Outbuilding made of pre-fab panels

[dirtychinchilla]

Afternoon,

Come the summer, I'm looking to build an outbuilding which will be part shed, part office and guitar playing room. I've been thinking about how I'm going to build it and today I thought, what about pre-fab panels?

I then stumbled across these panels which are relatively cheap and have an OK U-value (0.18 W/m²K).

On the face of it I'm thinking, awesome. They're well insulated, they should be sufficiently structurally strong (I have no idea actually, but I think they would be OK), and they're pretty cheap.

I can't actually see a down side.

Just wondering whether anyone had embarked on this before?

I would still clad the outside with some nice wood, put in a little electric heating, some windows, and also buy some sort of modular roofing panels for it.

The most annoying thing for me is that this would to sit within 2 m of our boundary with next door's garage, meaning that under permitted development it would have to sit under 2.5 m high. Although there was some sort of confusingly worded exception to this. It's not that I want to build it super tall, but I was looking forward to the aesthetic of a sloping roof.

I was also thinking (can you tell it's rumbling around in my head), would it make sense to make the floor out of the same stuff? It might not actually be designed to support a load, but if it did then the additional insulation makes sense. Having said that, I'd probably set it off the floor slightly to prevent anything bad happening if our garden flooded.

All good fun!

dirtychinchilla

 

[roccles]

I made some enquires about building a SIP Garden office last year and am still very interested in doing so but have had to put it on the back burner for now.

Here is what they quoted me last year if it is of any help. I was then planning to add a EDPM rubber roof and clad.

DIY Metro 4.5 x 2.5m *External Shell Size Shell Kit comprising:

SIPS panels for floor, walls and roof
Cutout for French doors @ 1500x1950mm
Cutout for side window @ 600x1950mm
Joining Splines
Floor bearers
Breather membrane
Polythene sheet for weather proofing during construction
Tile baton
All fixings and adhesives
Assembly instructions Room kit price £2,775.00
Delivery Charge £ 202.50
Sub Total £2,977.50
VAT £ 595.50
Total Amount £3,573.00

Some examples

https://www.simplysips.co.uk/gallery/

https://www.futuresips.co.uk/garden-room-kits/

 

[dirtychinchilla]

I made some enquires about building a SIP Garden office last year and am still very interested in doing so but have had to put it on the back burner for now.

Here is what they quoted me last year if it is of any help. I was then planning to add a EDPM rubber roof and clad.

DIY Metro 4.5 x 2.5m *External Shell Size Shell Kit comprising:

SIPS panels for floor, walls and roof
Cutout for French doors @ 1500x1950mm
Cutout for side window @ 600x1950mm
Joining Splines
Floor bearers
Breather membrane
Polythene sheet for weather proofing during construction
Tile baton
All fixings and adhesives
Assembly instructions Room kit price £2,775.00
Delivery Charge £ 202.50
Sub Total £2,977.50
VAT £ 595.50
Total Amount £3,573.00

Some examples

https://www.simplysips.co.uk/gallery/

https://www.futuresips.co.uk/garden-room-kits/

Thanks for that. That seems like a decent price for what you get. I wonder how much 6 x 3 m external would cost...maybe another £1.5k. That's definitely geting to the expensive end of things, but that seems pretty comprehensive.

I'm wondering if I could assemble the same, but for lower cost.

One thing I'm curious about is whether SIPS can be used as structural panels i.e. floor and roof. I think you'd have to put some sort of structural support beneath the floor to make that work.

 

[roccles]

The same panels that are used for the walls are also used for the floor and roof.

The video on this page shows laying the floor with the floor bearers underneath - LINK