Building Work

I have been building what I am calling a shed. The garage workshop can quickly become invaded if you're not careful and though I don't altogether mind sharing space with people, I do kinda draw the line at bikes, lawn mowers, wheel barrows and then things like freezers too. In my garage space I have three workbenches. That way I can invite additional guests if I like them, they are not too talkative and they really, really like woodworking. The only machine is my bandsaw and an extractor for the dust. That's enough. But at the moment I have freezer and a lawnmower in there along with two sets of support workers paired as trestles and saw horses. Now these teams get used from time to time, once a week or so, and because of shortage of floor space in the garage I am always ready to saw up boards and planks outdoors and that's why the shed is a good place for storing these.

Because there was already an old but sound concrete slab in place I was quickly ready to get the 2x6 (5cm x 15cm floor joists laid and I used treated wood for this. The slab allows me to build a 9'10" (3 metre) by 10'6" (3.2 metre) building with a pitched roof and has a 2" (50mm)fall but is level across; not much work shimming up off the slab with sliding wedges periodically to ensure no bounce in the floor. I combine adhesive with outdoor stainless screws to screw down the 3/4" (19mm) plywood and used shuttering plywood which I will sand and coat with a waterproof finish for easy sweeping and such. The joists are on 2' (60cm) centres with double rows of blocking on 16"(40cm) centres across.

I am building this directly onto the back wall of the garage to economise as there is no good reason not to. My next step is framing the walls which I will do with 4x2 (10cm 40cm)(2x4USA) studs I picked up today. I am planning to clad the outside with 3/4" (19mm) barrel cladding T&G. All of the cladding is treated wood. So far I have six hours in the floor but I am still using mostly hand tools like handsaws, hammers and such with drill-drivers for driving the screws and also a jigsaw which I used for some scribing cuts.

When I was at the timber place I saw this shed that they were selling. Because it says, "Great Price" in all caps does not mean it is. It's a shameful thing altogether really. 4' x 6' (1.2m x 1.82m), so a quarter of the size mine will be and half the height. The framing is 1 1/4" (3cm) by 2 1/2" 6.2cm) and the cladding is 5/16" (7mm) thick. Mine will cost four times the price but it will have a 30 year life span at least and it has many times the quality in materials and labour. Definitely worth the DIY input. I cannot believe what the ~Brit's will buy for a shed. Unbelievable. If I were to put just one of my workbenches in their shed half of the space would be lost!

I just got it covered with a tarp before dark, to keep the plywood dry before the rain came 10 minutes later and which we are expecting over the next two days.