Show Me Yours!

[Dualfuel]

Please post pictures of your generator sheds...Spring has finally sprung on the Keweenaw and I can start thinking about pouring concrete again. I wanna build an engine house. I would like some ideas. Pictures help me a lot too. Sooo, please post pictures of what you have...no matter how humble....right now we have half a plastic dog kennel sitting on top of the Honda. So whatever you have, has got to be better.

Another trivial thing....they call a shed 20'X10' here...that size and it needs no permit...I am wondering whether that is measured from the inside or the outside. If from the outside, then how do they measure a root cellar?
Thanks,
BPJ

[mike90045]

On my facebook pages, the photo albums are un-restricted, I'll have to try to find the links for the 12" slab pour and sheds.  I basically built 2 buildings, one for batterys/inverter, and one for generator, put them back-back, and they are working fine. slabs are 12" thick, and about 12' x 8'

I think this link will get you there.
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.1206151312716.2030956.1196643274&type=3
The generator shed has the chain link fence "door" for ventilation and possible flywheel chunk retention.
The roof of the shed is made from 2x6 instead of 2x4, but you can drill a hole for a steel pipe in a 2x6, and
when it runs the length of the building, you have a lift point anywhere you want.  It came in handy, and now is
used as a hanger for spare belts and to dry siphon hoses.

The 8" metal mounting pole for the PV array had to be in a 24" di hole, 10' deep, concreted in.

Engine room:
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.1204527312117.2030711.1196643274&type=3
After slab was poured, I tried mounting on a stall mat, but that was not good.  Ended up drilling and
epoxy mounting SS all thread into the slab (8 locations), and bolting the engine cradle to that with 1/4"
plywood buffer strips (leftover flooring scraps) between metal and concrete.   So far, so good.

(update - links in the .sig work, but not the ones in this message body)

[Dualfuel]

Thats pretty good documentation...thanks. Its funny how much of the same stuff or same direction we are going in. I bought an auger truck so I could start building mounts and towers, even fence post holes.

[Tom Reed]

Here's my generator shed. What are you planning to use for a prime mover?

[Dualfuel]

Dear Tom,
I have a variety of choices, but I better curb my enthusiasm... I have an Onan CCK that is currently sitting on the concrete I poured for the engine house last summer. I have an inside area of 10'X20' to work with. The perimeter footings are 2' wide and 11" deep. I am leaning toward poured walls 1' thick and at least 4' high with some other material going up from there.
I ridiculus option that I need to track down today...that will require a lot more concrete but its sort of a dream. Like how guys in their forties want a blond and a corvette...well I want this 100kw Kato generator w/ its 1197cid Waukesha six cylinder gas engine.
For now...I have space enough for two or three of these smaller generators.  I like Mike's set up. All the shiny new components. Although, I believe these things need to be seperated, or firewalled.  If my generator house burns up, I still have power because my batterys and solar are in a different area. Thats one consideration about Off-grid, namely that fire trucks can't get to where I live, unless I tow them in with the bulldozer. So, I suppose fire safety has to be considered, although I am known to not be a safety fanatic. Sometimes you don't have to worry about safety if things are setup right.
I see you have your engine on a nice concrete slab...I really really like that. I do want this engine house to be a work of art like the old victorian engine houses were. Yours reminds me of that, with that slab.
I know, I am yakking away here, but I am fishing for the right ideas now, before I start pouring again. So thanks for showing me what you have.
BPJ

[Dualfuel]

This a picture of what I have ready to go. Right now.

[glort]

I have been giving this some thought lately as my house is on the market and it's an odds on bet whatever new place I go to won't have sufficient Sheds for my needs.
What I have been looking into is using old shipping containers.
They care cheap, secure, strong and have good floors and supports that I thing would be capable of holding down my Jumping Lister If I put down some wooden rails and mount it on that and to the floor beams.

I looked at the price of the pre-fab sheds and for comparable size to a container, a shed is about 50% more but you need/ would Definitely want a concrete floor with one of those where as the Container comes with it's own floor. For a bit extra you can get an insulated container that would be stronger thanks to a stainless steel liner and would be great in keeping the sound level down.

As I am looking for a place with plenty of land area, my thoughts are to get at least 2 40 ft containers and place them apart then get some steel and make ( or have made) a roof to go between them giving me somewhere to put vehicles undercover for a great bang for buck price.
It's also easy to place 2 containers side by side, cut out the sides and make a wider area that is still lockable and completely secure.
The removed side walls can then be used as a Verandah on the side of the containers or as a roof over the top for protection and climate control on non insulated units.

Containers come in 10, 20 and 40 ft sizes so can fit in a lot of spaces from small to large.

[Dualfuel]

Oh Hey, Glort...I did some stuff with those containers in Iraq. They are indeed versitile. They made great ovens when sitting ouit in the sun. We put Camo netting over ours to help shade them. We put three together to make a court yard. Also stacked one atop another too, to make a watch tower. They are also good if you have security issues. They lock up pretty good.
I have a 1 bag mixer (6ft^3) so concrete, for me, is not an issue. Where as getting containers shipped here to the island would be expensive. Hell, they charge $60 just to send a solar panel here. Do post some pictures of what you end up doing.

[SteveU.]

Ha! Ha! HI All. Thia last part about the metal CONEX containers is just too funny a joke on me.
Illistrates well the Location, Location, Location with a lot of Purpose, Purpose, Purpose thrown in.
These here, and those using them here in the PNW wet side of the Casdade mountains find them to be cold clammy dew sweating (out of air condensing) boxes you will either have to heat or run constant dehumidifiers in to keep everything you store inside from rusting, and brown and black spot mold mouldering away.
I needed a metals, equipment, storage and welding building as an alternative to all of the really old, old drafty fire scary dangerous wooden Farm outbuildings.
So I scraped out a flat 25 foot by 45 foot spot and put down a pad of 12 inch thick 3/4" inch and minus crushed basalt gravel. Had a instant-appear in 6 hours on a lafe Friday afternoon 20'x40' galvanized steel tube colored metal carporter structure put up onto layed down 6"x8" groung contact treated wooden timbers. The next year I put side metals on it. (Ah . . a little matter of a $16. a square foot of building permiting and "develpoemental fee" evading going on here.) The next year after was to be enclosing one end wall. Creeping incrementalizating in the finest Gov'Mint taught traditions. The final "wall" to be a fabric welding cutain. Ha! Even after just the two side metals wall up I've gone inside  too often with condensing out air dew dripping down and raining on everything inside. It will often overnight frost coat on the inside and then rain down inside when hit warmed if their is any rare morning sun energy.
So . . . all of the expensive metals like the chainsaws and weed eaters have migrated now to inside my wifes all wooden 8x12 TuffShed she orderd and had insta-building put up in that same year in a single day with only a $35 permit fee. Our legal shed maximum without a the per square foot "Develomental Impact Fee" owed. This is like the Eurpean VAT. Value Added (to what?) Tax. Ah. I see. It is a "you obviously can afford it" tax to pay for Governments social programs and services. Also put her building onto a perimeter retained basalt gravel pad for drainge.

Generators running in her fully tied togather and floored wooded mini-gabled "barn" shed is like a running in an acoustical wooden musical intrument. Just barely OK up to the houses with the shed doors closed. Open the doors to let out aircooled engine heat and now an amplified grand piano effect. Nice rich enhanced tone then though.
Same genrators on the gravel in my single walled no insulation ecoing capable metal "shed" in much, much quieter to us and the 400 foot nearest nieghbors residences.

DuelFuel, and anyone else: you really want to have the center floor of your generator equipmemnt rooms completly separated from the surounding walls by at least 4 inches for sound/viberation isolation.

At least I got that part right. Wife was correct. I should have built wooden with post and beam with just a spaparate sheetrocked welding area. Groan. Would have been classed as a Permanet BUILDING then and been a min. $12,800 just for the permiting and fees and manditory inspections.
Here it is poured floors, foundations and even concreted into the ground posts that says it is a Permanent Building versus a movable "portable shed". Ha! Nothing blown away yet. Ground augered in anchors do not violate the "portable" part.

Regards
Steve Unruh the Scofflaw

[Dualfuel]

Dear Steve,
Sorry, I do owe you some text...I am in for about an hour while the oil pumps circulate yet another batch of  BD. So...first the heart breaking comiseration about your government out there. I will say this...I often get really stir crazy in late March, because everyone else has no snow, and is busy doing something. I always have fantasies of moving somewhere. Then someone like you pipes in the horror stories of what the world is like somewhere out there, off the island. You see, when I first came here I recognized something here that I remembered from my toddlerhood in the 1960s. At first, I couldn't quite place my finger on what was going on, but now I do have an idea. This place is about 40 years behind the rest of the country. An example, they still OIL the dirt roads here. Basically, this place is an abandoned industrial waste site, and it may have regulations, but they are not inforced with the enthusiasm of the more "treehugging" areas to the south or west. In fact, I think its going the other way...they are letting us shoot wolves now...
About the buildings...yup, If I was in the desert I would have a shipping container, here its just a way to get dew on everything. The other thing would be snow load. Five feet of wet heavy march snow would crush one of those things like a bug. Snow load is everything around here...its a 12-12 pitch or steeper, otherwise you have to shovel that roof all winter. People here, keep a spare snow thrower on the roof all over town. I digress...
Yes that was a good tip about keeping the engine slab floating away from the footings....I may have to pour a different set of slabs for the foundation of the engine house. No Prob. I was going to pour a 40'X40' area regardless.


DF

[SteveU.]

Yes. Heavy, wet late March snows are crushers alright.
Here is March 2010.
This is at two hills ranges into the Cascades at only ~700 valley floor altitude.
Attic spaces opened up and an extra 100 pounds of firewood burnt off to do the house roof melting off.
3-4 gallons of gasoline to do the same in the metal shop-shed. I now have set up center post jacks for the next time and a made up snow rake. These ok for the drier November-January snows - NOT for the later season wet sticky heavy stuff.
Next picture is our property just 30 mike directly East at 2000 feet river valley floor center within the Cascades. Yep 5 feet snow common there Nov-Dec through Feb. The cabin you DO NOT see does have your recommended snow pitched roof. Survived well since the late 40's. Five mile's north of that at 3000+ feet the snow pack starts at 5 feet annually and goes up to 10-12 feet even 18 feet. Good for the rivers fish migrations in May and June and smolt flushing later. This is our snow park/snowmobile territory. Only ever been fire watch lookout towers up there. And they are on stilts!
Nobody in these valley floors ever digs down to live or store on the wet Westside. That is for another 15-30 miles from the cabin over the Cascade Crest on the eastern dry-side. Min. 70 inches to 140 inches of rain with the snow the melt offs floodings makes that stupid crazy here. We learned to locate and build up off of bottoms. Between the shop and the lower house yard was a sheet of flowing water last winter at warm central Pacific Pineapple Experss heavy rain rapid forced melt off for 2-3 days. Always; as you have done; best to live 2-3-4 years BEFORE building, just looking, deciding. And really, really think it through WHY you see the locals doing what they do and why. The chepeecko's here the one's always summer buying the lush lowland hollows with bear grass in them, building and later with floated out septic systems. I've seen some of these properies summer time re-sell now, be winter /spring abandoned after two years now 5-6 times in 20 years. Bear grass does not lie like people will.
Location.
Location.
Location.

Regards
Steve Unruh

[Dualfuel]

Ha Ha! Steve!  I love it. We do get that 18 feet here occasionally... you see the funny pictures of the people using the second floor doors to get into the house with...or the snow tunnel to the gas station....
That is getting rarer here though...nobody builds those elevated walk ways anymore. Just one old mansion still uses one.
There were a lot of embarrased people here this spring...we still had several feet on the ground in may, and even the road commission had a garage collapse. Total was over 300 inches...and it may seem strange, but after a while it just doesn't matter. So I never keep track. What matters is if the blower truck has enough shear pins to open the road out to the highway...that kind of thing.
You seem to have a similar situation there...I love the beargrass story! Here, a common site is the Uhauls lining up in the spring to cross the lift bridge and get out of all this snow.

[Dualfuel]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7petMvKkJE
This is the Kubota/junk yard engine shed....