If Carlsburg built sheds

dr rockerdr rocker Regular
edited September 2011 in Life
They would not be a patch on my shed. I have put about 6 full days of work into it along with a helper most of the time. It took 3 of us to turn over the base when it was screwed together. It has cost me about £250 for things I have had to buy. If I had bought one that was as strong and well built I would have been looking at least £2k and probably around £1200 in labour if I were to pay to put it up. I have spent quite a few hours collecting things - pallets, perspex, boards and things like screws. The shed also killed my old router - when I was making the door, the extractor hole got blocked, wood shavings built up around the cutter housing and it overheated, melting a bearing to the motor, so it was propper fucked.

I had planned to build it solely out of bits of pallet - I did weld together a tool to easily break pallets up - I will keep collecting old pallets, sometimes you get some decent timber - I made a box today with a 11 TPI general saw and some chisels so you can get decent timber for free - cut rabit joints with the saw then teased out the timber with chisels and then used them to plane the bottom of the joint pretty much flat.

I digress, here is the shed.

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About 10% of the pallets I collected. Most of them I split down into timbers - started off with a bolster chisel and a blacksmiths hammer, but after a few evenings using this combo, by elbow and shoulder were fucked. Not to mention my little fingers that seemed to take the brunt of the slips. At one point, both of them were bust open down the leading edges. Maybe I should put my gloves on before I start bleeding...

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This is my Father stood on some pallets we have screwed together for the base. They were roughly 3'x3'4". They got screwed with 4" screws. I always recomend Makita gear when using battery gear. They make some hard core tools and if you do manage to break them in general use, they seem to be good about covering parts - including batteries.

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That is the base set on brick piers. Their are nine piers in total, 3 bricks high, at least 3 bricks to a level. We had screwed down some 4"x2" runners to the bottom of the pallets that would sit on the piers. I had to buy the 4”x2”s. I think they were around £20. They had all been pressure treated beforehand, but I painted the bottom of the shed with some tar I made so I could be sure if I did fuck all else to the base for 30 years, it would not rot.

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That it the frame up. I screwed some 3”x2”s down to the base through the strong parts of the pallets, then built a frame with 3”x2”. Although there is not a lot to the frame, by this point in the build I knew I would be cladding it in sheet material and the strength could come from that. Think of the frame as the pencil drawing the masterpiece is painted on.

The shit in the blue can I got from a neighbour. He moved about a year or so ago an gave me a load of timber he had in his cellar. I don’t think he could manage his house and land any more (these are old houses and take a lot of upkeep, I had to rebuild a chimney on an external wall and the stack earlier this year, a total cunt of a job). He was a mad DIY'er, I think radioator and water outlet in his house had it own isolation – a think he thought he needed but he would have been better off converting his water system – he had 2 hot water systems and 2 cold. The electrics were only good for weighing in and his bathrooms grew some nice mushrooms.

Anyway, he gave me the stuff in the blue tub, saying it was creosote – something that has been unavailable in the UK for a few years now, but if you have some you can still use it. I took it with the intention of getting rid of it. Later on he told me it was chromated copper arsenate. I could not justify using this stuff near to where I grow food, so I will get rid of it.


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This is the roof and one side on. You can see the side looks grey and rough. These are three old sheets of marine ply I had. One of them had been cut in two, and all of them had been used to mix up mortar and concrete. Kept the mess on the inside so it did not damage the outside, plus I can line the inside or it would not be seen due to shelves, etcetera.

The roof is 25mm ply. I bought this. It was about £25 a sheet new. I had been in touch with a few people selling second hand, but they were just people who put speculative adds up online in case they came across any plywood – probably builders and pikeys. None returned and good stuff. I needed three sheets.

We can get some decent snow here so it needs to have a strong roof, On top of that, I need to be sure in 30 or 40 years time, that if the shed feels strong, the roof is strong in case I have to get up on it and do any work.

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This is the back and sides. It is 1 ½” thick chipboard. Not something I would usually use in this situation, but it was to be felt covered and sealed at the bottom, so it should not get wet. Plus, it was free. I think it was due to be the ends of shelves in a local super market, but had not been needed and someone had kept it for some purpose that they did not need it for any more. I got it for 1lb of tomatoes and six sweetcorn cobs. Try taxing that, fuckers. I also got some other materials which you will see later in the build.

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This is the front on. The door I made from 4x2”s I bought. Routing the channel to take the plasic sheet killed my router. The plastic is 16mm thick and had been used in places where they have protected checkouts in petrol stations and cheap booze stores. It it tough as fuck- I tried to break a piece with a spade to see how hard it was. I got pissed off and used a scaffold bar which did do it.

The steps are made from kerb edge stones I had left over from making my greenhouse base and a paving stone I had stacked up.

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You can see here I have put felt all over the shed and latted it down. The lats have been stained – the thin ones were nailed, the wider ones drilled and screwed. I have since put down some paving in front of it, put a gutter along the back to collect water and a couple of barrels in front.

A very strong and decent sized shed for not a lot of money. I have enough stuff left over to make a nice shed at he top of my garden, a 8'x5' with a pent roof.

Comments

  • Darth BeaverDarth Beaver Meine Ehre heißt Treue
    edited September 2011
    I hope it does not snow where you live. Judging by the 4 years I framed houses as a youth that thing would not last tow seasons in my neck of the woods due to your framing approach.
  • dr rockerdr rocker Regular
    edited September 2011
    I hope it does not snow where you live. Judging by the 4 years I framed houses as a youth that thing would not last tow seasons in my neck of the woods due to your framing approach.

    I can see what you mean. We can get 2-3 foot of snow here. I did say that the frame was a kind of skeleton, but the boards are what give the complete strenth to it. Before the sides were put on the roof was on and it stood to grown men moving around on it no probs, but the intention has always been to add extra framing anyway from the inside when building draws, shelves, cupboards etcetra - its why it was not construted with studs, trimmers and noggins.

    I have seen too many sheds built in the past why some one has built really good stud walling and failed to take into consideration what they will be storing and how the wall size and pattern lends itself very badly to the size of the things being stored. I wanted to get a lot of gear into the shed to decide how best it would fit. Got two walls done.

    I too worked on sites when I was younger.

    If it does fall down I will post pics of it down and pics of me building it again with a bottle jack, scaffold bars and arc welder.
  • Darth BeaverDarth Beaver Meine Ehre heißt Treue
    edited September 2011
    That roof support is what worries me the most. Especially if you get the weight of snow up on there.
  • GoingNowhereGoingNowhere Global Moderator
    edited September 2011
    Good effort dude, looks pretty awesome! Maybe I'll post the pic of decking that me and my dad built :)
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