Insulation

[bss]

In addition to

heating

the yurt, a properly installed woodstove also exchanges fresh air in the living space. It does this in the form of intake draw. As a rough rule of thumb, a woodstove will draw same CFM as the temperature it burns at. The cooler your fire, that much less air is being circulated in the room.

A 20' yurt has a volume of around 2000 cubic feet. With a 500 degree fire burning, the air being pulled through that stove to fuel your fire is also exchanging 25% of the volume of air in your yurt per minute. That is a very good ratio. Where does this air come from? Provided your yurt is reasonably airtight ( weatherstrip, door sweeps, insulated draperies, drip skirt/ outer cover interface sealed, no errant holes in floor, etc) it comes in through the

dome

opening! With no fire, much

moisture

is being created but zero air exchange is happening.

Wait, aren't all of the components of a yurt are designed to work together in some sort of big round shangri-la or something like that? That's the way the brochure makes it sound. I think there is much info out there now about how to buy yurts now, and a plethora of options for every budget, and this is a good thing. Unfortunately not much info around about how to actually live in a yurt. Yet.

Do you have an insulated roof? Meaning some sort of reflectix (the material

pacific yurts

uses in their

insulation

packs). Not the rigid board, but an actual insulating layer between the roof skin and the rafters? How about the walls?

[Gypsykat23]

Hi I am new Im jason and I live in a 30 pacific yurt in southern Oregon. This is our second year in our yurt and after last winter with the bubble wrap

insulation

decided to up the game for this winter. Well after looking at the budget and searching online we decided go do our ceiling with standard fiberglass insulation. We then skinned it with thin plywood called luan. It looking amazing and works great BUT! A few day ago and a week into cold weather my wife informed me that the roof was dripping. Well I investigated and soon realized that there was a

moisture

problem in between the outer layer and the fiberglass. Argh!!! I thought I was almost done. Well now we are not able to take it down because it is cooooold. So we decided to just live with it for now and hope it doesn't mold. We decided to live in a yurt to make life simple. I feel I have been battling for two years making this thing work. weather its to hot or to cold it seems to me that as much as we would like to think that these tens are livable full time. The materials say different. I am actually considering framing in my whole yurt and making it an actual hard structure with a real roof this spring. Any one ever have this problem and how long did it take for mold to grow?

[Jafo]

I don't think it is likely a wood stove would draw from the

dome

. The yurts I have been in are far from airtight. There are plenty of places to pull air in.

The moisture is an issue because you have warm, moist air touching the cold roofing material/insulation. The air must be vented. This isn't exclusive to yurts. Look at any standard home and you will see the attics breath through the soffit, and usually some sort of vent pipe. Years ago when I used to work with a handyman as a helper, we would get jobs where the home owner had a damp attic and mold issues. Almost every time it was because the insulators had put insulation blocking the soffit. Once we cut it back, the problems ceased.

How do we vent the yurts without freezing our butts off? That is the question. I think the only real practical way to do it without making a lot of modifications, is to always keep the dome open. I am open to any other suggestions?

[bss]

It comes though the path of least resistance. if the dome is open, the room fills comes from there. If not, the stove has to work harder (less efficient) to pull the air from all of the little drafty places instead. Meanwile, there is no fresh air exchange happening in the upper half of your yurt because it's all sealed up. Pretty safe to assume there isn't much air leaking in through the roof. But now the inside of the roof cover gets wet because there is no cool air moving thru the dome, across and down the ceiling as there should be whenever moisture is being created inside the yurt.

The dome has to be open. That is why it exists. The fact that it also acts as a skylight is only because it happens to be made from clear material. Your living space needs air exchange. When the doors or windows are closed up and moisture is being created your air exchange is not sufficient. Open the dome. Let it breathe. You will stay warm and dry, I promise.

[Jafo]

The thing is, I don't think the dome would be the least resistance because the warm air is naturally going up, and warm air seeks cold air. With the dome open, the hot air rises out, pulling the cold air in from below. This is one reason why a yurt cools well in the summer.

Now if the entire yurt was air tight, sure, I suppose it would have to pull from the dome, but I would think it would be the last place.

[stephanwik]

Originally Posted by Jafo

Now if the entire yurt was air tight, sure, I suppose it would have to pull from the dome, but I would think it would be the last place.

We usually put an adjustable vent through the floor just behind the wood stove to solve this problem. It works well.

[lindaroth]

hi everyone, I live in Connecticut. am planning on putting up a yurt. need to decide which company to go with. want to use it over winters there, as well as summers. am willing to put in wood stove. can anyone recommend which company to go with? there are so many and they all look good.
thanks
linda roth

[homesweetyurt]

Despite our current condensation issues, we are now in our second Pacific Yurt and still love them.

[Jafo]

Originally Posted by lindaroth

can anyone recommend which company to go with? there are so many and they all look good.
thanks
linda roth

Can you tell us how you plan on using your yurt? Will this be a full time home? How many people will be living in it if so?

[TORV]

These insulation tips are great, here are some wood burning tips...these guys are wood stove experts and the owner john as been involved in several yurt projects

Energy Plus - Burning Tips