on it, since the khana will be slightly bent when the yurt is standing. I figured if I layered it on any thicker, the varnish might crack under the stress.

Me varnishing in the garage. It looks like the baja is looking at my butt and smiling!

The next step now, after the last batch of khana pieces are dry, is to join them all together into the lattice sections. I think I will do this two days from now. I also forgot about making a door frame! I will do that tomorrow, I think, while the last batch of khana dry.

Khana Pieces

2009-12-28T14:18:00.000-08:00

Here is the update on how building my yurt is going:

In the past few weeks, I bought the wood pieces to start making the khana, which is the slat walls of the yurt. I went to Ashby Lumber in Berkeley, and bought 80 pieces of 8ft slats (they are 1x2 inch) made of douglas fir. I am following Paul King's guide, although I am not bending the khana pieces as he suggests in his book. I just don't have the time or the energy to make a steaming vessel to put all of the wood pieces inside and then bend them.

The khana join together at points 9 inches apart to form a criss-crossed lattice style wall. For my 12 foot diameter yurt, I will need to make 3 sections of khana, which join together to create the wall. The wall wraps around and is forced into a circle. Once it is joined to a door frame (as you can see in the photo below) it creates a strong support for the roof poles.

This is a picture of a yurt from allaboutyurts.com where you can see the lattice wall, or khana.

I have a total of 85 pieces, the longest being 6.5 feet. This should make for a 5 foot wall height. It took me two weekends to cut down each of the 85 pieces to length, and also round off the two ends so that there weren't any sharp corners. Then I had to drill holes every 9 inches. There were soooo many holes to drill that it literally took half the entire time. I first made a template piece, which had three holes drilled every 9 inches. I put that on top of the piece of khana I was drilling to mark where to make each hole. When I marked the three from the template, I moved the template down the piece until I reached the end, as Paul King suggests in his book.

Some of the khana pieces I made our of douglas fir. The ends were cut at an angle so that there were no sharp points.

I am now in the process of sanding all of the pieces (all 85 of them!) and then varnishing them with one coat. I got over half of them sanded already and about 1/5th of the pieces varnished. The varnish will seal the wood and make it look nicer from inside. I am basically done with the frame of the yurt. Now I just have to put it together after I finish varnishing all of the pieces, including the roof poles.

Update On My Yurt

2009-11-15T21:33:00.000-08:00

I spent this weekend working on my yurt again. I got a lot done, and I'm really happy about that! But I've also been working on it sporadically during the past few weeks after I get home from school. After I finished putting together the crown, I sanded it down to even all of the jumps out of the wood, then filled in the holes and gaps. I got a type of wood putty that resembled tile grout, but it was light brown. It was hard putting the putty into the gaps, since it was very course and sandy (not like putty at all) and at first I was really upset at myself for not opening the little bottle up at the store to check its consistency. But the stuff dried very fast, and sanded down well, and didn't crack or anything yet. So overall I'm pretty happy with how the grout/putty turned out.

I am sealing the crown after I sanded and puttied it.

Since last time, I decided to paint the crown in a traditional Mongolian design, bright red, orange, blues, pinks, and yellows. That is why I am sealing it instead of varnishing it, because I will paint right over it in the next few weeks. Come to think of it, I may hold off on painting it until I finish the frame of the yurt and put it up once as a test.

After the wood sealer was dry on the crown, I drilled holes into it for the 36 roof poles to slide into. The roof angle is 30 degrees, so all of the holes had to be drilled at an angle, and made for quite a hard time fighting with the drill press. One hand was turning the wheel to bring the drill down, the other hand was holding the angle finder to make sure I was drilling at the correct angle, and both my legs were bent, supporting the wheel securely. Too bad Romy wasn't there to take a picture. I must of looked funny!

The yurt crown with 36 holes drilled into it.

The crown now is basically finished, except for some decorative touches (like the painting and some bowed sticks I will add later to support the rain dome). So next I moved on to finish the roof poles. Since they were still rough (all I did last time was round them out), I had to cut each of them to 6 ft. This wasn't too hard, but it was time consuming. Some ends were split, so those were the ends I cut off. Other ends had knots in them, so I also chose to cut those off too.

All 36 roof poles are now 6 ft long.

To attach the roof poles to the crown, I decided to go with a 3 inch long dowel pin that is 1/2 inch thick. I cut those to size from a long dowel rod I bought at OSH (a hardware store). That was much cheaper than ordering real fluted dowel pins from a supplier. I only needed about 40 dowel pins, but usually large dowel pins like that are sold in bags of 100! Anyways, 2 inches of the dowel pin goes inside the end of the poles, and 1 inch will stick into the crown. The dowel pins are now part of the roof poles. But to make drilling easier for myself, I first drilled a 2.5 inch deep hole into one end of each pole (1/2 inch thick) and then cut the same end off each pole at an angle, to accommodate the slope of the roof. In the process, about 1/2 and inch was sheared off, which is why I had to drill the hole 2.5 inches deep at first instead of 2 inches. It is much easier to drill into a perpendicular surface than into one that is angled at 30 degrees!

The holes for the dowel pins are drilled into each end of the yurt roof poles.

As an added complication, since the yurt crown is a polygon instead of a true circle, some of the poles come at an angle to the crown (I'm not talking about the angle of the roof slope). There is only one roof pole per polygon side that comes in straight on, and that's the one right in the middle of each polygon section. The other two come in at opposing 10 degree angles. So I had to cut each pole either straight on with a 30 degree slant, or +10 degrees with a 30 degree slope, or -10 degrees with a 30 degree slope. Consequently, I labeled the end of each pole so that it will be easier to build it.

Each roof pole is labeled and cut with its corresponding angle.

I also cut a notch into the other end of the poles for the wall attachment, but I will save explaining that for another post.

Yurt Crown Almost Finished

2009-11-01T18:27:00.000-08:00

Today I spent almost all day finishing up the crown. The crown consists of two rings, each with 24 individual pieces which are held together in a ring form by wooden dowels and glue. This by itself isn't strong enough, so I made a inner supporting cross brace thing, in the shape of a tic-tac-toe.

6 of the 24 pieces that make up the double ring of the crown

I made the inner crossbars by cutting four pieces of the salvaged redwood 2x2's slightly larger than the inner diameter of the ring. I cut grooves into these pieces so that they would snap into each other.

The inner crossbars of the crown.

Next, I recessed the 8 spots where the crossbars meet the ring with a router tool. I then made the corners square with a small bit on the Dremel tool. The crossbars sink half way into each ring, and the rings sandwich the crossbars in.

The crown crossbars are recessed half way into the top ring.

After cutting notches in both the top and bottom rings, it was ready to be glued together, sandwiching the crossbars in the middle. Each notch had to be traced out and measured individually.

Getting ready to glue the top and bottom rings together.

After the rings were pressed on top of each other, I used long wood screws to screw them together, for added strength, to make sure the sandwiched pieces wouldn't come apart. These were the only screws in the entire structure of the crown.

Me and the crown all put together!

The crown is pretty strong! The crossbars really made a great difference in its strength. I am letting it dry overnight, and the next thing I need to do is sand all of it again to even out any bumps or jumps (some pieces didn't join exactly flush).

A closer look at the crown.

Its not perfect, but after sanding and filling in any gaps with wood putty, I think it should look a lot better. I am debating whether or not to just varnish and leave it natural, or paint it in a colorful, traditional Mongolian pattern, like this:

Yurt Roof Poles

2009-10-31T19:02:00.000-07:00

Here's an update on how the yurt is going. Last night we were supposed to leave in the bus to go visit the natural hot springs on the east side of the Sierra Nevada mountains, along hwy 395, for the weekend. But the bus wasn't running right, and we were in the middle of changing out all of the window seals in the baja so we couldn't take the baja either :-(

So we decided to just stay at home this weekend and work on the VWs and I would work on getting the yurt roof poles done. This morning, I set up the table saw and began choosing 36 2x2's that weren't cracked at the knots. I used John LaTorre's method of making poles which he outlines in his book, The Pavilion Book, a complete guide to buying, maintaining, and living in a Medieval-style tent. I met John at the vwcamperfamily camp-outs that we go to in the VWs. His book is awesome! I recommend buying it if you plan on making a tent or yurt, or even a tipi, because he gives a lot of good insider's tips.

36 yurt poles which I cut on the table saw

To make the poles, I cut the corners off to make a octagonal pole. Each pole went through the table saw four times, once for each corner to be cut off. I made 42 poles total, but ended up rejecting 6 of them because they had knots or splits that made the pole weak and bendy. In the picture, the poles look striped, but this is because the redwood was exposed to the sun for a while which made them brown. When I cut the corners off to round the poles, the red, "fresh" inside was exposed. I think it looks cool like that, but I'm not sure if the brown parts would do well being coated with some spar varnish.

Another picture of the poles

The next thing I need to do is cut the poles to size. Since I am making a 12ft diameter yurt, the roof poles need to be 6ft long. The roof angle will be 30 degrees, thus making the crown 2.5ft in diameter. I will also need to taper the roof poles to make them easier to stick into the crown.

The Beginnings of My Yurt

2009-10-28T22:41:00.000-07:00

So I decided to start building my own yurt. I've been thinking about buying one for a while, for long term camping. Maybe one day I would live in one, but not yet. Many of the modern yurts made in America are meant to be permanent structures, although they were originally built and designed by nomadic people, like the Mongolians, and meant to be moved around a couple of times a year. Pacific Yurts is a large company that makes modern yurts, but they are expensive and heavy. The smallest one they make (12ft diameter) is close to 900 lbs! And it costs about $5000, just for the base model. There is another company, GoYurt, which makes a small lightweight (250 lb.) yurt which is meant to be taken camping and stuff. But that yurt costs $4000! Being cheap, I decided to make my own. My plan is to use as many salvaged materials as possible, with out sacrificing quality. I will spend money where I have to, but I think I can make the whole thing comfortably under $1000, including all of the tools I have to buy.

A traditional Mongolian yurt. Hopefully, my yurt will come out looking like this when I'm all finished!

I found a guy on craigslist who was giving away a bunch of 2"x2"x12ft pieces of redwood. He took apart a gigantic deck awning, and salvaged the redwood pieces. Most people who do this charge for the wood because it is pretty valuable, even used! Redwood has a lot of tanin compound in it naturally, which gives it a high resistance to rot and resistance to insects. Thats actually why redwood trees live for thousands of years. Anyways, I picked up about 20 pieces of the 2"x2"x12ft sections, and I am keeping them to make the roof rafters. Since I have so many, I will also attempt to make the crown of the yurt out of them as well.

I've also found a good website for learning how to make a yurt: simplydifferently.org. They had a nice picture of how the yurt is set up:

The way a yurt goes together.

So I've spent the past week beginning to build the crown of the yurt using the salvaged redwood. I bought a power sander off of craigslist, too, and a table saw from Sears. Romy already had a drill press, which came in very handy so far. Here are just a few pictures:

These are pieces of the crown that I cut out of the 2"x2"s and dowel pinned together. They are drying out after being glued in pairs. After that is dry, I will glue them on fours.

This is what half of the main structure of the crown looks like. It isn't glued yet, so its a little rickety.

The yurt crown will be 2.5ft in diameter, and it will have cross members across the center, as well as a domed section. It will look something like this, but instead of being circular, it will be a 12-sided polygon, with 36 roof rafters.

A yurt crown.