I'm enjoying reading everyone's tales from the playa. Maybe next year I will seek out more of you and get some tours :)
I built an 8' hexayurt from Tuff-R insulation boards. It was fantastic. ==Overview== * This yurt was for sharing. My camp had about 20 people, and my hexayurt vision was that we'd all sleep in our tents till the sun kicked us out, then all stumble into the yurt for a few more hours. * Verdict? Hexayurts are BADASS. There was always someone napping or chilling in the yurt. And even though our shade structure improvements let me stay in my tent later this year, the extra sleep from the hexayurt was crucial. Especially when I didn't get back to camp for the "night" until 11am. * A few pictures here: <http://picasaweb.google.com/sweetser/Hexayurt#> ==Construction== * Made a foldable hexayurt that shipped in 3 sections-- wall panels plus two roof halves. This minimized packing size and taping on the playa. * Used the 6" bifilament tape for connecting and anchoring, but used 3" strapping tape from Staples to seam the edges. This was a significant cost savings, and it adhered just fine. * Playa setup was a breeze. Walls unfolded instantly. The two roof halves were set up next to each other, then the entire seam was taped, with the help of one person on the inside, and a broom to run along the seam on the outside. * Took the time to bevel all the edges. Very worth it. * Used 11 anchors, and it was solid as a rock. Of these, 6 were connected to tape seams that went all the way up-and-over. The remaining 5 were midpoint anchors, and these were only taped about 3' up the panels. They held very well, though, no peeling. * Cut 3 11"x30" windows, covered with furnace filters. With all these open, there was plenty of breeze, and dust was not bad. A roof vent would have been nice, something more protected to keep open during windier times. The large windows also let in plenty of light, which was nice. * Did not tape the groundcloth at all. Surprisingly, not much of a problem. Cloth was 1-2' wider than the yurt all around, and yurt was anchored with ratchets, which clamped it down pretty well. This was not a dust *free* yurt, but very dust minimal. The biggest source of dust was foot traffic, anyway (again, not bedroom, but living room). ==Innovation== (such as it is :) I had about 1200 sq. ft. of white sheer fabric I wanted to cover the inside roof. How to hang this? With more tape, of course! I made 12 tape hangers along the top edges of the wall panels, and one big hanger at the roof center. I basically made a pipe pocket (just as you'd do for your tape anchor if you weren't using PVC), then before the roof went on, I taped it up-over-and-down the inside of the wall, so the pocket part was just inside. When the roof was attached, this sandwiched the tape hanger between wall and roof, plus the outside of the hanger was also taped into the long strapping tape which held the yurt together. The roof hangers were similar, taped from the outside before the two roof halves were joined. Sorry to not have a picture of this, hope it makes some sense. These hangers were really sturdy. I used them to hang fabric and a lantern, but think of the endless things you could hang in your yurt :) ==Tear Down== * How do the rest of you cut that first roof seam apart? Maybe you just have a longer knife than we do, and you can get it from the inside? We just taped our knife to the broomstick, which worked well, it was kinda fun. * The roof halves were cut apart at the wrong seam, so it shipped home in 4 pieces instead of 2. No biggie. * Everything else folded right back up, ratcheted back between 2 sheets of plywood, and tossed on the Boston-bound shipping container. All in all, fantastic experience and results. The truck with all my gear gets back this Saturday, and Saturday night the hexayurt is getting reassembled in my yard. I'm not done showing it off yet :) -Tori On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 12:28 PM, Craig Clayton <[email protected]> wrote: > For those that went to Burning Man, how did everyone's yurt hold up? Any > suggestions about what went really well or not so well? > > For my part I built a 6' stretch hexayurt with no windows or vents (didn't > get around to creating them) but with a swamp cooler and I must say it was > quite cool in there with that swamp cooler on, although I suspect a fan > might have been just as good. With a queen size air mattress it was a bit > crowded with our boxes so if we use it next year we'll have to figure out a > better organizational system...maybe vertical shelves/drawers. > > We put 12 tape anchors on it and it barely moved at all during the week but > I think we could have gotten away with just 8 - putting tape anchors 2' > apart on the short walls seems overkill. We used long pointed stakes > instead of rebar and it was much easier to put in a take out of the playa. > After a week the tape was starting to detach but wasn't a problem. We > bought 3 rolls of tape and still had .75 of a roll left after taping the > seams and putting together. > > All in all a great experience! Lots of people asked about it - good > conversation piece. > > --Craig > > > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "hexayurt" group. 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 -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
