My "Pinterest" Project Shed Build

[aart]

I'm not sure what size the gable vents should be from a technical standpoint, but I would assume the square footage of gables should be equal or greater than the soffits.

Just some thoughts:
You could get an aesthetically pleasing triangular gable vent for the front large enough to 'cover' the hole left by the rectangular gable vent now on the front, and move the rectangular one to the back.
The foyer partition.....I understand your concept of separation (that's now shot-bummer)....was thinking the foyer could be 'ceilinged' off, the upper portion of partition replaced with chicken wire and area above foyer ceiling used for storage...dusty storage, but storage none the less. The dust will go high, carried by airflow...my 12 foot high shed windows have quite a bit of dust on them when I close them up in winter I have to clean(shopvac) them for better light infiltration. That's a lot of extra 'rework', I know, but just a thought.

 

[Finnie]

I'm not sure what size the gable vents should be from a technical standpoint, but I would assume the square footage of gables should be equal or greater than the soffits.

Just some thoughts:
You could get an aesthetically pleasing triangular gable vent for the front large enough to 'cover' the hole left by the rectangular gable vent now on the front, and move the rectangular one to the back.
The foyer partition.....I understand your concept of separation (that's now shot-bummer)....was thinking the foyer could be 'ceilinged' off, the upper portion of partition replaced with chicken wire and area above foyer ceiling used for storage...dusty storage, but storage none the less. The dust will go high, carried by airflow...my 12 foot high shed windows have quite a bit of dust on them when I close them up in winter I have to clean(shopvac) them for better light infiltration. That's a lot of extra 'rework', I know, but just a thought.

Well I appreciate your thoughts. It does help me as I ponder my options.

I knew there were guidelines as to ratio of square footage of ventilation. I was planning to measure the soffit vents to see what their area is. Guess that's even more important now.

DH and I have discussed all that empty space going to waste up in the "second floor". We've thought about a loft. But the idea was to access it from the human side, not the chicken side. I suppose if I can't stand all the dust in my gardening and storage area, I can always convert both halves over to chicken coop!

 

[Finnie]

Well, another long holiday weekend, and another step done on my shed!

Today my daughter and her fiancé came over and helped us hang the interior paneling.





















Next up- seal the floor. (Or rather, what I really need to do is bug the guy who is supposed to fix the ventilation. He'll respond with "Yeah, we have some time coming up when we can do that." And then a month goes by and I don't hear from him.)

But my next job is to seal the floor and then paint everything else.

 

[TerryH]

It's looking SO nice Finnie. I love the stained glass window!

 

[lovechicks1293]

It's sort of going to be a joint project, with the mini-barn company building the basic structure, and supplying the lumber for that, but also using roof metal, doors and windows that I bought myself before hand. And then after they are done with their part, I will take over and put the exterior siding on myself and finish out the interior myself.

So their estimate for their part of materials and labor is supposed to be around $5,000. And then I have been keeping track of all my other costs. So far I have spent just over $1100 on the doors, windows, roof metal, vinegar, etc... I just remembered I need to add $25 to the list that I gave to a friend of mine for driving me to Lowe's in her pickup truck to bring home the corrugated roof sheets.

So I imagine the costs will keep piling up as I build things like nest boxes, poop boards and roosts. I hope it will stay under 7k when all is said and done.

When I first started out with chickens, about a year and a half ago, I built what I was calling my "practice coop". I built that almost all by myself, kind of in a hurry. (Still took me 8 weeks.) But I knew that I would be wanting to do a more long term project that would be fancier, better designed, and hold more chickens. I'm excited that it's finally under way.

Here is a photo of my Practice Coop. I discovered from it that I can learn how to use power tools and build things that I didn't know I could do before. It was very empowering.

Oh my gosh the lights on it are so cute and festive!

 

[Finnie]

It's looking SO nice Finnie. I love the stained glass window!

Thank you, Terry! I'm just very happy whenever there is a little step in progress.

And thank you Lovechicks. When Christmas was over, I switched those lights out for some white ones that I leave on year round. They are really helpful when I have to go close up the coop in the dark. Plus I like to believe they deter predators, maybe make them think twice about coming into the lighted area.

 

[Finnie]

Well, well, I bet you all thought I had given up on my shed plans!

I really did waste all the beautiful weather we had last fall, and didn't work on it like I should have. The chickens are still living in their previous quarters. I always have too many irons in the fire. But we had glorious, unseasonably warm weather here last week, so we got busy and coated the floor. From reading on all of BYC last week, it sounds like it was strangely warm all over the country.

So we painted the first coat of Henry Solarflex last weekend on Saturday, and then let it dry for three days, but it wasn't until this past Friday that I could do the second coat, because my weather app kept saying it was going to rain. Finally I just went ahead and did it Friday morning, because it was sunny and the app said no rain until 5:30 pm. Wouldn't you know, it started sprinkling at 1:00, and I had to run out and shut the doors! At least it had 2 hours of drying time first.

So here are what pictures I could manage with painty rubber gloves on.


I wanted to mention some stuff about the Henry Solarflex. It was very easy to mix. I had been expecting it to be similar to the Black Jack 57 that a lot of people use. They say that stuff takes a half hour to mix together. Well the Henry was nothing like that. In fact, here is how it looked after opening the can, without any stirring:

(This one might have been the can they shook up for me in the store last fall when I bought it. The other cans had a little bit of yellow liquid on top to mix in.)

I tried to explain to DH how everyone says they pour the can out and push it around with a push broom. But he was convinced rolling it was the way to go. So he rolled about a foot or so up the walls, and I used a paint brush to get the edges and corners. Then he poured out to the floor and rollered that. It did not make a sloppy thick coat like I was expecting/hoping.











It definitely needed a second coat. I think rollering it like interior paint spreads it out too thin. So the following Friday I did the second coat while he was at work, and I slopped it on as thick as I could. (BTW, we used up four cans of it, and this is just the chicken half, about 9'x14', and up the walls some.)

I did buy a new push broom and tried that to spread the paint. But I went cheap with the broom, and it's bristles were too stiff and spread apart, so all I really did was make wide deep grooves. After a small section of that, I actually got down on my hands and knees and used my latex glove and my left hand to spread it around like finger painting, and then the paint brush in my right hand to go lightly over it and even out the brush strokes. That worked pretty well, and it was really quite fun! (Except then my knees hurt the rest of the day. )









I think the Henry Solarflex will be OK. Not having ever used any Black Jack 57, I can't give a good comparison. When I did my research before, there was a lot of info from people using the Black Jack, and not a lot on the Henry. But I really wanted to use white, so I thought I would go for it. I think if I ever get a chance to do another project, I will use the Black Jack, so I can see the difference. I think the Henry has a sort of chalky feel. I'm not sure how it will hold, up, so I will probably need to come back and give a better review in a couple of years. The guy in Home Depot when I was buying it said he just uses Kilz in his chicken coop. He said he can't recommend the Henry for the off-label application, not that it wouldn't work, but just because it's made for roofs, not floors. But he did agree with me that if it failed, I could always cover it with linoleum later. I guess time will tell.

Next up will probably be painting the rest of the interior with regular paint, and building the pop door. I am brooding some chicks in the garage right now, and DH really wants them out of there. He wants me to get the shed to a point where I can run an extension cord out there and brood the chicks there before I have it finished and ready for the big chickens. They will just be in a penned area, and they won't need the roosts and nest boxes. They just need to be safe from predators.

Oh, and he has a plan for fixing the ventilation as well. He's now convinced that with the super long ladder and someone holding it steady, he can get the ridge cap off and cut a ridge vent with an angle grinder, and then put a ridge vent on and a new ridge cap. So, if he's willing to do that, then that might solve that whole issue. (I chickened out and never harassed the builder enough to make him come out.) After I wrote twice and was told twice that they would come, but they never actually did, I knew it was either get tough with them, or give up. What can I say, I am a wimp.

I'm going to hit submit, and then go back and edit, because I'm afraid of my computer crashing and losing this whole post.

 

[Finnie]

Wow. So it's been more than a year since I updated this project. I did paint the interior walls last spring. Then in my mind I had it all worked out what order I should do the rest of the projects required. (Nest boxes, window screens, pop door, poop boards etc.) But life happened and I got caught up in other things. (Got my first grandson in April that year!)

I still bought and hatched out chicks, though, and before I knew it, I needed to start using the Pinterest Shed to brood chicks. Which turned into half size chickens that needed roosts. So I threw up some makeshift roosts and made do, and time wore on and I kind of quit working on all the rest.

Well now it's spring again and I have yet more chicks that need space, and last year's birds really need their space improved. So I kicked my butt out of procrastination and "I'm afraid I can't do it" mode, and now I am on a mission to finish the interior on this thing. I need to work fast. Vacation is in 10 days, and I really want to have the improvements in place for the chicken-sitter.

Wednesday I drew up plans, Thursday I checked what wood we had laying around that I could use, Friday I bought the rest of the wood needed, Saturday I did most of the cutting, and today I painted the floors of the poop trays so they can dry while I finish the rest of the cutting.

Too busy to take pictures, but I'm waiting for paint to dry on one side so I can flip them over and do the other sides, so I thought I'd take a moment to snap one photo and post it.

Yesterday I had the mitre saw table set up near the tailgate of the van. (Was shady then.) Worked out pretty well to not even unload the wood. Just cut it, label the pieces, and set them back inside the van. In organized piles.

Time to get back to work. More painting, cutting, and assembling whatever parts I can. Then tomorrow I'll need to do a major coop clean-out and hope that I can get as far as installing their new roosts over new poop boards before it gets dark. Otherwise I'm going to have some pretty grumpy chickens when they can't find their usual places to sleep! Well, they will probably be grumpy about their nice new space any way, until they get used to it.

 

[Finnie]

Oh my goodness I'm so upset! I just wasted 20 minutes tapping out a progress report with photos and then I got an error message that there was a problem with the page so it was reloaded. Without my post. Apparently our new save feature didn't help in this instance.

Rats. No time to re do it now.

Edit: Oh look at that. At least the photos magically appeared, even if the words were lost!

 

[aart]

Some(?) of it's here:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/th...s-poop-pictures.621363/page-182#post-20051552

Are those 'frames' the brooder doors?
#kregenvy