A 12' x 12' Scratchbuilt Shed

Last year I was running over to my friend Andrew's house, to work on his On30 modules, and I noticed an old and very dilapidated shed. Since it was a crappy day, rainy and cold, I decided to come back later to take some photos. As fortune would have it, the next day was sunny ... and this is what I found:

My first thought was that it might be a tobacco shed but realized that it lacked the ventilation such sheds required. After comparing the spacing of the rafters and the width of the door to the width of the building (guesstimating a 30" door) it was about 8' square. The small door on the second level was only 4-1/2' tall. Someone suggested that it could have been a slaughter house for a farm - but I realized that made no sense either as the only door on the bottom level was too narrow. Oh well, we'll say it's "just a shed."

Having brought one of the photos into Sketchup I used Match Photo to re-create it in 3D and finally scaled it using a 30" width for the door.

This was the first time I have tried using wax paper on top of computer printed plans. I used Northeastern Scale Lumber Co.'s Flamingo Glue with a stainless steel tip applicator. The applicator worked great ... and the glue is excellent. I made a point of making the 2"x4" lumber from Northeastern, very dark. The frame of the shed I was using as a guide was so dark it’s almost black.

I glued up the framing for the upper and lower sections. The Snap & Glue Set made it a 'Snap' (pun intended). Each section got an additional Top Plate, arranged so joints were lapped creating a 'standard' double top plate. Then the lower section received a ceiling, or the upper section a floor, however you look at it; and the two were joined. Both floors got joists. I took the time to clean the glue up as it would be a relatively strong structure.

Framing for the walls are glued up. I printed out the floor joists. I spaced the joists close to rest on the brick footings. I figured that whoever built this thing would have probably 'engineered' it according to what made sense to them at the time. Just looking at the framing on the right, I removed the center of the middle joist and double-up the ones on either side. The idea was that the hoist mechanism would pass through the center. I have some 2" x 6” stained to build the joists. I had some O scale 1" x 10"  that I used to plank the building, but I had some 1/32” balsa that would scale 1-1/2" thick; just about right for floor planking.

All of the framing was glued up, minus the roof. Since I planned on having the doors closed there isn't much need for taking time with the interior, but ... what the hey.  I wanted to put some kinda pulley, perhaps a rusty chain, hanging from the center ridgepole. Seems to me that would add a lot of weight from that ridgepole, so I thought of what would have been used; perhaps a beam just below the ridgepole? I'd come up with something.

Framing is finished. Will get started on the crappy sheathing next. That should be interesting.

Taking a close look at the photos I took, I determined that the roof had been replaced 'recently' ... perhaps 20 years prior. I decided to model the building prior to that roofing. I sheathed the rafters with rotten boards. At that time I hadn't decided what to cover them with. 

I have three walls sheathed, more or less. I still needed to go back and darken any cut edges and add nail holes. My thought was a pin in some dark brown oil paint then a downward smear with turpoid. The yellow will be toned down with some red oxide color. The front still needed sheathing along with the two doors.

I got the sheathing completed. The next thing was to add the doors. There were bits-n-pieces of corner trim left on the actual building and I would probably add those too. I thought I had some O-scale corrugated sheet, but nope.

Pretty much finished with the shed sheathing and weathering. At this point I still needed to add sheet metal 'patches' and some kinda roofing. Thought I would leave the door off of the second level, maybe put some broken hinges or some such.

Finished. Used some brick from Rusty Stumps to make something for the thing to sit on. Left the roof alone. Heck, suppose the roofing blew off at some point and never was replaced?