I'm looking for ideas for a cheap and fairly easy car shed. I have some 4x6 wood for posts, but I'd have to secure them upright. I guess I could put concrete in 5-gal buckets, but that would add to the cost. Roof? I get snow so I need a halfway decent roof. I also have some water tank hoops that are about 8' in diameter. If I could prop them up then a tarp for the roof ... What have you? Thanks, Kurt
I built this for under $100, completely made of 2x4's. The only thing I have to worry about is snow, but in Oregon its really not a problem, just knock it off as it builds up. I might add some plywood under the tarp to make it resist more. Its 12ftx20ft, I put it up and moved it 20ft with the help of one other person. Its been standing over a year now no problems. I might have to replace the tarp soon though. Ryland
Its not. I was going to tie it down but it survived a couple good wind storms before I got it staked down so I decided it would be fine. Its pretty much surrounded by trees and the house so its pretty well sheltered. And as I said its been up for over a year. Ryland
Lucky ,really. what you have is a giant kite. Hope it does not land on anything expensive. Not trying to break balls,that wind is strong stuff. Good luck.
I ran out of cover space for my stuff so i built a lean to off my garage for 5 hun. I used heavy oil barrel pallets for the floor so it's 5 inches off the ground and 1/4 plywood on the walls,2x4 studs, insulated, had enough insulation from house reno 15 yrs ago. Tin roofing,and made my own door out of steel studs for light weight. Made it for my motorcycles originaly but discoved my rpu fits in there. 14'6 x7'3. tight but it goes in there. I;m happy.
urt, You are getting some great ideas for your car shed ! Will check back to see what ideas you get. Min is like my car corral. Take two garage door and mount them at 90 degrees to the outside walls and all tin roof. Good idea to have someone with a tractor level the ground . . . .
You better check with your city before throwing any money around...my Dad got halfway through putting up one of those tarp and pole garages you can get at the home improvement stores and they told him he needed a permit and permission...even though it's a temporary structure...lots of red tape bullshit to get through these days with the local bureaucracy...good luck...
You might take a look a the car tents, or portable car garages. Fabric and frame. There might be a line that has a snow rating?
In this area almost every car lot has metal sheds for sale for from 700 to 2000 bucks depending on the design That is metal frame and metal roof. They are considered to be portable so permits aren't needed. Like the one on the right at the top of the photos on this page http://www.carports.com/ I have seen a few of those locally that the owners have enclosed. Not totally cheap but they make a pretty presentable car shed when viewed from the street. There is one like the one on the top left of the photos set up here locally and that enclosed area makes for a pretty nice workshop if you don't want to enclose the whole thing. You might look into building your own wood frame and having a local corrugated metal shop cut metal to size or see what they have in their blem and leftover pile. Then there are always the Costco or Harbor freight metal frame setups with fabric tops and sides. not too secure but they keep the car covered and hidden if they have sides and ends. Usually around 200. I have seen one of those frames that a guy covered with corrugated metal and it passes the 50 ft test pretty well. I think he added wood strips to the frame before putting the metal on though.
I'm not pro-government bureaucracy (far from it), but there really are good reasons to require building permits. A sub-standard/makeshift shed can be an accident waiting to happen, not to mention the tackiness of them. Real estate values, as we all know have diminished greatly, all we need is for our neighbors to start throwing up tarp buildlngs which drives down our property values even more. Hard to sell a house these days, especially if your neighbors place looks like crap. Do it right, or don't do it. Just sayin'.
In Michigan. Anything larger than 100 sq ft. (10 x 10) or requires a concrete base requires a permit. They do check and do levy fines by a per day basis..
Getting ready to build a lean too off the side of my house-very interested to see more ideas on this thread! I do agree though it should be safe and eye-appealing for yourself and neighbors.
You might try and look at old truck bodies. Truck wholesalers have them, maybe even a damaged one that they would like to get rid of. Try a junkyard or a truck body shop. Another choice is cargo containers. All the above have doors on them and a good snow carrying capacity Paint them white or green to hide in with the shrubbery and even paint on windows with curtains for the neighbors to view. If it faces the street, put a false peak on the top front.
some metal roofing ideas, i ran an ad on craigslist for free tin sheds, well i had to take the ad off because i could not bring them all home, i stopped at 5, theres lots of roofing material in an 8x8 shed, also one piece metal garage doors, there around 7ft high by 7-1/2ft wide, i see them for free all the time.
Sometimes I feel like I have no space, then I read about y'all with lean to sheds. And my 20 x 25 shop looks bigger for a while.
You could use metal roofing for the roof. Its easy and faster then using shingles. Sometimes cheaper.
I live on 31 acres in south Tn- I don't have to ask anybody anything. Why do people buy houses in places where you have to have approval for what color you're going to paint your shutters?
Its the old work in the city for the big $ jobs, then spend all the $ on a house near the city. 31 acres, I would check into shipping containers (box on the back of the semi trailer) great storage, theres a dedicated group of people building houses from them and fighting the building code pusher to allow it, WTF its an engineered structure built to do 70 mph. If you already have 4 x 6, build a pole barn style lean to, use 2 x 6 for the roof, set the posts in concrete, Tarp it off for now, deck the roof and sheet the sides when you find materials cheap or free. I see garage doors free on craigslist a lot
My neighbors didn't like my blue tarps so replaced the with camo tarps--- completely hidden from sight now.
Use discarded privacy fence pannels for the walls. There's usually enough good pannels to do a shed when someone replaces thier entire fence around a yard.
man , what ever ya do just make sure its safe & your shit don't get damaged or you get hurt. tear something down for the lumber is a good idea. good luck