Spring Cleaning – Hexahome: How to Repair Every Part of a Yurt

Spring has (sort of) sprung here at Smoky Mountain Center!

The snow has melted, the birds are singing, and the buds are sprouting. After a long winter the Smoky Mountain Center’s facilities are undergoing a bit of spring cleaning to get ready for the Summer 2015 Residential Corps Program. Practically every square foot of our 11 acre homestead is being spruced up, scrubbed down, and polished. It is a huge undertaking, but a stroke of good weather has allowed us to get an early start on a ton of exciting projects.

First, as a work of curiosity as much as necessity, we took a crack at giving one of our yurts a little bit of love.

We call this yurt by a lot of names (the other yurt, the Septa-Yome, the corps member’s cabin, etc.), but from now on we’ll call it the Hexahome. The alliteration is great and it rolls of the tongue nicely. Unfortunately, upon closer inspection it was well in need of some freshening up!

A little information on our Yurt.

• The hexahome is the smaller of our two yurts. Here is an image of the other.
• They are made by a local Asheville company called Red Sky Shelters.
• The yurt design has been used for over 3000 years, originating from the steppes of Mongolia.
• This particular model is called a SeptaYome (Septa = Seven Sides, Yome = Yurt Home).
• Here is a schematic of the exact design.
• They are (when properly upkept) totally waterproof and insulated, making them excellent semi-permanent cabin-esque dwellings.
• The hexahome has electricity and even Wifi!

  

At first, we believed the hexahome only needed a deep clean and a few minor repairs. That is, until we peeled back the interior roof canvas (bottom layer) as well as the insulated space-blanket roofing material (middle layer) and noticed the poly-carbonate exterior roofing material (outer layer) had a massive 8 foot long tear down the length of it.

A simple patch was not going to hold a tear this big. Drastic measures needed to be taken.

Roof Patching Steps:

1. Remove the interior roof canvas and insulating strips to expose the polycarbonate roof.
2. Unfasten the exterior roofing material from the yurt structure.
3. Peel the roofing material to the crest and reach over to unscrew the vent-dome from wooden circle.
4. Remove the roofing material and spread it out on the ground for easy access.
5. Clean and dry material adjacent to the tear with damp, soapy rag.
6. Tape ripped edges together using large amounts of Waterproofing Repair Tape.
7. Cut polycarbonate strip (acquired from Red Sky Shelters) to custom size to completely cover tear in roofing material- approximately 8′ by 1′.
8. Sew patch onto the out-facing side with sinew and a heavy-duty curved needle.
9. Repeat steps 1-4 in reverse order.

Another issue we ran into was how to clean the exterior canvas sidewalls which were in decent shape, but extremely dirty. Since it is located at the top of a small valley, the hexahome takes quite a beating from the elements. On the sides which received the most light (south-facing) the canvas was very dusty and some lichen had grown in some spots. On the sides which received the least direct sunlight (north-facing) the canvas was muddy and had algae growing on certain portions. We had to develop our own method for giving the canvas a deep clean without removing the material from the structure (it is fastened with at least 100 screws).

Cleaning Yurt Canvas:

1. Scrape off lichen and excess dirt with a soft-bristle cleaning brush.
2. Wet the canvas with a hose (we used a backpack garden sprayer) and scrub down with the brush to remove as much of the grim as possible. This is tedious and can be strenuous depending on the amount of dirt. It may seem like you are simply spreading the dirt around and making the stain worse- this is okay, there is a method for removing it.
3. Wet the canvas down again without scrubbing until the water runs clear.
4. Mix up a gallon of Mold and Mildew Stain Remover for canvas. Red Sky Shelters also makes a brand of this stuff called “Fab-Clean”

   

5. Scrub down the canvas with the mixture and allow it to sit overnight. Be sure to cover every inch of the canvas with a little of the mixture; it literally “eats” away the stains at a microbiotic level.
6. The next day, scrub down the canvas once again with water mixed with a little vinegar.
7. Let it sit for about 15 minutes, then spray with plain water until it runs clear.
8. Allow the canvas to dry. You will be amazed how much cleaner it is!

Lastly, once the majority of our cleaning and repairs were complete, it was time to install a floor into the hexahome. Yurts are built on custom foundations that resemble decks. The foundation is equipped with a vapor barrier which helps with insulation. Flooring can be any variety found in a home.

For the hexahome, we were going for economical comfort, therefore, we settled on carpet flooring. The cheapest carpet you can buy in stores is about $0.41 a square foot. After debating in a Home Depot for the better part of an hour, we decided to forgo the store-bought carpet and look for “carpet scraps”. Carpet scraps are the ends of the long rolls they sell in stores or other custom pieces that are marked down from original retail price and are excellent for Do-It-Yourselfers. We checked craigslist for a few days and found the perfect piece, a 16’x12′ roll of high-quality carpet. The Hexahome is 16′ at its widest point and approximately 200′ square total. This roll was 192′ square and the exact length of the Hexahome’s widest point (16′), making it nearly perfect for the job.

However, I soon learned installing a rectangular carpet into a 7-sided room was not the most straight-forward task, especially when your material is very, very limited (in fact, 8′ square less than needed).

Installing Carpet Flooring (and landing) in a Yurt:

1. Remove everything from the yurt.
2. Clean the floor extensively, all dirt left on the floor will remain there forever.
3. Cut carpet pad to size with a utility knife and fasten the underside to the floor along edges with a small amount of doubled-sided carpet tape.
4. Align the long side of the carpet parallel to the door, leaving the space closest to the door without carpet to allow for a landing.
5. Bring the carpet into the yurt and lay it on the floor as it will rest. Using a pencil, draw an approximate line of the cuts adding 2-3 inches to be safe.
6. Cut the excess flaps of carpet to align with the shape of the floor.
7. The carpet should be a few inches too large all the way around. Carefully trim the excess until the carpet fits perfectly.
8. Take the largest sections of trimmed carpet and cut them to fit into the corners by the door, allowing for as much of a landing as desired.
9. Put double-sided carpet tape along the edges of the topside of the carpet pad.
10. Place the carpet onto the tape making sure the carpet aligns with walls correctly and walk on the edges so the tape adheres to the underside of the carpet.
11. If desired, nail along the perimeter every 2-4 feet about two inches from the end of the carpet.
12. To install vinyl flooring as a landing, remove carpet pad in that area.
13. Cut particle board or plywood to fit beneath vinyl flooring. This creates a smooth surface for the flooring to adhere to and minimizes the level between the landing and the carpet.
14. Cut vinyl planks to size to fit into landing shape.
15. Install planks in the method described by the manufacturer. Some planks use adhesive, others are inter-locking

Now our restoration in complete!

The hexahome is ready for the season. Are you?