Call that a shed?*

This a shed. I’m about to lay down a deposit the size of a decent bike frame to secure the rights to this flat-pack furniture on steroids. Four weeks from now, a huge truck shall abandon a few hundred planks, and a single sheet of badly translated instructions on our concrete slab.

My understanding that this grown up self-assembly wardrobe will somehow do exactly that, while I examine my giant erection with unconfined joy and some awe. Do your own jokes, I’ll be back in a sec. Finished? Right, moving on or – to be more precise – up, my real plan is to shirk any building responsibility by dragging my friends from all over England to assemble it for me.

A tissue of lies shall promise unlimited food, beer and riding in exchange for ten minutes light work with a chisel. Apparently a competent DIY duo could assemble this in a week. Less usefully, nowhere is an estimate provided for six drunk blokes, one exasperated wife, and an impatient man skilled only in “powertool trigger revving

But the completion of that building is right here; front and centre on the critical path of a thousand tasks that start with a big digger, and finish with financial ruin. The idea of a static caravan was put beyond possible use by a reasoned argument starting “WHAT? You’ve seen Grand Designs? Four of us in a caravan for two months would be Last Person Gouging with added Cutlery

I’ve spent some quality time designing systems to hang bikes and hold planes. However, I’ve pulled back from that dark realm of sadness where humourless men speak of “A Steed Collection” and “My Hanger“. Instead I’ve sketched out a few ideas on wine soaked paper, and passed them over to the only person in the Leigh family with spacial awareness.

Now stop sniggering and help me out here. I have a problem with the siting of a rain water harvester.*** Anyone know what 6000 litres of litres of water weighs? Is it “quite alot?

* Remember the film? “That’s not a knife…“. I had impure thoughts about Paul Hogan’s bit’o’stuff in that movie. Saw it again the other night. Hairstyles in the eighties, what were we thinking?**

** In my case “I’m going bald”

*** Oh yeah, livin’ the dream here, livin’ the dream.

8 thoughts on “Call that a shed?*

  1. bruce

    An ex-colleague bought something similar and I went to help unload it – it took 4 of us half a day, just to unload the wagon… The driver mentioned that him and his Lithuanian buddy could build it in a weekend – I suggest to my pal to take up the offer – he didn’t, and three months of weekends later, not yet finished…

  2. DaveB

    I know it’s too late but I could have taken a zero off that price.
    They are so easy to design and build..and wholesale timber is so much cheaper. But, of course, this is a Leigh project!!!

  3. Alex

    Mike – thanks. I am now better informed and a little more worried!

    Dave – it isn’t too late, tell me more 🙂

  4. Andy

    6000litres is also quite large at 6m3. For the imperially minded I’m looking out the window at an old metal oil tank which, @8000litres capacity, is 8ft x 4ft x 4ft (free to anyone who’ll collect it). Your water tank is going to be big, ugly and will need something solid to sit on like a concrete pad. You might also need to site it within reach of the downpipes. If I were you and had diggers coming anyway I’d seriously consider burying it.

  5. Andy

    Seems all those math classes were wasted. Our tank is actually 4000litres so your 6,000 litres is going to be huge. I think we might have actually walked about inside one at the home show.

  6. Alex

    We’re burying it. I am just not sure how deep we’ll have to go. Australia but he sound of it. I’ve just knocked down the old post and rail fence that surrounds the hardstanding.

    I think Carol wanted to reuse the rather nice wood it was made out of. My choice of destruction tool may not – in that case – been a good one. Still sledgehammers are ace!

  7. Andy

    Our replacement plastic oil tank was 1800+1800 bund so 3600 litres and that’s about 4ft 6″ tall so I’d guess your’s is going to be a bit taller and longer plus a couple feet of access spout plus the buried ones still need hardcore and 6inches of concrete at the bottom of the hole. That’s an eight foot deep hole large enough to park a small car in. And our plastic oil tank weighed 250kg empty!

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