Yurt Flooring

[The Redekers]

Hello friends,

we will be building a 40 ft Shelter Design Yurt this year. It comes with a SIP Floor and my question is to do with the interior finished floor, most likely hardwood. Given the weather in Eastern British Columbia, it makes more sense to install after the yurt is erected but it would probably look better if it was under the lattice walls. Any advice?

The Redekers

[Jafo]

Installing it first is of course the easiest way to do it, though you have to protect the floor when you put up the yurt. Here are some other suggestions:

http://www.yurtforum.com/forums/buil...9.html#post747

[Bob Rowlands]

A fast flooring guys dream job is wide open spaces, no walls no nuthin to deal with. Snap a line, rack it out with a slight overhang at the perimeter and get to power nailing. Use your tape hooked to a nail driven in the focus and pencil the perimeter circle. Cut with skilsaw. Burn the drops. It will go LIGHTNING fast.

Think about it. No fiddly fart arounding cutting the last piece in any row to a constantly changing angle, and then recutting the same dang drop to yet ANOTHER angle to start the next course. Not to mention swinging the hammer with the khana wall in the way, which it will mostly assured be be. JMO Good luck.

[Bob Rowlands]

Oh yeah, forgot to say, buy a roll of heavy duty plastic sheeting from depot or lowes. The stuff comes in 100' rolls. Probably $20 a roll. Cover your work with the sheeting for the night. Lay scraps over the sheeting around the perimeter and tack to the flooring or subfloor. That'll hold it down good in wind. Good luck.

[Shelter Designs]

The best way to lay a floor really depends on what type of flooring you are planning on laying down over the SIPS platform. As pointed out in the link Jeff put up, installing a perimeter of 1x6 or 1x8 around the edge of the SIPS floor and cutting the outside edge flush to match the arc of the circle of the SIPS subfloor is a nice way to go. This gives a solid base for the yurt frame (lattice, snow legs, and window and door frames) to sit on. You then have the yurt up and can install your flooring in a protected environment from the elements. This is really ideal if you plan on putting in a floating (non nailed) laminate. If you are going to put in a real wood nailed down floor, swinging the hammer to set the nails around the perimeter as Bob pointed out, may be difficult with this method.

Protecting the flooring is a must. Even with plastic sheeting covering the work we have had customers sustain major damage to their nice flooring and lose a substantial investment due to water damage. You also run the risk of damaging the floor during the installation of the yurt. It is a bit of work to cut the end of every piece of flooring to match the angle of the 1x perimeter, but in our experience it is the best way to protect the floor and insure no damage will be sustained. This is very true for the Redeckers in your very wet BC climate!

We have excellent pictures of many methods of installing flooring and are happy to give advice. Please feel free to contact us at (406)721-YURT or [email protected]