building a woodland shelter

[smojo]

I'm back on the trail for building a shelter. Tried a tarp but decided it's not the way to go because of the distance to my woods, I need to make my time there as productive as poss. and not waste time putting up and taking down temporary arrangements. I figure to make a bus shelter style (open front) and am collecting free wooden pallets and intend using them as back and sides. I want a fixed corrugated roof and so my next question relates to roofing sheets.

Been looking for used corrugated sheets but not found anything cheap enough or close enough to collect. So a visit to local B&Q gave me two possibles.
Coraline bitchumen panels 2m long and almost 1m wide. Plain black ones approx. £15.50 a panel. Green coloured on one side approx. £17 a panel. The other option and cheaper is clear plastic at 1.8m long and .66m wide at approx. £7 a panel but they look naff in a wood and are light and probably flap and rattle in the wind. So my preference would be the Coraline ones as they are quite heavy and more stable and won't rattle probably and will blend in better. So the question is - has anyone used Coraline and what do you reckon and are there any drawbacks I haven't figured on? Ta

[Dexter's Shed]

another option for your roof smojo, and one that I'll be using in future builds, as I think it not only looks good and blends in with the woodland, but is also relatively cheap

the woods opposite us have built a round house,

so, wooden battens laid across roof, at 12" spacing, then heavy duty plastic sheet stapled on, then battens laid across in opposite direction (all nailed/screwed) then a layer of chicken wire, then they put wood/bark chippings on top, which is rubbed through the chicken wire, and lastly, a sprinkling of grass seed, within a year you have a grass roof, your only outlay being plastic sheet,chicken wire, bark chippings and seed, plus a bit of elbow grease

[oldclaypaws]

That is so cool. Only marginal downside I can see is it might be a bit dark in there, but then you could sew a few plastic bottles into the roof as 'downlights'.

[Dexter's Shed]

it's not Paws, they have just used woven wall panels (hazel?) and the light streams in, then inside on the walls, they have rolled up tarps, to lower down if its cold, big wood burner inside, of course it's not like Blackpool illuminations in there, but would you want it to be?? I like the quaintness of it.
smojo's shed sounds like he wants a three sided affair, so light won't be a problem

[Wendelspanswick]

I built a portable horse shelter for a friend about 15 years ago and used Coraline for the roof and it has stood up well with no leaks or repairs.

[oldclaypaws]

I wonder Dexter, would 'Asterix The Gauls' House be classed as a temporary seasonal structure, unlikely to draw the wrath of the Council bods with clipboards, or would some killjoy nimby try to spoil the fun by reporting it as a structure needing consent? Be nice if you could do one every year or three in a different location and not need to worry about the jobsworth mafia.

[smudge]

Built my shed from an old gulvanized greenhouse strong as hell lucky for me builders were knocking down a bungalow opposite & let me have any used building materials I wanted so have 4x2 wood all round & polycarbonate sheet on one side of roof for light, painted all wood green to blend in,

[smojo]

another option for your roof smojo, and one that I'll be using in future builds, as I think it not only looks good and blends in with the woodland, but is also relatively cheap

so, wooden battens laid across roof, at 12" spacing, then heavy duty plastic sheet stapled on, then battens laid across in opposite direction (all nailed/screwed) then a layer of chicken wire, then they put wood/bark chippings on top, which is rubbed through the chicken wire, and lastly, a sprinkling of grass seed, within a year you have a grass roof, your only outlay being plastic sheet,chicken wire, bark chippings and seed, plus a bit of elbow grease


That is so cool and I would really love that but various reasons would stop me - (1) takes too long (I need something easy and fairly quick to build so I can get on with other jobs) (2) think you would need planning permission from council and doubt it would pass due to it looking inhabitable (3) looks too inhabitable and therefor might attract unwelcome guest (4) I'd be gutted if someone vandalised it. I have no reasons yet to think they would but wouldn't want to invest so much time and loving craftsmanship. So I chose a bus shelter style made form pallets for a few reasons too (1) won't invite unwanted guests (2) fairly quick to build (3) cheap (4) somewhere just to pop into when caught out in showers, keep some firewood dry and probably have my fire in front of it for some warmth in winter. Something like these but I'd try to disguise the pallets with dead wood propped on it. I like the bark chipping roof idea very much though and if I was using that method I could arrange the pallets in a hexagonal shape more like the roundhouse. Got me thinking again now. Won't rush into it yet.

http://petdiys.com/wp-content/uploads/2 ... helter.jpg

http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos ... 31409b.jpg

[Andy & Heather]

We too went through the tarp/windbreak/kelly kettle stage and whilst they kept us dry, nothing we tried kept out the freezing wind. We resorted to a £20 pop up tent and a 5 litre thermos flask - not very romantic but incredibly practical. We could now spend a whole day working in the winter knowing we had a dry, wind-proof shelter and warm drink even if it was lashing it down with hail outside!

If we had not been able to get planning permission for a permenant shelter then we had already decided the way forward was to buy Quechua Base tent as our local children's group use one for their outdoor club base and said it was brilliant.

As for the roofing - we have some on our garage roof and it worked fine for about 10 years before it started leaking. The only problem we have had is that it seem that the wasps love to build nests under it every year! Onduline roofing is what Ben Law used on part of his woodland house if I remember correctly.

[smojo]

We too went through the tarp/windbreak/kelly kettle stage and whilst they kept us dry, nothing we tried kept out the freezing wind. We resorted to a £20 pop up tent and a 5 litre thermos flask - not very romantic but incredibly practical. We could now spend a whole day working in the winter knowing we had a dry, wind-proof shelter and warm drink even if it was lashing it down with hail outside!

If we had not been able to get planning permission for a permenant shelter then we had already decided the way forward was to buy Quechua Base tent as our local children's group use one for their outdoor club base and said it was brilliant.

As for the roofing - we have some on our garage roof and it worked fine for about 10 years before it started leaking. The only problem we have had is that it seem that the wasps love to build nests under it every year! Onduline roofing is what Ben Law used on part of his woodland house if I remember correctly.

Thanks, helpful reply. The problem with a tent is that if it gets wet, you need to dry it out when you get back otherwise it will smell rank next time. So that means more work and faffing about. The main reason for a permanent shelter means it's always there ready for the sudden shower and no packing up or sorting out when you leave. Onduline looks good.