The coop is done....now time to work on the RUN.

[ChickityChina]

Honesty, im new to this kind of ground work/framing. I'll be trusting some friends to guide me on this part I think.

I was only being partially sarcastic. I would love to put a big heavy frame directly on the ground, slope be danged. But I will likely do something like you are doing. Have the vertical posts be level with the coop, and basically have the top of the run level. The base of the run wont be level and will be slightly shorter on the far end than the near end. The base boards will have to be manipulated to match the slope. I need to noodle on it a bit.

Ditto.

 

[Gridguru]

I was originally going to use these:
http://www.amazon.com/Simpson-Stron...qid=1458686214&sr=8-2&keywords=4x4+post+spike

Menards locally sells them for about $14.00 each, they go into the ground 30 inches. I figured they would be sturdy enough, especially once I tied everything together. I ended up digging and burying the post instead, a few people told me it would be better in the long run. I bought 8 foot treated 4x4's and put them two foot in the ground. My ground is not level either so I did mine the easy way. I found the post that set in the lowest place in the yard and screwed my first support board to the top of that, I got it level and ran it to the next post. I leveled everything off of that. Once I got to the high side my post were about 8 inches taller then the support. Once I all the braces/supports on and they were attached level I used a "saws all" and cut the tops of the post off. My rolls of HC were 3 foot wide so I ran mine horizontally the length of the run. 2 pieces on each side covered from the ground to the top. Then on the "roof" of the run (mine was 8 foot wide) I ran three sections from the coop to the end. I just over lapped the pieces and kept them all three foot wide.

My post were 8 foot apart and then I ran some treated 2x4's between them and across the "roof" to have more points to nail the HC to and to keep everything tight. The only mistake I made on my coop construction was when I put the two windows in the front. I forgot to drop them down low enough so be under my run roof. So you can see the angled piece coming off the coop, I ran the HC up that then attached it to the coop above the windows. It ended up working out fine. This is the only decent picture I have on this computer.

I remember seeing your post on the construction. I need to go back and look at it again.

That's how we built my friend's run. Put all the posts in, leveled the braces and then chopped off the tops of the taller posts (chainsaw). If I sink the blocks level, I wouldn't have to do that. But.... again, I am not sure yet how hard that will be to dig that trench. I need to get an accurate idea of what the slope actually is.

 

[Gridguru]

Here are the plans for the run. It will be roughly 10ft x 18ft (180 sqft total).

The ground is pretty unlevel, with about a 10" drop from the NW corner to the NE corner. I plan to frame this similar to the coup and have the posts sitting on concrete blocks dug into the ground. The front of the run will be about 7ft high, while the back left corner will be closer to 6ft due to the elevation change.

I have dug out the area for the foundation blocks and leveled them to the ground. Man that was a pain. So many large rocks and thick clay up there. Good for protection of predator digging...bad for human digging.

I have four 8ft, 4x6 posts. They will stand on the blocks and the framing will go on around them. Everything will be level(ish), except the base boards. They will run along the ground with the elevation changes. The face of the run, the part with the door, will be level all the way across, so that's good.


The circle in the top right is a tree.

I am building it so that i can run the 4ft hardware cloth in sections without having to do a lot of cutting. At least that's my plan. We'll see how well it goes.

 

[aart]

Maybe build your frame work level, lowest point of framing at highest point of ground, and the HC will just go past the lowest horizontal framing into your apron?
You could attach some 'dummy' verticals below bottom horizontal where needed to attach HC before it hits the ground.
Hope that makes sense.

 

[Gridguru]

Maybe build your frame work level, lowest point of framing at highest point of ground, and the HC will just go past the lowest horizontal framing into your apron?
You could attach some 'dummy' verticals below bottom horizontal where needed to attach HC before it hits the ground.
Hope that makes sense.

Yea, that makes sense and isnt a bad idea at all. I'll need to see how it would effect the "door side" of the run.

 

[RonP]

That is exactly how I originally built my run, to compensate for a 10 inch slope. The end result, is that the run looks perfectly level although the ground is not.

 

[Gridguru]

That is exactly how I originally built my run, to compensate for a 10 inch slope. The end result, is that the run looks perfectly level although the ground is not.

Just to be clear, which method was the way you did it? Running the bottom boards along the ground and all others were leveled.... or Aarts idea of going level off the high point and adding boards underneath where needed?

 

[RonP]

I ran the very top boards first, making sure it was level. I then ran the subsequent boards also level. The bottom board only touches the ground at the highest point. At the lowest point the bottom board was a good 10 inches off the ground. I just ran the fencing skirt from the bottom board down and out.

 

[Gridguru]

I ran the very top boards first, making sure it was level. I then ran the subsequent boards also level. The bottom board only touches the ground at the highest point. At the lowest point the bottom board was a good 10 inches off the ground. I just ran the fencing skirt from the bottom board down and out.

Gotcha. I think im going to do this as well. Thanks guys.

 

[TerryH]

Love the run! It's looking great. I'm following closely. The area for our run slopes away from the coop so I'm going to have to compensate for that. Still not exactly sure how the best way will be for us.