Backyard Shed Complete!

The shed is finally complete!  All total, I worked on this on and off for about 3 months, and I am happy with the results:

This post is going to be more about showing what all I have done than about how I did it.  Some of this worright gone on for a long time and I have not documented it well along the way.

We'll start with the doors and latches, which were actually the last thing I did.  The doors are what's commonly referred to around here as "Dutch doors."  This means that each door is composed of a top and bottom piece that can open independently.  So for each opening, there are two Dutch doors, or 4 total door frame sections.  Here's the left set:

 

And the right:

The door pull and latch system is something I came up with and made at the forge.  The left door has a fixed pull, and the right side pull is attached to a rod that acts as a bolt latch between the two doors.

Here is a picture of the back.  You can see the rod coming through the slot in the door, and passing through a piece of square tubing mounted to the door.

Then there is a matching piece of square tubing on the other door that this rod slides into when you close the latch.  You can also see the fixed pull coming through the door in this picture.

The sheet metal exterior of the top doors overlaps the bottom doors, and the sheet metal of the right doors overlaps the left doors.  This causes the bolt to lock both left doors in place, as well as the bottom of the right door, which it is mounted to.  But this arrangement leaves the right top door unlatched.  So I made this little rod to lock the top right door to the bottom right door when they are all closed.

I made all the door frames from welded 1 inch square tubing.  I also made the hinges at the forge from 1/8" sheet steel.  Here are a couple of the hinges that have been made but not yet painted so you can see how they go together: 

 

This is the pattern I cut the steel into before rolling the eyes or barrels at the forge.

Here is a picture of some of the door frames in-progress.

And here is my forge set up inside the shed.

  

 

This was a long project, but the results are worth it.  I've really enjoyed having the new shed.  Unfortunately it's already full.  It seems that no matter how much storage space one has, one will need more.

 

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Backyard Shed: Part 3

Having completed the build of my shed in part 2, I was eager to start getting some stuff out of the garage and into the shed to free up some space.  I started with my yard tools, specifically, my shovels, hoes, rakes, and forks.

I began by selecting a group of tools and laying them out so that they would fit along one of the short walls.  I laid them across a 2x4, and marked where the handles of the tools intersected the board.

I cut a rabbet into this board, and it became the top of an L shaped assembly which I would hang the tools from.

I cut rough notches into the top board with the bandsaw to match where the tool handles would sit, and then glued and screwed it to the bottom board.

I hung this rack in the shed, and set my tools in place. 

I found that the rack had to be set low enough for the large shovel heads, which caused the hoes to sit too low and hang below the exterior sheeting of the building.

To remedy this, I threw together a quick little frame to raise the hoes up.  It's all constructed of scrap 2x4s and held together with pocket hole screws.

This first rack took care of hanging my shovels, hoes, and forks, but I needed a couple of other hangers for my rakes.  I left them off of the first rack because their large heads would have taken up a lot of the space.  I made these hangers by cutting another notch into a board, and then gluing and screwing it to a piece of 2x4.

 Here you can see I let the large rake heads overlap a bit to save space.

I also made a mount of the same design as the rakes to hold my pickaxe.

I forged a piece of 1/2" rebar into a hanger for my sledgehammer.

I made this little tool holder for this wooden tamper I use in the garden.

Sorry for the extremely long hiatus I took between this post and the last.  I hope any formerly regular readers I had are still hanging in there.  Look for the last installment in the shed series coming very soon!