The entire process of building your yurt, from cutting the wood in the forest to moving into your finished ger will require about 80–120 hours of work. The logical way to proceed is to start with the walls, this being the most time consuming job, followed by the door frame, the crown, roof, and finally the cover.
This book tells you how to make a ger with a diameter of ten feet (3m), walls four feet (1.2m) high and a roof six and a half feet (2m) high at the crown. If you wish to make a yurt of a different size simply alter the size and number of components (see table on page 7). If the ger is very large or to be used in the winter when the roof may have to support a heavy weight of snow it may need two upright poles to support the crown. These poles are fitted to all but the smallest gers in Mongolia but are of symbolic, rather than structural significance.
Tools and Materials
To build your yurt you will need the following tools and materials:
Tools:
- good sharp handsaw
- coping saw or electric jig-saw
- spokeshave
- electric drill
- 3.5mm drill bit
- 1” (25mm) wood drill bit
- sliding bevel
- four or more G-cramps
- workbench
- smoothing plane
- sharp knife
- a strong sewing machine (an old Singer hand machine is good)
Materials
- 95 wooden rods 5 feet (1.52m) long and approximately 1” (25mm) diameter, or slats ½ x 1–2 inch(13×25–50mm)
- strong nylon string, 80 yards (73m)
- 40 square yards (34m) of waterproof canvas
- 2 square yards (2m) of plastic coated canvas
- 9 square feet (1m) of 1 inch (25mm) thick timber, or 18 sq. feet (2m) of ½ inch (13mm)
- 26 yards (24 m) of rope
- wood glue
- linseed oil (one pint [500ml])
- strong thread to sew cover
- 60 brass eyelets (grommets)
Sources of Materials
Here are a few useful names, telephone numbers and ideas for supply of materials:
| Materials | Sources |
| Canvas | Tony Beal Ltd. (Glasgow) Tel. 0141 7732166 |
| Mitco (Romford) | Tel. 0181 5906070 |
| Sawn green oak batons | Fountain Timber Products (Bristol) Tel. 01934 862710 |
| Hazel poles | Try your local wildlife trust, or woodland estate manager. |
| Willow poles | Try one of the many farmers growing willow as a biomass fuel. |
| String, glue, varnish, grommets etc. | Any local hardware shop. |
If you wish to make a yurt other than the size described in this book use the following table. The instructions remain the same only the numbers of poles and dimensions are different.
| Yurt Dimensions | Component dimensions (numbers*) |
| Diameter | Walls | Height | Wall poles | Roof pole | Crown Ø |
| 8’(2.4m) | 3’2”(1m) 5’(1.5m) 4’(1.2m)(48) 4’(16 or 32) 18” (45cm) |
| 10’ (3m) | 4’ (1.2m) 6’6” (2m) 5’(1.5m)(48) 5’(16 or 32) 2’(60cm) |
| 11’ (3.3m) | 4’ (1.2m) 7’ (2.1m) 5’9”(1.75m)(48) 5’6”(1.7m) (32) 2’6” (76cm) |
| 12’ (3.65m) | 5’ (1.5m) 7’6” (2.3m) 6’6”(2m) (56) 6’ (1.83m)(36) 2’6” (76cm) |
| 14’ (4.2m) | 5’ (1.5m) 7’6” (2.3m) 6’6” (2m) (64) 7’ (2.13m)(40) 2’6” (76cm) |
| 16’ (4.9m) | 5’ (1.5m) 8’ (2.4m) 6’6” 2m) (72) 8’ (2.4m)(45) 3’ (91cm) |
- Numbers given are those for complete poles allow another 14 poles to make the short lengths for the ends of the khana.
- For the sixteen foot yurt make three khana sections, therefore allow an extra 21 for the ends.
Obviously, the bigger the yurt, the more canvas you will need to cover it:
| Yurt diameter | Canvas requirements (square yards) |
| 8’ (2,4m) | 30 (26m) |
| 10’ (3m) | 40 (34m) |
| 12’ (3.7m) | 50 (43m) |
| 14’ (4.27m) | 60 (51m) |
| 16’ (4.8m) | 70 (60m) |
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