Dear Friends,

I will be needing a temporary shelter for a couple cars and I've been looking around at these ez shelters that are sold at places like pep boys, wal mart, sams and so on. I wonder if any of you have any experience with anything like this.

So does anybody have any thoughts or could let me know what has worked for you? This one is from SAMS wholesale.

(IMG:http://graphics.samsclub.com/images/products/0075321680022_L4.jpg)

I don't know anything about this one but another place to check would be Harbor Freight. If they don't have any stores in your area you can still order online at harborfreight.com. I think they have a couple different ones that you might want to check out too.

I think the biggest concern you should have is having some sort of vapor barrier on the ground or floor of the shelter to keep from getting a lot of condensation and eventually, rust underneath the car while it sets.

When I build my workshop/garage I'm going to go so far as to put down a vapor barrier under the concrete, and then after the concrete has fully cured I'll do an epoxy paint to seal it even better.

Howdy,

I have one of these:

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/disp...temnumber=42211

For $170, I couldn't beat it. Its held up well through at least one (maybe two?) Ohio winters as well. You can also get replacement covers.

Its not a sealed structure... The floor is whatever ground you put it on (in my case, pavement) and the sides have maybe an inch or two gap. I didn't try to seal it as I thought with temperature swings & such that that would trap moisture and be worse than just letting air flow through it to keep the humidity at whatever ambient was.

I've got some bare metal in there and it certainly does surface rust, and does it more than I'd expect it to in a more climate controlled area, but it hasn't been particularly bad. I wouldn't worry about any metal that had any type of coating (paint, powder coat, primer, oil film, etc.).

I've been happy with mine.

Mark

I have the Cover-IT version of the Harbor Freight product, but with an upgraded commercial grade material for the shell. This was required by the local... Building Inspector! The small town I live in is very political and insisted on building permits $76 and, get this, building, foundation, and fire inspections. Then they tried to say that it was taxable as a permanent structure since it could remain in one place for more than 180 days. We finally managed to squash that by pointing out that the Mayor had three on his property and had neither permits , nor a tax assessment for them. The payback came from the "Fire Inspector" who required the commercial grade fabric to meet a 20 minute fire rating. While this is stupid enough on its own, I live in a 110 year old Balloon Framed wood house (which has a fire rating of milliseconds). The result added $400 to the cost of the materials for the "shelter" besides the permit fees. The footing inspection involved looking at the tops of the eight 2' auger anchors inserted into my lawn. I love my town (flaming sarcasm intended).

However, he's a plus for you. If it's near to your garage, you can run plastic electrical conduit underground and up inside to power florescent lights and tools. If you don't have to spend $400 to upgrade the fabric you can go to the local business that gives away their used wooden pallets (4' x 4' are best) and lay them in an opposed grid inside the shelter. Screw exterior grade plywood to the tops of the the pallets and you have a solid stable floor above grade. A few pieces of 2 x6 or 2 x 10 laid laterally work as a ramp if you don't own a set. These "upgrades" are best done on Saturday and Sunday after any "inspections are completed.

I'm not sure it's wise to check with the local authorities first or not. In my town it wouldn't have made any difference. The Building inspector rides aroud looking for way to generate capital for the town, so you don't need to worry about being reported by neighbors. God I Love New Jersey (molten sarcasm).

This post has been edited by jensend: Mar 13 2008, 07:36 PM

That sounds familiar. I was renting/living in West Hartford, CT, when I got a letter from the town zoning officer. Among the complaints were no permit for the structure (Costco 10x20' tent that collapsed under snow load a week later after a few seasons of use), undrivable vehicle more than 1 week (which I moved into the 1 car garage, but would work on it outside as there wasn't any room in there), open trailer not being allowed (I explained it wasn't for business use, so they allowed it), parking on grass (had to be asphalt or gravel, so I dumped gravel over the lawn), and get this - 3 unrelated parties living together without a permit. I was happy to move one town over where I'm friends with all my neighbors and nobody complains.

A.