My house needs a shed

[videogamemaker]

I'm actually already done with this project, but wasn't a member before starting, so I'm going to slowly post my progress photos.

Background: We live in a duplex in downtown 101 in Reykjavik Iceland. Houses here are traditionally smaller than most Americans are used to, but one nice thing is that almost all houses have a "storage". Apartment blocks always have a storage level where each apartment has a storage room. Our house was originally built with the garage functioning as the storage, but it has since been turned into a home office by the previous owners, and now a full studio apartment by myself (if you are interested, here are some photos of the final internal: Agust and Ben's flat renovations: Bad on me). The conversion from garage to studio meant the front garage door is no longer used. It's covered over internally but leaks cold air, so adding a structure over it would increase the insulation as well.

TLR we needed a storage space, and we have an extra long driveway, so why not put one there?

Here is a shot of the driveway. The shed will go in front of the double black doors. There are already two pieces of lumber attached using concrete bolts in this photo, showing the general size and height of the shed.

Here is a rough 3D plan. The thick supports are 95x95mm and the rest is 45x95 (roughly 4x4s and 2x4s for americans). The overhang of pink board to the right is so I can have a hanging potted plant at the end.

After the frame is up, I'll add an OSB skin, tar paper water barrier, board N batten siding, and a corrugated steel roof.

Here is the completed frame, got a bit excited and nailed on the first OSB piece before taking a photo of the bare frame. The rain gave me motivation for a cover too. Not obvious from the photo, but there is a support beam under the middle of the OSB, it's not unsupported in the middle between the roof supports.

And the intrepid workman taking a small pause for a selfie

 

[videogamemaker]

Ok, frame is up!

Here is the three 45x95 boards everything else will be attached to. Concrete bolts are 10 cm deep with square washers to improve holding power

Here is the frame itself, 95x95s and 45x95s. Next time I'd prefer doing some fancy insets rather than having to pay for L brackets, they are expensive, and require more screws per attachment point, but worked for now. The plan is to use the bottom row as a frame to pour more concrete to level it out, and work as an attachment for the front two framing pieces, currently the bottom of those 95x95s are just sitting, no real fasteners. I tried concrete bolts but the concrete under is just too ****** and the distance too great for the bolts I could find. Made sure they are all level.

Apologies for the branches in the way, was the best way to get a top down photo. The roof supports are so short and strong I figured they didn't need any internal bracing. They are attached with purlin hangers with a triangular wedge cut to fill the gap below from sitting them in at an angle.

Cut out a seat for them from the 95x95s and bolted them on. Here it shows the cutout and then seated. The part of the 95x95 protruding above was cut flush with the roof support

Here is the completed frame, got a bit excited and nailed on the first OSB piece before taking a photo of the bare frame. The rain gave me motivation for a cover too. Not obvious from the photo, but there is a support beam under the middle of the OSB, it's not unsupported in the middle between the roof supports.

And the intrepid workman taking a small pause for a selfie

 

[videogamemaker]

Plywood skin is on!

Every horizontal internal beam had a ripped half piece in the center for rigidity and to nail the OSB to. These vertical beams were just toe-nailed in.

Some pieces required some elaborate cuts to attach.

The above piece is in the upper right of this photo

The light betrays that this photo was taken before the left side was closed up, but I forgot to take a photo after fully enclosed. Also wasn't sure how long til roof would go on, so I put a tarp on top to protect the OSB, even though it's supposed to be water resistant.

 

[EddieWalker]

Interesting shed. It's always fun to see how things are done in different places. I'm looking forward to seeing what it looks like when you are done.

 

[videogamemaker]

Interesting shed. It's always fun to see how things are done in different places. I'm looking forward to seeing what it looks like when you are done.

Thanks Eddie, I'm curious how you would have done it differently? This is one of my first enclosed structures, and it's a combination of Pole House construction and just generally figuring things out as I go. Would love to hear from someone more experienced.

 

[EddieWalker]

I'm hesitant to comment because I really admire and want to encourage everyone to start somewhere. My first structure fell down in less then a year. It took awhile of being told what to do, before it clicked in my head how framing worked. And then to understand code and tables.

I would have done something similar with your ledger boards attached to the existing building. Those boards would have been sealed between the wood and the existing building to make them water tight.

The wood on the ground would be pressure treated. It would also be sealed to keep out water and air. A SDS or SDS Max drill will go through anything and allow you to use anchor bolts to lock the sill plates in place.

For such a small structure, I would have gone with studs instead of purlins on your walls.

I like that you notched your posts, but if you had used studs every 16 inches, or even 24 inches, and rested your rafters on the double top plates, it would have been easier and stronger.

I would have used 2x6's for rafters. Rested on the top plates of the stud wall, and attached with joist hangers on the ledger board. Maybe resting on top of the ledger board if I had the room to do it that way. Then secured with hurricane brackets.

The rafters would be 2 feet apart at the most. If you have snow, then I would have gone 16 inches and lined them up to rest on top of the studs in the wall.

OSB, what you call plywood is only rated for a 2 foot span when attached perpendicular to the rafters. The goal is to have the longest length of the OSB crossing as many rafters as possible. If I cannot get it to attach to a minimum of three rafters, I cut the longer piece shorter so I can get that other piece to attache to three rafters.

Covering the OSB was a good move. OSB can handle a small amount of moisture, but the ends quickly swell once they get wet and the overall strength decreases.

We have a very high grade of OSB that costs twice as much because it's coated with a rubberized membrane that allows it to be exposed to the weather for an extended period of time. It's called ZIP System.

When OSB comes together, like on the side of a wall and the roof decking, it needs to have some sort of support. Top plates are the common way to do this. It allows you to attach it to something solid, so there is no movement. Movement and water are the death of all buildings. The goal is to eliminate both.

When I do not have the right tool, and its too expensive to buy, I rent it. If I can't afford it, I wait until I have enough money, and then rent it.

 

[videogamemaker]

really great advice

No problem, I'm an artist so I have had to take classes and come to grips with feedback, I appreciate it.

Just a few quick notes.

1. all the frame timber is pressure treated
2. At the end I plan to pour concrete to to the top level of those bottom purlins, which should seal out water
3. Every seam of OSB has a wooden member behind it, even if the photos don't show it.
4. unfortunately zipboard is not available in Iceland. I plan to cover the OSB with roofing felt before a board n batten siding for the water barrier, and the roof will have corrugated metal with flashing covering the concrete (which is why I didn't silicon behind the wood, but that's a good point for any future similar projects)

I understand the "every 24 or 16" with 2x6 for rafters, I'm hoping what I have will be strong enough, but will keep that spacing in mind for future projects. We definitely have snow, last month we got 51cm (20 inches) in one day!! Do you think it's worth trying to go in from underneath and add more supports in between these?

 

[EddieWalker]

I saw your support between your rafters in the pictures, but I'm unable to say if it will handle your snow load or not. If it was me, and I was at your point in construction, I would double up your rafters and then run purlins over the tops of them, perpendicular going from side wall to side wall. 20 inches of snow would probably destroy half the houses here in East Texas. We get 2 to 4 inches every other year, if that.

 

[videogamemaker]

The shed is actually completely finished and I'm adding these images slowly, mainly to get the kind of feedback you provided to learn in the future. I could probably go back in and add some support members but would need to do a lot of cutouts to make room for my horizontal supports. I might do so, however.

Roofing paper is on and I made a door! One of the biggest things I learned is not to forget planning for the door framing members. I would have had to steal too much room for the door itself to add it to this design, so I had to work around no door frame. Works for this project, but wouldn't for something larger or more important, which was why this project was a learning experience for larger things going forward.

Door is two layers of OSB sandwiched around a frame of 1x2s all pressure treated. I used screws with washers in even pattern to anchor the OSB to the frame. This was to save money (final build was less than half the cheapest door available in Iceland) and because of the odd size I planned the door.

Internal frame with rubber seal.

Routered hinges, went way faster with a proper hand router, last time I did this I had to use a dremel and it took fooooorever.

Also to save money and construction time, the door uses just a handle and latch rather than an internal lock. I like this latch design as it covers all the screws when locked, as it should be. Not all latches have this design!

Roofing felt is on, with strips of plastic running between the nails for extra strength. Wooden strips were cut to give some separation between the boardNbatten siding to come, and grooves were cut in the strips before attaching so that any water that does make it through can leak down. Strips were made by ripping 1x2s down the center, then using my table saw sled to put grooves every 10 cm or so. They were nailed to the OSB with framing nails, but once the siding goes up there will be longer ring shank nails all the way through.

These strips are lined up with the internal supports to provide easy guides when nailing the siding through.

closeup of groove against roofing paper to show how drainage would work.

Next up, the siding itself!

 

[CCWKen]

I like watching other people work. It gives me inspiration to take a nap.

Looks good. I'm curious about how you'll deal with the moisture wicking up from the bottom though.

 

[videogamemaker]

I like watching other people work. It gives me inspiration to take a nap.

Looks good. I'm curious about how you'll deal with the moisture wicking up from the bottom though.

That's the problem right now. My plan is to level the concrete in the front so it aims more smoothly toward that drain, and add a tiny gutter to funnel it as well. No real other options that I can think of.

 

[EddieWalker]

You are doing good at sealing it up. Did you add metal flashing to the bottom of your walls to keep the water from getting under your siding? You can already see the damage beginning to your OSB in your pictures where it gets wet, stays wet, and will quickly rot if allowed to remain wet.

 

[videogamemaker]

You are doing good at sealing it up. Did you add metal flashing to the bottom of your walls to keep the water from getting under your siding? You can already see the damage beginning to your OSB in your pictures where it gets wet, stays wet, and will quickly rot if allowed to remain wet.

View attachment 504453

I originally intended to, but a combination of not being able to find rolls of flashing (it's all custom ordered to match your roof color here from what I found) and the poor condition of the driveway (meaning I thought a seal was unlikely) made me skip it.

In those images though, the dark brown is more the splatter of mud on the driveway splashing up than it is wetness. I'm fairly certain I will have to figure out some better solution to alleviate the water in this area though.

 

[Coyote machine]

Bottom line is if your OSB stys wet, whether mud or water splash it will fail.
Can you get sheets of thin plastic to use instead of metal flashing, or some rolled metal, (in round coils) that could be used to create a custom flashing moisture barrier? Maybe even some scrap flashing that is in different colors from a local fabricator?
In the meantime I might suggest tacking up some plastic just above the 'water line' where the water /mud are evident in your pics, and holding it in place at grade with rocks or bricks or something to allow moisture to escape until you can seal the area permanently. Water is not your friend when it comes to OSB/plywood.

 

[videogamemaker]

Bottom line is if your OSB stys wet, whether mud or water splash it will fail.
Can you get sheets of thin plastic to use instead of metal flashing, or some rolled metal, (in round coils) that could be used to create a custom flashing moisture barrier? Maybe even some scrap flashing that is in different colors from a local fabricator?
In the meantime I might suggest tacking up some plastic just above the 'water line' where the water /mud are evident in your pics, and holding it in place at grade with rocks or bricks or something to allow moisture to escape until you can seal the area permanently. Water is not your friend when it comes to OSB/plywood.

The shed is actually completely done at this point other than final paint job, so can't really go back and add flashing. Yesterday we had a hellish rain/snow mix and I went out after hours of the wetness and felt the OSB from the inside and it wasn't wet, so it doesn't seem to be wicking it up. I've got some plans to ameliorate long term problems I'll posit and post illustrations of when I get caught up to the progress with the thread.

Siding is up! I used 22x120 and 22x45 (1x5s and 1x2s roughly) for the board and batten. Pressure treated, though apparently I could have saved some money and weight by using normal lumber and painting well. Live and learn!

This shows the air barrier the strips created. This way if/when water gets behind the wood siding, it isn't clamped tight against the paper, allowing drying to happen much faster and better.

Used a "magic" wood block as a spacer, almost lost it a few times and panicked that my spacing would be off, haha. These are sunk in using 90mm (3.5 inch) ring shank nails. Top, middle, and bottom row of nails are completely sunk into wood behind, but the second to top and bottom rows protruded out through the OSB backing and I hammered them bent behind the OSB to hold better.

Some intricate cuts required, mostly done with a hand saw

Battens going on. I had a short piece of batten I lined up by eye and made pencil marks at the top and bottom, and then used that for lining up the full length battens. Pre-drilled the nail holes on the battens to avoid splitting.

Very satisfying getting the first 3 up and seeing how the full thing would look.

Even more satisfying finishing a full row.

Over the door. Looks a bit abrupt without a frame, but this was one of the biggest lessons learned on this project (plan for door framing!). The lack of frame was really made apparent when I saw that water could get behind the siding between the wooden strips. I had to add vertical wood strips between to make a better seal.

Here shows the solution I used for the two sides, since they end over concrete walls, rather than the ground. This is a 1x5 with 45 degree angles ripped, and then screwed through. All boards and battens were bevel cut at 45 to match up as closely as I could.

and a pull back view

Here is the right side, using the same ripped 1x5 with 45 degree cuts for the bottom.

Unfortunately no pull back shots of final boardNbatten without showing the roof on, which I want to keep for tomorrow's post.

 

[EddieWalker]

Nice craftsmanship where you tied your siding onto the top of the wall.

 

[videogamemaker]

Nice craftsmanship where you tied your siding onto the top of the wall.

Thanks Eddie! This is my first major carpentry project. I made a sink basin table for my bathroom out of reclaimed palet wood, as well as a shelf, and I designed and made a desk back in high school with my dad (so looking forward to my son's older years, hoping he'll enjoy projects too), but this shed was a big one. I'm finding most of the problems stem from lack of experience, but my art training has helped with craftsmanship and my 3d job with spatial reasoning. I say that because I bet this project is a mix of beginners mistakes with attention to detail, haha!

Roof is on! Roof was such a fiasco, the ordering. I ordered this through the local hardware store, though it comes from one central provider. First I had to figure out all the roofing specific words in Icelandic (flashing and edge covers are different words) and then had to deal with 2 different employees, and despite providing multiple emails, links to PDFs of exactly what I wanted, PLUS several illustrations, it was a mess.

First order? only the flashing came in, they apparently forgot to cut the corrugated metal itself.

Metal comes in, I go to pick up, and the edging is missing, as is the color match nails. I drive to another location to get the nails, get back and of course my hatchback breaks and I can't get the hatch to open. I had to youtube "manually open VW polo hatchback" in the parking lot and rip off the plastic to get at the mechanism. Barely enough room for 1x2 meter roofing in a VW polo, but it fit.

Finally back 2 weeks later for the edging. At least the guy was very helpful and friendly.

Here is the roof with flashing attached to the top. The flashing goes completely over the concrete lip of the wall the shed is attached to, so no water getting in that way. Also there is a special wave foam fitted at the back and under the flashing to totally prevent water getting under at the top. This shot shows the completed siding too.

Pull back shot

Had to use clamps on the siding after it came to get it even.

Almost every nail is driven fully into wood, but the overhang didn't have any support under (we'll see if this is a problem with bowing in the future. It's supported at the top and bottom, but nothing in the middle)

All done with the roof! You can see in this image the two support blocks I attached for the overhangs on the left and right front. This also shows the small U-shaped cover for the bottom of the roof. The bottom covers only the roofing paper and OSB, while the side U-covers go over the corrugated metal as well. This is apparently to allow any water that does get under to drain down and off. If the bottom edge covered the roofing, any water would just collect there, rotting the wood. I also had to add supports between the end roof rafters so the nails at the bottom would have enough wood to drive into.

Next up, pouring the concrete floor.

 

[videogamemaker]

Floor time!

Swept, vacuumed and painted the floor with primer.

The left middle darker bit is actually earth. The driveway itself is built up to the street level (our back yard is over a meter lower) and the driveway is basically a concrete box filled with earth. The dark bit goes all the way down, and one of the main reasons I wanted to repour the floor.

One 20kg (50 lb) bag at a time. I realize I should have ordered concrete in bulk, but there are few options here, I had zero clue how much we needed (we estimated 13 and ended up using almost 30) and had zero easy way to funnel it in. Bags ended up being more hassle and probably more expensive, but much easier.

However, it quickly proved to need way too much volume, so we found small gravel for half price, and filled most of the floor with that first (so much for priming the floor!)

All evened out by hand, one bag at a time, with a toothed trowel. I would have loved a long trowel on a pole or something more appropriate, but honestly just wanted to get this project done and not drive around looking for a specialty tool.

No picture after drying, but it feels nice and strong, nothing inside has shown even a spec of dampness since, despite lots of torrential rains and even some snow. Seems the flashing, rain membrane, and raised floor did their job. I learned a ton on this project and now we have a nice big shed for storage. A job well done and my sense of pride is swollen. :-D

 

[fatjay]

Mixing that concrete sounds like a terrible amount of work. I have some uneven slabs on my back porch I am going to fill with concrete to level out, and I'm dreading it.

 

[videogamemaker]

Mixing that concrete sounds like a terrible amount of work. I have some uneven slabs on my back porch I am going to fill with concrete to level out, and I'm dreading it.

Luckily I bought a standard drill bit adaptor for my big 1000watt hammer drill which can be set to spin only. I put my mixing wand into it and it made short work of the cement. Helped that the right measurement of water was exactly 2 liters so I just had a lineup of 2 liter pepsi bottles ready to fill. It still took about 2 hours to mix 27 bags - 1 bag at a time. :-D