Good Outline, Bad Plans: the Build Your Own Shed Manual
Written: Nov 06 '02 (Updated Dec 17 '06)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: provides an adequate outline for planning your shed project
Cons: undependable blueprints, cursory treatment of new topics
The Bottom Line: The manual may contain a good outline of the steps in building a storage shed, but it's mostly a vehicle for selling suspect blueprints.
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| scmrak's Full Review: Build Your Own Shed Manual |
For just two people, the Ms and I seem to have accumulated an enormous amount of "stuff" in our lives. I blame her, she blames me, but the plain fact is that the two of us can barely fit all of our junk into a 2400-sqft house. Of course, the lack of either a basement or a useable attic means that all our off-season clothes and toys (skis and the like) must be stored in our rather limited closet space. A complication is the lack of any storage space anywhere in the house substantially bigger than a breadbox -- there are a zillion drawers and shelves, but no big, empty rooms.
Our garage has always been especially crowded: having nearly an acre of land to maintain requires storage space for the garden tools and implements like a wheelbarrow and riding mower; but fitting two cars, four bicycles, riding mower, and a fairly complete woodshop into our two-car garage resulted in a system that resembled the game of Jenga: you never knew when removing one item would cause all the others to come crashing to the floor.
So I decided to build a storage shed in my back yard. At least some of all that crap, errr, stuff could go there. So we set off to the local Big Box of Lumber and Hardware, where we looked through their selection of DIY books on sheds. We brought home a couple, pored over the contents for a weekend, and then got to work. We ordered a set of plans out of the UCanDo Build Your Own Shed Manual. {NOTE: this title has been republished by Home Design Alternatives, but there is no difference in the text.] The blueprints came in the mail within about five days, and then the real work began. I used this manual and a book out of the TimeLife home improvement series as guides for the project.
Follow the Steps
The Build Your Own Shed Manual's layout is designed to guide the builder through his or her construction project from the ground up and from the outside in. The first 44 pages of the book take you through the project from site planning and preparation to construction to finishing; then there are thirty sample shed plans and instructions for ordering blueprints. Scattered throughout the text are drawings of typical sheds, and there's also a glossary of common terms. The steps in building a shed (according to UCanDo) are:
Planning Your Shed: which includes deciding on both the site and style of your shed, with discussion of proper placement.
Layout of the Shed Site: site preparation and leveling are covered, and then a discussion of how to lay out the site and stake the building's location. This is where you'll learn how to use the 3-4-5 right triangle to get square corners.
The Foundation: Choosing the base of your shed: this discusses choices in flooring, including wood skid/wood floor, concrete pier/wood floor, and concrete slab. There's also a section on how to mix and pour concrete.
Choosing Materials: UCanDo provides hints on choosing lumber - treated? engineered? what species? - and on selecting the fasteners used to construct your shed. You'll see a sample materials list, and a discussion of metal fasteners (tie plates, stud anchors, and other connectors) and their use.
Wall Framing: Here you'll find discussions of typical framing plans and what the blueprints mean, how to frame window and door openings, and how to build a frame component and move it into place. There are also tips and tricks for raising and squaring the walls.
Roof Framing and Sheathing: Cutting and erecting the rafters are covered here, along with more help in using metal connectors for the rafters. Addition of the roof decking follows. Ventilation -- turbines, gable vents, and soffit vents -- are covered here as well. There are special sections on gambrel and shed roofs.
Siding: How to add horizontal lap siding and vertical panel siding are covered, along with a quick discussion of using building paper as a vapor barrier. There are sections on treatments for the wall corners and the roof fascia and soffits.
Windows and Doors: Learn how to install pre-built doors and windows into the rough openings, and how to frame and build specialty doors, such as dutch doors.
Roof Treatments: How to install roofing felt and shingles, or corrugated roofing (metal or fiberglas).
Interior Treatments: Here, there are brief sections on electrical wiring and interior finishing, and building a ramp for getting large or heavy equipment into your shed.
In general, the book's instructions are clear, and they're moderately well illustrated with line drawings (no photographs). They're not particularly extensive -- 44 pages is definitely not enough to write a comprehensive guide to building a structure -- but a practiced do-it-yourselfer should be able to get through most of the steps without an excess of head-scratching. I found myself referring to other references a time or two, but never had to call my father-in-law (the master carpenter) for help!
The Plans
Besides the step-by-step instructions, UCanDo included thirty shed plans for which you can order blueprints. The designs range from simple boxes with a roof to fairly complex plans for a kids' playhouse with a porch and window boxes and a couple of greenhouses. There are the typical barns, and a poolside cabana. Each illustration has simple specifications for size and features.
The plans -- blueprints -- cost from $16 to $60 for one set plus $10 for a second set, with a minimum of $5 for shipping and handling. You can order them by mail or by phone, and either send a check or charge them to a major credit card. My plans came in about five days, though you can pay (through the nose) for overnight second-day delivery. Included in the plans are:
* materials list
* complete framing diagrams, with elevation drawings for all sides
* rafter (or truss) diagrams
* fully dimensioned detail drawings
* step-by-step instructions
My Experience
The text: I felt that the book was useful and provided a good outline for building my shed. I thought it could be a bit more comprehensive, though, as the text did not always answer my questions and was sometimes confusing.
The illustrations: The pictures are, by and large, quite simple - sometimes to the point of over-simplification. Where the text was lacking, better illustrations might have made new concepts a little clearer. Still, I was almost always able to puzzle through.
The plans: For the most part, the plans were clear and concise. I ran into three problems, one of which caused a great deal of pain later. First, the materials list was inaccurate, especially in the area of fasteners (way underestimated on nails) and roofing (quoted triple the amount of roofing shingles actually needed). Second, there was a major screw-up in the dimensions on my plan, which meant that I had to modify the blueprints to complete my construction. Third, the shed was not properly weathertight as designed, which meant that I had to tear out a wall two years after construction and replace all the framing and the windows. That was neither fun nor cheap.
Overall
If you're already a competent do-it-yourselfer, you should be able to follow the steps in the Build Your Own Shed Manual with no problems and build your own shed from the ground up. I don't recommend, though, purchasing the blueprints -- if you do, make certain that you check all dimensions (especially windows) and verify that everything adds up. All in all, though, I wouldn't recommend this as the primary reference for constructing a storage shed.
Note: For a more recent and more dependable reference book, I recommend Building a Shed from the Taunton Press's "Build Like a Pro" series. For more information, see my review
Recommended:
No
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