HawaiiYurts
Industry Specialist, Yurts of Hawaii
What a nice, thorough, honest, and helpful review! Salute!
Anyone purchase a Smiling Woods Yurt?
- Thread starter Barb
- Start date
Yurt Gurl.
Great info. I posted about my Smiley Yurt in the message above yours, and would say your experiences were similar to mine. I had a neighbor who had a nice crane that we used to hold the ring up at the top, and hired an engineer to review the installation of the tension cable...
We went for the pine tongue and groove ceiling and are in Arizona. We had shrinkage so there are alot of gaps between the panels. That is my biggest complaint. It would have been better to set the panels somewhere to acclimate before installing, but this is new construction so there was no place to do so. We also spray faom insulated everything which while costly, really does work nicely.
Sounds like similar experiences - and I think if you are willing to do the work, smiley is a good option.
Great info. I posted about my Smiley Yurt in the message above yours, and would say your experiences were similar to mine. I had a neighbor who had a nice crane that we used to hold the ring up at the top, and hired an engineer to review the installation of the tension cable...
We went for the pine tongue and groove ceiling and are in Arizona. We had shrinkage so there are alot of gaps between the panels. That is my biggest complaint. It would have been better to set the panels somewhere to acclimate before installing, but this is new construction so there was no place to do so. We also spray faom insulated everything which while costly, really does work nicely.
Sounds like similar experiences - and I think if you are willing to do the work, smiley is a good option.
Thanks HawaiiYurts and 1daveman! And yes, I agree. It's so much work, but worth it in the end
Yeah, I think they could come up with a better ceiling option, I'm just not sure what it would be. I had the panels inside for a while and also polyed them all before install and they are still popping and warping.
Just curious...have you had any condensation issues from the skylight? I know Arizona is a dry climate...But just curious?
Yeah, I think they could come up with a better ceiling option, I'm just not sure what it would be. I had the panels inside for a while and also polyed them all before install and they are still popping and warping.
Just curious...have you had any condensation issues from the skylight? I know Arizona is a dry climate...But just curious?
I just wanted to post a follow-up for anyone out there having problems with condensation in a Smiling Woods yurt around the frame of the skylight. I tried a couple different things. Fan does nothing. Window plastic just created more of a humid wet zone in there. So I thought about stuffing fiberglass insulation around the ring. So far, it seems to have worked. But, it's only December and hasn't gotten extremely cold yet. But, I purchased an 18 ft step ladder (insanely expensive) and shoved a bunch of insulation up around the skylight frame. I can't open the window at the moment. But that's fine, because it's winter. Aside from that, no other problem. And in the spring, I'll just remove the insulation. I will try to add pictures if this helps anyone.
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Bob Rowlands
New member
Thanks for update.
Fiberglass holds a lot of water. And can be a pocket fulla nasty when in a confined area. Like under an old school house trailer with plumbing leaks. I worked under some of those decades ago. YUKKK!!!! lol
Fiberglass holds a lot of water. And can be a pocket fulla nasty when in a confined area. Like under an old school house trailer with plumbing leaks. I worked under some of those decades ago. YUKKK!!!! lol
Scratch the fiberglass insulation...totally didn't work. Just soaked up all the condensation and I had to remove a bunch of wet insulation
Can you show us a pic of your entire yurt?
Sure can Here is my yurt!
Also, I tried another method of dealing with the skylight condensation. We cut two half circles of plexi and set them on top of the ledge of the compression ring with a piece of wood in the middle to hold up the plexi....then lots of tape all around to block off any warm air from getting to the skylight. Also, in between the skylight and the plexi I put a bunch of towels to catch any drips along the ledge. It seems to be working, the towels are catching drips especially when the sun hits the metal and there have been a few drips on the plexi, but it's all contained!
So far it seems to be working, I think I'll change the towels once a month during the winter.
Saga continues!
Here is my yurt!Also, I tried another method of dealing with the skylight condensation. We cut two half circles of plexi and set them on top of the ledge of the compression ring with a piece of wood in the middle to hold up the plexi....then lots of tape all around to block off any warm air from getting to the skylight. Also, in between the skylight and the plexi I put a bunch of towels to catch any drips along the ledge. It seems to be working, the towels are catching drips especially when the sun hits the metal and there have been a few drips on the plexi, but it's all contained!
So far it seems to be working, I think I'll change the towels once a month during the winter.
Saga continues!
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Although it is not the most elegant technical solution, you reached the urgent main goal with.
haha true.
If anyone has any other suggestions, I'm all ears.
The humidity inside is around 43%. I have the woodstove going. The temperature inside is between 60-70 F and this winter the temperature outside is sometimes -10 F at night to 20-30 F during the day. I live in a humid climate, lots of ice and snow and rain. And the skylight frame is metal.
If anyone has any other suggestions, I'm all ears.
The humidity inside is around 43%. I have the woodstove going. The temperature inside is between 60-70 F and this winter the temperature outside is sometimes -10 F at night to 20-30 F during the day. I live in a humid climate, lots of ice and snow and rain. And the skylight frame is metal.
Hello all,
Since this is the most current post i thought i would give it a try to activate it again. I am almost done building a smiling woods yurt ponderosa. Is anyone still active here? I have some questions but also have some answers if any of you guys are wondering. happy to share what i learned along the jouney.
happy yurting
Since this is the most current post i thought i would give it a try to activate it again. I am almost done building a smiling woods yurt ponderosa. Is anyone still active here? I have some questions but also have some answers if any of you guys are wondering. happy to share what i learned along the jouney.
happy yurting
Hello yurtgurl,
I wanted to ask if anyone had issues with the roof rafters contracting and expanding? I realized that there is about an 1/8" to 1/2" gap between the compression ring and the the rafters. This happened after having a heavy snow load on the roof. It was quite a stress test. From -25C with lots of snow on the roof to +2C, rain on the snow and than sudden shedding. Did anyone ever re tighten the cables or had some issues with them stretching? I already added an extra cable due to heavy snow load in our area. I guess overall I would like to snow how the structure settled over the first year or so.
Thanks
I wanted to ask if anyone had issues with the roof rafters contracting and expanding? I realized that there is about an 1/8" to 1/2" gap between the compression ring and the the rafters. This happened after having a heavy snow load on the roof. It was quite a stress test. From -25C with lots of snow on the roof to +2C, rain on the snow and than sudden shedding. Did anyone ever re tighten the cables or had some issues with them stretching? I already added an extra cable due to heavy snow load in our area. I guess overall I would like to snow how the structure settled over the first year or so.
Thanks
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Canada, I think the pictures look totally normal to me! I do have some tiny gaps here and there from the compression ring to the rafters. But from your pic, I don't see any difference from mine. I've been through three winters with a variety of snow loads and also negative temperatures. To the summer where it's 90 degrees and really high humidity. I've never had to add anymore cables. The yurt seems very solid. The only movement I've noticed is the birch ceiling panels popping out and moving a lot. I see yours look really tight and nice. Mine are kind of all over the place now lol. When the sun hits the roof, I hear a lot of pops and bangs of the metal roof expanding and contracting. Sometimes really loud! That took some getting used to. But I've definitely had a couple feet of snow up there and it handles it no problem. Mostly slides off within a day or so. If you want, I can send you a pic of my rafters...
Thanks for your response. I have to agree with the movement of the panels. I had some move on me which creates tension on the brad nails which fasten them. Some of them broke and three of my panels opened to the side torears the rafters. Should be an easy fix. Regarding condensation I only had issues one time when it was -25C outside. But my skylight is currently not connected to the opener mechanism since I apparently mounted it to low. Last fall when I had the skylight closed with tension water came in. I am a bit disappointed in the quality of the skylight. I used some silicone on the outside to fix it. Back to condensation. I had some ice build up when it was cold and when it melted it was dripping from the compression ring on the rafter side. Where the gaps are besides that I never had issues with condensation but my guess is it is due to not being really air tight up there and allowing for enough venting because of that. Have you siliconed or glued the gasket between the compression ring and metal ring? Anyways I will get up there in the summer to try to get things more tight and reinstall the opener.
besides that I never had issues with condensation but my guess is it is due to not being really air tight up there and allowing for enough venting because of that. Have you siliconed or glued the gasket between the compression ring and metal ring? Anyways I will get up there in the summer to try to get things more tight and reinstall the opener.That's interesting about the fact that you don't have the opening mechanism connected! Because that is currently where most of my condensation is coming from...very interesting. No, I haven't caulked anything. They told me to caulk the edge of the metal bracket that the skylight sits on top of. And I'll do that in the summer when it's all warm and dry up there. It's been quite the saga figuring it all out. I also get frost and ice build up in the coldest times.
Anyway, I'll try to get some pics of my compression ring/rafters connection in the next couple days and post them.
Anyway, I'll try to get some pics of my compression ring/rafters connection in the next couple days and post them.
Regarding the opener. It seems to be not well thought out. This is where water leaked once in the fall. Also when I had my blower door test the guy mentioned that around the opener is where he could see cold spots with his thermal camera. Did your gaskets between the two glasses of the skylight move torwards the Center? Mine tightened and moved. Don’t ask me why. Like mentioned before. Not super impressed with the skylight quality.
Bob Rowlands
New member
I'd tighten up the cable.