This forum gave me so many ideas and inspiration for my kids cubby house that I wanted to create my own post with picures and a brief outline of how I went about making it. Hopefully it helps others...
I am pretty proud of it as this is my first ever construction from the ground up. Biggest thing before that was putting up a flat pack shed... I have developed a theory that when a man gets to a certain age in life (I am 30 in 2 weeks) he just wants to build s#$%! Bit like a womans biological clock and wanting to have kids.
I didn't like any of the online plans I found, so I drew my own in Sketch Up. This was very helpful to me as I could see it in 3D before trying to make it. The sub-floor went together easily. It even came out perfectly (to the mm) square on the first go! Yellow tongue for the floor which I found to be a pain as I couldnt get them to butt up perfectly without a gap. Ripped the tongue out and it was much better! If I did it again I would just use ply and paint it.
Next were the stud walls. Very easy, especially after a mate called over and showed me a few tricks. Everything is screwed in and I bought a new Makita you beaut drill yesterday which I wish I had when I started about 2 weeks ago! Or a nail gun...
Left the windows and the door until later. Again, in hind site I should have done them at this stage.
Stuffed if I could figure out how to notch the roof trusses so they sat nicely on the top plates. After about an hour and a few arguments with the Mrs as she was trying to help, but not helping I just plonked them on there and drove some 100mm treated pine screws down into them + a few gal screws and later some strapping so she wont blow away (I hope)
The best part was having the kids around and involved. They had to leave a few times while I cut things and when I was putting the roof on incase anything fell (and it did).
I had about 5 ~6m sheets of Colorbond that I was given and I assumed (another mistake) it would make the roof and all the walls + door.
Roof bearers (is that right) go in. And I added some bracing for the trusses.
Looking more like a cubby house now, a rather large one!
Thats pretty much all I could do with the corro I had, DOH!! Off to the recycled building place. $50 worth of different coloured corro later and I was back in business. Cutting them was a bastard. Then realised I was using thick cutting discs, not the nice thin ones. Another lesson learned!
I also didn't think about how I would get roofing screws into the top of the roof as I couldnt climb all over it. The OH&S officer in blue wasn't impressed!
Deck is 40+ year old fence palings from Mum and Dad's old fence. Also made the window reveals from the same. Use Blackbutt (I think) flooring for the fly screen surrounds on the front truss. Will clad the back truss with more fence palings. Also putting a barge board up made from, you guessed it!
$30 paint from the big green shed bargain pile tinted with some green Solagard left over.
All up I think i spent a max of $400 but it is probably more like $350. I had most of the fasteners already so I didnt take that into account. Loads of fun, frustration and a sense of accomplishment.
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