What I have noted in constructing yurt walls is that when the assembled wall is erected, placed in a circle and attached to the door frame, an extremely interesting event occurs: individual wall rods behave like an archer's bow, especially if straight rods are used rather then steam bent rods. Imagine a straight piece of wood bent around and imaginary cylinder, and now imagine the straight piece of wood at a diagonal being bent around a cylinder like a yurt wall rod and you will get that each piece of wood is being bent like an archer's bow. The wood attempts to straighten under tension and gives strength to the wall. How this all interacts with the vector forces of the roof resting on the wall heads, I've not worked out yet. Maybe someone is or knows a physicist or engineer who might contribute to understanding this interaction. Please feel free to comment or find a friend who can comment on this curious fact about yurts, especially those Mongolian yurts built with straight wall rods.Bruce Sargent
ForLoveofYurts.com
I am beginning to get it. The roof weight compresses a wall rod at an angle given by the rod meeting the roof. The sprung rods resist the roof weight like drawn bows as well as with the upright compressional vector between the ground and the roof.
ReplyDelete