Alaska Survival Cabin

Hello :) I came across this project after my DT teacher had suggested to us in school. I wanted to try it out for fun and also practice some Fusion360 skills & test my creativity. I ended up choosing to design a survival cabin after I had watched some camping/survival videos from a YouTube channel - Outdoor Boys, in which Luke (the man in the video) shares his nature experiences and tips in Alaska. Even though I live in Singapore and have never been to Alaska, his videos are fun to watch and I was inspired to improve the survival cabins I had seen him review.

**FOR THIS PROJECT - CREDIT TO:

Outdoor Boys YouTube Channel - https://www.youtube.com/@OutdoorBoys

Rural Life TR - https://www.youtube.com/@rurallifetr

Materials used:

1. Pencil, eraser, ruler, pen knife
2. HD Foamboard
3. 1mm PVC Foam Sheet
4. Hot Glue gun

The two videos attached in the images are both survival cabins Luke had gone to. One of them is a small, not so nice but still functional cabin, while the one featuring the bunk beds was the nicer cabin. I wanted to incorporate elements from both cabins into a design.

Both cabins feature basic necessities, such as a basic kitchen area, bed(s), small dining area, extra emergency hiking gear for hitchhikers who need them & etc.

In the video featuring the not so nice cabin, one of the problems that Luke faced was keeping warm as his clothes had gotten wet from the snow. In the end, he attempted to use his hot water bottles to keep himself warm in his jacket & to dry his wet pants, but it only dried partially.

His experience in the nicer cabin was better, it was warm and more spacious.

The first image is the floor plan of how I initially wanted the cabin to be. However as you will see later, there are some changes due to time constraints.

During this process however, I was thinking how to address as many of the problems Luke faced in the videos. I decided that one main element that would be important was a heating source that could also double as a kitchen. Hence, I researched the Bukhari oven (heater) that is used across Central Asia and northern areas of the Indian Subcontinent. Later, I came across these two videos as shown above from a YouTube channel - Rural Life TR, which featured a traditional Turkish wood burning oven and decided it would be better than the Bukhari.

This was better because it not only provided heat, but you could also cook food on top.

These are some angles of the design I build in Fusion360. I am still new to Fusion360, so it took some time to figure out how to extrude, create new sketches, render etc.

The cabin can comfortably fit 4 people. It has 4 bunk beds with drawers underneath storing board games & small entertainment, a big closet with extra emergency gear & storage to put backpacks, a smaller shelf unit with a small cabinet on top which stores an emergency kit & informative books about hiking & the area itself, and a wood oven. The L shape bench has cabinets below which would store foldable stools & table so that the user can take it out to sit by the wood oven during meals. This is to save space.

The entrance of the cabin features two benches, a metal box which stores firewood & hooks on the wall for hikers to hang their poles/extra gear if needed.

Using HD Foamboard, PVC Foam Sheet & a Hot Glue gun, I assembled all the components together.

I don't usually do side projects like this, but I am happy that I did it as I had spent a lot of time thinking about it. Even if this model may not be as practical in real life, I hope that it showed what I would do as improvements to the space. Thank you for viewing my project!