The End of the World

[Tree Bones]

Dan R-M,
Sorry for your hardship. Don't let one bad experience stop you from moving onward and upward. Yurts are great. Overall I think they do very well in the wind. Lessons learned will help you and others to improve on old designs and the new ones to come.

Originally Posted by Marshall Eppley

The one thing i took note of is the wall slats look a bit small and i would think there would be alot more of them.

I agree with the under size lattice and that there should be more of them. I use 160 - 3/4" X 1-1/2" X 6' on a 20' yurt wall.

We had a severe wind storm December of 2011 with winds of 100 mph. This happened while I was out of town and not able to tend to my yurts or see first hand exactly how they reacted to this kind of wind. It blew down a lot of trees and my yurt stood up to the torture. However I did learn a few things.

It is critically important to have solid connections at the rafter to the the hub and rafter to walls. The top and side canvas must also be securely fastened. The wind pressure causes the canvas to inflate and deflate rapidly as I have learned during lesser wind storms.

Now if a tree like the ones shown in the photo below came down on top of you then all bets are off.


Quote from our local paper
"Strong wind gusts of up to 100 mph that whipped through the Sierra on Thursday, December 1st left a swath of damage in their wake. Three separate fires burned about 250 acres before being contained December 2nd – downed trees, power outages and serious damage to numerous homes were a result of the intense wind gusts.

Much of the damage was concentrated in the small foothill community of Twain Harte, CA where homes are built around Pines, Cedars and Oak Trees. The trees are continuously trimmed and unhealthy trees are quickly removed, the unusually strong wind gusts uprooted healthy trees causing them to fall on structures around them."

[Dan R-M]

Thanks for the specs you note! There are a few things I know I'd do on a new one - bevel the

center ring

to butt directly against the rafter ends, and use some kind of bracket to mate the rafter end into (instead of the simpson that I doubt was designed to be used that way).
And thanks for the encouragement! The replacement yurt is on the backburner for now, with home repair ahead of it. I will post the great platform-cover I've put on in the meantime, though...

[Jafo]

Dan, how goes it? Have you continued on your yurt adventure?

[Dan R-M]

Only in my dreams, right now, unfortunately. The yurt was going to be the fastest way to get over to our garden site to live in a seasonal way until we got the run-down house fixed back up again.
We're switching the priorities of the two now, however, so it'll be a bit yet before we pick the yurt again. It looks like the forum is picking up major steam!

[Jafo]

Completely understandable. Well good luck with the house! Hopefully that is a better experience.

[Marshall Eppley]

Dan I wish we were closer I would be more than happy to help with your yurt. Im sorta old fashion where you help your neighbor every chance you get and he does the same for you. for instance my neighbors built my cabin while I was putting plumbing in another neighbors cabin.

[bss]

Wait, did I read that right?

The rafters were affixed to the roof ring with simpson brackets?

[Dan R-M]

And screws, yes. Thoughts, bss?
I think, myself, that they alone were not the reason for failure. In fact, they held the rafters to the

center ring

throughout - even as I was trying to push the whole thing over. It looked like something out of War of the Worlds. Maybe a female alien, with a lovely head of vinyl hair. This deserves a photo...

BUT, I think it goes without saying that there are better ways to join rafters to rings.

[Jafo]

Wow.. Amazing... I hope your next adventure yields a better yurt.

[Marshall Eppley]

Wow what a mess I set up one of my yurts one winter with no wall covering at all just for the heck of it and to see if I could come up with a way to make it stay put. I had the cover blow off once. had trusses raise off the wall, but never had any collapse what so ever. what I did was thread ropes down through the walls to an anchor in the ground in equal parts of the wall. And put a rope around the top through the trusses to keep them from pulling out of the roof ring. this also keeps the roof from inverting due to weight. My little test taught me a lot about ways of doing things. just my two cents worth.