I slept in my tree house last night. My girlfriend was in town, and in typical fashion, when she is, I usually like to spend my night in our tree house. It is raining and almost snowing today, but when I woke up this morning, I noticed what looks like a leak coming from the base of the door in the corner. It is a very small amount, and I have had leaks in this area previously, but was hoping with my last caulk job, it would fix it. No such luck. If anyone is up for helping me trouble shoot, I would be happy to add a few pictures to the post. Anyway, thanks for the help.
Hello Kenny-
Ah the dreaded leak.. I deal with this in the Shiitake, a towel and heater is my solution. The wind blows the water toward the door and because there is no rubber strip along the bottom, there is moisture. No rubber strip because of adjustments to the door as ‘settling’ (?) occurred. It isn’t enough water to cause real concern. As I’m sure you are aware, each tree house has it’s own personality and traits, some good some not so good. My greatest challenge has been in dealing with trees going through the roofs. The Shiitake has a tree in the center, the first year rain running down the tree trunk splashed off a couple small branch cuts, ran down a beam and onto the floor. The branches had healed over, so I took a small coping saw and cut them flush. Now the rain runs down the trunk and out the bottom. awesome!
The Calypso hasn’t been as easy. each year has been trial and error. Never choose an irregular tree, meaning there were groupings or a cluster of branches on a Doug Fir. Usually conifers have symmetrical or near symmetrical branch growth, because of this irregularity, there is no way to cut the branch flush. I don’t like eliminating this natural flow of water on the tree, but after a couple of years having water damaging the floor and wall, we used silicone in addition to our flange. The angle on the roof where the tree exits collects debris, water pools there and pours in at random times. It can be pouring rain, I run up there with towels, and it’s dry, then next time it will be puddled inside. The silicone worked great, but after the summer heat it got soft and first rainfall pushed through again. I’m preparing to replace our flange with a larger tire inner tube. We’ve carefully cut a ditch into the bark, “if you do this, be extremely careful to not cut into the cambium layer if your tree is living”. the ditch is about an inch deep, the inner tube fits into this. I’m hoping with the wider inner tube we can keep the debris from gathering under and around the tree trunk. Inside the irregular branches splash when water runs down the trunk, I plan to use the smaller inner tube and hope to divert water from the irregular branches and allow it to flow down the other side of the tree. I’ll keep you posted. Best to not have an irregular tree in the first place. Know your trees well.
Maybe if you build some storm break, Plexiglas maybe (?) to keep the brunt of the storm rain from blowing at the door (?). If nothing else, keep a safe oil heater on low to keep moisture in check and towels to keep water off the floor. If you fix this problem, which I hope you do, keep me updated. “Touch your Trees!”
Finally clued a flexible threshold to the bottom of the door. Not the perfect solution, but I am hoping it works. We haven’t had much rain since I put it on, but I am sure we will see more rain soon and can put it to the test.