A bender, in this case, has nothing to do with getting drunk. A bender is also the name of a home you can make in a couple of days from a combination of natural and man-made materials. A bender looks like a short longhouse of the Native Americans. There are a variety of reasons for building a bender, whether you have crash landed in the woods and need shelter; whether you are in the army and on training in wilderness survival, or are homeless and wanted a place to call your own. The last instance is what happened to me and my lunatic of a partner, Mitch when I lived in England. One of the big concerns in making a home is what roofing products to use.
Use What You've Got
With a little imagination, many things can be easily converted to roofing products for your bender. You can also start with one of the roofing products and upgrade as you go along. If you were in the situation Mitch and I were in. We were living in a tent and were facing an English winter, which is just as harsh as winters on the Atlantic Coast of America, my home country.
First, you need a flat piece of ground. Pound it flat is you have to. If you can get a sledgehammer or even a usual hammer, you can drive stakes into the ground to make holes for your frame. Get some small pieces of rocks as well.
Now you get to know why a bender is called a bender. You find young, green, bendable wood like hazel and bend them. Two hazel trunks bent into an arch and tied together can make a sturdy frame. This is even sturdier if you weave other green trunks in between the arches.
Once the frame is set, which took Mitch and I one day, you can think about putting in a stove (if you have one) or roofing products. Here are some of the roofing products I've seen on English homemade benders:
Old army surplus tents
Plastic tarpaulin
Real tarpaulin that costs a fortune
Silk parachutes
Huge old blankets and towels
Cloth bags that used to carry coal, rice or flour
It Works
You are best mixing and matching your roofing products, depending on your situation. My bender had plastic sheeting and then was topped by an old army surplus tent. The bender lasted for over three years, longer than my relationship with Mitch.
