Consolidated Kansas

[HEChicken]

I will admit, SketchUp can be somewhat frustrating at first, but stick with it. I'll also add that the current version (8.0) fixed a number of bugs that I thought made using the previous versions more than frustrating. I'm also like you when it comes to tutorials in general, but the "new" SketchUp videos they've posted were a big help to me. They give you a good idea of how the software was designed to be used & how it "thinks". I also didn't want to imply that SketchUp will create a materials list for you once your plans are done. You'll still have to figure that out by hand. However, when you have something to look at that has measurements it's not too difficult. I don't consider myself an expert by any means, but I feel pretty comfortable with it that I could help you out if you run into problems. Just let me know.

Thanks David. Okay, here's my first question: dimensions. I started my coop yesterday and used their handy dandy method of getting it the right size, by typing in the measurements and letting it adjust the rectangle to the correct size. So far, so good. But how do I now see those dimensions? Once they're in, and the rectangle complete, the dimensions don't show up in the measurements box any more and I'm not sure how to see them again. (This also comes up when I look at other people's shared plans, but can't tell the lengths of their walls.....)

 

[HEChicken]

Just talked to Ivy. She was in Wal-Mart picking up somethings. Guess they finally removed the cath around 10 last night. Whatever they put in DH's artery to like self close the wound failed, so, anyway, they had to hold pressure on it for like 45 minutes! Guess they had a all start football player holding pressure. OUCH!!! Anyway he still bled some, and had to change his bed. He has not got out of bed yet, giving that time to heal and stay healed. Don't want that to open up! Anyway all of DH's syptoms are now gone. No chest pain, no shortness of breath. So he is feeling much better!

So glad to hear he is doing better - thanks for keeping us posted!

 

[Hawkeye95]

Thanks Loralee. Oh trust me, I've already read your whole page. I even subscribed to it so I'll know when you update it. Bwahahahaha.

Thanks for the tips on building. Here's my deal: we will be moving shortly to our new place in the country that is on 10-acres. While house-hunting, many of the places we looked at already had either a chicken coop or a shed that could be converted, but the place that we finally settled on doesn't. In a way I'm happy to build from scratch and be able to do it just the way I want it. On the other hand, right now it seems a pretty overwhelming task. I'm no stranger to tools and do have *some* skills. My dad didn't have a son to follow him around so instead I was always his helper and he taught me a lot along the way. At 10 I mixed all the concrete in a rotary mixer, for him to complete a really large building project. I did yard work and helped him both build furniture from scratch, and strip older furniture to refinish. At 16, he put an extension on our house entirely by himself and I was right there with him. Well, I guess I would say we did it entirely by ourselves LOL. Later, in my first house, I had the basement roughed in when the builders built the house, and I refinished parts of it myself, doing electrical, drywall, dropped ceiling tile, door framing, and some nice shelving in the window. So its not that I've never used a power tool but somehow I've never built a whole building from scratch by myself and I'm here scratching my head a little trying to figure out how to get started. Maybe its because Dad was an architect by trade so he always planned everything and I never had to do that part....

Anyway, that gives you a little background. Now back to the project itself. Originally when I looked at the google map images of the property, I planned the placement of the coop. Then I had to go back out to the property one day and discovered a concrete "pad" in another area, that I thought would be a great place to build the coop. So I had to readjust my plan but now think the new location will work even better. The dimensions of the pad are:

15'9" long by 10'11" wide. In addition, there is a 4'x4' extension on one of the back corners. There must have been a shed of some type on the pad at some point in the past because in each of the 4 corners there is what is left of a steel post. The posts are 6-8" in from each corner. So my idea was to use the points where the posts used to be to mark the dimensions of my coop. This will mean that the coop will sit wholly on the concrete pad with a 6-8" strip of concrete surrounding it. For the 4x4 extension, I thought that might be a good place to keep a couple of bins, for feed etc, so I'd like to extend the roof to cover that area. So to wrap up, I'm looking at a building that will be approximately 10x14, give or take a few inches. I was a little disappointed the pad fell just shy of allowing a 16' side wall, since more cutting will be involved this way.

As for materials....I have multiple doors already so the people door to the coop is taken care of. In addition, one of the doors is a narrow little internal bathroom door that I thought might be used as a poop tray under roosts. I plan to obtain windows from Habitat so I'm not concerned about those. I also am not concerned about roofing material. We just found out that the roof on the house will be replaced prior to closing. I plan to tell the roofers to leave enough of the old shingles (from the un-hail-damaged area of the roof of course) to use for shingling the coop. I also have a lead on siding that has been recycled from a guy who dismantles mobile homes. So what I'm looking at purchasing new is really just the base lumber - studs, OSB etc.

Anyway, any tips you can give me on planning will be more than appreciated!

For as large as you are talking about, I'd think about either doing a pole barn type build... or buying the kits that give you the hardware and truss design for the size you want. They sell those hardware kits on Amazon for cheap. You can change the dimensions to fit your needs. My Dh built our pole barn-- and that might work the best. How are you going to attach your posts to the cement? There is the lazy way-- where you can buy the post mounts that drill/screw down into the cement. But that won't give you the wind load for the building that you are probably wanting. Kind of important here in KS. The other way, is to mark off your larger 4X4 (or larger) posts and use a saw to cut your cement and then break it out, dig it down and place your post and then pour cement back into it. That is what I'd do. More work... yes. But then your building will be there longer and not take off. We had a shed of ours get lifted from our cement pad last year. It's because my DH was being lazy and attached it by using the drill/screw into the cement method. Our pole barn was fine--- but that poor shed was lifted up and torn part. Our neighbors were bringing back shed pieces to us all summer long as they found more of it in their yards or pastures. One of the reasons I went to the extreme on building my large chicken coop and putting it down 3 feet into the ground--- I didn't want a repeat of our building loss-- which in this case would mean loss of life, too.

I have a few more things I want to do with my chicken coop this Spring-- or sooner if the weather holds. I'll add them to my coop page when that happens. It has been so fun! Now that we're moving, I'm already drawing up plans for a bigger/better and just as cute new chicken coop. This time I'm going to make it with basically two coops in one-- so I can run my layers on one side and my silkies on the other.

 

[chicken danz]

I thought about you all day yesterday! I am sick too! I don't think it's a sinus infection, though. I'm pretty sure it's a cold. I have the runny nose and cough and lots and lots of sneezing! All I want to do is sneeze, and half the time that tingly itchy feeling doesn't do anything. You know that feeling when a really good sneeze doesn't happen? Really annoying! I got this from my kids. My littles came home from preschool coughing all over me two days ago. Bah. Fortunately my oldest child and DH are fine... so far. I'm hoping they don't get sick.

Exactly my symptoms! I am miserable!

 

[Hawkeye95]

HEChicken-- BTW, I never had the building experience you had as a kid, but I did do auto mechanics with my dad. I took auto mechanics in highschool, and I spent many a summer helping my dad over haul engines, micing cylinders, and cleaning carburetors-- however, now the cars we have now don't even use those! My DH is a hobby carpenter-- he loves building furniture, etc. He has a machine/tool for everything-- from dove tailing, to precision cutting. He is not really thrilled that I'm using his stuff, but so far I haven't broke anything! For xmas I gifted him with a few more tools that *I* wanted to work with! LOL He was happy to have them, but little does he know I got them to make my life easier. hehe!

Checoukan, thanks for the update. Scary about the excessive bleeding. I hope that doesn't become a problem later. I know they have to thin his blood when they are working on the heart, but scary that he wasn't clotting like he was supposed to. Glad his pain is gone! Amazing!

 

[chicken danz]

The same thing happened to my Dad when he had one of many stints put in, but he did fine. Once it plugs Ivy's husband should be ok.
HEchicken, I wouldn't use the old roofing. You want to get a good seal on that stuff or you'll have leaks. Shingles can be cheap if you don't go with fancy colors. You can also put on a metal roof for very little and don't have to have all the plywood structure underneath. If you have metal posts sticking out you could drill through your base and screw on nuts if they are threaded. Worst part of course would be determining the exact spot to make the hole. I would use the metal posts that are already in the concrete and build the building the same size. It's awesome you already have a concrete pad there.
Speaking of wind, it took down our temporary kennel again. We had taken the tarp off the back end but not the top. It still crashed it. This time it is in a heap. I think there'll be some bent metal to deal with. Sure glad I didn't have any birds in there.

 

[rittert3]

Ok just wanted to mention that with sketch up you have to draw every board not just lines (unless you just want to play with possible dementions). I draw 2x4s as 2x4, 2x2s as 2x2 but when you go to build realize that lumber dementions are actually off by a little. You can refer to this table if needed http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lumber#Dimensional_lumber. Mesh is very hard to draw so I just fudge the the fencing materials provided to represent what I will actually use.

 

[Jeff21]

Does anyone use plastic zip ties on their chickens legs to tell them apart? I have quite a few hens I can't tell which is which!

 

[HEChicken]

HEChicken-- BTW, I never had the building experience you had as a kid, but I did do auto mechanics with my dad. I took auto mechanics in highschool, and I spent many a summer helping my dad over haul engines, micing cylinders, and cleaning carburetors-- however, now the cars we have now don't even use those! My DH is a hobby carpenter-- he loves building furniture, etc. He has a machine/tool for everything-- from dove tailing, to precision cutting. He is not really thrilled that I'm using his stuff, but so far I haven't broke anything! For xmas I gifted him with a few more tools that *I* wanted to work with! LOL He was happy to have them, but little does he know I got them to make my life easier. hehe!

That's so funny because at one point I wanted to be an auto mechanic too! It was never my dad's specialty but my first car was a '69 Corolla with a really simple engine and I did all the work on it myself. Oil changes for sure, but whenever something went wrong with it, that little ole engine was so simple I was able to figure it out and I was always thrilled to be able to get it operational again "all by myself". On one occasion the fuel pump died and I got a quote from Toyota on getting a replacement. For a poor student, the amount they quoted was out of the question so instead I went to a local salvage yard and wandered around until I saw a similar vintage Corolla. I removed the fuel pump, paid the guy $5, and went home and replaced mine with the new one. The car worked perfectly again after that and I had quite the sense of accomplishment. I then decided it would be fun to do that for a living and looked into it but quickly gave up that idea when I realized how much more sophisticated most cars are than that little car of mine, and how much more complex and less easy it is to work on them. Now I don't even change my own oil (though I'm glad I at least know HOW to do it), since for what Walmart charges, and not having to deal with disposing of the used oil afterward, its just worth it to me to pay them to do it.

Thanks Loralee & Danz for the suggestions re anchoring. On two of the corners there is still a 12-18" piece of pipe sticking out of the ground. On the other two they are gone. I don't know how useable the two that are left will be. Prior to this, I had been thinking I would anchor it using augers, like I did with the kit shed I installed in the backyard of my current home. I think I got the augers for under $50 at Menards as a special order. They are a set of 4 auger screws and you attach the wire at all four corners of the building, then drill the screws into the ground until they disappear (a long way) then tighten down the wire until it is taut. If I can't use the holes where the steel pipes are/used to be, I may still anchor using that method. Ummm....Loralee, how do you "cut" into concrete?

 

[HEChicken]

Ok just wanted to mention that with sketch up you have to draw every board not just lines (unless you just want to play with possible dementions). I draw 2x4s as 2x4, 2x2s as 2x2 but when you go to build realize that lumber dementions are actually off by a little. You can refer to this table if needed http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lumber#Dimensional_lumber. Mesh is very hard to draw so I just fudge the the fencing materials provided to represent what I will actually use.

Oh wow, that does indeed seem like a LOT of work....perhaps graph paper will be easier after all