Internal room skeleton idea?

Threaded plumbing and fittings: T's, elbows, etc. 1/2" or less for lighting, 1" + for load bearing stuff. Gets pricey after a while, tho. Man, did I cry when I realized what that pipe rack made out of plumbing fittings really cost me.... wow.... If you had a welder, you could limit the plumbing to dis-assemble-able portions, and weld the rest in much cheaper tubing, w/ minimal fittings.

Might could do w/ aircraft/steel cable/turnbuckles for the lighting, iffin you had solid supports to attach to.

Yep.... good idea

Then I could move everything real easy huh

Hey Me,

You might consider using a bunch of heavy duty knock-together shelving units. The kind with key-holes and 1/4 pins. Put up two and hang hard-board or better yet peg-board between them, and you got lots of strength, stability, and design options, and hanging options. Get them all the same, and you can stack them from floor to ceiling to create "rooms". heck, you cam make bunk beds from them too! I don't think I'd hang a hinged door from them, but a pocket/sliding type of light-weight material would be fine.

Take care.

Brian Lawson, Bothwell, Ontario.

Yep that might work

And be very cheap as well

Yeah PV but can you imagine drilling all those f'ing holes? LOL I guess it wouldn't be so bad if you only put in the ones you needed at the time.

Gosh, used pallet racks go pretty cheap around here. Not much more than the scrap value from what I've seen.

Really?

I've seen light weight metal shelving not that expensive

Cheapness is in the eye of the beholder. :) Actually, you can find these shelving units often scrapped in junkyards. The punched grey stuff, w/ sheet metal shelves, about 12 or 18" by 36", are at least $80 a "unit", new--a few years ago here in Brooklyn, NY. Scrapped, they ought to be near-pennies.

Also, apropos of JR Carroll's usual perspicacity, you don't need punched angle iron either, iffin yer willing to drill the attaching holes yerself in regular angle iron, also available in scrap yards--and from all those bed frames you see thrown out in yer local ghetto. With wheels! Must from the regular evictions'n'shit.

Agree

What I'm looking for is kind of a poor mans adult "erector set"

Someone else suggested using Unit strut....and there products would work just fine

But I'm trying to think out of box here and use something modular, cheap, and scalable,

Again.... goal is to create all sizes and shapes of internal structures in a room. Structures capable of supporting some weight and used to hang a variety of things from.

I like that! Kinda rolls of the tongue.

SNIP

SNIP

Hey PV,

The good stuff like that is called Dexion, although I see lots of clones at the big stores now-a-days.

And somebody mentioned Uni-strut. Way too expensive, especially if you intend to use their assembly hardware. Although, with the proper cap pieces slid on/in, it can be used in some cases as duct, but the pre-punched stuff is really big bucks.

My suggestion about the "key-hole" shelving was to use the good stuff, rated for at least 300 pounds per shelf. The light -weight economy stuff is great AS SHELVING if you already have something to fasten it to, to keep it upright and steady plus an additional wood or something as a "liner" to top those paper-thin shelves with.

Take care.

Brian Lawson, Bothwell, Ontario. XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

I will check into Dexion

Point taken on Unistrut being way too expensive

Understand

Thanks!

How about using steel studs like they use in commercial buildouts these days? They're mass produced from folded sheet steel so they're cheap, they pin together and they already have the holes for wiring runs in them. Build the internal frame, get everything working and then, if you get tired of the industrial look, you can put up drywall on the inside where you want / need it.

Jim

Good idea!

Again.... this is just a thought experiment at the moment

It may be something I think abt using for doing a business in an older building tho

They are fairly light as well, correct?

One man could handle them?

Extremely light, and not a lot of resistance to twisting. They need to be in a fairly well self-supporting system to be structural. I'd go with the pipe system idea myself.

I built the walls in my hangar with steel studs.

The screws can be a bit of a challenge to start - at first - because the flanges flex a bit under pressure.

There are two "sizes" - thickness of metal - interior and exterior.

But it's the sweetest setup for working alone.

If you want to do wall "sections", lay them out on the floor where a ladder isn't necessary.

Then stick the sections together as desired...

Someday I hope I'll build my new house this way.

Steel shell, steel roof, steel stud interior for dry wall, stone, steel and and glass exterior.

But what if you construct a "box" with them? A box big enough to create a skeleton just inside the room

Wont spreading the stress over the structure work?