5000 lbs moved- check. But now, the garage was FULL. There are a few options when you run out of space because you have too much stuff:

• Get rid of some stuff
• Organize your stuff
• Make more space so you can spread out more.

Obviously organizing stuff is for people who are smart, so I chose to do the first and third options. I sold a valve grinder and a brake lathe which I’d acquired as part of the deal in Saugus, which removed about 3-400 lbs and about 5 cubic feet of machine. Good enough.

However I still had a bunch of big things which I wanted to keep but now wouldn’t fit in the now full garage, namely lots of lumber and bicycles. So, time for option 3: build more space. Flashbacks to this.

A local dumpster was nice enough to provide me with some good, old, wood. Most notably, I was able to get two 2x8s which were 19 feet long- perfect ridge beams. The dumpster also provided about 20 2x8s between 5 ft and 7 ft in length, which were originally the floor beams of an old house. It was a bit of a shame really- there was a lot more which I know ended up in the landfill. I was a little stupid and left the wood uncovered in the snow, but luckily it warmed up and the wood dried off pretty quick.

I floated a bunch of designs, including several more house-shaped ones (like Aarons shed). However, to maximize ease of building, and for the easiest time hanging stuff, I chose a more boxy design. This design is easy to build and maximizes storage space per square footage. However, if a sufficiently snowy winter comes, it will definitely need to be shoveled. But, if it collapses, whatever. It was made of trash anyways and is full of trash too. In terms of dimensions, I wanted the shed to be able to fit my 17′ canoe, so I made the shed 18′ in length. This was the primary motivation to go with a more boxy design, so that the canoe would be about to be nicely hung. Massachusetts requires you get a building permit for any structure over 120 square feet, so therefore it had to be under 6′ 8″ wide. All my rafter lumber was about that size anyways. I made a basic CAD. The rafters are spaced 24″, and only have a span of about 80″. These are unlikely to break.

Another interesting variable was how tall to make the shed. The building code only mandates a certain square footage, so building up is completely legal and basically free storage space. However, I really didn’t want the shed to blow over in a windstorm, so I made it about as tall as it is wide. In terms of rafter slant, that is a balance between additional height making the shed more likely to blow over plus losing height in the back of the shed, versus the rain having an easier time flowing off . I decided to make it pretty flat, having a slant of only about 7.5:1 or so. This is quite shallow, but again, maximizes storage volume for a given square footage. I will definitely have to shovel if it snows a lot. Whatever.

Anyways, time to get building. With daylight savings time, it was always dark when I got home from work. But, science stops for nothing, so I got a good work light and built in the dark.

Pulling all the nails from the lumber was somewhat annoying, but the wood was free, so I’m not complaining.

Ridge beams cut.

Time to assemble the first end frame. One of the hardest times here was making sure it was actually square, especially because all the wood was *slightly* different in width versus the CAD model. I modified the cad to be correct and aligned everything by measuring corner to corner.

Once the alignment was correct, diagonal braces were installed. I used the beeg boi 3.5″ screws.

The frame stood up. For once in my life, I thought ahead, and cut steps into the frame. The ridge beams will sit in these notches. This will also make the assembly extremely strong.

Edge frame 2.

Maneuvered into position. These frames were HEAVY. Hopefully they will last many years!

The next step was installing the Planning ahead!!! I realized that before the long boards were attached, I should attach the rafter hangars. The only problem here was that the rafter hangars from home depot were designed for newer 2×4 lumber, which are actually only 1.5″ wide. This old lumber is somewhere between 1.75 and 2″ wide (dont make em like dey used to!), which means that the hangars have to be bent to fit right. I used the Linley for the first time to cut out some aluminum to make a jig which the rafter ties were hammered around.

Rafter hangars installed on ridge board. They are offset because some of the rafters are thicker than others- the normal rafters are 3.625″ wide (a 2×8, which was actually 7.5″, ripped in half) and the thicker rafters are 5.5″ wide. The thick rafters are the ones which will hold the canoe up.

Next step: actually installing the ridge beam. Because all of my friends are too smart to help me build stuff, I did it alone by using a system of ladders. First, the back ridge beam was supported by a ladder in the middle, while the northern edge frame was clamped to another ladder. This worked pretty well.

Front beam installed, also using the ladder method.

After the ridge beams were installed, I levelled the frame by digging on the south side and putting the dirt on the north side. I put little pieces of flat stone down to act as mini-foundations.

All rafters installed! The two pieces of lumber in the back are supports for the rear ridge beam, which I also placed on small pieces of stone after installation.

I moved all the stuff in. It started lookin nice!! 😀

For now, it has a tarp roof, which is good enough. Eventually, it may get a plastic roof. We’ll see! I’m happy. Yay!

A qualiT project. In all honesty I am pretty happy/impressed, from getting the wood to completed shed was only 13 days, from first circular saw cut to tarped roof was only 5 days despite me having my job, which is pretty cool.