wonderful salvage

well i've mentioned before that our family has been big on using salvaged items and my son is bringing home literally tons of salvage from the redo at his shop (bought by Chinese) and yes with permission.

yesterday I helped him unload a bunch of steel he brought home from work..this load was over 1/2 ton..and he was going back for another load

three of the pieces are amazing..they are 1/4 Inch thick steel panels that have a slight curve ..(imagine a playing card that you sqeeze on the sides a little to make a curve)..

they are odd sizes..but generally about 5 1/2 feet wide at the sides and 8 to 9' long ..we have unloaded 3 so far but there are more coming.

man them buggers are heavy..i got a finger caught and nearly broken under one..but i'm ok.

anyway..we need some storage buildings..and these will be the roofs for some smallish storage buildings..we will build one to park our tractor under..to keep it out of rain and snow..

he also got some 4x4 steel railing pieces that he can cut up to use for bracing for things or weld together to make stuff..and gobs of steel tables..some with lifts..some with bearings so the tops turn..some with rollers..some racks for welding and some huge freestanding racks for his garage/barn to put things on..like shelves..

but the curved steel pieces have our minds just churning..what structures we can build from them..i was also thinking that one of those would make an ideal roof for a root cellar !!

the root cellar idea was to dig into the side of our bank and put blocks for the walls and then take the tractor and sit one of those big curved steel pieces on top of the blocks..as a roof....coat it with tar or rubber of somekind to protect the steel..and then pile sod over the top..

just a pipedream right now..but with 6 or 8 of these steel pieces coming it is a great idea in my humble opinion.

i also thought one might make a nice footbridge over our drainage ditch..but that seems almost like a waste of the steel.

sounds like an awesome find! I bet you will find all sorts of uses.

I love to salvage things, especially wood. The bridges down here used to be made by taking a Corteza tree and using the log (often 30 meters long!) and dropping it across the river. Continue doing until you have enough, then tie together with cable. After that, fill with river rock and dirt.

Corteza is so hard it won't absorb water, so they last for years and years. It is actually cost effective now to replace it with a concrete bridge for the value of the wood!

We use the wood to make truck beds, outdoor chairs, corrals, etc.

yeah, he said they are cleaning out all the warehouses this week..so it will be interesting what they find to salvage..

going into mid November now..we won't be doing a LOT of building still this fall (Mich)...but we'll have all winter to get our heads around what we can build in the spring..

also cause this is a rubber and plastic shop..some of these big sheets of steel have a coating of rubber on them..which also waterproofs them..which is great for using outside.

Brenda, it looks like one of those metal pieces would make a very small roof, but if you use three, turning the middle one upside down, and placing the edges of the other two over the top of it -- like spanish roof tiles -- that might work for the roof of a larger cellar.  Just give them a bit of a slope so water will drain off.

Kathleen

what a wonderful idea Kathleen I hadn't thought of doing it that way..we were trying to figure out how to make the seams not leak....but that would work really well..would be lower in that spot..but not by that much..the curves are rather slight..i'll mention this to my son..we got 4 exact pieces and then a 5th that had 3 cross braces on it..and was sl different size..

could use three of the same ones for a 15' long structure..that surely would be enough for the tractor to pull under..and it would be 8' wide..water would easily drain from the upside down one and we could put a drain area on each side with leftover french drain if we needed it..

thanks..i'll make a note of that to tell Joel later..he has next week off..we might actually be able to whip it up that way rather quickly..no welding !!

Glad to help!

Kathleen

i drew up a sketch for my son, after reading your suggestion..and with 3 panels we could easily make an 8 x 16 roof over for the tractor..which would be perfect size..and also would make it the right size for putting 4x8 siding panels on....with a side access door to access the tractor seat this would be ideal..hopefully my son will agree when he sees my sketch..