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My quick intro

While my knots seemed tight yesterday, I am going to switch to bolts for the top and bottom row so it is tight where the rafters sit. Will post a pic later.
 
Yes knot tying is very hard on the hands. I tell customers who make my kits that if their hands are not burning after 30 mins, the knots are not tight enough. I had one customer who was under pressure to get it tied fast, had bleeding hands😀
I wear leather gloves with the finger tips cut off, but I still have to be careful around the base of my little finger. I’ve tied so many knots now that the calluses on my finger tips cause problems on my iPad!

I oil the rafters and lattice as sanding etc is so time consuming and you really need to put a minimum of two coats on which means sanding between coats.
There are 3 disadvantages to varnish, the first as described, 2nd any chips or “dinks” to the varnished parts means moisture can penetrate into the wood and the varnish stars to flake off. Thirdly, if you need to re-coat the wood, you will have to cut all the knots off, sand, re-coat and then re tie the lattice. With boiled linseed oil, you can re-coat in situ.

So what are you going to do for the roof ring? Are you going to steam bend some of that nice wood you milled up, it looks perfectly straight and without knots. Ideal.
 
Hi Yurtman

I am not a fan of the wipe on oils for outdoor things at all. There is a great book on wood finishing by Bob Flexner and is considered the bible. Varnish will be quite fine for my needs. Actually the only time I would consider an oil is on cherry, but would still put something else overtop it once cured.

As for the ring, first rendition will be a simple pine glueup as I have yurt camping with my kids early june so the pressure is on. Its been a decade since I used my router table and have no idea where it is for the rafter ends. Router is easy to find. For the tenon end I plan to stick the tenon cutter in a big arse lathe but need to whip up a quick platform to hold the rafter piece on for uniformity.

Come this winter, which generally sucks in canada, i will try some steam bending forsure with ash. Should have no problems getting a 36" diameter steam bend out of 1/2" thick ash. Driving home from grocs I thought it would be fun to do a dovetail joint where the 2 ends come together in the ring. Would not be laminated but a single piece brought together at the ends. Dovetails would be plenty strong to keep it together. Tomorrow I will search for the router table!
 
I primed and painted my wall and rafters and yurt door with Rustoleum oil enamel. That's one heavy duty finish that withstands the yurt cover snapping in the wind on rafters and laths. Door and it's frame to sun and weather. But only to a point.
 
Plan to start sewing canvas this weekend. I have read that sometimes there is a layer between the canvas and wood. Wool of course in winter but anything else to provide some protection to canvas chaffing on wood?
 
For a bright interior, install a light colored liner first. Felt second. Outside cover last.

My yurts only had a cover, no liner, no insulation. The cover snapped and popped in heavy wind to where the rafters left marks on the cover. There was no chaffing.

I had a rope 'bridle' on top of the cover to help secure it and the rafters. It worked OK but a tight 15 year pro fit vinyl cover it was not.
 
Hi Bob.

I think I will attach 6 straps coming down off the roof cover to the ground sheet. That way it will stay on or blow us all into the sky. A tad warm today for mid may at 100F humidex but I love it. The roof ring is pine and I will make a proper hardwood one. It is 4 layer glue up octagon cut to a circle. It is rough sanded and I dont think it would last 100 years compared to a nice hardwood one. Rain is coming so will set it up again inside to start sewing. Still have to sand the odd edge from tenons and such. But progress! I was skeptical with a 3 ft ring on a 12 ft yurt but it is good enough for me. I thought the scale might be off. It is roomy inside and even though the walls are around 4', the ring sits about as high as I can reach stretched up.

Yurt1.jpg
 
A few photos of my 16' yurt are on google images.

Bob Rowlands homemade yurt.

Mine is the rustic one with green door and vertical rafters each side of the door frame. As you can see in closeups my roof ring is heavy. You can see the five point 'roof bridle' shadow on the interior view.
 
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I might get to sewing material tomorrow! Have ends of various parts that need to be varnished and while it is drying I will start with the ground sheet using vinyl. What kind of webbing did y'all use? There are several different materials, nylon, polyester, polypropylene etc. Also how is a door constructed, well I guess fastened? If the wall canvas wraps around the door frame uprights, it does not leave anything to fasten to. Wisdom appreciated!
 
The reason we wrap the wall canvas around the door post and attach to the lattice on the inside is because even though “boat shrunk” Sunforger canvas is supposed to be pre shrunk, it isn’t. It will shrink the first few times it gets wet and so if it was secured to the door posts, it woukd get very tight, be under a lot of stress and squeeze the lattice.
With the lattice wrapped around the door posts, it provides about 10-12” of adjustment.

In the instructions, it showed drilling round holes outboard of the door post tenons in the threshold and header. In our door canvas we sew two “tubes” to the outer most edge. Inside these go 3/4” dowels and they then fitted into the holes in the header and threshold.

You could put a door frame within the door frame, to which you could screw in hinges to attach a wood door.
The wood doors I sometimes sell use pivot pins like those used in bifold doors and so the doors swing on these. With a door frame within a door frame, it will allow you to add a jam to keep the draft out.

There are always compromises especially with canvas. Vinyl is great as it last longer, you don’t have to hem cut edges and it doesn’t shrink. A lot of advantages, but I would only use it in permanent type yurts as its harder to pack up fold up is more heavy and bulky. Not ideal for a camping yurt.
 
Very productive day today. One more seam to stitch up on my main roof portion. I made it using pie slices of canvas so it would sit better than longer pieces. Also used a ratchet strap for the tension band. Sewed a bunch of straps together after cutting off the hooks. Interesting how strong the structure is as I can hang from the ring no problem with little flex in the structure. Tomorrow will sew up the wall wrap which is prob the easiest thing to sew. I plan on making a 1 ft skirt to hang over the main roof canvas. It will come over the rafter ends and I assume tighten up with a strap for a good bug seal. I am still pondering what to do about a ring cover. Current thoughts may be a zipper and separate canvas so I can zip it out and swap in a screen or chimney ring as needed. Man what a fun project! Thanks for all the inspiration and wisdom.

Roof.jpg
 
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Comin together. Nicely done.

Yes, I found the upper most tension rope that compresses the roof and wall covers against the lattice, very effectively seals out bugs as well as drafts. You'll dig being sealed up tight.

Off topic. To get a really good natural cooling draft in the summer, hike up the bottom of the canvas about a foot and tuck it under the lowest tension rope. REAL nice natural cooling effect. The cooler air next to the ground comes in and runs up and out the ring. I found it very nice for a lil yurt nappy. haha
 
Tomorrow is the big day when we head out yurt camping. Just finished sewing the walls which by far was the easiest part to sew. We had a week long power outage so that threw my mental sched into a a loop. Will post some pics from campsite and also have some video edits to make of the wood construction. Will have some sewing fixups to do after back from camping weekend but it will be bugproof for now.
 
If someone could tell that loon to keep it down out in the lake I would be indebted ����

Set up fine. I did not get any viable door done that would keep the mozzies out at nite so i just tossed a big tarp over it for the night. But sooooo roomy.
Yurt.jpg
 
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