Building a practice shed

My first blog post! My goal is to periodically update this blog with posts pertaining to two subjects; home improvement/DIY projects, and drum stuff. A bit about myself...I am a drummer, a few years out of college, and I play (mostly jazz) gigs and teach around the Washington D.C area, which is where I reside. About two years ago, my mother passed away, and my younger sister and I inherited the house we grew up in, putting us in the unusual positions of being homeowners at the ages of 17 and 23. We have a charming and unique house, but like most older homes, there is an endless amount of issues, repairs, and maintenance that must be addressed. I am new to all of the trades that are involved in home improvement, but I've enjoyed learning, and I find the work to be very satisfying/deeply frustrating/physically painful. This first post will cover the construction of a shed I built in my yard to practice drums in (a shed-shed?!), so it will be something of a mix of both subject areas. First, I'll detail the construction of the shed, and then I'll wrap it up with a short video of me actually playing some drums in it.

foundation materials

the foundation laid out

floor frame, mark II

The first step was laying out a foundation of 16 concrete blocks (4 rows of 4), laid out over some thick plastic sheeting topped with gravel to keep plants from coming back. One principle I've been slowly learning is that everything is more tedious, complicated, or difficult than you think it will be. I found that to be relevant for even this first, “simple”, step. It took several more hours than I originally imagined to get all of these blocks perfectly level with each other, in order to provide a flat surface for the shed. To level the blocks, I dug them all into the soil at varying depths, to account for the very slight slope/general unevenness of my yard.

easy walls

hard wall

Once the foundation was done, I had the first half of my lumber delivered from a local lumberyard. I didn't order it all at once, because at this point I really had no concept of how long this project would take, not having built any sort of structure before. To determine the amount and type of lumber I needed, I spent hours researching basic shed and building construction, and then planned it all out in a notebook. I built the floor frame first, using pressure treated 2x6 lumber. Because of my carpentry inexperience, I made a few rookie mistakes during this initial step. First, I spaced the wood framing members incorrectly, and I did not use nails that were rated for exterior use. Because of this oversight, the exposed nail heads were covered in red-brown rust spots after one day in the rain. After a bout of obscenities, I dissassembled the whole floor and put it back together correctly spaced, with exterior hot galvanized nails. I then closed in one side with pressure treated plywood, which would eventually be the bottom of the shed, when the floor frame was flipped over onto the blocks. Before flipping the floor frame over, I assembled the frames for all four walls, using the upside-down floor as a sort of construction platform. Framing out the openings for the door and windows took careful reading of a few different webpages, before I finally reached an understanding of how to properly do it. Not everyone is born knowing what king studs, jack studs, and trimmers are, OK, internet how-to article writers?! Use some gosh-darned pictures. Or at least a helpful illustration.

fluffy stuff inside the floor

completed floor

this required help

With all the wall frames ready, me and a few friends lifted the floor frame up, and set it down on the blocks, with the open side up. I filled the cavities with batts of fiberglass insulation, and then closed it in, using 3/4” CDX plywood as my subfloor material. After this, the walls went up, again with some help from friends. Although I did try, I could not simultaneously balance a 12 foot wall frame and nail it into the floor (and yes, I did drop the wall, attempting this). The next step was to enclose the frame with building wrap, which helps keep moisture out of the interior of the building, but also allows moisture to escape from the inside out. Installation is fairly simple; the material is wrapped around the building, from the bottom up, and them the seams are taped. It might look familiar-nearly all new houses are built with this stuff.

building wrap

too much math necessary

 After all the Tyvek was up, I began working on the roof. This was the part of the shed that required the most detailed planning prior to construction, because of the exact angles and measurements involved. I found a very helpful website that assisted me in planning and visualizing how to build the roof; all I had to was enter in the dimensions and the roof slope that I wanted, and I was provided with the angles and measurements, and even a printable template to trace the angles to be cut onto the rafters. I think I would have been more equipped to

make these sort of calculations a decade ago....at age 25, geometry class and the pythagorean theorem seems fairly far off. I attached the ridge beam (the piece of lumber that travels down the center of the roof) onto posts at either end, nailed all the cut rafters to the beam, and then used hurricane ties (metal clips used to protect

window #1 installed

roofs from strong winds) to secure the them at the bottom.

amazing girlfriend
 Nicole Saphos helps out

Before the sheathing (the wood panels that will serve as the exterior wall) could go up, I had to prep the window openings by adhering flashing tape all around the corners, to help protect against water infiltration. Once the openings were flashed, I caulked around the openings, and slid the windows in. The window installation took longer than I wanted, because of circumstances that were surprisingly not caused by my own foolishness. One of the original two windows I ordered was broken right out of the box, and it took several weeks for a new one to arrive. Unfortunately, my local home improvement center (rhymes with “foam repo”) forgot to actually order the window, which is a necessary prerequisite to receiving said window. Finally, I was able to install the second window, and put up the sheathing. I used T1-11 plywood siding, which is a fairly cheap, but durable siding material that comes as a sheet of 4'x8' plywood with grooves in it, to make sure it looks cool.

Once the siding was done, I was able to install the door. I bought steel pre-hung door, meaning that it comes ready for installation, already in a door frame. The door installation was fairly straightforward, except for the “shimming” part. For those not in the know, “shims” are small strips of wood that are used to make things fit tightly, or to adjust with alignment. However, the actual correct usage of these enigmatic “shims” is something a mystery to me. Why are we shimming everything? Why can't we make the rough opening for windows and doors the actual size of the window or door, and not include any shims? Is there some secret shim cartel that is forcing the hand of helpless carpenters everywhere? Do shims go on all sides? Nobody knows.

door and roof sheathing installed

adding window trim, and
tar paper on roof

After the siding was completely up, and the Shim Illuminati appeased, I progressed upwards. For the roof sheathing, I used 5/8 thick OSB boards. Before I was able to completely finish putting all the roof sheathing up, my shed had to endure several days of heavy rain. Everything was completely soaked, and a significant amount of water pooled on the floor. I was pretty bummed about this, and I used my wet-vac to removes puddles of water inside several times. After everything dryied off for a day or two, I started to feel a bit better. I reminded myself over and over that this happens to homes under construction all the time. Still....it was a little traumatizing. IT'S MY DRUM SHED, NOT SOME REGULAR JOE'S HOUSE AND IT HAS TO BE PERFECT, OK? Once the roof sheathing was up, I had to figure out how to enclose the area under the overhang of the roof, referred to as the “eaves” or “soffit”. This was trickier than I imagined, and I think this is sloppiest part of the finished shed. I had to make some difficult cuts with a circular saw and jigsaw while standing on a ladder. in retrospect, I CLEARLY should have planned it all out more exactly beforehand, and cut all the pieces safely on the ground.

just like a puzzle..

many pain

With the roof sheathing and eaves finished, shingling the roof was the final step in making the shed weathertight. Before I began, I added metal drip edge along all the edges of the roof, and stapled down tar paper over the roof. After watching several instruction roofing videos online (there seemed to be a bunch of different methods for laying out shingles), I reluctantly got up on the roof. For the most part, laying down the roofing was not difficult, even a bit fun. Sort of like laying out a big, easy puzzle...where all the pieces are the same....and the puzzle is on a roof. However, there was one major bummer that accompanied finishing the roof; the extreme pain that was inflicted upon my hands. Roofing nails are very short, and that made it very easy for me to repeatedly hit my fingers with a hammer. I even had to sub out a gig with the Bohemian Caverns Jazz Orchestra at the last minute, after I hit two fingers so hard that I couldn't play at all that day.

weatherproof!

more fluffy stuff

 To finish the inside of the shed, I put in fiberglass insulation, hung drywall, and put carpet on the floor. I stapled the batts of insulation in the walls, and just sort of sat the the insulation on top of the ceiling rafters. All of the small areas around the windows and doors were filled with spray foam insulation, a substance that I discovered is close to impossible to remove from one's skin. After everything was insulated, I hung drywall on the ceiling and walls. Unless you have a drywall lift, or some other kind of support, hanging drywall on a ceiling is extremely difficult without a helper. I managed to hang one panel by myself, using a highly unstable lift comprised of a ladder with paint cans on top.

this isn't safe at all

I enlisted some help from friends for the final two ceiling panels, and I was able to hang all the walls without assistance. I chose to leave drywall unfinished, meaning that I did not paint the drywall, and I did not cover the seams between panels or exposed screws with joint compound. In my limited experience, finishing drywall properly is both very frustrating and unattainable. I always end up applying way too much mud, which leads to an excess of drywall dust everywhere, as a result of the sanding process. For those who don't know, drywall dust is the absolute worst, most annoying, microscopic, supernatural substance in the entire known universe, and I wanted to avoid dealing with it. Perhaps at some point, I will finish out the drywall, but for now, I don't mind the utilitarian look at all. The final step, before I was able to move in my drums, was to lay carpet. I went to the Depot, purchased an 8' by 12' foot section of the cheapest indoor wall to wall carpeting, and it laid over some foam padding and carpet tack strips. I finished nearly all the drywall and carpeting over the course of one swelteringly hot day, and it resulted in a nasty sweat rash on my chest.....the final lesson I learned was to always wear breathable clothing when working in high heat.

just napping

the finished interior

done!

Building the shed was a lot of work, much more than I expected, but it is finally all done (except for a few finishing touches of paint on the exterior)! My drums are set up inside, and I have been practicing in it nearly every day for the past few weeks! It is immensely satisfying.....and also very hot. I snuck an extension cord in through a window, which I use to plug in a lamp and a fan, which does help a bit with the heat. Now, this overview of the construction of my practice shed makes the whole process look a lot more streamlined than it actually was: I made a lot of mistakes, and figured out a lot as I went along, mostly by watching youtube videos. I hope that anyone reading this didn't find it horribly boring, and I also plan to include posts that are focused on drumming/music (drumming is obviously not music). Below is a video of me playing for a couple minutes in the shed. I'll be posting more in the near future-please feel free to share this blog with others!