Foundations

[remus]

Hi all
I've been offered a 40ft ex shipping container to replace an old shed we have taken down.
The container will stretch over the old base, but will be on soil front and back.
What kind of foundations would you recommend for it to sit on.
Also how much fall so the rain will run off

thank Kevin

[GB_Groundworks]

We've got containers sat on mot

Or you could dowel the existing concrete and extend it.

Depends on what you are using it for, we set ours level then built a 1 foot high timber lip on one side and used box profile roofing sheets to great a slipping roof off the other side

Means the floors are level inside

[DNgroundworks]

We have ours on MOT also, no need for concrete i dont reckon unless it already there.

[remus]

Only going to be used for general building bits.
I was thinking of lifting it above ground level a bit to get some air under it to stop it rusting, or is that not needed.
I also plan to build of the side to make a covered space for the tractor and mower.

[Tony McC]

If you want it off the ground, then old railway sleepers, either timber or concrete, will do the trick.

[Jamster21]

We used telegraph poles on chiller lorry box - been there 5 years or more now and it seems as good as it was then... Bed them in a bit obviously unless you want an ugly caravan...

[Tony McC]

I have a vision of the container units being rolled away on unfixed telegraph poles!

And why are we still calling them 'telegraph' poles. There hasn't been a telegraph service in Britain for 30 years or so! I suppose it's a bit like the refusal of many in the trade to update from the term 'MOT' which disappeared in 1978.

[lutonlagerlout]

MOT
ministry of transport sounds quite official and every supplier in the dirty south still refers to it as that

same with sharp sand,if you ask for sharp here you get plastering sand

we call it riverwash or flooring

LLL

[mickg]

we still call it MOT and so does all the merchants we buy from

in the north west its washed river sand or plastering/screeding sand

[r896neo]

Come to belfast we call it blinding.

[Tony McC]

If we can still call it 'MOT' at the suppliers, can we pay them in pounds, shillings and pence? Farthings and Groats, perhaps?

[steve r]

Telegraph poles carry the wires for the electric light!

[Tony McC]

I saw one in Leek last weekend that had more pitch oozing from it than there was between the setts around the base. You could see smearing at shoulder-ish height which made me think it must have softened so much in the hot summer we had that passers'by, squeezing along the narrow ginnel, must have rubbed-up against it and got a black sticky patch on their clothing!