Shed advice

[Bob_H]

Howdy - I'm lucky to have ended up with a great shed at my new house in rural South Australia. It is divided into two halves and I am setting up the right hand end (12m x 7.5m) as a workshop for instrument building and general woodworking. This part of the shed also has a mezzanine floor 210 cm high against the right hand end of the shed, measuring 7.5 m by 3 m. The shed has loads of power points (three phase), plumbing and LED / fluro lighting.

The shed is not insulated and gets pretty warm when temperature head north of 30, and very unpleasant when north of 40 degrees (which I am told is to be expected quite often in summer). I am considering two pieces of work and would appreciate any advice on materials, insulating techniques, pitfalls etc from forum members:

1. Enclose the area under the mezzanine to create a 7.5m x 3m x 2.1m room for clean work, gluing and timber storage. This would include building a wall with a door to enclose the space, insulating and ventilating it, and possible air conditioning it.

2. Improving conditions in the larger shed for general machine and tool work - I presently have a standing band saw, thickness sander and bench top drill press, fine band saw and several workbenches.

Specific issues I am working through include how to best insulate the enclosed room (eg batts, foil board, moisture management issues), ventilation and humidity / temperature control of the enclosed room and possible approaches to cooling / insulating the larger work space (is it worth the effort?).

[WJ Guitars]

Hi Bob

I converted my old fibro double garage into a guitar workshop. I stripped back to the frame and insulated the roof, walls and floor. See youtube link.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJG8bx5qLYQ

For insulation and sound rating being in a residential area I used:
- Outer skin foil
- 30mm thick foam panel sheets (for greater insulation 50mm or greater is available)
- Wool batts
- Sandwich internal lining 12mm MDF board and 10mm Gyprock.
- The roof sheeting is metal colour bond sheets and the external walls are brick.
- Raised Timber floor with foam and wool batts on the concrete slab.
- Double glassed windows.`

At my location this installation treatment has proven to be very effective and also controls the noise of machines. No complaints yet from the adjoining residents. The sound rating may not be an issue at your location. I would recommend foil, foam sheeting, batts and gyrock wall lining in your mentioned right end enclosed area as a minimum treatment with air conditioning.

Wayne

[Bob_H]

I converted my old fibro double garage into a guitar workshop. I stripped back to the frame and insulated the roof, walls and floor. See youtube link.

A lot of great information there - I will take some time to look closely at what you have done.

Thanks, Bob

[nkforster]

Nice shed mate.

[Cutty]

I have shed envy - that would be room for my entire car collection and a bigger workshop

[Bob_H]

Nice shed mate.

Thanks - I got lucky - it was the house we wanted, in the location we wanted, and it had a huge, well built shed (the previous owner built sheds for a living!).

[Bob_H]

I have shed envy - that would be room for my entire car collection and a bigger workshop

Thanks. Making good use of a big space presents challenges, but it is a good starting point Keen to get good advice on approaches and then find myself a carpenter to help - getting a bit long in the tooth to learn all the skills needed to do it justice myself.

[jeffhigh]

Having a small, sealed, dehumidified room for assembly and pre assembly storage is a must IMHO.
All the other things like insulation, ventilation and Air con will make the place more comfortable for you but not necessarily reduce the Relative humidity to accepted levels.

[Bob_H]

Having a small, sealed, dehumidified room for assembly and pre assembly storage is a must IMHO.
All the other things like insulation, ventilation and Air con will make the place more comfortable for you but not necessarily reduce the Relative humidity to accepted levels.

Thanks Jeff - will look at the issue of humidity control as a priority issue

[kiwigeo]

My 3 x 6m workshop is in The Adelaide Hills. At first I had a dehumidifier running 24/7 to keep humidity under control...but found that all I was doing was racking up huge power bills. The shop is well insulated and I find that apart from during short periods of really cold weather or hot humid weather the RH generally stays between 30 and 50%.

Ive just finished a new house build..its a Passivhaus. The entire building envelope has a double membrane system that controls moisture and also makes the building air tight. The house is ventilated with a mechanical ventilation system that incorporates a heat recovery core. The membranes and the HRV system generally keep RH within the rang 40-50%. The Proclima membrane system I used may be of use if you want to exert tight control on a part of your building. There are small HRV units (eg Lunos) that are designed for small areas.

[TKAY]

Nice Shed but if not laid out practically will drive you up the wall in the future.
From designing darkrooms and farm workshops and even sheep yards, start with a largish, A3 minimum.drawing of outline to scale . Preferably graph paper plan, and then draw all machines,shelves,doorways etc on a similar scale on another sheet of fairly stiff card and cut them out.
Now you can build your virtual shed and find out whether material coming out of the saw hits the shelf/thicknesser etc.
For the sheepyards I had the basic size drawn on a large sheet,60cm plus corflute and had a sheet of Mylar as an overlay. This was fantastic to write on with chinagraph pencils even in the rain
Best of "luck"
Tom.

[WJ Guitars]

jeffhigh » Sat Jan 08, 2022 7:25 am

Having a small, sealed, dehumidified room for assembly and pre assembly storage is a must IMHO.
All the other things like insulation, ventilation and Air con will make the place more comfortable for you but not necessarily reduce the Relative humidity to accepted levels./quote]


For my dehumidified assembly room (re: Plan and Section view drawings posted), all the doors in the workshop have 'Raven' door seals that are fit around the door jamb and include a drop down seal to the floor. I also used mastic to seal around the lining sheet joints for the walls and the ceiling. I don't run my humidifier all the time. I have found that generally at my location the RH stays between 38% to 55%.

Before starting work with my tops and back and sides I run my dehumidifier for 2 weeks. The RH then stays around 45%. When the box is closed I switch the dehumidifier off. Generally, If there extreme weather changes occurring, to protect my wood stash that is stored in the assembly room I will keep the dehumidifier running to minimise potential warping issues.

Wayne

[jeffhigh]

Yep, whenever you exchange air through ventilation, leaks, door opening, in a humid environment, You have to pull moisture out of the air you have introduced.

[TallDad71]

We are separated by a common language.

In England this is a shed! Very jealous.

[Dave M]

A trick I saw somewhere on a forum was to have upright panels on wheels acting as tool racks. These can be moved around to reconfigure the space.

[Mark McLean]

How much instrument building do you plan to do? Is this just a weekend hobby, building one or two per year, or are you going to start a business and be doing it 40 hours per week? I ask because the issue of RH control is very important, but only at certain stages of the building process (when bracing, closing up the box, when spraying certain types of finish). The rest of the time it is not so important. So you could waste a lot of money and effort achieving RH and temperature control for a big area, 24/7, when you only need it a few critical days for an occasional build. A hobbyist has the luxury of saying “ nah, today is too wet or too hot to be in the workshop, I’ll do something else”, but if it is your livelihood you need a space where you can be comfortable and productive every day.

What climactic issues are most problematic in your area - heat, cold or humidity? It looks like Lyndoch is south of Goyder’s line ( i.e. not arid), but I am guessing that in SA anywhere away from the coast it is pretty dry most of the time, and sometimes really hot?

If you enclose that small area, about 7x3m, a standard dehumidifier will keep it dry, and you don’t need it running 24/7 if you are only doing a few instruments. You could set up in there a go-bar deck for glue-ups, a spray booth if you do that, and wood storage. Other stuff is done in the bigger area which is less controlled.

Will you be doing other general woodworking? Dust control is a major issue for work involving lots of large scale cutting and sanding, and is the issue most pertinent to your health. Dust collection at the point for larger standing equipment like saws and sanders, and general dust extraction from the air in the shop as a whole - all needs careful planning.

Having large equipment like bandsaw, table saw, drill press on platforms with wheels is very useful.

We are all very jealous looking at that shed!

[Bob_H]

How much instrument building do you plan to do? .....

We are all very jealous looking at that shed!

Thanks for the advice Mark - I'm not a professional, nor every likely to develop the skills to worry any existing professionals! That said, I am retired and if I can get my life sufficiently organised would like to spend quite a bit of time on instrument making and general woodworking.

The weather here is characterised by hot dry summers and damp winters - plenty of 40 degree days in summer and plenty of big swings in temperature and humidity during the day. A small controlled environment for storage and continuing to be able to work in adverse conditions (either heat or humidity) would be very handy but I am not under the same pressure as someone who runs a professional shop.

The advice in this thread has been very helpful - I am thinking I will enclose and insulate a small area and just look at airflow (possibly overhead fans) in the general work area. I have dust collection set up for my band saw and drum sander. I am pretty lucky with the shed - just trying to get the most our of it!