Time to get off our butts

[pat and kathy]

After 2 1/2 years of living in the Airstream, building a deck, a shed/storage/shower house, putting in a garden, it's time to expand the living quarters. We live in Keller, washington onthe Colville Reservation, 1400ft elevation, about three miles from Lake Roosevelt up a creek valley which either funnels wind uphill from the lake or downhill from the mountains. Moderate snow...maybe 10-12" max at any one time, rarely gets over 90 in summer plus we have good afternoon shade from 30-50ft Pondersosa thinned. Rain? Not enough to live on so we get water from the community well six miles down the road. Our site has a slight slope, perhaps 2%. We're planning on a 20ft yurt, probably from Shelter Design due to [a] proximity and [b]

insulation

package. We'll use the Airstream for cooking and dining area and turn the back bedroom into?????. The yurt will be our bedroom, living room and library...Kathy is a retired English AP teacher and has close to 3000 books. Wood heat...on the rez a cord costs us elders $80 a cord, fir and larch, delivered, split and stacked. Propane backup. I'll put in a ground level deck, 2x8 treated on 4x6 beams with R-38 in the floor. then 2x6 or 2x8 #2 fir, larch or pine [whatever is on sale at the mill] at about $275/1000bft. for the decking. Finish the deck and throw some decent-looking rugs inside. I have electric...last power pole on the road...so the yurt will have 40A and propane but no water.

My goal is to order the yurt in january for Memorial Day delivery, start in January purchasing lumber for the deck when its cheap. We live on Social security so it's a bit of cash out every month for materials...no credit thank you. Our goal is to be able to move in by November 1 next year which is when we normally get our first hard, lasting freeze.

Hints from yurters....special tools you've found helpful, stuff first-timers overlook, oddities from manufacturers, options you should have bought but didn't, things I will forget so remind us now

Best Regards

Pat hayes, Kathy Walden, the labs, the cats, etc
Keller, washington

[cmwingfield]

The best advice I received before building my yurt was, "invest in a good cordless drill". I'm seven years into the yurt process and during that time I imagine I've screwed in about 10 thousand screws. I bought a three hundred dollar Makita drill and it has served me well. I' also a retiree and it's the best retirement setup that I know of. Good luck!

[Jafo]

Ditto on the drill. Brush up on the importance of Pi too.

[Bob Rowlands]

Makita 18V cordless impact driver/drill with 3.0 AH lithium batteries. Do NOT get the 1.5 AH model! Absolutely without any question the best drills I've ever owned and I've bought six over the last 34 years.

[dennishl]

I opted to go cheap for cordless tools just to get started, I own a Ryobi set and figured I'd be replacing it soon or later. The batteries only made it a year. But, I had a local battery shop re-cell them for a total of i think 3600mah each and have been very happy with the Ryobi set ever since. The build quality seems solid enough, I've been using the drill for years without issue.

My biggest piece of advice is when laying out your deck, make sure everything is square, it will make cutting your platform round much easier. Wittness marks will ensure, in the event that you ever have to move it, that it will go back together again. I am so glad I marked a center line on my floor joists!