Start to Finish - How to Build a Cedar Shed | 43

What is going on guys? I'm Zach. Welcome back to Workshop Edit. In today's video I want to take you through how I built this 3 foot by 6 foot cedar shed. Now the best thing about this project is even if you don't have any of the materials that I use in this project or you've never built anything like this before in your life and you have none of the tools that I use, the total cost of this project would still only be about $900, which is over $500 cheaper than the next best option that you could find at your Home Depot. And you're still going to have to assemble that thing yourself. So if you're looking to build something like this or you're looking to get into the DIY space and start acquiring tools, this is the perfect type of project to get started because the construction of it is actually really simple. So let's go ahead and get started. To begin I started out by modeling the various components and phases of this project in SketchUp. I'm not very good at this but a little practice goes a long way to be able to model basic projects and this proved immensely helpful in figuring out materials and measurements for the space I was working with. The first step was to create the base of the shed and if you're interested in building something similar I'll leave a link to download my SketchUp file in the description. The base was the only component to be built from pressure treated lumber. It's about twice as expensive as regular 2x4s but since this would be sitting on the ground I wanted something that was weather resistant and would be resistant to any rot even though water really wouldn't be building up underneath it anyways. I marked out and began cutting down my materials on the miter saw. To assemble things I'm using 3.5 inch screws and butt joints and these screws made for quick work and I didn't have to bother pre-drilling anything or worry about the wood splitting and this made for quick work using only the impact driver to assemble each of the components. Now I bought three pressure treated 2x4s and in reality I needed more but I ended up using just a regular 2x4 for the inside supports of the piece. These would be floating off the ground so not really a big deal. Next up was building all four sides of the shed which required a lot of breaking down my 2x4s into their various lengths based off of my sketch model that you saw earlier and I think I bought 36 2x4s for this build. The second component that I focused on was the backing of the shed which was very straight forward and resembled the structural framing of a house. I think my studs were 12 inches on center though and again held together with just screws and butt joints. Now I designed the roof to overhang the outside walls and the front of the shed and this was just to protect from any rainfall and hitting the sides of the shed. Again it wasn't really a big deal but also aesthetically it looked a lot better. I added two additional cross supports that matched up with the base of the structure so that it could rest on top and I could use some longer screws at the end of the project to attach things together. You'll see how this all comes together at the end of the project. Next up was building the front of the shed. The one thing I changed about this design is making the door opening slightly wider and using two doors instead of one. But since I made it the width I did which was about 32 inches I ended up using only one door. And building this was relatively straight forward too. It consisted of a top structure that was supported by two narrower structures below and it was all encased within another top support piece that could tie it all together. And I'll just say I'm obviously not following any sort of larger building codes for this. It's only a 3 foot by 6 foot shed and how I've constructed it is more than strong and safe enough for the purpose that it serves. Last step was to create two side walls that sloped up from the back piece to the front. And I ended up going back to my SketchUp model to figure out what that sloping angle was so that I could set the miter saw and rip a slight angle on top of the piece so that the pitch was consistent across the vertical supports. Now to make sure things were square when assembling I used an extra lateral piece that was the same width as my base to make sure that my outside vertical supports were the same width and then I screwed all four of those pieces together. To make things easier I laid out the middle 2x4s that would serve as further roofing support where they needed to go, marked out the length at which they would need to be, and then went and cut them down individually on the miter saw so that they were a perfect fit. And then again just some screws to hold things in place. And then I just repeated the process for the other wall. Next up was the fun part of removing rose bushes on the side yard where the shed would be. Once removed I leveled out the ground and got rid of any of the ground vegetation and got rid of all of the stumps from the rose bushes and began digging out and compacting the area to put the stone blocks down that would support the back of the shed. My method was to dig out a square, compress the dirt using the stone, and then add more dirt and just repeat the compressing process until I had my three stones in place and they were level with each other and the concrete pathway that the shed would also be sitting on. And then I just wetted everything down and cleaned off the side of the house to help make that dirt settle a little bit better. Now the next phase of the project was adding half inch OSB to each of the six sides of this project. Originally my plan was to only use cedar planks for the walls, but I quickly realized that this wouldn't offer much in the way of security. So I opted instead to have each piece of OSB screwed in to all of the 2x4s at various places and then just covered by the cedar walling. This to me felt a lot more secure and you'll see what I mean in a little bit. Now the easiest way to do this was to sit a piece of OSB on top of one of the walls and line it up to two of the corners. And then after securing two of those corners and a few other touch points to the framing, I could then mark out a few lines on where I could run my circular saw across those edges and then cut all those materials to the exact size that I needed. And then I'd go back and add more screws everywhere I could and then just repeat that process over and over for each wall until all six sides were completed. And this was much easier than trying to measure and cut to size and then attach. And the OSB really helped in adding some shearing strength to this build overall. Now once each piece was framed and the OSB was attached to it, it was time to begin final assembly. And this was the last thing I did before the end of the day. Now I moved the base structure into its final place and then one by one attached each wall to the base using a series of three inch screws and my impact driver. The first wall was incredibly heavy so I carried it into place and then my wife helped me scoot it into its final position and hold it vertically while I drove in the first set of screws. And this didn't have to be plumb yet as I'd make sure all that was taken care of as I added the adjacent walls. And I think I used six or so screws for each of the base pieces and this felt more than secure. And you see me putting this little piece in place just in case it wanted to tip over forward on top of me. That would have been bad. So my design for the side pieces was actually about one and a half inches shorter than it needed to be and rather than trying to extend it and messing up my design, I simply added in a second two by four at the base that I could then rest the corresponding wall on top of. And again, everything was secured using a series of three inch screws. Now since I didn't have an extra set of hands at this point, I used a clamp to bring the two adjoining walls together and make sure that they were perpendicular to the ground and each other and then drove in more screws to attach those walls together. The last piece of the puzzle was the front part, which I was just tall enough to carry in by myself and it was damn heavy. And I again placed it where it needed to roughly go and then scooted it into its final place and then used a clamp to pull the two pieces together and drove in some more screws and repeating this process on the other side. And at that point it was getting dark, so I decided to call it for a day and I felt incredibly productive. And the next morning I got to work on the door and this was a really simple structure. Just four 2x4s butt joining together and then held again with screws. No pre-drilling or anything. And I must have messed up in my measurements slightly because the door was about a half inch too wide, which wasn't a big deal. I just went back to the shop, disassembled, and moved in the width of the outside piece about half an inch and then cut off that excess piece back at the miter saw. And I was happy to find that after the second try it fit once I took it back to the shed. And knowing everything fit, I went back to the shop and attached OSB to the front of it. Again, adding strength as well as making it more secure. And to attach the OSB better and add more rigidity, I also added a center 2x4 to the piece. The door felt solid at this point. Once completed, I could begin the rather simple process of adding cedar fencing planks to the exterior of all the surfaces, starting with the door. And everything would be held in place with one and a half inch brad nails. Now, I'm in Southern California and my local Home Depot doesn't sell cedar 2x4s, but they do sell these fencing planks, which are cheap and really awesome. So I'm guessing that most people have access to them regardless of their geographic location. Originally, I designed it so that the door would have lateral cedar pieces and match this cedar of the actual shed. But off camera, I actually changed my mind and ended up making everything vertical. And I added a little X pattern to the front as well, and you'll see what I mean in the final piece. Now, adding cedar to the exterior of the actual shed was relatively straightforward too. To keep things even, I started with a long piece over the door, and by getting this tacked in place and level with some brad nails, I could then work off of each side as my reference point. For the top piece, to match the angle, I had to cut down two pieces with my circular saw that matched the pitch. This didn't have to be perfect, so using a circular saw with the piece clamped down to my work surface worked just fine. Now, like I said before, I'm adding trim to all the edges of my shed, and it's not necessary, but aesthetically, it does look a lot nicer. Now, just like I ripped down that angled piece in the previous step, you can just as easily use your circular saw for this step. Now, that being said, because I have a table saw and was under a time crunch to finish this before the end of the weekend, I went ahead and used mine to rip all those pieces down to two and a quarter inches wide. Then, piece by piece, I lined it up on the corresponding edge and tacked it all in place with more brad nails, lots of them. Rather than trying to cut everything to length at once, I simply tacked in a piece and then would measure out and cut to length the next piece and then tack it into place and then just repeat that process. Okay, on to the roof. Now, I'm not a roofer. I've never installed a roof, and I did about an hour of previous research to figure out what I would likely need for this project. I came to the conclusion that because I'm in Southern California where it barely rains and that this isn't a house, and it was only about $30 in total roofing materials, that I really only needed one thing of laminated shingles in the color of my choice and some roofing nails to make this structure complete. I did follow the directions on the back, which was as easy as starting with a bottom row and in a corner, nailing in the appropriate amount of nails to hold down a piece along the chalk line, and then repeating that process with a staggered pattern all the way to the top. Now, I like the look of cedar, but I felt it was just a bit too light, so instead I decided to make a mess and stain the entire shed a red chestnut color. With everything assembled and stained, the final step was to assemble the door. To begin, I cut some scraps of OSB and brad nailed them into the inside frame of the door so that I could hold the door in place when putting on the hinges. I also used some very thin scraps that I had on hand as spacers on the floor so that the door could sit on top of them while I attached it, and then when I removed them, it wouldn't drag on the ground. Now, I'm using some exterior gate hinges for this, and the screws they came with were incredibly small and wouldn't penetrate through the cedar and the OSB into the studs, so I chose to use some more of the 3-inch screws that I had on hand. I marked out and decided for this step that I'd pre-drill everything, and in hindsight, after doing one set of hinges and driving in the screws, I realized I could get away with just drilling in the screws. Now once the door was in place and secure, I could remove the temporary piece holding it in and then use a few more screws to install a simple handle to pull it open, and then I can test it. It worked great, and it felt really secure. Now, I'm using this $20 locking mechanism that I got from Home Depot. It's as simple as attaching to the door and the shed and letting the latch fall into place, and then securing with the lock of your choosing. One thing I had to do after I attached it initially was take it off, go back, and chisel out a recess, as the mounting piece actually has a little lip, and with it sticking out on the frame of the door, the door wouldn't close properly. It's kind of amazing that when it comes down to it, that little bit of clearance was actually needed to close the door. I also went back and added a few extra 2x4 blocks where there were none behind the locking mechanism, and it just helped make it a bit more secure. I then could go back and knock out all those pieces of OSB that I had temporarily tacked in to help flush up the door on the inside. Last step was securing the roof, and I left this as the last step, as not having it secured made it easier to stain and move the roof around slightly to get into those hard to reach places. To keep the door from swinging past where it needed to be, I used a tiny piece of cedar and brad nailed it to the floor. It's very small, but it works perfect to prevent the door from swinging in past where I want it to. Last step, you probably noticed it's shaking a tiny bit when I move about the shed, so I cut down a few pressure treated shims from the scraps I had, and hammered them into the gaps where the ground wasn't perfect. The last thing that I wanted to do was add this dollar store light that's powered by three AAA batteries, and I could just turn it on and stick it wherever I wanted in the shed, and it would provide just a little bit of light in case I was trying to locate something in the dark and didn't have a flashlight on hand. And with that, and the purchase of a padlock, the shed was done. And honestly, it came out really great. The best part about this project, like I said before, is even if you didn't have a single tool that I used in this build, between materials and purchasing those tools with no discounts, you'd still spend about $500 less than what it costs to buy one of these things pre-built from Home Depot, and you would still need to assemble it yourself. So don't let the tool stop you from trying to DIY something like this, especially since after the fact, you'll have a great set of starter tools to tackle further DIY projects. I hope you enjoyed this project, hopefully it was inspiration and directional enough to go out and tackle something of your own. If you enjoyed it, I encourage you to subscribe to the channel, like the video, and let me know if you learned something about it. Definitely check out the Sketchup file if you have any questions about the dimensions of it, and again, thanks for watching, I'll see you guys later.