We are planning to spend an extended weekend with my daughter and Son-in-law in deepest Dorset. They have recently moved into a big old farmhouse which he gets as part of his salary as a farm manager. It has the advantage that the old farm office in the house is no longer being used so he has put it to use as a workshop. I am currently building him a new workbench as his Christmas present (if the snow melts enough for me to get to my workshop - walking with a stick is a bit dicey in the snow!) He currently is custodian of my Wolseley WD2 which had to be disassembled when they moved house, so I suspect we may be playing with that on boxing day!
We are spending Christmas Day with son, daughter in law & grandson. Boxing Day with daughter and son-in-outlaw. 27th is the Wessex SEC Mince Pie Crank up (this year at The Court Hotel at Emborough) rest of the week reading & watching what I've been given by Santa then the Bristol &South Glos SEC crank up at Frog Farm on 3rd.
Noon in Bristol - still no snow .........
Regards,
Kim Siddorn
"THE DOUGLAS STATIONARY ENGINE RESOURCE (admin)" wrote in message news: snipped-for-privacy@brightview.co.uk...
17:00 in Bedfordshire and knee deep in the stuff, how do you know you are reading and watching, its supposed to be a surprise. All the family is to descend on my sisters for two days, my wife and I are stopping with mummy as she lives around the corner from my sister. Then on the 30th I'm going to play with Gary Milward and his brother, in between I have to get a bush finished and posted off and also strip a D a H1 pump and get it all back together.
Plenty of good food, see how my nutmeg whiskey and chilli vodka have turned out. Made the latter with scotch bonnet last year - very hot but with a sort of composty taste, trying cayenne this time.
I usually have some sort of worshop project lined up but nothing specific this year so just a bit of unfocused tinkering and if the weather is conducive I can hopefully do a bit if ground work towards new engine shed :-) What sort of sleepers should I use as a base (in contact with damp ground) - good old BR creosoted pine or the continental hardwood variety.
My method is simpler. Dig off grass to a depth of a few inches, lay sand, lay plastic barrier, more sand, tread down and level off with a board then lay paving slabs. Erect the shed on the paving slabs, job done.
I don't want to lay a solid slab but I hadn't thought of concrete sleepers. Just had quick look and they seem to be available for around the same price as reclaimed tree wood ones - though at 250kg ea they would be rather more difficult to handle.
Don't want to lay a solid slab but I hadn't thought of concrete sleepers. Just had quick look and they seem to be available for around the same price as reclaimed tree wood ones - though at 250kg ea they would be rather more difficult to handle.
I think reclaimed concrete sleepers would be seriously OTT for a shed - unless you intended restoring Tiger tanks within it :-)
Actually you can get concrete lintels or sleepers (not sure what the proper name is) designed for sitting domestic type sheds on, they are much lighter than railway sleepers and won't bsugger you up carting them around. Also the timber yard near me sells brand new oak railway sleepers that would be good, they would surely slice in half so you get two for the price of one...
I'm concerned not so much the load bearing capabilities of which wooden sleepers have plenty, but longevity in contact with the ground. I had assumed hardwood would be best but others have opined that well creosoted softwood should out perform it in that respect.
The shed BTW is to be one of those interlocking 'log cabin' kits.
Pressure treated timber is normally guaranteed for 15 years though this period seems to be reducing all the time. Beware that dipped timber is a different treatment. Don't cut it after treatment if possible.
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the best life, I would go with a concrete base on a damp proof membrane. Power float or well trowelled finish then paint to seal it. Oh, and make it thick enough, 4" is a normal minimum. A sheet of weld mesh costs very little and adds a lot of strength especially if the shed is anything but small. I assume yours isn't. The down side of a concrete base is that it attracts condensation in the spring as the air warms up faster than the ground. As allways, it's a trade off somewhere. Good luck.
Shed kit itself has a timber floor so I'm hoping to avoid some of the condensation problems I have with my concrete floored workshop. The question is what to put between this and the ground, I favour reclaimed sleepers but what sort?
I came across some new bridging timbers which where 300mm by 360mm douglas fir treated with some organic copper preservative ( the modern form of tanalising free of chromium or arsenic).
The offcuts looked handy, about 600mm long, but the engineer needed a consignment note for them as they were considered hazardous waste. I imagine old creosote sleepers have the same problem.
I'd not use second hand sleepers. You have no means of knowing if the treatment used will not leech toxic gas into an enclosed environment, especially when it gets good & hot in the summer!
New concrete in contact with oak is not good. They react with each other to the detriment of both - particularly the oak.
As has been recommended by CRN & John, lay a damp proof membrane (DPM) of heavy black polythene (type) plastic, thus "tanking" what is above it. Float in a concrete base (I agree about bracing with rod) to at least 4" depth. Redimix is better than hand mixed as it is consistent & you can order spec according to use.
If there are machine tools to fix to it, make up wooden patterns of the footprint(s) and fit suitable captive bolts to the patterns. To fit our hefty steel 4.1 metre gates at Wychurst, we prepped wooden footprints, bent galvanized steel studding through a right angle & concreted them into a cubic metre of hand mixed stuff.
We are intending to scrape out the stamped earth floor in the Longhall this year, fit a DPM and joist into the cill beams in order to fit a boarded floor. We were lucky enough to obtain 1,000 pressure treated ( not just dipped) softwood planks intended for scaffolding from a bankrupt woodyard & these will also double up to form the joists. If you are forced to cut treated planks, it can do no harm to paint the cut ends with Cuprinol Five Star or similar.
Although it is technically no longer available in the EU, old fashioned creosote is still available. I've found it in 'cheap shops' like "What?" and no doubt others too. BTW, they also had shelves full of 100 watt filament bulbs!
Finally, what is the local position on planning permission for garden sheds?
Kim, creosote is available, it's just not available in retail stores. I buy
5 gallon drums from a farm fence and gate supplier with no bother at all, in fact he delivers it for me! Don't be duped by the stuff you see in builder's merchants, B&Q and cheap stores - on close inspection you'll probably find it's called (something like) ''Creotreat'' and is some substitute based on oil rather than coal tar, lasts 5 minutes.......
BTW, they also had shelves full of 100 watt
E-bay too for good old fashioned bulbs, I've just purchased some 200 watt bulbs, finally I can read magazines properly again in the living room :-)
Sleepers are for base - suspended floor over that with ventilation in between. I do like reclaimed sleepers, dad has had a shed on similar base for upwards of 30 years with no sign of deterioration (shed stays bone dry too). But those are on stacks of paving slabs (to level sloping site) rather than in direct contact with ground - yes I could do the same but I'd be in danger of exceeding the 2.5m height limit for permitted developments!
Significant changes as of last October, all checked out on planning portal and good to go!
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