Pole barn, best bang for the buck?

Geo-TH,In

Well-known Member
Thinking of building another pole barn at the north end of county
I have a 30x40 down south and a 26x46, west side of county. Both are 1200 sq ft.
I find I have more usable space with the 30x40.
I'm leaning towards to making a 30x48x10 with 2 overhead doors on the 30 ft end.

Remember the bigger the pole barn, the more crap you will collect.

What size pole barn do you think is the best bang for the buck?
 
Hi Gene, that's an interesting comment you make. Must be because of roofing and not wall construction? For example (ignoring doors and windows), I could build a 12x12 building (144 square feet) and only need to build 48' of walls. Then I could build a 6'x24' building, still 144 square feet but that would take 60 feet of walls. Then for the square structure I'd need 7 fourteen-foot trusses (assuming a 1' overhang and 2' spacing between) + sheeting, but the long skinny one would need 13 eight-foot trusses (with a 1' overhang and 2-foot spacing) + sheeting. Is my math correct? Is it the roof differences that account for what you say?
 
I have a 48x96x12. wonderful building, but as with everyone too darn small. Rafters may be the the limiting factor. longer the more expensive. I have them on 2' centers with 5/8 sheathing and tubber under metal roofing. so far no frost problems.
 
Everything I have priced, as an estimator, up to 40? truss span, square is cheaper. At 40?, steel framed buildings become competitive. Another cost efficiency factor is to building as long as a multiple of post spacing, typically 8? or 10?.

Good luck with your project.
 
Crazy horse < I have been around buildings for years and the most square feet for the money comes from a near square of square building. You are right on your thinking. The only thing that does come into play is after you go above 30 ft or so on a wood truss the cost jumps because the truss has to be heavier. A building 20 X 80 has 200 running ft of walls and only yields 400 sq. ft.but a building 40 x 50 has 180 ft of walls and yields 2,000 sq. ft of building. Closer to square one gets the more square ft of building.
 
JM ..... you said "A building 20 X 80 has 200 running ft of walls and only yields 400 sq. ft" .....

You meant to say 1600 square feet right?
 
I also was thinking 36' wide is what mine is ? Wider than that the trusses went way up in price. But this likely varies by location and who you get them from.
 
I looked at a lot of different barns before I put up my building. In our area we can get a lot of snow and have seen a number of pole barns come down in heavy snows. I ended up putting up a what they call a modified U shaped building(40X60). The wind and heavy snow does not effect this building and no place for birds to nest. I built my own end of building with the standard roll up doors and 20 foot double sliding doors on back of building.
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I agree I help a friend build a barn. He was going to built a 40x60 with 8 foot spacing. I told him a 64 will take no more post. So he went to 64 feet. That last 4 feet was cheapest part of buliding
 
It looks like you have a heater in there. How do you insulate a building like that ? spay on type ?
 
Not really, Spook.

The wider it is the stronger the rafters or trusses have to be, so a bit rectangular is the cheapest per square foot.

I?ve always heard a 60 foot wide shed is the best bang for the buck on width, above that the trusses get pretty spendy, below 60 foot you are paying a little more than best value. Then make it as long as you can afford.

Doors on the ends, so you don?t need the big heavy costly beams to span a sidewall, and around here so you don?t get the pile of snow off the roof against the door.

Paul
 
My shed is 48 by 81. It is 14 high posts with a scissors truss. The scissors trusses cost more, but they allowed me to use smaller poles spaced 9 feet. The smaller poles and spacing was cheaper than going with a 16 foot eve and regular 8 foot spacing.

Lot of little details to play with.

If I put up a 30 foot wide building with 2 doors on one end, that would be a very expensive building, as I couldn?t fit much in it...... so the size has to fit the use, and we don?t know what it?s really going to be used for.

I wish my building were a few feet wider, 4 or 8 or whatever the next price break would be.

Glad I got it tho, the last she?d put up here dad built in 1960s, at 36 by 48 and only 11 feet high door, it just doesn?t hold much farm stuff any more. And he stupidly put the doors on one side, jeez I can?t use the shed all winter with snow frozen 3 feet high against and in the door track. What was he thinking..... never put doors on a side wall as the only doors in Minnesota......

Paul
 
My building has no insulation but the double barrel wood stove will warm building to about 40 degrees but I don't do much in shop when it gets cold. There are three types of insulation that i know of and here are some pictures of each.
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Have to be very careful with the older ribbed steel buildings up here with snow, because of some bad assumptions about snow loads the code used to allow, almost all the old ones have collapsed now. Anything post 1995/2000 or so and the ones that have been reinforced inside with framing have been ok.
 
In Ohio I'd think an uninsulated metal building would "rain" inside like metal pole buildings do without vapor barrier.
 
I had a friend that had a building like that. He created an overhead garage door opener with the drive axle from a front tine tiller !
 
This has been up since 1984 and not problems. These building come in different gages of steel (any way they did when I bought this one). I know of three of these that are older than mine and still in great shape. One of them is 60 x 200 FT. The ones that have come down here were not pt up correctly.
 
best money I spent was on my overhang it was about 4k more but I can be outside cut weld grind without make a mess inside
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I'm in MI and all the doors are on the sides of ours. You have to plow the doors out right away after it snows and they don't freeze shut. A longer over hang like 2 foot helps too.
Depending on how much you want to keep at the other location check out those containers for a shed you could put 2 of them in for space with lockable doors on the end.
 
Yes they always have come in difference gages to deal with different wind and snow loads. Trouble was here people wanted the absolutely cheapest and would get the code min spec. Same thing happened with the fabric buildings. Theres one in our local auction designed for 28 lb per square foot, needs to be closer to 60 lb per square foot in a sheltered area here to meet code. It would likely be fine in an open area but it won't last 5 years otherwise.
 
a square building may be more bang for the buck.

But you won't have long sides to add lean-to's along the sides either which you are more likely to be able to do yourself.
 

I'm building a 32 x 48 14' right now.

It was cheaper to go wider to get the same square footage in my case, less trusses and less posts to set.

I looked a hoop buildings and at least for me, the cost of an equivalent size hoop wasn't much different than a pole. I know the pole building will be up in 40 years time with next to no maintenance, the hoop likely will need a few roof covers.
 
Here is what I'm getting built, month behind schedule, learned a lot,, but its coming now. 50x80x16, 4ft centers
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(quoted from post at 15:25:57 11/01/18) a square building may be more bang for the buck.

But you won't have long sides to add lean-to's along the sides either which you are more likely to be able to do yourself.

My first barn was 40 x 84 with 14' lean-tos and lofts down both sides inside....so I got a lot of cheap square footage. My last barn was 36 x 72 with 8' lofts down each side, added over 1000 sq ft for very little cost. A wide building with wider lofts would have required larger beams and more cost. With the lofts I have about $31k into this one.
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I too am leaning towards a 32x48x10. Trusses on 2 ft, osb, 35
year shingles.

When I had my 30x14x10 built metal and shingles were same price.
 
Seems I was told that the price of trusses really start going up once you get over a 24 ft. span. Might be one reason for Gene's comment.
 

Twelve 36 ft trusses, 40 LB snow load, 12' on centers cost me a little less than $3100 out here. Picked them up at the plant a mile away. Enough for the 72' barn.
 

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