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I'm pricing out a detached 24x24 garage with concrete slab and it's coming in around $45k which is out of my price range. I started looking at other options and found a local semi-modular shed builder that will build a 16x24 shed for $15k. It's a lot cheaper than the detached garage per square foot because they don't do any excavation or poured slab. I need to level the area myself and they will assemble the shed right on top of it. The strongest flooring option is a double 5/8" plywood floor with 12" OC 2x6 joists. Is this strong enough to store a car (let's say an Audi Q5 which is 15 feet long and 4400 lbs) plus some garden equipment such as a tractor, lawn mower, snow blower, and tiller?
It'll be strong enough when new, but after a few years when those 2x6's start to rot from being placed on the ground, you'll find the flooring start to sink.
My parents had a shed for their riding lawn mower and some other things, after about 6-7 years the flooring of the shed started to warp a bit, eventually had to put a new floor in it.
If you want to go this route, I'd get cement and pour it yourself after they lay the 2x6's, or make sure they use treated wood that is designed for ground contact (even better is fully treated wood that can be buried.) Then it won't rot from moisture.
OP lot's of future problems with rot, warpage, bugs, animals burrowing, dead animals , termites, stability etc etc.
Even treated wood today rots eventually in moist conditions like rain settling in underneath.
Go the concrete floor way and save a lot of future costs and headaches. It will also help with the value of your home.
Can you have a "pole building" put in where you live? They don't require foundations (nor floors), so they're usually cheaper to build. I had a Morton building built for an airplane hangar 35 years ago, and it was much cheaper than what a steel building would have been. It still looks new today. Mine had steel siding, but you can pick whatever siding you want.
The building was 50x80, and I initially just had a 20-foot-wide concrete pad poured down the middle of it for 2 planes to set on. A couple years later I had the rest of it poured. Price wouldn't reflect today's price, but I can tell you that the building itself was equal to the two big doors in it (one on each end).
Just got to thinking, about 40 years ago I was a board member/VP for a weekly newspaper that burned to the ground, and we needed something to move into quickly. It ended up being a pole building right on main street (Cody, WY). I was hesitant to buy a pole building for a newspaper office, but after seeing it I was sold on it -- one of the better looking buildings on main street at that time. You'd have never guessed from looking at it that it was "pole built".
Yes, the 2x6 joists and floorboard will both be PT, but I've heard this type of material hasn't been used for too long so there's no telling how long it will last long-term.
Good idea about pouring the concrete between joists. I'd have to ask them if maybe they could do that for me. Problem is, I'm not sure how long an above-ground slab will last here with the constant freezing/thawing cycles we get in the beginning and end of winter. I'm afraid it will start cracking soon. For example people don't have concrete driveways in New England because of the weather conditions.
Can you have a "pole building" put in where you live? They don't require foundations (nor floors), so they're usually cheaper to build. I had a Morton building built for an airplane hangar 35 years ago, and it was much cheaper than what a steel building would have been. It still looks new today. Mine had steel siding, but you can pick whatever siding you want.
The building was 50x80, and I initially just had a 20-foot-wide concrete pad poured down the middle of it for 2 planes to set on. A couple years later I had the rest of it poured. Price wouldn't reflect today's price, but I can tell you that the building itself was equal to the two big doors in it (one on each end).
Just got to thinking, about 40 years ago I was a board member/VP for a weekly newspaper that burned to the ground, and we needed something to move into quickly. It ended up being a pole building right on main street (Cody, WY). I was hesitant to buy a pole building for a newspaper office, but after seeing it I was sold on it -- one of the better looking buildings on main street at that time. You'd have never guessed from looking at it that it was "pole built".
No idea what a pole building is. Since the poles make up the foundation of the building, is the flooring optional?
having spent 30 years in the coatings industry, I've baffled at how folk think that a concrete slab on grade does not absorb and hold or transmit moisture comparable to that of the dirt it rests on. A calcium chloride test or a patch test is an essential part of assessing a concrete slab for it's moisture content before applying any coatings, especially ones that are moisture blocking such as epoxies.
the difference between a concrete slab and a wood joist in direct contact with the substrate soil moisture is that the concrete doesn't rot. But it still has the moisture and if that's a problem with a dirt floor area in your climate zone, it's identical with the concrete.
Absent an effective moisture vapor barrier installed under the concrete slab, there will be moisture in the concrete placed on grade.
Similarly, you can place a moisture vapor barrier on a prepared soil base before placing wood on top of that to minimize the moisture absorption/exposure to the wood joists.
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