Easiest Shed Foundation I’ve Ever Built

Summary

Highlights

• Jeff shows how to layout the 9 by 6-foot shed base using 2x8s and strategic post placement. 📏
• Understanding roofing dimensions helps in preventing unnecessary cuts — a smart planning move! 🧠
• Why using Simpson Strong-Tie products ensures robust construction. 🛠️
• How aligning floor joists with red square markers on a tape measure leads to structural integrity. 🔩
• Mastering the combination of screws and hangers for long-lasting durability. 🔧

Key Takeaways

• Building a shed foundation is easier than it seems, especially with Jeff guiding the way! 🛠️
• No need to cut roofing materials if planned well — saves time and effort! ✂️
• Using quality tools like Simpson Strong-Tie makes all the difference in structural strength. 💪
• A precise tape measure and the right saw go a long way in achieving perfection. 📏
• It's all about proper groundwork! Screening and tough blocks help set a solid base. 🧱

Overview

Chapters

• 00:00 - 01:00: Introduction and Planning The chapter, "Introduction and Planning," introduces the task of building a shed base in an afternoon. Jeff lists the necessary tools and materials and outlines the dimensions of the shed as 9 ft by 6 ft and 8 ft tall. The base will be made using 2x8s supported by posts coming out of the ground. Jeff begins by explaining the construction method, highlighting the posts at the corners for stability.
• 01:00 - 03:00: Preparing the Foundation Frame The chapter titled 'Preparing the Foundation Frame' outlines the initial steps in constructing a foundation frame for a deck. It discusses framing a door area using posts and highlights how dimensions are maintained consistently. The 9 ft section is emphasized to illustrate the size and symmetry of the posts.
• 03:00 - 06:00: Cutting and Measuring Joists The chapter on 'Cutting and Measuring Joists' discusses the process of installing an ice and water shield, followed by a 38-inch wide corrugated metal roof product. The segment highlights that although the product is 38 inches wide, the last rib is always covered by the next piece, effectively reducing the width of each visible segment to 36 inches. This information is vital for planning and ensuring that a full sheet begins the installation process, with additional sheets allowing for a perfect 9-foot finish. Understanding the precise measurements helps in optimizing the material use and achieving a seamless roofing process.
• 06:00 - 11:00: Installing Joist Hangers and Joists The chapter explains how the choice of roofing material can influence the dimensions of a shed to avoid unnecessary cuts and adjustments. Specifically, it describes measuring and installing rim joists, emphasizing the need for the rim joist to extend 1.5 inches beyond each side of the intended 9-foot width to accommodate joists and ensure proper structural support.
• 11:00 - 15:00: Setting the Shed Base The chapter 'Setting the Shed Base' discusses the initial steps for constructing a shed base, emphasizing the importance of planning dimensions. The speaker explains a method of calculating dimensions using segments, recommending standard segment measurements to avoid on-site cutting of roofing material, which can lead to rusting if not done properly. Flexibility in shed size is allowed, as long as these principles are observed.
• 15:00 - 19:00: Leveling and Securing Posts The chapter focuses on the initial steps of constructing a frame for a perimeter. It involves positioning and aligning the frame correctly. The process is detailed, starting with cutting lumber directly from a pile using a square and a saw. The saw has a framing demolition blade, specified as 24 teeth on a 7 and 1/4 inch saw, with a marked zero point to ensure precise cuts.
• 19:00 - 23:00: Finalizing the Structure The chapter 'Finalizing the Structure' provides a detailed guide on achieving precise cuts using a saw and square. The process involves aligning the saw and square with specific marks, ensuring the saw's table runs parallel against the square for a perfect cut. Attention to detail and precision are emphasized to ensure accuracy in cutting.
• 23:00 - 27:00: Completing the Decking The chapter titled 'Completing the Decking' covers the process of measuring joist spacing for a decking project. The speaker explains the importance of using a good tape measure, which has red squares indicating the standard 16-inch on-center spacing for floor joists. The instructions include measuring from the outside and marking the front and back for all joist locations using these red squares as a guide. A marker is used for marking these measurements.

Easiest Shed Foundation I’ve Ever Built Transcription

• 00:00 - 00:30 hey guys Jeff here and today we're going to show you how to build a shed base in an afternoon this is all the tools and materials that you're going to need to get the job done let's just get started we're going to build a shed 9 ft by 6 ft 8 ft tall okay and we need a shed base which going to be 2x8 and we're going to have posts coming out of the ground to hold it up off the ground okay now the way I build it the corners are these posts they coming right
• 00:30 - 01:00 up okay they're going to be through the deck it'll be part of the deck and then I'm going to be also framing a door area using the post the same way and the way that we're going to get our width okay the 9 ft is really simple cuz when I'm done the posts from here to here are going to be the same as down here okay and so when I'm finished that Dimension is going to be covered with a
• 01:00 - 01:30 ice and water shield and I'm also going to put on a um like a corrugated metal roof product and that roof product is 38 in wide okay but the last rib it actually gets covered from the other side of the the metal so the next piece that goes on goes there and so each segment is 36 in and if you know that then you know that I can start with a full sheet here add another sheet finish 9 ft perfect okay so knowing the size of
• 01:30 - 02:00 your roofing material dictates the size of your shed this way you're not making Cuts you're not ending up with weird scenarios where you're an inch short or something like that so we are going to go exactly 9 ft wide off the corner of this post so that means my rim joist if I'm going to be having a joist that goes like this and then setting my post inside of it my rim joist the one that goes all the way out here needs to be 1 and 1/2 in wider than my 9 ft on each side okay
• 02:00 - 02:30 so we're going to go to 9t 3 in on my rim that's how I do my math in the back of my head and so we're going to start by doing that if you want to make your shed a different dimension you can follow the exactly the same system we're doing here today you can go 6 ft wide with one door you can go 12T wide I don't care but keep your 36in segments so that you don't have to be cutting your roofing material on site which is a bit of an issue because if you don't use the right tools it rusts really easily
• 02:30 - 03:00 right so that's basically that in a nutshell that's the plan now we get to execute so step one is to build a a perimeter frame uh that way we can get it in position get it squared off so this is how I like to cut right off the pile guys what I just take is my square and my saw and this is going to do all the work today okay we're using a uh framing demolition blade it's a 24 Toth on a 7 and4 in Saw and what I do is I always put a marker on it this is the zero point it actually cuts from that
• 03:00 - 03:30 metal and a little bit and a 1/8 of an inch to the right okay so you put your saw your Square here your saw you slide them both over together until I'm going to line up those two marks now I know exactly where my cut is okay get the blade going and you just push it all the way through running this side the table of the saw up against your square and that makes a perfect cut every time
• 03:30 - 04:00 here we go okay guys so we're going to grab our tape measure and I what I want you to see on this tape measure is that a good tape measure will come with little red squares on it that is traditional floor joist spacing 16 inch on Center okay so what we're going to do is we're going to measure from the outside and mark the front and the back for all of our joist locations based on these little red squares and I'm going to do this with a marker we always mark
• 04:00 - 04:30 the side of the pencil line where the joist will actually sit all right so we start with a piece of wood 16 in from that start we start with the piece of wood and so on and so on but in this particular build because everything's going to be symmetrical we want to actually measure from both sides moving towards the middle okay here's my 16 my 32 here's the 48 red square and you'll
• 04:30 - 05:00 notice that the next chice is already marked and it's not dead center okay and that's all right so this time because we're doing the symmetrical and it's important because of the nature of this particular build all right Joy spaces can be less than 160 you just don't want them any bigger than that all right there we go so now we got our front and our back laid out we're going to take this one we're going to set it back here about 6' 7 7
• 05:00 - 05:30 fet away bam make some room and now we can cut our joist for the floor and we'll start with just two of them we'll screw the box together and then we'll be able to position it Square it off know our locations and then we'll be able to move on to the next step uh we need 1 2 3 4 five 6 seven eight of them all right so here's the two types of hangers we're going to use right this particular hanger sits on a rim joist and the wood come right up sit inside
• 05:30 - 06:00 this and contact the wood 6' s m this is the one that we're going to use on the outside okay okay this one gets screwed on first and then the wood sits inside of it and there's going to be screw heads sticking out of these holes so the wood gets contact with the screw head so we have to take a quar inch off for each end for the screw head okay okay so we're actually going to go 6' 7 on the interior but the two on the outside we're actually going to go 6' 6 and a half gotcha okay yeah quarter freee
• 06:00 - 06:30 genen yeah yep okay perfect cool so while Matt's cutting all my lumber for me I'm just going to set up my rims these are what we call Simpson strong tie whenever you see a product from Simpson okay um generally speaking they make structurally rated Hardware only okay and you can see that there's a little stamp on the end of that screw and it has a number attached to it now the secret here
• 06:30 - 07:00 is to know that this is exterior grade it's a number n by 1 and 1/2 in all right and it's for connectors designed for metal connectors of all kinds joist hangers those are hurricane ties in the picture and it comes with its own bit slaps into your drill there we go press and play and it's a six-sided drill there we go and we're going to use these screws to attach all of our connection Hardware
• 07:00 - 07:30 that way you don't have to worry about swinging a hammer and driving in structural Nails structural screws are just as good as a nail and I find them a lot faster making sure we're flush on the side just hanging out a little bit there we are can I get an over an off cut oh thank you sir all right here we go you can see look at the Gap
• 07:30 - 08:00 because it's sitting on these screw heads right that's just experience talking now I'm going to take my marker I'm going to put it in this offcut press it over make a mark on my wood there we go that is how we set this up now in the world of structural screws or structural anything you want to put a screw in every hole okay that's just the way it
• 08:00 - 08:30 works that way you know you've actually met the rating that the bracket's been designed to carry this is designed to carry a 2x8 here we [Music] are Let's uh put this together drive two screws into the end of this mat okay
• 08:30 - 09:00 this is just to get it tacked together for now okay so we're using a 3 and 1/2 in treated screw we'll tack this together and then we can set it in position then we'll square It Off by measuring corner to corner on both sides get in the perfect location
• 09:00 - 09:30 okay there now we have our the shape this is exciting that's the shape of our shed I like that corner I like where it's facing let's do a measurement you do one side I'll do the other and I'm going to go from the lead Edge on that side on the corner okay that's important um when you're doing this you don't work
• 09:30 - 10:00 across the middle of your tape you want to pick the lead Edge on both sides at the point okay so you're on the point over there okay right now I am 138 and a/4 let's do the other Corners I am 137 and a/4 I'm out an inch so that means that our box has been pushed tighter together okay so hold your corner in position and what I'm going to do is I'm going to move this this direction
• 10:00 - 10:30 I'm I'm out an inch so I'm going to change that to half an inch I want to go to 137 and 3/4 just by pulling it straight to the left so I'm 137 and a qu I want to go to 137 and 3/4 there we go got it let's confirm okay perfect you know like we're we're making a pressure treated shed base for God's
• 10:30 - 11:00 sake right not a rocket ship okay um now let's get uh screenings so what we have to do now is we want to set up our shed base we're going to work directly on the grass now grass is a lousy thing to put a shed base on even with our special feet so let's do our thinking about our design now we have a post going here right we have a post going here
• 11:00 - 11:30 okay on the inside of this Junction that's going to happen in a minute same over here we got a post on this corner and a post on this Junction right here okay so what we want to do is pour the Limestone screening make a little pile in each of those four locations and that way we can then set our feet on top of it press it into position okay and then we'll be in good shape all right now let's talk about our shed base here
• 11:30 - 12:00 it is this is a tough block um this is an available in Home Depot in Canada okay if you're down in the states they also make a a camo makes a great little camo Block it's a little bit bigger foot has a little more flexibility but this is great it's a shed for piz sake what we're going to do as you'll see the bottom is designed that it sits over top of the all that stone and it's got flat sections to disperse weight the tough block doesn't carry as much as a camo but this is a small shed and even with a
• 12:00 - 12:30 snow load in the winter time with seven posts um we're going to be rated here for over 10,000 lb so I don't know what you keep in your shed but you could store gold bars in here no problem all right now what we're going to do is we're going to set these in position you can see the 4x4 post would sit on the inside all right but we need this point to here okay so there we go it's going to go here we go I marked off the three on the back one
• 12:30 - 13:00 one in the middle one in that corner okay and we still got to do the front corner as well so once we got all of our dirt we'll be able to um lift the corner up slide these into position and line up where the 4x4 post goes in that exact position so that our 4x4 post is making contact with both sides of this as well I'm telling you you can do this in the afternoon just got a follow a system
• 13:00 - 13:30 that works and this is going to work great now because we're on level ground pretty much back here it helps right we are going to set this off the ground just a little bit uh we have a Four Season climate here so we're going to get snow we might get a little bit of water ponding back here but it generally drains away from the shed behind it should be great okay one two three four and then one two three three four
• 13:30 - 14:00 again okay now we're going to push all that towards that corner until it's right in that right spot bam but that location there does that look good to you sure that's just to get started and then we'll do the ones on the back now this is about getting us 95% of the way there okay okay now
• 14:00 - 14:30 remember when we leveled this all off and squared it off sorry we me measured corner to corner we're going to do the same thing again in a minute but we just want to get all this on Stone roughly in the neighborhood where we're going to put it okay now we're going to install all of our joist packages secret if you're working alone
• 14:30 - 15:00 all right you want to Crown all these so basically you're looking down your board and looking to see if there's any curve and if there is a curve you want to put the the rainbow the height of the curve on top okay that's a floor joist Rule and if you're working by yourself here's a tick tip [Music]
• 15:00 - 15:30 that becomes an extra pair of hands all right you can set that right where you want it okay that's nice and snug yeah no kidding that exact measurement I'm telling you that
• 15:30 - 16:00 all right one on the top here we [Music] go now these joist hangers we add on afterwards okay to through into the rim
• 16:00 - 16:30 joist and then there's a couple of locations to put screws on an angle into the joist but that's why I like to screw through the plate first because I find that this holds a lot better to keep things from separating all right we add this after the fact oh I think I grabbed a couple of 2 x 10s instead of 2 by 8s just run to the store real quick around
• 16:30 - 17:00 the corner we need uh 2 4 6 8 10 12 truth of it is um you don't frame with 2 by8 very often right only when you're doing outdoor work like this are they looking for me what's going on and they're looking for guys building things without a permit welcome to Canada this the Canada shed infection buau here we are making sure everything is
• 17:00 - 17:30 flush it's super [Music] important top and bottom now Quick Trick when you're doing screws you don't wait don't screw until you see the the head go into the wood always look on the back side have to screw until the Gap disappears sometimes you got to go an inch of the wood before you get enough torque to get that to happen but you go until that closes now the screw is in
• 17:30 - 18:00 place if you want to make sure that they're flush okay you just take your hammer and you hit both boards at the same time until they're actually hitting both boards okay because that's flush but the wood has a rounded Edge and so it's misleading you can easily install these too low if you're waiting for the shadow to disappear
• 18:00 - 18:30 and gaps are closed brilliant [Music]
• 18:30 - 19:00 well let me get my last P stick in here V at least I'll feel like I got something done sometimes a foot's a better Hammer okay there we go uh now it's time for us to uh identify the highest Corner
• 19:00 - 19:30 okay so we can set our first post you know just looking at it I think it's over here set this up and it is okay so when the bubble is uh to one side it means that side's high and if you lift the other side it goes into the middle so all we know is now we're ready to start setting our post first post is going to go in the high corner we'll attach that and then we're just going going to work our way around
• 19:30 - 20:00 to all four corners getting everything leveled off and thrown in with some uh construction screws first once we confirmed it's all perfectly level then we'll go to the next level and put in our structural screws to carry load if you're doing this by yourself this is going to be a bit of a tricky tricky phase you'd have to roll the deck off but we're just going to lift it standing on an end lean it against the tree okay there we go okay and boom now so consider this if you dig a hole in this
• 20:00 - 20:30 location to put the block because these tough blocks are are a smaller diameter after we put the second Rim joist on it's almost completely covered but I'm not digging a hole I'm packing that in this way and I'll tell you why so this this mold takes the weight and diverts it to these four flat sections but if I fill up most of that space with my Limestone screenings or stone dust or
• 20:30 - 21:00 whatever you got available then you're going to be able to transfer load directly from the post directly into the ground underneath okay we have them roughly in position now we want to pack it even once this is set nice and deep I still have the ability to maneuver it and slide it around because it's still on a stone dust base okay so it doesn't going to have a problem as we go down the road this one is is in the wrong position
• 21:00 - 21:30 period now what this does is it gives me the ability to really get that base flat in the ground the 10x10 plate if you just straight up and down you'll get that buried really nicely one more thing if your area where you're building is on a hill you
• 21:30 - 22:00 definitely want to dig holes okay and set your post below the ground level that way it's not going to have a desire to slide down the hill over time all right you're welcome yeah that's really good advice okay now gentle in the right spot would be great give or take all close back there uh next step before we move too fast too far we're going to get all the
• 22:00 - 22:30 joist hangers on one screw for every hole Choice hangers uh you got a couple of options this tab right here it's designed to hammer in to lock it in place okay then you got all your hands
• 22:30 - 23:00 free we're using a 1 and 1/2 in screw that does not protrude out the backs side okay we're going face screw straight in each of the holes here and on this side we're using a different length of screw okay this is a 2 and 1/2 in and the idea here is it'll come through the Fastener through the joist and then into the rim so there's my location okay and then you can visualize it this
• 23:00 - 23:30 way it goes through through the bracket through this and then into the rim and that's a good piece of where all the threads are okay that's locking this bracket through this wood into this if you want to rely completely on that you can but let me show you okay it sits there in a in in an angle but you're just catching the little Edge okay you're actually your screws
• 23:30 - 24:00 only going through this little corner and my experience is is if you don't have screws coming through this side first and you're relying only on that what happens is this head stays in the bracket the threads are all over here okay right but then the joist can easily tear through that last piece of wood all right and so I don't like to rely on that which is why I like to add a couple of extra screws there you go you do
• 24:00 - 24:30 you at the end of the day you end up with a whole lot of Fasteners but your joist is going nowhere all said and done if you're going to be involved in doing something Overkill um the structure the foundation the thing you're never going to see again that's where that's where you want to Overkill all right [Music]
• 24:30 - 25:00 uh now we're done building our structure for strength we still now have to square it off yet again here we go all right real quick what was the number that we had 130 137 and a half okay I'm still 138 cuz why I'm going to go to 137 and like 3/4 or
• 25:00 - 25:30 something okay uh we're out an eighth of an inch woo that's not the end of the world all right I'm not going to go lose any sleep over that right now what we want to do though is uh throw a couple of in there all right just through the top what we're doing is I'm just setting up some
• 25:30 - 26:00 diagonal boards we're going to throw a couple of screws in um two at each end on the on the picture frame of the rim that'll keep it from twisting while we're manipulating with all of our post and putting on our structural screws I just like to make sure that it's not moving around it's so close to square right now it's not even funny it's not worth fighting over all right dude let's check this out we'll go here wow yeah after we panel those things
• 26:00 - 26:30 down it came out perfect we got uh two different size post okay because we're going to do a single slope roof so what we're going to do guys we're going to put our 10f Footers up front um it'll end up being higher than we need and that's fine we'll cut them down to size later on but Matt I want you to grab the eights right now there's three of them we'll start in that back corner with the level and I'm just going to use uh some of these 3 and 1/2 inch screws temporarily to set the height and
• 26:30 - 27:00 make sure that we're leveling our perimeter first what I'm going to do is I'm going to lift I want to slide my base first no I want you to lift the post out or help me slide at the same time whatever you prefer and there we go this is one of these situations where it just doesn't make any sense right these
• 27:00 - 27:30 screws that are holding the bracket to the meat so that they don't tear apart um or in the way that quarter inch screw head makes it impossible for me to get that in the corner tight and level it the design for typical construction let's say it that way calls for double Rim joist where it's transversing load but because we have post so often we're our span is like not even 5T anywhere and I'm using 2 by8 so I'm more than happy especially on a shed not really
• 27:30 - 28:00 concerned about it I don't need to double up for strength so what I'm going to do is I'm going to stick like this keep nice and flush going to put my post in here I'm going to use a 4 and 1 half inch headlock screw I'll show you in a second on from two different directions and we're going to level this first with the regular screw okay once we get the whole base leveled then we'll use our structural screws to transfer our load and I don't need to have a second Rim all right so I don't want to have that in the way I just want to be able to walk up here
• 28:00 - 28:30 grab a couple of screws get the height set and have a nice and snug in the corner so I don't have to be fussing around with this all day long I'm going to lift with the bubble right in front of me and when it says level I'm going to drive the screw Matt's going to help me cuz he's a gentleman and you'll notice that I'm in a bad spot there right because see the Gap mhm now I'm nice and level but I have a
• 28:30 - 29:00 gap so let's do this let's mark that post let's fix the Gap I'm going to set this screw here I'm going to back this one out this time I'm going to lift it up to that spot where the Mark is and I'm going to drive this screw first at the bottom and pull that base over here we are yeah and then I'm going to pull this base
• 29:00 - 29:30 over here get that sunk in there and so before we can put any anchoring in here we want to just get the post level on here see how much movement this post can make in the entire structure all right can you just hold it on there and then uh tell me when you see it looking somewhat level how's that we close right there okay how's the other angle decent
• 29:30 - 30:00 this way it's got to go away from you away away from me yeah okay we're good there yeah all right and then I'll drive one here now that's a lot more stable okay CU I got four screws top and bottom that's a lot more stable now we're going to go check the other Corner over there you want to do the lifting right there
• 30:00 - 30:30 yeah and I'm already closed on the Gap so we're pretty close man yeah okay good the only last thing I want to confirm is that yellow on that rim to that corner just to confirm but it's on that board that was going to something that was already leveled so it should be fine but can you just take that level on that first joist there and confirm we're good yep all right good we're level
• 30:30 - 31:00 now let's drop the other eight in and then we'll do all the four across the front so what I got here is this m this inch and a half basically okay and an inch and a half this material here is actually in the way it's making on the contact with all these screw points so I'm going to just run my saw real quick Zip Zip Zip I'm going to notch this out so that it sits over top of all that mess all right remember this is a
• 31:00 - 31:30 4x4 and if we were to take a look at the size of that beam and say okay our expectations for that post to carry let's call it 1,000 lb or500 similar to the foot and we were to lose 10% of the size of that post we're still at 1350 lb it's not an issue okay so that's what we're going to do we're going to make this simple I'm going to slice a cut through here and I'm going to cut on a 45 and just take that whole inside the corner right out of the way I'm not
• 31:30 - 32:00 going to sit there and fart around with a hammer and chisel all day long we're just going to get her done okay and I'm going to bury this thing okay hold it nice and flat and drive [Music] straight there we go problem solved all right minus 10% but now we're going to clear all that Hardware let's drop it
• 32:00 - 32:30 back in there we go nice and snug like a bug in a rug I'm going to uh anticipate that that's fine moving left to right and then front to back you're good there okay
• 32:30 - 33:00 all right okay guys so we're just going to avoid a step we're measuring now hey look at that measuring tape 9 in okay there's my location and we're coming out an inch and a half there's my cut line what else he needs in way we'll grab the other post I'll just do both of these at the same time all right now again we're setting this to but inch and a half deep we don't want to overcut
• 33:00 - 33:30 [Music]
• 33:30 - 34:00 the video is all about making a shed base but in this system the post the structure that go carry the roof it's all part of the structure before we can even put the decking on let's just move on and finish decking this um we can get rid of these extra boards now that we're all secured so we'll pop them off and then uh we'll get working okay yeah is this is just a stopper board okay this Cuts
• 34:00 - 34:30 uh you want to have a screw every 12 to 16 just to make sure it's pulled tight okay now what happens is put our boards on these are the ends that are clean there's no sticker no nothing pull it over okay yeah all right and then you can give it a little bit of a love tap yeah that's all it is just a love toop
• 34:30 - 35:00 yep okay now we're ready to ready to screw them in if you're a fan of the channel you've seen some of our other shed work uh when I'm using really nice wood I like to use camo screws or if the deck is going to be exposed to the sunlight and the weather almost everything we're doing here is going to be covered so surface screws are great in this scenario and here's the deal we're using a 2 and 1/2 in screw the shaft is thin at the top because
• 35:00 - 35:30 that is almost completely in this board and the threads go in the choice so we want to go to the middle about one inch back straight down not on an angle and just recess the screw about a 16th of an inch and if you want to have it look perfect you can chalk line you can get a straight edge you can do whatever you want to do
• 35:30 - 36:00 [Music] [Music] [Music]
• 36:00 - 36:30 now I'm still up against my positive stop at the other end this is still a joist location this doesn't get sunk all the way yet so that I have nice tighten grip later but I'm into the rim Joys here and then what I'm doing it's going to be fun
• 36:30 - 37:00 uh I have a three and a qu Gap that's awfully tight too in it I think just for good measure because this um when you're using a skill saw which is the only cutting tool I'm really using here we're just going to measure 3 and a quarter okay and we're going to have the blade on the on the short side of 3 and a qu all right make sense so the way it works is this make a measure make a Mark 3 and a/
• 37:00 - 37:30 qu and the black mark is on the inside of that three and a/ quter line okay right okay now here's my cutting line put the saw right on that black line put my finger here going to hold the plate watch this here we go when I'm done [Music]
• 37:30 - 38:00 the reason I did this is I want to have this cut side inside okay the shed because I've got the entire shed being made out of pressure treated for a reason right and that is I don't have to worry about how I'm waterproofing and the wether the weather
• 38:00 - 38:30 systems and water diversion all that much but I don't want to put the cut line right near the outside wall either doesn't make any sense e okay now I'm only going to put in one screw on each each location here but I'm going to change sides okay so this side that side back and forth just to help make sure it doesn't want to flip out and Warp
• 38:30 - 39:00 okay burn it in go ahead I want to see you do it works every time yeah 60% of the time 100% of the time something like that something like that all right hey you guys day two as you can tell we got a little bit of um now when we're making this video
• 39:00 - 39:30 obviously I'm trying to challenge myself to do this in 2 days which is anywhere from 16 to 24 hours depending how close to Farmer you are on the Spectrum okay now before we go finish the rest of the floor there's two things we've got to get done one I've got a storyboard um of Rim joys for on top of the post because what happens is you can see right in the back here for sure this one overnight got a little bit wet and it decided to go like this and that's really good for us so we're going to storyboard these
• 39:30 - 40:00 we're going to get a couple of beams up top square everything together again and that is going to make life really simple for us um so then we can move forward because until I get those posts in the right position I I don't have the right amount of torque in the 4x4 in the in the Cradle okay so I want to make sure all the poster is straight as they're going to get before I put in my my legs now we've got some headlock screws we're going to drive in there to secure it all and we have to do that before we finish
• 40:00 - 40:30 the last two deck boards ah so we just need a few minutes we'll wrap this sucker up and we'll be good all right now if you're working alone this is a great system go and buy yourself couple of these bad boys okay yeah that'll work just great now step one we're going with lots of
• 40:30 - 41:00 overhang so we don't have to worry about the details right at the moment but we do want to Mark the inside Corners to just Mark where these posts are supposed to align at the Top If we set the top the same as the bottom then we increase our chances of having success dramatically here we
• 41:00 - 41:30 go all right now we're going to get this over here nice near the top okay let's see we got which way is they going to pull together the easiest yeah right here okay
• 41:30 - 42:00 okay now I can drive a couple screws hold this all in place okay W that actually pulled off now at this point all I'm doing is securing the ridge so that I can hold everything Square all right and then we'll go into details later
• 42:00 - 42:30 about how we're going to finish framing up around the roof but for now just about getting this locked in okay that one's done time for this side okay uhhuh now you got your drill on you
• 42:30 - 43:00 this one is here and what we should end up with is the door area here which is 47 in frame to frame should be the same all the way up bam there we go so 47 here let me show you the tape wow 46 and 78 that's about as Square as you're going to get when you're doing this whole you know Swiss
• 43:00 - 43:30 Family Robinson treeh house construction style build right all right um next thing and then of course is we're going to get our deck boards and we're going to trace this out and get those cut with the jigsaw all right so for reference installed my board up against my end stop here okay and I threw in a screw just to hold it in place while I do all my measuring here we go now this this is as simple as setting your Square against
• 43:30 - 44:00 the old deckboard running it over to your post making a mark okay and then tracing your hole bigger than the post about the size of your your marker all right so let's do this again there's my mark trace my hole a little bit wider this is not the time to be um doing finished carpentry right we're not trying to make this snug and exact because wood expands and contracts if we
• 44:00 - 44:30 make it too snug it's going to end up splitting so give yourself a little Breathing Room on top of that we measure and of course the post is three and a half but because this is uh been outside and raining it's actually a little swollen so it's three and a half in a bit we're going to give ourselves that bit okay we're going to go to 5/8 now there we go so that's my Mark we're going to trace out in a minute we'll get the rest of these done and then we'll pull out the jigsaw and cut
• 44:30 - 45:00 our holes all right let's stick this one on like a glove [Music]
• 45:00 - 45:30 okay now we should end up here with about a half an inch overhang which is why this is the perfect design system having a 2x8 single rim and that works perfectly but you know what Matt I'm moving too fast here I wanted to uh get those other screws in here the lags because this is going to be a door and I'm going to have a hinge gate on it I wanted to go at it from the side as well as from the front all right so while we're here let's just talk about this this is the headlock screw this is a structural screw the
• 45:30 - 46:00 same way that the small ones were structural screws for the joist hangers this is a structural screw and it replaces a 38 lag bolt now that's where you get all your load transfer strength okay so what we're going to do is we're going to add two on the face of each of these posts and because this one's going to be the gate I'm going to add another one here to help give it a little extra well two more here give it a a little bit more how shall we say strength so when
• 46:00 - 46:30 the door which is almost 4T is swinging out it has some some lateral support this way as well okay so we're going to drop this in nice this one first and once again I don't want to do this until I've got my deck on it stabilizes the structure I want to have my two Rim joists up top on make sure
• 46:30 - 47:00 that everything is pointed in the right [Music] direction woohoo okay and for those of you who are wondering about the end from the beginning on this I am planning it a later date once the wood has had a chance to weather and bleach out a little bit coming back and doing some paint work and so my Rim joist and my posts are all going to be painted black and so then this is going
• 47:00 - 47:30 to just blend right in done and done now that is solid the reason we're using 4 and 1 half inch screws check this out the dimension from the post to the outside of your Rim is five so when you drive these screws even if you want to drive them in before you put your decking on I get it you're not going to have anything sticking out on the inside to catch your foot or rub up against your ankle and you've actually transferred a perfect amount of load so we're good to go when we're doing decks
• 47:30 - 48:00 guys a lot of times we're going to add blocking next to these posts um just for so that the deck boards have some structure we have that blocking built in where the door is and where people are going to be walking but in this particular build this is actually going to be where our wall gets installed we'll go show that system in a minute but we don't need blocking except for where you're going to walk oh all righty that's it two
• 48:00 - 48:30 [Music] screws hey you're too tight if you have to hammer it on you're too tight you want to actually make the storyboard a little wider than your post so things can expand and contract because you forcing that in you're going to split the board split it yeah you'll tear the chunk off at the very end for sure so let's not do that okay let's be real careful here actually
• 48:30 - 49:00 like mindful two and a half so this is perfect cuz we took the time to rip the second last board down that is the secret to this success
• 49:00 - 49:30 here beautiful two these right two in the yeah you can look at that corner over there and you can just mimic that as far as their location and everything they're not going to be as visible on the back obviously so if there's a screw in the way don't worry about it oh oh buddy oh that sucks okay here's the
• 49:30 - 50:00 trick put in a space air screw all right I think this wood got his ass kicked the first time you installed it it really does work every single [Laughter] time yeah you feel that that wiggle is there because
• 50:00 - 50:30 they're not done yet you can do two if you want you can go right in the middle I just did one and it it would work really good boy while Matt's taking off that cheater board I'm going to show you this right here I am going to just Mark where the edge of my rim is I'm going to trace that around the top okay now I can take my chalk line and
• 50:30 - 51:00 run a string line over here and I'll just set this right on the edge okay and then over on this side I'm going to do the same thing visually visually just check where this goes now in Tree House construction doesn't
• 51:00 - 51:30 necessarily mean that that board underneath is straight right so there's two things we're going to do one is a chalk line have a general idea 54 board is actually 1 in not inch and a quarter here we go so we're going to go like this and till it's sticking just a hair past an inch you want to go about an inch and an eighth to the top of the tip of the blade because these boards all have
• 51:30 - 52:00 little cupping in them we want to ensure that we're going to cut through the first time all right now this saw is equipped to be exactly one and a half Ines right from the post which should be where that joist is so it actually works out really well then we're just going to follow the chalk line [Music]
• 52:00 - 52:30 not bad all right now this is a um an exposed Edge that's not really visible from the lines of sight in the backyard so you have two options you can grab a stained sealer sorry a cut and seal product and you can seal it up or you can just incorporate that into your rim and paint it when we get to
• 52:30 - 53:00 painting since we're going to be painting and staining everything here eventually down the road in a couple months I'm not going to worry about if it's a cut exposed Edge right now because it's not going to be buried the reason we use a cut and seal product is when we have cuts that are structural that are encapsulated by other wood and we don't have ability to stain it or or paint it later but all of these exposed cuts are going to be here for us to paint later we're not going to worry about it for now okayo we have a finished deck platform
• 53:00 - 53:30 [Music]