treehouse attachment methods

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treegeek

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maybe this is a tad off-topic, but...

a friend and i are brainstorming about tree-house building. we have a few books and a bit of carpentry experience between us (mostly him) and were tossing the idea around of a single-tree platform maybe 20 ft up a huge doug fir. brackets seem like the obvious choice. we also were talking about 3 smaller firs nearby as a potential site, in which case attachment/stress issues get more complicated i think. never done this before. anyone out there have actual tree house building experience they'd care to share? i've installed a fair number of "old school" steel cable systems and i s'pose for that reason lean toward bolts and cable and maybe a turnbuckle for adjustment. no idea how to determing potential loads to this hardware, though i imagine the further off the ground you get in a big tree the more intense the dynamic.

anyone?
 
Hey Kathy, I saw some attachments on the Tree Walk at Capilano suspension bridge tourist land...
 
hey mb,
i guess we were hoping for a tree-friendly improvement on the traditional hammer & nails version. also, if we're going to put a bunch of time and imagination into the thing, it may as well last 10+ yrs, so nails might be a bit sketchy in the longer run. any ideas on alternatives? i was wondering if we could find like junkyard shock absorbers or leaf springs or something to allow for movement (multi-tree version) and yet be fixed. dunno. makin it up here..
k.
 
I dunno 'bout the shock absorption thing, but I would make the major attachments just like cabling, an eyebolt passed completely through the limb.
 
My father in law built a treehouse last summer (right before Isabel). Turns out he is not much of an engineer. He used 3/8" lag bolts to attach the main beam to the tree. I can tell you from experience that 3/8" bolts will not withstand hurricane force winds. I have seen people use large ropes to secure the structure to the tree. The ropes give enough so that the structure can sway in the wind. My dad built a treehouse when i was younger. He secured the main beam (a 4"X12" I believe) with probably 1/2"X6" spikes. If he had not torn the thing down, I think the treehouse would still be there. Maybe when MB said nails, he meant something more like the spikes my dad used. Later, Roger.
 
Peter Nelson wrote a book called Treehouses that you should check out. He goes into attachments, load handling, etc. in great detail. Do a search for Treesorts in Oregon as well... quite a cool place.
 
how about just suspending the whole thing from branches further up the trunk
 
Originally posted by treeman45246
Peter Nelson wrote a book called Treehouses that you should check out. He goes into attachments, load handling, etc. in great detail.

i had his other one and just borrowed that one & haven't had a chance to read it yet.

Do a search for Treesorts in Oregon as well... quite a cool place.

tom emailed me his whole treehouse-site list, which had treesorts on it. sounds awesome! have you been there?

thanks for the input.
k.
 
Originally posted by stephenbullman
how about just suspending the whole thing from branches further up the trunk

that was one of the plans we were trying to draw up over beers the other night, sort of like a platform/hammock suspended from the three smaller trees i mentioned above. i thought that would be a good built in shock absorber - the platform could rise and fall as the trees moved apart and together. there's not a huge amount of wind at the site, but it seems prudent to plan for it anyway.

how would you attach the rope or cable the platform was suspended from? the whole girdling issue makes me hesitate to use anything but installed hardware.
 
there must be someone out there who has actually built a "grownup" tree house..
anyone?

i'm really just looking for stories of mistakes not to make i guess. and curious about how the load of the lumber & the rigidity of the platform would affect the three trees if we went that route.
 
I wouldn't think it's such a major undertaking. Here's a treehouse in my area. It's pretty cool, but you can't see much 'cause of all the growth.
 
Originally posted by Mike Maas
Cool, but those are not tree houses by my definition. It has to be way up there, high enough that a fall kills you, high enough that you are constantly aware of the height, high enough that even the boggie man won't try to come up and spy on you.

Yup. Those are the requirements! :cool:
 
For the major supports I'd drill through the tree and insert a stainless pipe that a stainless bolt would will pass through. Stainless every where. Whatever would be less harmful to the tree.
 
Originally posted by Mike Maas
Through holes are a problem with CODIT because they exclude wall two. You can't make a cube with three sides.
Also you want the injuries as small as possible, just like you would want the injuries as small as possible, if somebody was bolting a house to you.
Most tree freindly hardware is nickle plated, or galvanized, and that seems to work well. Stainless is expensive.
Stainless is nickel based steel and stronger than regulare steel. It allows the use of smaller dia. holes and rod.

I'm working on another project that has to be non-invasive and and am using inverted tires with webing. Kinda like cobra and it is about holding heavy objects that the tree can handle and grow with.

Jack
 
Great thread Kathy, I wanted some input on tree houses some time back, it was in a weird place, This should kick it off...

People here everywhere today, i'll pop back later and add my 20 cents worth...Derek..
 
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