I am building a 4x8 tool shed. I have the 4 sides up, and must buy materials for the roof and siding. I am not sure when I will get around to doing that. If it rains now is the framing going to be okay, or should I put tarps over it?
On a related question, the siding is supposed to be installed with galvanized nails. I hate to spend the money for them, since I have more non-galvanized nails than I will ever use and would have to buy the galvanized. How serious will the rust stains (I presume that is why galvanized is called for, no?) be if I use regular nails? (upstate NY)
I've seen houses under contruction sit for months with no serious effects.
When you see those little runs of rust starting, you'll know if the money for galvanized was worth it. In the whole scheme of things, how much will you save compared to the risk?
I don't like it either to see wood get wet but my own house under construction got rain on it and so far about 10 years later, no problem. Therefore I agree with Edwin Pawlowski's post.
If the rust from the nails runs on the shed's paint job, will that bother you?
The framing will stand up to getting wet for a while, but if it's too long, it _may_ warp in ways that make things difficult, and if very long, it could start to objectionably weather/rot. Getting wet for a week or two? Nothing to worry about.
More of a concern is plywood (eg: floor decking). If you have a non-exterior grade plywood floor deck, if it gets really soaked, it may start to delaminate/soften. If water doesn't puddle on the decking, it'll handle a few rains without problem.
That said, when we had a "reconstruction" halt on our shed before the roofing arrived, I did put in a tarp to protect the floor and the plywood gussets on the home-made roof trusses.
If, say, this is formed vinyl/aluminum siding where the fasteners are hidden, it doesn't make much difference. I'd use galvanized hex head socket-drive _screws_ and power drive 'em. It's not as if it's a lot of fasteners.
If the siding is board type, _especially_ if it's a composite product (weather proof MDF, aspenite etc) or pressure treated in some way, galvanized is really essential. Modern PT (eg: ACQ lumber) aggressively eats non-galvanized (or casually coated) fasteners just from atmospheric moisture, let alone getting wet. You might not see any staining, but the siding will start falling off. Perhaps as quickly as 3-4 years.
It's up to you. Both will hold. The uncoated will bleed rust in the future, and even if the building is plumb, level and square in every other respect, a glance will intimate that the construction was sloppy. The way I look at it, if a guy won't even spend a few bucks for better nails, what else did he skimp on?
Quite a number, undoubtedly. Sounds like one that probably was abandoned during construction either by a spec builder or an over- extended buyer who couldn't afford the higher rates...
Years ago there were half a dozen of them in a new section of the subdivision off ours that stood there for five years or more. When the housing market picked up again, a developer bought the lot for a song, razed them back to the footings then rebuilt and sold them all...
Ran outa money, huh? If somebody buys and restarts, they need an engineer, or experienced carpenter, to go over the whole thing with a straightedge, framing square, and long iron bar to thump the wood and see if anything rings mushy. If there was standing water on the deck plywood, it is likely warped at best, and delam'd and rotten at worst. Could be a major PITA piecing in new decking, since it runs under the floor sills. It may be salvagable, may be a near-teardown. Need to check foundation for bowing and frost heave, too, but it is likely okay if properly built, and backfilled once framing was in place. Need to check for mold, anywhere that was dark and wet, like under the tarpaper edges, corner leads, sill plates, etc.
I've seen places like that before, usually where owner was acting as GC and burned through personal or construction loan money faster than anticipated. Usually sold at a very deep discount, or if abandoned for years, sold for the land value.
Up here, at least, inspectors will reject trusses that have been exposed to the weather for too long. I'm not sure what the precise criteria they use is, but I'd assume that if the wood had turned grey (or worse), they have to be scrapped. Perhaps considerably before then.
I would suspect the first thing that starts to become worrisome is repeated swell/shrink cycles (from rain/hot days) loosening the gusset plates.
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