The Ideal Shed Thread

[Duncan Gibbs]

Gary (WX) would win hands down! I'll have to real a few shots off of his set-up when I'm there on Saturday. He'd better not try and tidy up... Oh wait! That would be next to impossible given the time allowed!

[Larks]

Um , we don't tell them .

Better to beg forgiveness than grovel for permission eh?

[RFNK]

That's right! I try to avoid ever having anything to do with council! But with a new house build, Bernadette doesn't have much choice. I sympathise!!

Rick

[Larks]

That's right! I try to avoid ever having anything to do with council! But with a new house build, Bernadette doesn't have much choice. I sympathise!!

Rick

She's also a little less "back woods" and hidden where she is, and perhaps more likely to want to sell and trade up at some time in the future, in which case everything really does need to be on the books.

[Duncan Gibbs]

Ahhh'm in da gawwwddddaaaang booooon docks har ahhh am!

[waltwood]

I like seeing pics of other shops so here is mine. It is 30' x 50' and the large doors are 9' wide. A larger boat would have to be built outside like the one on my thread "Building an Oyster Barge".

[Duncan Gibbs]

As I said on your thread Waltwood, lovely set up and space you've got there. I'd reckon you could build a bigger boat in the shop, but you'd need to take advantage of the slope down to the doors and create a split level by retaining the ground either side of the big doors and up to the other end of the shop. Just think: You could fit a Dragon in there! (Insert both grin & wry grin here)

Progress on mine: Managed to get the only builder at the EBS on the weekend, a really nice guy called David (friend of Rick's) to help me install the latest batch of windows hinged to their frames by Whitcos.













A small adjustment is needed to the middle end one but considering the speed with which we put then in I think it's pretty okay overall.

Two more frames to make, fit with windows and install now.

[WX]

Gary (WX) would win hands down! I'll have to real a few shots off of his set-up when I'm there on Saturday. He'd better not try and tidy up... Oh wait! That would be next to impossible given the time allowed!

You didn't take any and it seems I don't have any distance shots of it either...I'll take one.
Here it is, an early morning shot.

[waltwood]

Duncan, Thanks for the kind words about my shop. Sorry I did not respond the first time but was busy with my daughters wedding which happened this past weekend. This is a long thread and people are really enjoying it, it is going to take me a while to read it all and get up to speed. What is a Whitco?

[Duncan Gibbs]

A Whitco hinge is a friction stay type of hinge:



A small rebate is let into the top and bottom of each window to attach the stay part and house the slider when the window is closed. The slider gets attached to the frame. Lovely things... Just don't paint them!

[Duncan Gibbs]

Northern elevation one third clad with iron around the base and all the windows fitted:



From inside:



And the cabling for the first two permanent circuits run:



There'll be a 15 amp circuit with two plugs at either end of the shed and a 10 amp circuit with 10 double sockets, both run along the north side.

As an aside my table saw rise and fall stub axle which connects to the worm via gears has sheared at the handle locking pin:



It means the first good clean-out the saw has ever had since I bought it, as well as fixing a niggling problem with the arbor worm as well.



I'm thinking of getting a new shaft turned and a keyway put in to the shaft and handle to reduce the likelihood of this happening again.

[PeterSibley]

Bring it up and I'll fix it for you .... I hope .

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

Walt's shop just pisses me off

Duncan, I love your build... it's funky and lots of light. I like my shop, but lately I am having serious desires for more space... sadly I have no land for it. Hmmm maybe the wife and I are moving.

[Larks]

I'm very envious of all those windows Duncan!!!

[Sailor]

This thread about your incredible thread is MANY times longer than a lot of build threads. And its not done yet. Keep at it. We're looking for the completed shed too you know!

[Duncan Gibbs]

I was thinking about your observation Sailor, and legitimate though it is, you have to realise that I'm suffering terribly from the "one-of-usness" (AKA "The Sickness") that The Lemmonyfresh one nailed to me upon seeing the trusses strapped to the top of my car. In that picture alone is a clue: Trusses equate to another building... A second carport for my car which currently resides in the shed entry and large quantities of timber that I've milled. Now, I have more logs that need milling, and probably more logs coming. I've got a Dragon in the shed that needs finishing. We've just opened up the hillside pictured a couple of pages ago with an excavator where we want to terrace the slope, retain it with treated logs and iron and espalier fruit trees to the tops of the logs with wire strung between. I've also cut the keel for Erica and have a verandah to corble off the side of the house and... wait for it... Shelves to put up!

I need five of me!

[Larks]

I need five of me!

Jeez mate...do you really think the world is ready to be blessed with five Duncans'??? Heaven forbid!!

[Duncan Gibbs]

Cladding 50% done including the iron:



Powerpoints along one side wired up and live:



I've got two 15 amp points at either end:



So this means I've been able to fire up this beasty for the first time:



The blades are sharp as and the machine runs beautifully.

More soon!

[Duncan Gibbs]

Time for an update! I've received a free 'donger' (aka, portable site office) that I'll be putting in place on Friday, and as a requirement I've had to shift a pile of timber. I've taken that as a cue to build my first set of timber racks at the entry of the shed.





I've begun cladding the outside and this will continue all the way up to the roofline, helping to keep the stacks clear of leaves. It will also mean I can wrap some plastic around the exposed interior sides and fumigate the stacks at the first sign of anti-timber nasties.



Half filled:



I've since filled the lower two racks with another pile, but the shot I took was completely out of focus and not good enough to post here, esteemed crowd you all are.

[m2c1Iw]

Cool and still room for another boat.

[johnno]

......and a few possums Looks great Dunc!

[RFNK]

I think that's donga. A donger's that wee thing you've always had.

Racks look great!


Rick

[Garret]

I think that's donga. A donger's that wee thing you've always had.

Racks look great!


Rick

I was gonna say "nice rack" but I thought it might get me in trouble - then I remembered you guys are Aussies.....

[andrewpatrol]

Love the shed Dunc, now do tell more about "Erica" or is she the Dragon

[PeterSibley]

......and a few possums Looks great Dunc!

and a carpet snake or two .

[Larks]

Good stuff Duncan! Are you still going to do the cantilevered (if that's the right term) roller door? Just wondering how you might keep the weather off the one end of your stash.

[capefox]

My workshop is a 10 x 20 ft garage with 2 ft taken up by shelves covered in my wife's Xmas decorations. I'm sometimes afraid to use rubbing alcohol to clean tools and wood surfaces because the vapor concentration could easily get bad. I vent, use fans, remove rags quickly, etc.

[m2c1Iw]

I think that's donga. A donger's that wee thing you've always had.

Racks look great!


Rick

That one nearly went through to the keeper.

[Phil Y]

I reckon you're a bit of a mad bastard dunc. I somehow missed this thread till now. Great looking shed, cept the flat roof. Yuk. Lots of light though and great ventilation. Perfect up your way. Or down your way. Whatever.

[purri]

Needs at least a 20 foot ceiling for at least one big build with cross travel 3 phase hoists, a true and fair slab for lofting and lotsa snake freeways with insect screens all around the windows that open.

[P.L.Lenihan]

With the luxury of so much space, Mr.Gibbs, I do, most certainly do, hope you will see to it you have a proper corner office(nothing fancy, about 32 square feet, a 4 X 8, will do) behind whose windowless door will be two simple chairs, one simple desk and perhaps even a few simple shelves for boat books and boat plans etc...Inside the largest drawer on your simple desk will reside elixirs most tasty and alluring, with no more than 3 drinking glasses.
Then, good sir, when friends/family/inlaws and royalty come a calling, you will always have at least 2 options:

a) escape to your private "office" for business purposes, with the DO NOT DISTURB sign at eye level.
b) invite the rotter to share some juice and tell each other lies 'till the moon light begins to reflect off that third glass I mentioned earlier.

If I lived closer, a whole lot closer, I would even consider paying you rent for a little nap nook up in the rafters where Nat would never think of looking. Ah yes, just me, the rafters, some ice and medicine....I could live forever like that!



Carry on Mr. Gibbs, very fine, funky, shop you're building, and do be careful. Accidents sometimes happen near the end of big projects, just when we begin to feel too full of hubris and booze!




Cheers!


Peter

[Duncan Gibbs]

Love the shed Dunc, now do tell more about "Erica" or is she the Dragon

Thanks Andrew! The Dragon is called Looe and she needs my attention, but in the words of Mr Cole Porter, it's just too Damned Hot! Erica is but a figment, living only on paper that you can see in the Designs and Plans section of this good forum, although I have kind off shaped up the keel for her... You know... Just in case I ever run out of things to do around here.

Good stuff Duncan! Are you still going to do the cantilevered (if that's the right term) roller door? Just wondering how you might keep the weather off the one end of your stash.

The door is going to be split in the middle and roll off in two halves to either side. Not much hits that end of the rack, although I was thinking of rigging up a kind of flap/door to the end as well. I have a bit of an industrial relic from Wagga to hang in the entry soon...

I reckon you're a bit of a mad bastard dunc.

I reckon you're right Phil!

Needs at least a 20 foot ceiling for at least one big build with cross travel 3 phase hoists, a true and fair slab for lofting and lotsa snake freeways with insect screens all around the windows that open.

I need a bucket of cash before anything else Rick. The insects are the least of my worries as far as animal life getting in: It's the chooks that are the real terror.

With the luxury of so much space, Mr.Gibbs, I do, most certainly do, hope you will see to it you have a proper corner office(nothing fancy, about 32 square feet, a 4 X 8, will do) behind whose windowless door will be two simple chairs, one simple desk and perhaps even a few simple shelves for boat books and boat plans etc...Inside the largest drawer on your simple desk will reside elixirs most tasty and alluring, with no more than 3 drinking glasses.
Then, good sir, when friends/family/inlaws and royalty come a calling, you will always have at least 2 options:

a) escape to your private "office" for business purposes, with the DO NOT DISTURB sign at eye level.
b) invite the rotter to share some juice and tell each other lies 'till the moon light begins to reflect off that third glass I mentioned earlier.

If I lived closer, a whole lot closer, I would even consider paying you rent for a little nap nook up in the rafters where Nat would never think of looking. Ah yes, just me, the rafters, some ice and medicine....I could live forever like that!



Carry on Mr. Gibbs, very fine, funky, shop you're building, and do be careful. Accidents sometimes happen near the end of big projects, just when we begin to feel too full of hubris and booze!




Cheers!


Peter

Ahhhhrggghh now Mr Lemmonyfresh! Let me tell ye a tale! And let me begin with one of your favourite pictures...


























Now, ya meremba this? Well just behind that august automobile of mine is the site to which those trusses pictured on it's roof have been assigned a permanent home, but there is an order of works in play. For taking up the space up until last Thursday and Friday was the "Wee Garage" that housed the ride-on lawn mower, a big pile of timber slabs and flitches, one stand of black clumping bamboo and two medium sized Eucalyptus trees of the species E. toreliana, being a weed species from Far North Queensland. Now our one and only chance to fell these two 20 metre high trees was before this office, of which you speak so desirously was to be installed. As well the "Wee Garage" and pile of timber now sitting nicely in the new racks had to be removed and the bamboo pruned low, dug out and replanted. All this in the stupid, stupid, stupid heat... But you'll need some picture proof of all this...

Here is the newly emptied space, achieved with chainsaw, brute force, lots of grunting and swearing and a 12 tonne excavator:





Ripe now for the trusses to be installed on a future pediment when a bit more cash comes our way.

Now, I know you're thinking to yourself, "What's this Gibbs bloke rabbeting on about? Trusses? Torelianas? Where on earth is this heading?" Well, as I said opposite the newly emptied space is the site for this office of which you wax so lyrically. As it happens I have this mate up in Queensland who calls me "The Mexican" because I'm always on the lookout for (put on accent now) 'a bunch of stuaff!' He's the one who gave me the trusses. Anyway he gave me this:



THE OFFICE! Please note the windowless door. I know it's not actually in the shed, but it's literally a hop, skip and a jump away from it...



It's going to be painted the same colour as the shed windows and have a large awning fitted over its roof. Then there's the fitting out to do, an wiring it up to the leak-trickery, putting a couple of windows on the other side and getting a little AC unit to put in the purpose made hole at one end. It also has some pretty good storage underneath it:



I have some ideas for incorporating timber storage off either end as well...

[Larks]

Brilliant Duncan, great score!!

But,......ahhhh,... I have to ask.........what happened to that big pile of green waste that was laying just below where the conga landed????

[Duncan Gibbs]

It's quite visible in the top shot of the newly empty space, just awaiting cool weather, the chainsaw and a mulcher.

[Alland]

What is a snake freeway.

[P.L.Lenihan]

Dear Mr.Gibbs,

I do indeed member dat photo of the da truss topped car...God the nightmares I had after looking at it too! But that was the past and by all evidence, you Sir, have outdone my wildest hopes and expectations in the present, not to mention creating a wicked streak of envy deep within my person! A friend actually ga...ga...ga...gave you that office!?! Good Lord, Mr.Gibbs!! You must have done something terribly right in another life, Sir!! And it is the same fellow who gave you those trusses also?!?! Do whatever you may and whatever you must but do keep this good mans' trust!! Who knows...he may one day give you a boat to boot!

O.K...breathing deeply....I've just now managed another calming dose of medicine and can bring myself to ask you, if it is not too indiscrete nor too soon, but what will the over night rates be for a single bunk in your office should a bloody tourist show up and need some basic lodging. Also, will curtains be provided or will the tourist have to come equipped?

Cheers!



Peter...busy gnashing his tooth and sitting on his thumbs to keep the green witch of envy at bay........

[RFNK]

As it happens I have this mate up in Queensland who calls me "The Mexican" because I'm always on the lookout for (put on accent now) 'a bunch of stuaff!' He's the one who gave me the trusses

No it's not - it's because you like Melbourne.

Rick

[m2c1Iw]

You did get development approval for that structure didn't you Mr.Gibbs. I ask only because I've just been given the run around by our council over the location of four transportables on our property located only for twelve months while we do some major building upgrades on another site. You'd think we were building multi story apartments with all the hoo hah they required.

[Larks]

It's quite visible in the top shot of the newly empty space, just awaiting cool weather, the chainsaw and a mulcher.

I see, I didn't pick that it's actually in a different spot than the donga and it didn't seem like something that you'd do to park the donga in front of something like that.....

so, geographically speaking, how is the donga opposite the cleared space? I thought the containers would be opposite the donga, or is the cleared space up on the driveway to the house???

[Larks]

What is a snake freeway.

It's what leads to a snake holiday resort like that pile of cleared trees in #582

[P.L.Lenihan]

It's what leads to a snake holiday resort like that pile of cleared trees in #582

there goes another mouth ful of supper all over the damned table! Yer killing me Greg!

[Duncan Gibbs]

O.K...breathing deeply....I've just now managed another calming dose of medicine and can bring myself to ask you, if it is not too indiscrete nor too soon, but what will the over night rates be for a single bunk in your office should a bloody tourist show up and need some basic lodging. Also, will curtains be provided or will the tourist have to come equipped?

I'm sure we could find window dressings to suit sudden arrivals from tundras afar, and the rate would be equal measures of medicines to be consumed by said bloody tourist. It should have a nautical library, along with a collection of National Geographic magazines going back to the very early 1960s.

No it's not - it's because you like Melbourne.

Notwithstanding the fact I am, actually, from Melbourne!

You did ....

What was that Mike? The rest of that text went terribly blurry for some obscure reason, despite trying to refresh the page a number of times!

so, geographically speaking, how is the donga opposite the cleared space? I thought the containers would be opposite the donga, or is the cleared space up on the driveway to the house???

The latter it is Greg: The containers are on the terrace below the driveway that you can enter off its dogleg halfway up.

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

The way I see it is that Duncan has been totally responsible in putting that office there. Look at the labels people!!! First Aid, emergency phone numbers, it's a bloody clinic in the yard!!!

(always fun to see how you're coming along)

[Larks]

It's going to be painted the same colour as the shed windows

Mate if you can paint that donga transparent what the hell are you doing in landscaping?...Defence wants you now!!!............................

[m2c1Iw]

The way I see it is that Duncan has been totally responsible in putting that office there. Look at the labels people!!! First Aid, emergency phone numbers, it's a bloody clinic in the yard!!!

(always fun to see how you're coming along)

Strike me pink and the helipad for the medivac is all levelled out front to, gawd Dunc don't you dare sharpen those chisels anymore not that we have doubt whatsoever about your safety record in the shed it's for the helpers .....right you caring soul you.

[The Bigfella]

Hey Dunc... some ideas for you mate.....

[PeterSibley]

Strike me pink and the helipad for the medivac is all levelled out front to, gawd Dunc don't you dare sharpen those chisels anymore not that we have doubt whatsoever about your safety record in the shed it's for the helpers .....right you caring soul you.

Very safety concious is our Duncan .

[62816inBerlin]

National Geographic Magazine 1960s - 1980s

I'm sure we could find window dressings to suit sudden arrivals from tundras afar, and the rate would be equal measures of medicines to be consumed by said bloody tourist. It should have a nautical library, along with a collection of National Geographic magazines going back to the very early 1960s.

.....

Now I could help with those. Memories of hours spent poring through articles describing far-off places like Europe and Australia (we lived in Trinidad at the time) have stopped me taking the whole load to the local tip or putting them in the paper recycling bin...
No idea what shipping them to OZ would cost, however, they weigh a ton!

Cheers,

Gernot

[RFNK]

No need to sweat it Gernot - we already have them in abundance.

But Duncan, as it is a medical facility, shouldn't the coffee table have a pile of Wellbeing and No Idea magazines?

Rick

[Duncan Gibbs]

Not this one Rick! No Sir! This one is different: Special if you will, as it now has a strong association with a boat building shed. I think I shall place all the issues with nautical stories in them in a separate pile, with the two that cover Robin Lee Graham and his remarkable voyage in the Lapworth 24 Dove right at the top of it.

Is Ian suggesting I outfit the shed to work on the two wheeled variety of infernal confusion engine vehicles??? Ideal? Hurumph!!!