i built a roundhouse spring 2012 with a reciprocal roof here in west tennessee... it was straight-forward design and roof construction built up by my self in a day... the entire home was constructed using only hand tools with the single exception of a battery powered drill... the roof rafters are 6" diameter on average at base and 18 1/2 feet long... this gave me a nice 4' diameter skylight and little over 3' eaves... the roundhouse is not a 'mudhouse'... after reading much about alternative construction material (cob, cordwood, bales, tires, etc) i decided to go with 4' x 8' wall panels... 20 panels will give a diameter of about 25 1/2'... i chose reciprocal over the compression ring used for yurt roofs mainly because of the band needed for yurts to hold it together vs the self-supporting feature of a reciprocal roof... the ONLY problem i had with the recip was trying to use bale wire to tie together... found out quick that the poles want to slide down... working by myself, it was simple and much better to drill thru the overlaying rafter and the one under and drop a 10" bolt to pin them...
