Menard's EZ-Sell EZ-purchase kits (EZ-Build, EZ-Frame), not EZ put together

This is another rare personal post.  We spent a lot of time talking about the inadequacies of this kit, so I thought I'd put down some thoughts for others to glean from.  InfoSec/tech stuff will continue in the next post.  Promise.

A few weekends ago I went to my parents and helped on a project to replace a rotting out shed and put together something that looks like the picture on the left, sans the window.

Here's the link to the kit itself, sold through home improvement store Menards:

Midwest Manufacturing - E-Z Frame Yard Barn - 12'

Our experience with this was not great.  The instructions were, by their own words, suggestions of what kind of a shed could be built with the materials and sketches they provided.  The key things that need to be remembered with this build, in my opinion, is:

• You'll need to do some guess work on what their directions mean
• You'll need to reinforce their joints for the peak and floor "joists"
• You'll need to reinforce the floor even if you've reinforced the joists
• Use screws where you can and not the nails that came with the "kit"
• Materials are not cut for you
• You may have lots of spare parts/wood left over
• How to build a foundation is up to you and the instructions are going to be hard to plan from

There were more issues, but I forget them all.  Let it be said that you're probably better off building one from scratch.

Chris
LABrat.com