Designing / layout tools?

[Airbryan61]

Hello,

I am in a "holding pattern" while I wait for the banks and lawyers.... and while I wait, I want to design my Yurts. I want to design and layout the doors, windows, interior walls, place some furniture, etc... would also like to do some platform/deck design. Is there a specific software package others have used for this purpose that doesn't require a massive training curve?

Thanks for your input

[Jafo]

Hmm, my wife was using some software to design the family room. She is out with the kids at the moment, but when they get home tonight I will find out what it was and post it tonight. She is not very tech savvy so I can't imagine it being too difficult to understand.

[Airbryan61]

Ok, Thx. The biggest problem I have found with the apps I have played with, is creating the round walls.

[Jafo]

She said she created a free account here:

Create floor plans, house plans and home plans online with Floorplanner.com

I looked through some of the help sections in there and it appears you can round the walls, in fact the demo shows a round wall in it. If it works out, please come back and share some of your ideas and post us an image of what you created there!

[Airbryan61]

Thank you very much. I just started playing with it... looks like it is going to be fun. It may be a while... but I will post what I draw.

[Jafo]

Where are you planning on putting your yurt?

[Airbryan61]

Aloha... and thanks for asking...The plan is to build a Family ranch on between 1 and 3 acres on the Big Island of Hawaii. We will be building 3 yurts, completely permitted, but off grid, eventually. We will hook onto HELCO in the beginning, but will be septic, water catchment with UV filtering, and eventually, Solar. Then, we will building a fairly large aquaponics system and be as self sustainable as possible. Lots of plans... just waiting for things to settle with banks and stuff on the mainland. Hope to be getting started before Oct.

[Jafo]

Perhaps you already know, but the owner of

Yurts of Hawaii

is a member here. She is what we call an Industry Specialist. She knows all the ins and outs of building, permitting, customizing yurts. Here is her profile:

Yurt Forum - View Profile: HawaiiYurts

She might be able to help you out if you run into any troubles along the way.

- Jeff

[Airbryan61]

Thank you. Yes, Melissa and I have been in contact and I will be using her and her expertise

[HawaiiYurts]

Aloha Bryan, Google Sketch is another great tool. Bit of a learning curve, but it's free and I've seen some impressive results with it! We do custom drafting for the building permit process, as it has to be 'just so' for the county, but it's always nice to work with people who have put some thought into design and have a model to review.