I build my project bike in my back room, but the growing family needed the space so I had to relocate to the shed.
hmmm
This is my shed- ….it’s not my dream workshop. Small and damp.
I decided to replace it.
Things are never that simple, I decided to get rid of the old wooden shed too, and re-model the car port too.
First I knocked down the wooden shed and dismantled the car port.
I dismantled the whole car port and using the bits reassembled it to a different design. I removed the central post from between the two bays and fitted a long beam (two 6 x 2 beams bolted and glued together) to support the roof in a single span.
Now I I knocked down the old block shed. Wife got a bit stressed when I was standing on the roof bashing the walls in. It remained standing with surprisingly little wall left.
I realised at one point that the old garden wall was swaying quite badly- the old shed was providing a lot of support to it.
I put all the stuff into a skip.
Isn’t the internet great?
I found some asbestos in the shed ceiling- it looked like hardboard but wasn’t. On the back was some ident numbers and I searched the web to work out what I should do. It turned out what I thought was “asbestos†was just cement sheet and so could go in the skip with the other stuff.
Eventually I had a clear site.
Looking at the big old garden wall I decided to do a little pointing to stop it rotting further. I decided to put the shed right up against the wall to give the wall some support. I’ll tar the back face of the shed to make it waterproof as I put it up.
First thing to put down was a new concrete base. This was a little more complicated than it needed to be for a couple of reasons. 1) the base was more than 9 feet from the gate so the mixer lorry couldn’t put its load directly in and 2) I needed a shallow “pit†in the floor.
The end fence is owned by the council, but as it was a concrete panel fence I decided that the best course of action would be to simply lift out some of the sections so that the mixer could pump directly onto the base. I made a big old A frame crane thing from the roof timers of the old shed and equipped with some tie down straps which I slotted between the panels I could hang on the end of the lifting frame and lift the concrete panels away without a problem. Actually it was really easy.
What was not so easy was the pit.
My new shed is not that big- I can’t get the bike lift in, and the ramp fitted, and have a bike length in front of the ramp to push the bike on. I experimented on several occasions but couldn’t get it all to fit- even if I used the open door. Actually the lift only just fitted with space around it (when up) if I put it in on the diagonal.
To get around loading the bike I decided to let the bike lift into the floor- so when it was down it was flush to the floor surface. That way I could roll the bike onto it from any angle.
All I had to do was mark on the ground the exact position of the pit I needed (on the diagonal) an then shutter it. Oh, and add enough concrete so it was deep enough to make the lift flush with the floor of the shed I didn’t yet have.
After lots of research and thinking- I cut the slot in the old shed base and shuttered the new hole and then the whole shed profile.
I put a piece of timer against the big wall that represented the depth of the concrete- that way I had a surface for the tamping bar.
I fitted a damp proof membrane and the mixer came along one morning and poured 3 ½ cubic meters of concrete.
It was slightly more than I needed and so I made a little ramp outside where the door would be to help me get the bikes in and out (it was a curved ramp so that the exhaust doesn’t ground out).
So here it is, ready for the shed.
