Building a shed in Finland

[clogs]

Dennis just an idea.....
my old house was a 17th cent converted water mill.....streams etc everywhere....absolutly no insulation and the roof let the wind in badly....
but I still used to work there everyday.....
the machines and there was a lot got covered with old blankets and Duvet's........u cant see em all........
then each machine got an old fashioned work light or an Angle poise lamp fitted with an 11watt curly wurly bulb.....
these lamps were left on from the first frosts until the last 24x7.....
abso no rust ever.....only the machines that got used were uncoverd.....
the placed looked a bit Goulish but who cares.....machines like pillar drills, miter saws etc where all mobile so they were pushed together and also got a bulb....being 11watts they used little elec and certainly we noticed no big increase in the elec cost....
those machines in the forground are an as new Myford metal lathe and mill, the one at the back is a Colchester student lathe....
the lamps were placed under the lathe and milling beds, so NO fire hazard....

 

[DennisCA]

Of course the question nowadays is, can you even get hold of a light bulb?

I'm personally curious about the idea of dehumdifying, since the idea is to make a tight shell with controlled ventilation. I wonder if a sorption style dehumidifier would work, they can run at low temps. My notion is that if the air is dry enough then it might not be a big problem, or manageable maybe with some suitable protective coating.

 

[JimJay]

Just my ha'porth here: my workshop is two rooms in the basement of our house. It's underground and part of it is under our upper terrace. It's normally damp all the time and the part of the ceiling under the terrace usually freezes in our -30C or lower winters. I put in a wood burner for heating but this turned out to be a bad idea; I only used it twice but it quickly became uncomfortably hot in there for me and it's now a base for my pillar drill. I use a small convector heater, together with a small electric dehumidifier and between them they do a good job. It's not the cheapest option but I find that around 12C is a perfectly comfortable working temperature for me and around 55% humidity keeps any rust at bay, so it doesn't cost a great deal.

 

[DennisCA]

I used to have an oil filed radiator in my shop until this year when I had a heat pump installed. It was an expensive way of heating a shop and power is set to be more expensive in the future than it has been.

I dont mind if it gets hot fast though, with firewood which is relatively cheap I can open the door.

The thing here is I don't do a lot of woodworking in winter, so the shop would mostly stand idle. This is why I don't like the idea of heating the entire area when I am not there.

My ideal solution would be to be able to keep the humidity down without heating, there's also protective coatings and sprays. Everything is cold, but dry and ready to use.
The 2nd best solution is probably what clogs describes. Cover the machines with a little light inside.