The Turboferret Shed

Sheds seem to be an eternally popular subject on here, so I thought I’d share my progress from the weekend starting to build my own.

I’m afraid it’s not as exciting as many on here without any revolutionary design, architectural wizardry or display any incredible woodworking skills, but it should do the job.

Idea is for it to be big enough to store about 5 bikes hung vertically on one wall, a workbench on the opposite wall, and hopefully my milling machine at the end. Should be comfortable to get bikes in and out plus work in there too. Currently all of my bikes and tools etc are in the spare bedroom and it’s time to migrate them out. Needs to be pretty secure and I don’t want it to be too much of an eyesore either.

Concept design

Roof panels omitted for clarity. Major material for construction will be 2″x4″ timber and 18mm OSB3 panels. Clad with deconstructed fence-panels and a grass roof. No windows and a chain going through the floor concreted into the ground below.

Dig holes

Carrier bags in the background contain the earth removed from the holes, which will go on the roof, plus a load of compost

1st set of boards on the roof

I was sure that I had measured the width of the boot and worked out that my boards would fit, but clearly I hadn’t! Fortunately the roof-bars served their purpose although handling 36kg 1220×2440 boards single-handed is a challenge…

Base support structure with board to check squareness

Braced structure, trial fit

Selection of power-tools. Impact driver certainly a good purchase

Staple/nail gun saved loads of time

Trusty circular saw

Posts creted in, base frame fixed down, first board attached

2nd board on

3rd board on and cut to correct width, plus frame of back wall being assembled

Fence-panel disassembly for cladding

Slightly damp cladding drying in the sun

Cladding being nailed onto what will be the back wall

Back wall all ready to be moved into position, only problem being that it’s now too heavy for me to lift

Overall, pretty pleased with progress so far, should have it pretty much finished over the next 2 weekends I hope, along with many more trips to Wickes. I would have made more progress but I cleared out their stock of 2″x4″x2.4m timber.

More to come!

Cheers, Rich

looks like it’s coming along.

FYI this is one of my old sheds, with the “herringbone” hanging of bikes, I used some 45deg blocks to set the wheel hooks at the right aspect.

Nice work. Looking to do something similar here so bookmarked 🙂

Why the fence panel cladding? Stuff you had lying about or just a good price for the materials?

Also what’s the thinking behind the grass roof?

Stoner – looks like your shed was slightly wider, but the interior layout will be very similar. I’ll be looking for hooks but need to make sure they are compatible with deep carbon rims.

MrBlobby – fence panels seemed to offer good value for the materials and easy to get hold of. 2 panels of 1.8×1.5m (5.4m2)covered the entire back wall which measures 3×2.4m (7.2m2) with less overlap, so it should take about 7 panels for the whole shed.

There are a few reasons behind the grass roof – firstly I want to minimise the visual impact, thus a green roof instead of a black one should be less of an eyesore, especially for our upstairs neighbours. I also think there may be an improvement in security, as there will be a considerable weight of soil/vegetation on the roof, so not as easy to just pry off a panel to gain entry. Insulation should stop it getting so warm inside compared to sun heating up a traditional roof. I also like the idea! Going to have trelis up the front to get some creepers going, and perhaps something along these lines:

Cheers, Rich

Thanks, nice that. Need to do anything with drainage for the roof?

Still thinking about how to store the bikes here. It’ll be a smaller size (mostly to store a few bikes and free up space in the big shed.) So thinking maybe a big chest high deep shelf the size of the shed to store stuff on top of (wheels, spares, tubs of kit, tool boxes, etc) with half a dozen bikes slotting in underneath. Be nice to have a space to hang bikes and wheels separately too. Need to think about that one.

Haven’t you forgotten the concrete for the chain?

From what I’ve read, some gravel and drainage holes at the low end of the roof takes care of excess rainwater. Plenty of info on the web about live roofs. It’ll probably be a combination of some spare bitumen sheeting which some builders left in our garden and some pond-liner to keep the roof watertight.

Chain is concreted into the same hole as the middle back post. You can just about make out the chain on the ground in photo #8 and then it poking up through a hole in the board in the next couple of shots.

Cheers, Rich

Stoner – Member

looks like it’s coming along.

FYI this is one of my old sheds, with the “herringbone” hanging of bikes, I used some 45deg blocks to set the wheel hooks at the right aspect.

I have done this in the garage, but need to change them about as the bikes actually stick out further than I anticipated (should have measured beforehand).

I used Arris rail (from Wickes) to get the hooks mounted at 45degrees…..think I’ve got a pic on Flickr somewhere……

Pic/day, so not terribly informative as I was being ahem, ‘arty’….

13-10-20 DSCN5261 by STW stumpy01[/url], on Flickr

I’d not really thought of storing the bikes with the handle bars turned 90 degrees

I’d always assumed it was a faff, but I guess it doesn’t take any more than 60 seconds with an allen key to do it and doesn’t affect anything

I’m planning to have the bikes hung alternately by front and back wheels, so the bars shouldn’t interfere with each other too much. That’s the idea at any rate, we’ll see how many I can fit in comfortably without them being a pain to get in and out.

Cheers, Rich

Chain is concreted into the same hole as the middle back post.

I see now, Worried you might have had to cut through floor to pour concrete!

Could you not hang the bikes with the front wheel turned 45 degrees to save adjusting bars each time you use, could always use a strap or bungy to help secure. Would be just like the Forest of Dean uplift trailer.

Top Shedding! 😉

Looking like it’ll be a nice project, nothing beats working in the garden on big man sized projects in the sun.
I’d maybe consider some beefing up of your ground work though. A green roof ends up weighing quite a bit (especially when wet) and with a milling machine in there as well the floor joists are going to be taking quite a bit of weight.

More supplies last night – the challenge being can I fit as much wood as I could fit on the trolley into the car….

Ratchet-straps to the rescue

Boot not far off being closed 🙂

Got virtually all the lengths of wood now, I think I’ll have the remaining boards delivered to save some effort.

Regarding the strength of the floor joists, I’m pretty confident that they’ll be fine. The supports which span the width only support the floor, not any weight from the roof. The mill (which is fairly light as milling machines go) will sit on a bench which spans the width, thus the load will go straight to the corners. Same with the roof, the loads will come straight down to the posts. The way the wall panels are constructed means that the joists which span the length of the shed are in effect doubled-up, and the OSB boards will add rigidity too.

Point loads in the middle of the floor would be another matter, certainly.

Support posts are 2′ deep and about a spade-width square into pretty firm ground, so hopefully they won’t sink!

Cheers, Rich

Quality thread. It doesn’t help now ,but I wish you’d had all that timber delivered.
And timely reminder from stoner and stumpy re the 45degree blocks, just about to rearrange my “fleet”.
Sorry for the hijack but,the one thing I’m concerned about hanging my bikes in the shed is that it gets very hot and on two occasions my fork seals have lost their oil…..maybe the seals were on their way ,maybe not .
Anyone else?

I was all set to have all of the timber delivered on a day when I had to stay home to wait for a passport to be delivered, but discovered that bulky items took about a week longer than normal stuff, so I decided to buy in bits as and when required. As Wickes only deliver to kerbside according to their website, I’m not sure I’d fancy moving ~half a tonne of wood singlehanded to the back of the house in one sitting :O

Cheers, Rich

If you compress the forks every now and again, this shouldn’t be an issue senor j, as it must take weeks for oil to ‘dry out’.

Shed looking good OP!.

Looking forward to more pictures mr ferret , if I was local I’d offer to help lift the panels.. 🙂
Cheers Nobeer – when they leaked it maybe looked worse than it was…

More progress this weekend, pretty pleased with how it’s going and how quickly.

Lifted the back wall up, not particularly easy single-handed as it’s pretty heavy. Bits of timber pivoted on the sides meant that I could lift it up gradually and they would act like ratchets to stop it falling back. Side wall being constructed on the base.

Side wall up

Side wall panelled

This is as close as I could get to the side of the garden

Front wall structure up – easier to erect the skeleton and then add the boards in situ

Roof supports placed on

Another trip to Wickes to get the remaining 8 boards I needed. To assist with moving these without assistance my EVOC bike bag donated its wheels temporarily and I made a little trolley. Made the shifting much easier!

Starting to board the front wall

Front wall complete

I did realise after this that I’d made a mistake, as the boards were meant to go to the top of the roof supports, so I should have notched the boards before installing. Not a major issue, I’ll just have to add some extra bits to fill in the gaps.

Side wall progressing and doorway

Side wall nearly finished, just need to make the door and hang it

I still need to get a couple more fence panels as I currently only have enough cladding for the front and half a side. One downside of adding the panels after the frames is that I need to clad them when vertical instead of horizontal. Much easier to just place the cladding when gravity isn’t working against you, but the nail/staple gun makes it fairly simple.

Did have a bit of a mis-hap trying to lift a board up onto the roof, which decided that it much preferred being on the ground, leaving me with a nice bump on the head 😳 I may need to rethink my strategy for getting them up without incurring further injuries!

I also had a re-think about the grass roof. Researching sedum which is the typical plant for living rooves works out quite expensive, but I think the amount of soil I’d need to prevent grass from drying out and dying in the summer would be considerable, and it might just turn into a horrible mess. I’ve bought some normal roofing felt although I might revist the green roof idea again in the future.

Hopefully make a bit more progress this weekand it’ll start to look less like an eyesore.

Cheers, Rich

Nice work, im moving house end of june and will need to build a shed!
so gatehering ideas. Just be careful any shed over 2.5m high this close to boundary will require planning permission! you shouldn’t have an issue until you sell up and solicitors ask to see the permission!!

senor j – Member

Quality thread. It doesn’t help now ,but I wish you’d had all that timber delivered.
And timely reminder from stoner and stumpy re the 45degree blocks, just about to rearrange my “fleet”.
Sorry for the hijack but,the one thing I’m concerned about hanging my bikes in the shed is that it gets very hot and on two occasions my fork seals have lost their oil…..maybe the seals were on their way ,maybe not .
Anyone else?

Bit late, but just seen this. What forks are they? My Reba’s (2008)pour all their oil out when inverted. Apparently it was a problem with one of the O-rings being specced a bit small on the damper side.
I’ve bought an o-ring kit off ebay with a larger o-ring that apparently cures it, but haven’t had the chance to strip them down yet.

If the leak is from the actual wiper seal – it could be they need replacing; I’ve only had oil appear from the internals – so past the U-turn on one leg (where the valve comes out the top of the leg & damper side where the lockout twiddler comes out the top; never from the wiper seal/stanchion inteface itself.

Good progress, turboferret!!

Mighty impressive DIY skills there and looking good.
Question about the door location, (based on your CAD picture). When you open it are you going to be walking directly into or having to avoid the handlebars of the first bike or is there enough room? Could you locate the door at the right hand end of that wall to allow max space for the first bike and maybe improving access?

How tall is it? Looks tall, did you think about planning etc. or just decide to crack on?

Have you thought about ventilation/condensation? Thinking with the boarded walls it’ll be fairly airtight (as sheds go) and especially if the roof is covered with soil etc. it might keep it cool = condensation on the ceiling?

Also, how are you lighting it for workshop/mill use? Something else to think of – if the answer is “LED”/”fluro tubes” be very careful, these often operate with a high speed flicker – dangerous with a fast spinning mill (or other tool) as it can appear to be stationary when it’s not.

In my old shed i used to remove the front wheel and replace the skewer, this meant the bars were parallel to the top tube and you could fit them closer together. I prefer fitting a wheel than adjusting a stem and bars (i always have trouble getting ghe straight)

Re: planning – the shed is 2.4m tall, the length of a standard board, so I think it sneaks under the planning restrictions. However, the way I’ve built it means it should be fairly easy to dismantle from the inside, and depending on where we move to next, I may very well bring the shed with me 🙂

On the access front, yes, bars will be in front of you upon opening the door, as can be seen from this top view from my SoldiWorks model

However, the bike which will be right next to the door will be my commuter, so drop bars and not as wide. I don’t have that modelled at the moment, but I don’t think it’s too much of a concern.

The door is massive though, a full 1.2m wide, so access shouldn’t be a problem.

I can also juggle the angle and position of the bikes to a certain extent if the one closest to the door does become an issue. I think it’s going to be pretty much ideal for grabbing the bike I’ll be using most and heading straight out the door.

I’m putting my new cheap Halfords toolchest to the right of the door, so moving the door would stop that!

Cheers, Rich

The door is massive though, a full 1.2m wide, so access shouldn’t be a problem.

Good idea to future proof the door width, that way you’ll be fine when, in 12 months time, 800mm bars are considered narrow!

With more rain forecast, I wanted to get the roof on, at least temporarily to stop the inside getting totally waterlogged. Although I’m using OSB3 boards which should be pretty damp resistant, I didn’t want them swelling up like sponges at cut edges, regardless of how much creosote I’d painted on.

To avoid further incidents of contact between falling boards and my head, I rigged up a slightly less dangerous method using some ratchet straps. At least if they slipped and fell they should go sideways or flip over, not slide straight down towards me!

As you can see from the shadow inside after fitting the first board the 2.4m long board isn’t long enough to cover the sloped roof and overhang, so there will be an extra section at the front

2nd board half-up

Fully up without any decapitation

Temporary half-board at the end

I had a half-board already cut but not wide enough to give me the required overhang over the side, so this is just temporary for the moment. I’ll get the circular saw out to finish off properly shortly.

I do of course realise now that since I’ve left a gap at the front of the roof, any water falling will run down and drip straight down into the shed. I should have left the gap at the top instead of the bottom, which would mean that only a tiny percentage of water would fall inside 😳 Oh well, not much I can do about it now from the office…I’m sure it’ll survive!

Cheers, Rich

Happy with progress today. Fixed cladding boards to the front wall:

And built the door:

Just need to clad each end, fit a lock to the door, and tidy up the edges of the roof felt 🙂

Also pictured is a ladder which I cobbled together from spare bits of wood to save buying one 😀

Cheers, Rich

A bit more progress this weekend, although the major amount of time spent isn’t really visible, that being reinforcing the door and fitting the lock. Slight issue there being that since my door is about 120mm thick, I’ll have to get a special long key cut as the standard one which came with the mortice is about and inch too short.

Door and wall partly clad:

Some pretification with hanging baskets:

The hole above the door is also filled, and the inside walls have had a quick coat of white emulsion. Need to finish the edges of the roofing felt but it’s nearly ready to start getting filled up with rubbish 🙂

Cheers, Rich

Looks great. The fence panel cladding has worked very well.

I’m about to buy almost exactly his ready made – a 12 by 6 pent but with double doors at the front. How much do you think it’s cost?

Cost estimate

15 x 18mm OSB boards @ £17/sheet – £255
7 x 1.8 x 1.8m fence panels @ £19/panel – £133
44 x 2.4m 2″ x 4″ @ £5/length – £220
12 x 3m x 2″ x 4″ @ £9/length – £108
Roofing felt + adhesive – £50
Screws/nails/staples – £40
6 x postcrete @ £6/bag – £36
Creosote – £15
Lock/hinges/handles – £50

Total ~ £887

I have ignored the additional tools I bought for the project as hopefully they’ll get plenty more use in the future. The prospect of hammering all the nails or screwing all the screws in by hand does not fill me with delight!

Cheers, Rich

Nice work, fella.

How do you intend to finish the corners…?

The corners will have some of the strips which have been liberated from de-constructing the fence panels, which are pretty much the right size and I have a huge pile of them now.

Cheers, Rich

Matching colour(way), too.

nice windows 😉

Clearly natural light inside would be nice, but would make it very obvious what was being stored, thus presumably increase the chances of being broken into. I therefore decided that I would compromise daylight for security.

Hopefully a few fluorescent tubes will make it tolerable to work inside, and I’ll probably have the door propped open too.

Cheers, Rich

It just seems abit monolithic with out them, but I understand the reasoning though there always….