Anyone have advice on the vertical posts... do I leave them raw or try to seal them so they don't soak up moisture?
I'm concerned if those skinny crossers are going to be able to handle the load. Wood weighs a heck of a lot and it's concentrated in such a small area. I'm not trying to dissuade you, just going by what my eyes are telling me.
I had thought about bracing them in between - add some crosswise. Do you think that will help? Or should I add additional beams same way? Any advice is welcome.
As someone who’s made the mistake of trying to build an elevated woodshed floor, I’ll just suggest not doing it. Your shed is going to hold 3+ cords, and with most hardwoods that’s 10,000 lbs+ when they’re green. Building anything that will hold that weight is a serious engineering project. I’d suggest doing some basic retaining wall and fill work to level up the ground, then putting down pallets to elevate the wood. Once you have the base set, sink posts around the perimeter and build a roof on them. Basically, use the ground to hold the wood, and only use your structure to hold the roof
WESF Thank you for the advice. Given the amount of likes to your post it seems you are not the only one who thinks that. I'm not sure I'm ready to scrap the whole thing but I'm definitely going to rethink. Not sure if I want to pay someone to grade that section of my yard, so I think that's out. I may consider a stepped down version making each section a different height. As close to the ground as I can get. Or just adding much more support to the 2 sections I have and not building the 3rd. I've also been considering not roofing it and just covering with tarp as I did my last pile. In that case, I can't call it a wood shed, can I?
I would go with more and maybe bigger diameter than what you have lying there now. How thick are the boards going to be on the top?
Putting additional supports (the pads on the ground) in the middle of each of your spans will help carry the load immensely. Think about it this way...would you drive your car/truck out on that? Well, that shed loaded with green wood will weigh somewhere's 2-3 times that! But I guess I wouldn't argue against just digging a lil out of the slope and then use the spoils to bring things up down slope (have to only dig out half as deep that way) then all those poles can be the uprights to support the roof...and IMO you do want a roof...dealing with tarps gets old, fast! A skilled operator with a skid steer or mini track hoe would be able to level up some tiered spots for sheds in a hurry.
Tore it apart yesterday and laid out where the additional supports will go. That will give me a total of 16 supports for my 8x6 section. That's 12 more holes to dig On the plus side...I halved a 6 inch log pretty easily with my ripping chain. Thinking about these as beefier beams.
I didn't give up... bad weather and laziness plus a little additional "noodling". Got all the holes dug and put the logs in. Then finally found a way to mark level so I could cut them. Today I finished leveling and put some bracing in between. I need to cut one more log in half and screw everything down and I'll have my baseboards. Next up...cut down a good size tree and attempt to use my Alaskan mill. Most of my trees are about 6 inches wide so I'll hopefully have some 2x6s for my floorboards.
Heh. I just found a picture of the very first tree I cut down. The woods looked like a jungle. Compare this picture to the one earlier in my post and you can see that I've done a ton of clearing in the past few years.
Awesome project, Annie! Sorry you had to rework the foundation, but it was definitely the right move. Looks like you have a bunch of cinder blocks laying around your place. You could use them to provide even more support between your cedar "piers." Quick, easy, and cheap, at least before you put down the floor. By my count, you'll need 12. Each one will require leveling (no problem, just a little work, which you clearly are not afraid of), and I like to place them with the solid sides on top and bottom, so they don't just sink into the ground. If you do it this way, best to put a short piece of lumber on top (I like 2x10 or better, but a couple of 2x4s or 2x6s work just as well, to span the whole block, to avoid them breaking. All of my stacks are on cinder blocks like I described, without any piers like you have. They do settle some, but in your case, a little settling won't cause system failure. Too much settling causes my freestanding stacks to fall occasionally, but it's usually because I stacked too high and the wood shrinks unevenly when curing. Your foundation is the key to this project succeeding. And this is absolutely your best time to do it. Once it's full of wood, well, you know... Think of adding the blocks as really cheap insurance (other than your efforts). Keep up the good work, it's gonna be awesome. I aspire to follow your example in the future!
Easy Livin' 3000 Thanks for the advice. I modeled this after my stacks with the rounds that I posted the picture of earlier. There are 4 cinder blocks spanning the 8' 2x4s. Since they are holding up nicely I didn't think I needed more support below. So, the plan was that the 1/2 logs would act similarly to my cinder blocks. Then, I'd put the 2x4s like this: I do have the blocks that I took from my original pallet structure and could certainly use them. They did sink into the ground and topple my pile which is why I started this project in the first place. Plus, leveling them was a pain in the bum. I put the "little" logs you can see there as additional structure to keep the buried logs from wobbling.
I like your the way you are using the little logs, other than they will eventually rot and will wick moisture, but that probably wont be an issue. Similar idea to the cinder block idea. It'd probably take about 2 hours to level the spots for to the 12 blocks. It saves lots of time if you use scrap lumber shims between the block and the joist, makes levelling much quicker and easier. I have plenty of experience doing stuff that fails on me. For something that's going to be as permanent and awesome as your rustic wood shed, I'd definitely spend the extra two hours to add a little more insurance against failure at ground level. The stack in the pic has been standing for over 6 years without issue. Note the way the blocks are placed at the bottom of the pic, placed on the side to fight sinking into the ground. It's about 6' of wood on top of the beams. Good luck with whatever you choose!
I haven't given up. Switched attention to getting next year's wood split. Can someone help me identify this?
