I'm going to build a log-cabin-style garden shed from tongue-and-groove 45x145 studs, standing on pilings. The shed's dimensions will be approximately 2.5x4m. I plan to use support beams of 45x170 or 195 and floor joists of the same dimension. The garden shed will have a wood-fired sauna. I have a few questions for those who know.
Can I manage with 2 support beams or do I need 3? Hopefully, it will be enough to make the shed 2 meters wide, but perhaps 2.5 meters is necessary due to the distance between the sauna stove and the wall.
Can a log-cabin-style wall be 4m long without a transversal wall to hold it together? I will have a wall inside, but it will be freestanding and will not contribute to stabilizing the outer wall.
Behind the sauna stove, I plan to build a wall of bricks or plastered leca. I'm considering the risk of the plaster or brick mortar absorbing moisture during the sauna session and then risking frost damage in the plaster or mortar when it gets cold in the winter. The sauna will be uninsulated and without heating between uses.
I've also never built a log-cabin-style structure before, so I'm happy to receive any advice or tips that might ease this work. There will be quite a bit of notching to do.
I've tested with some scrap pieces to see if it's possible to make it a bit more efficient and avoid processing each notch separately. I clamped a couple of pieces together and used a simple side fence on the hand router to rout them all at once. It went quickly and with good results. With a simple jig, you could probably rout as many studs at a time with precision as you can clamp. I believe this will significantly ease the work as it becomes like a wall kit that just gets stacked into each other. However, my Festool 1010 is a bit on the weak side, so I have to take a little at a time; a 1400 wouldn't be a bad choice.
How do you use the milling machine? I think saw and chisel.
That's what I thought too. It seemed like an endless job to achieve that, so as a test, I stacked several studs on their edges and milled a 45mm groove across all of them at once. Turned them over and milled the other side. A jig is probably good when milling "properly" so that the dimensions are exactly the same. And a more powerful mill would have been preferable for a faster job, but I'll manage with my medium-sized one.
