What height door to put in?

[tdsam]

Hi All

I have been a long time observer of the forum and have even caught up with some of the members at events such as the FC/FE Nationals at Phillip Island.

I have been keen to get an old van to restore but have not had the room to store one but that is hopefully all about to change.

The house is being built and the next job is to build the shed. One question that has come up is what size (height) door to put in. I do not envisage that I am likely to be looking at a particularly large van but now is the time to get it right. At this stage the plan is to put in a 2.5m door.

I would be interested in members advice on this.

Thanks
Shane

[Daggsey]

Hi Shane,

If it was me, I'd be going 3metres if possible.......you can probably get away with 2.8, but various vans have different wheel heights, axle heights, roof hatches etc. A lot easier to work that size into a design now then trying to alter something later on.

Daggsey

[Don Ricardo]

Hi Shane,

It obviously depends what sort of van you end up with, however I support Daggsey's comments. Our 14 foot Don bondwood van is 8 feet 6 inches off the ground (according to the specs), which converts to 2.6 m high. Even the smaller Don's (10 foot) are 8 feet 3 inches or 2.52 m. I'd be going for more clearance than 2.5 m just so that I'm not limiting my options. 3m as Daggsey suggested sounds good to me.

As it happens we are about to go through the same exercise as you, and will be building a new shed/garage for our van, so I've been doing much the same calculations!

Good luck with the building and with finding a van.

Don Ricardo

[Daggsey]

Shane,

The other thing to consider is whether you are having a sliding door or a roller door. You will find if you are using a roller door, you can possibly lose another 300mm when it is wound up.

I'm with Don Ricardo....I would go for the highest opening possible.

Another point worth considering is what your local authority will permit. Depending on the zoning of your property, many backward councils come up with stupid rules like minimum wall heights of sheds being 2.4 metres in residential areas.....you would struggle to get a 4wd with a roofrack into something like that.....unfortunately with many town planners and councils around this wonderful country of ours, common sense is very quickly taking a back seat to "aesthetics" . I'm probably treading on thin ice with public servants within our wonderful state and local governments, but it is real and is happening that a lot of these "shiney bums" rarely take reality into consideration when it comes to building regulations. Remember, most of the rules in this country are designed for the lowest common denominator, but that's another story! .

At the end of the day, I would check with your local authority first and build whatever is legally permitted as a maximum to cater for your future needs.

Daggsey

[Franklin1]

Hi Shane, I support what the other guys have said above. The absolute minimum clearance should be 2500 mm (and bear in mind that if you're talking roller doors then the door curtain usually raises to about 75mm less than the door frame opening, so you have to make the door opening higher, or you get the installers to put the catch lugs up flush with the headsill level. You have to specify that you want a minimum opening clearance and then let them work out how to do it )

Both my bondwood vans measure 2430mm from ground to just above the hatch tops so all my door openings are 2500mm minimum clearance. The Don vans are higher because their noses are always up in the air. They're such a snooty brand of van (Don R, maaaaate, I'm KIDDING ;D, and anyway...I said 'snooty' not 'snotty' )

The other recommendation I'd give you Shane is to have the width of the door opening made at 3 metres. Most of these old vans have a width of 6ft 6ins or 7ft, and trying to manoeuvre them through the standard 2400mm wide opening is a pain in the butt. If you can go the extra width to 3m then life can be so much more enjoyable.

cheers,
Al.

[Deleted]

reminds me of when Jenni & I were seeking shire approval to build the shed at her place.

The maximum allowable suburban shed was 60 sq metres and 2.4 metres high
So, we rocked up to the shire with our plans for a 80 sq metre shed and 2.7 metres high ;D.

Ditzy, in her usual style, with plenty of cleavage showing ;D managed to con the lady at the desk to get the town planner out of his office & come talk to us......not usually done, you're supposed to lodge your plans at the front desk . Anyway, she started chatting to the guy, and charmed him by showing him pics of our V V's, told him all about the website ..... and that we need this shed to restore our V V's
Fortunately this dude took a liking to our hobby , ......a few days later (normally weeks !!) approval turned up in the mail for our 80 sq metre 2.7M high shed , subject to neighbours agreement...........
That was easy too, just told next door neighbours we won't whinge about their son's drum practice, provided they agree to our shed ;D ;D ;D

Mark

[neilncheryl]

Hi Shane
We have 2.7metre height clearance and 6 metres deep for our shed but if we we doing it again it would definitely be 3 metres height and 8 metres deep. We have had two vans that wouldn't fit under 2.7 and I find that 6 metre depth doesn't give enough room to comfortably work around the van.
As has been said before, check with your local council as to what is allowed.
You can never have a shed that is too big - you will always find something to fill it with.
Neil