Hello H13'ers, just making an addendum to the subject title here. So we relatively successfully built and broke down an H13 at BM and got back home Sunday. Alas, the winds were *so* mild there this year (along with temperatures), that I would say this was *not* a fair year in which to truly wind-test the H13. So imo the jury is still out on that, unless someone ends up testing the H13 in a high-wind situation elsewhere. We took a risk and only used tape-downs to pvc piping, then tied those with rope down to rebar. We did not make a rope halo, so perhaps we got lucky.
(@Julie Danger it was SO nice to meet you at the hexayurt happy hour, you're even more beautiful in person! Jake and Mars the H13'ers from Seattle, sorry I missed your wine-tasting, I was exhausted and fell asleep back at my yurt and didn't wake up till 9pm). We built a 2-section roof, as we did with the base. However we must have done something wrong during the tape-hinging, as we couldn't get the 3rd panel from one of the base sections to fold over onto the other 2, so we just cut the tape in order to stack them all tightly and wrap them in a tarp because at 10pm in the dark and exhausted, we still had to tarp-wrap them, sandwich between two 4x8 plywood boards, then tie everything down properly to the roof rack. Tip: If you have/can rent a big enough vehicle/trailer so as to not have to make the tarp/plywood sandwich and then figure out all the knots so as to tie that mf down (and down TIGHT), I would highly recommend that, as it's a lot of work otherwise, and if you're not that great at knots and rope, you could knock off an easy 2 hours of set-up, and another 2 at break-down. From all that pulling rope knots tightly, if you're not used to that sort of thing (and you aren't in your early/mid 20's anymore like me), you will be sore the next day, I can guarantee that. The H13 was a great refuge against (the mild) wind, dust and sun, as well as the cold at night. In fact it was really warm at night, too warm the first few nights. It also got warm during the day too, warmer than I'd expected. I was told that because of the accumulated heat in the ground (prior to placing the yurt there), the heat has to slowly rise out of the ground, thus additionally warming the yurt the first few days until the ground reaches a cool temperature again, and that heat will rise into the yurt obviously. It seemed to make sense as by the 3rd or 4th night, I finally started to need to use my sleeping bag, though it was still too much to be inside of it. I simply laid it over me like a blanket and that was suffiicient warmth for me. There were 2 other people that shared the yurt with me just fyi. By the 2nd day we realized that a window was definitely going to be necessary. The tape hinges let in enough light to see during the day, but the window's more important purpose was to allow for cross-breeze or flow through the yurt. Luckily I'd brought 2 furnace microfilters with us. We simply cut out a hole the shape of one, then taped it in with the foil tape on both sides. It seemed to be a high quality filter since it allowed breeze to flow through, but very little dust. The dust will start to clog the filter eventually so you can either blow, brush or sweep the dust away from the window/filter from the outside. Opening the door will let the cross-breeze flow through nicely. Up till then, the wind would blow the door back and forth, almost shut at times. But once the window was installed, the door would blow around a bit but would mostly stay wide open. Thus, with only one window, you really need to have your door open for cross-breeze. Installing a 2nd window would allow you to have cross-breeze while also keeping your door closed. Not as much cross-breeze as having the door open, but some nonetheless. We never installed a 2nd window though, as it was a hassle dealing with moop from cutting out the window in the polyiso foam panel, so I left it with just 1 window. In that heat though, I would recommend you install 2 windows, and install them at home where it's easy to deal with moop. Though one interesting adaptation I did see at BM this year was that some yurts had some of those heat vent stacks installed into the ceiling, one even had one of those spinning heat turbine things on theirs, which makes lots of sense actually. That could avoid the need for a 2nd window. Structurally, it could be argued that windows to a certain degree, do weaken the panel's and therefore yurt's structural integrity. Then again so could a vent stack, but a vent stack is a much smaller hole than a window would be for a furnace panel, though the furnace panel would be installed in a side panel, not a roof panel. And a hole in a roof panel would have to be taped well in case it rains. As for our door and structural integrity, we did not do a tall door as unlike ^Lorin^, the 3 of us are somewhat vertically challenged (short), so we didn't need a tall door, but we wanted the extra room overhead all the way around inside the yurt, and the extra headspace means extra cooling space for heat to rise. Security was minimal, as all we did was poke a round hole through the door, threaded a piece of rope through it and tied a knot on either side, that became the door handle. Like many of you, we simply trusted nothing would get stolen (and nothing was stolen I'm happy to say). And it was tape-hinged along one side vertically so as to swing open and closed just like a regular door, i.e. we did not do the "cat-flap" style door. So if you don't mind keeping the door to under 4', then you don't completely cut through one of the base panels, nor do you cut into the 2nd panel above the base panel in order to achieve the "tall" door, thus retaining a greater degree of its original structural integrity. As for the floor, we taped a 16' x 20' tarp to the outside of the yurt. So kind of cupcake-style, but my friend used the nice *expensive* bifilament tape instead of nice cheap gorilla tape. Oh well, water under the bridge. The one mistake we made with taping the tarp floor up was we taped over where the window eventually needed to go. So I had to cut, pull and "throw away" (i.e. carry back home with me) perfectly good tape, expensive tape, which also pulled away the foil wrap from the panel, and that sucked. So I had to use foil tape where the panel foil had ripped away, then re-taped the tarp onto that outer wall but obviously below the new window. So again, this speaks to doing the window at home beforehand, and maybe roughly plan out how you're going to lay your tarp out at home before getting to the playa and trying to find the best position amid the heat, dust and wind (and hopefully not at nighttime). Things I would change: I can't really speak to the rope halo/tie-down dilemma because the wind didn't cooperate (though I'm not complaining). I would install at least 1 window at home and not on the playa, maybe even 2, and definitely before taping the tarp floor up. I might try out that heat turbine vent thing next time. I hate tying down that huge sandwich on top of my car. It also makes for really shitty mileage because of that 14 inch high 4'x8' brick you have strapped to your roof, completely ruining all aerodynamics. I normally get around 24 mpg in my volvo wagon, instead I got about 18-19 mpg. Granted the car was also fully loaded on the inside as well as carrying one other passenger (3rd yurt member arrived and departed separately), regardless though it was a buttload of gas. Honestly though I can't say which contributed more to the decrease in mpg, either the weight on the inside, or the oversized brick on the roof, since the yurt doesn't really weigh much at all. But at 65-70 mph, it's hard to know how much extra gas the tarped foam brick plywood sandwich on the roof is consuming wind-resistance-wise. Oh, and don't share your yurt with someone you don't really know that well. And absolutely make a basic ground rule - SHOES OFF BEFORE ENTERING THE YURT, no matter how short a time period you're coming inside for. Make sign and stick it outside if you have to. Because some people, even smart, educated, intelligent people, can be really fucking clueless sometimes. Thank you to all here for your sharing, tips, concerns etc. They were all of great value. @Julie Danger, I have video and pics. How do I send them to you ? By the way I forgot to sign the board at the hexayurt happy hour :-( -Alejandro -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "hexayurt" group. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msg/hexayurt/-/pR3CQYtI6uYJ. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/hexayurt?hl=en.
