I have been talking with my father about building a root cellar for some time. Back in December when we discussed it at length, we came up with two methods to build it. One is using used railroad ties, the other cinder blocks. After a bit of research, I found that RR ties contained creosote. I cannot bring myself to consider using the ties after reading how harmful this stuff is. Least of all having a structure that will house food stores in that type on environment. My fathers whole logic says “It will be cheap to build” or “easier to build” than using cinder blocks.
At the end of the discussion I had told him I could not use them due to the creosote, but I would pay for half of the building if we used cinder blocks. Since this was going to be a spring project for us, I put it on the back burner for a few months. Keep in mind that this location will be my bug out if things get bad. He has 100 acres in a rural area with a low population.
So needless to say I am getting him into the whole prepper thing, in case it goes south, which I try to think of things that are sensible to do. He has always had a garden and prefers to eat his own over going to the store. Hence the root cellar idea.
Yesterday he calls me up and says I’m ready to buy some storage food and an AR. I say great and tell him what the options are, then at the end of the conversation he says I checked the side of the hill where I was thinking about the root cellar and 8 feet down its rock mostly, I would think this is sandstone of some type since we are in N Texas area. Then the deal breaker rolled off his tongue like its already set in stone. We will be using RR ties to build, cinder blocks are too hard and costly. This is after the fact that we had agreed on blocks and I would pay for half of it.
So my question is how do I get my father to consider a different choice in materials without putting my foot down and saying “your on your own” if you use ties and that I cannot pay for half of that. He wants it to be 16’x16’, the ground has a high clay content and does not rain and soak the ground too much. He knows nothing about venting it, dirt or concrete floor. My father is a human junk dealer, and that will never change. He never throws anything away and will buy something cheap and spend 40 hours working on it. i.e. he has 3 chainsaws that are junk and you have to work on them for 30 mins to get them to run when you need to go cut wood. I got tired of this and bought him a Stihl to use.
These are the things I am up against:
He is 67 years old
Tough as leather
Stubborn
Set in his ways
Refuses to listen to good logic
His land
If I am missing something please tell me. I just want to use anything but RR ties. I would love to have a cellar and am willing to put my dollars into it as a father and son project.
Read more about creosote. Remember, you are trying to reduce risk, not add to your risks. Further, you don’t know that creosote is the only preservative in the wood. There may be arsenates.
Have you considered cedar logs? Cedar is naturally pretty rot resistant and should be fairly easy to come by in Texas. It might make a nice alternative material to creosote impregnated rail road ties or commercially available pressure treated stuff. They may also be a little more work than pre-squared ties, but could still make for an effective compromise. Especially if you can find a cheap enough source.
You pretty much lost right there. That being said. Frankly I wouldn’t be that worried about using ties. This is keeping in mind what, and HOW, I would be using it. Canned food,jarred food, rotated yearly, no exposed foods etc etc. You’re not spending time in there playing cards, you’re walking in for a minute or two and grabbing some food with a zero permeability storage surface. If you’re storing potatoes in open air boxes, hung-smoked meats or something that’d be a whole different ball game. I wouldn’t be rubbing up against and getting cozy with the tie surfaces either. You could also mitigate this with a sheet of drywall around the top 4’ also to limit contatc etc, hell you could sheet the whole thing pretty cheaply.
All THAT being said, I prefer to pay once/ cry once and if you have intentions of living there after he passes away this gives you a bit of a bargaining chip since it doesn’t need to be built for 20-30 years. It might need to be built for 60 years durability. Plus I’d think to build it for double duty like a tornado shelter.
SO, free comment number one, 16’x16’ is ****ing HUGE. I myself would pare it down. But for the sake of argument I’ll use your dimensions and give you some numbers to roll in your head in talking with him.
Using 8"x8"x16" blocks bought at someplace like lowe’s likely THE most expensive place you could buy the things are gonna run your roughly a buck a pop. That’s 12 per row and 9 rows using a 6’ ceiling. 108 blocks per wall not accounting for a door only puts you at around $400 for your walls (not counting mortar of course). I have a feeling this is alot cheaper than you OR he suspected. A 4" deep concrete floor comes out to about 3.16 yd^3. Around here, “last I knew” it was running about $93 per yard. This being a root celler doesn’t need much fancy smoothing so let’s say you do it yourself, run a cheap 2x4 form around the edge use a 10’ 2x4 scraped across the top to “smooth it” Keeps your cost around $300 for the floor, maybe a sheet of plastic under it etc. So far we’ve got about $700 into materials. All we need is a door, which could be literaly made from scrap, “me and your dad come from the same school” ;p and all you need to account for is a roof and some cheap 2x4/osb sheet shelving. Your really only in the $1-1200 range. Frankly what I would do using these numbers is talk him into doing block walls, crete floor and talk him into something like half the width(this will make it “INFINITELY” easier to make and stronger ta boot). and use ties across the top for your roof and just cover the inner surface with sheet rock. This also helps you out since he “sort of wins with the ties” and it’s an easy conversion later on to get rid of. Be VERY careful how, and how much dirt you put around it so you don’t collapse it inward. If I think of anything else I’ll try to come back to this later.
ok, reread and thought some more on this. Missed where this might serve double duty for you. Also forgot where you said you have a hill already to work with. In my head this makes it much easier to work with, in reality, shrug. What I’d do is run a backhoe bucket straight into the hill, that’s your building width. Doesn’t matter what it is, it minimizes your back filling which simplifies your wall reinforcing. If this is sand it’s gonna be a pain in the ass all the way around, literally. literally, literally. ;p Pour your floor, smooth it yada yada. lay your brick walls all the way around 6ish feet up. I’d probably sds some pegs in the first row of block to keep the bottom from shifting inward. I’d lay the railroad ties across the top from outside block edge to outside block edge. Shoot nails into a 2x4 running along the outside edge of the ties on the interior to prevent any inward shifting of the block wall. Cover interior ceiling with sheetrock. Outside ceiling I’d contemplate cutting a 2x4 the width of the structue from corner to corner so I could slope whatever roofing material I used for drainage, even as in often as you guys might get it. Pole barn steel is actually not bad, about $3 per ft if I remember right and it comes 3’ width any length you want. Think that in my head puts a roof at $150ish 8ft wide 24ft deep. Cover it with some plastic, i think, would increase longevity. I’d the bury it over with between 12 and 24 inches of dirt. lighting I’d probably buy a dozen of those solar walkway lights and you’ll have to cook up or contemplate some ventilation if you’re going to spend time in there.
As a young whippersnapper in the mid 70’s just before I joined the Navy, I did some landscaping. I built numerous retaining walls, some over 10 feet tall. I remember 2 things about creosote & RR ties. 1. Those things were nasty as all getout to work with. Creosote irritated the living crap out of my skin to the point of causing blisters. 2. The RR ties were extemely difficult to cut, and heavier than I would believe. We were using a chainsaw back then, and I distinctly remember constantly sharpening chains and replacing them often. Not to mention the occasional bits of hidden embedded shards of metal in the ties.
Personally I would consider finding a used cargo container that has been treated for ocean use and burying it. They are available online for purchase and priced pretty reasonable due to our demand for cheap chinese crap. Just a thought. Good luck with your father.
oh yeah, good catch on the container. I had that thought go skittering through my head middle post and forgot to put it down. Looks like about same ballpark cost but no “issues” and probably hell of a lot easier in long run just digging a hole and burying it. You might even be able to find one with a jacked up end and just weld it up closed and bury that end and get it cost of scrap. Hell, they even show up on ebay.
I never myself had any noticeable reaction to ties, but I certainly never had such sustained or repetitive contact. They also on the whole might have been older and more weathered. Pay heed to his warnings about cutting them with a chainsaw.
Thanks for the input guys. After me putting my foot foot down against RR ties the last time I thought I had it licked, but then he sprung it on me again. I am going to talk with him tonight about it more. The blocks here are about 1.50 ea I think, but I will have to check on it again. He seems to think if we use blocks plus the cost of the mortar it’s going to get expensive. Although he said he liked the idea of spending 2500 on RR ties.
Does anyone know how much in mortar cost a 12x16 or 10x16 building would cost ? I cannot find a calculator for that. I have to have some concrete numbers before I speak with him.
Ok just looked and and blocks are 1.85 ea at Lowes.
As for the connex building, they will need bracing and cost a lot to begin with, unless you know where you can get them cheap.
creosote = bad juju any way you look at them as we would be putting produce from the garden in there also. So stored food in cans and open air produce will be the main stay. Going solar would be cool also tho, but I will save it for another thread. I have heard how hard it is to cut thru them also for vents.
does sheet rock really create that good of a barrier to be safe ? and the smell would still creep thru I would think.
The only thing I know about creosote is that it stinks,and if I had to spend any amount of time in a “bunker” made of that stuff I would be as sick as a dog.
Just got off the phone with my father. He is now looking at buying a connex to use for $2700. He also agreed to do more math on the cinder blocks to get a more accurate estimate.
Is it a good idea to fill the walls with concrete, or just do as an option ?
ok this is what I came up with for the build out of blocks:12x16x8
400 cinder blocks, not including the front which will have a door.
Remember there will be pressure from sand around it, and when the sand gets wet, it will be even heavier. In winter, when the ground freezes, you will get earth heaves. I’m not familiar with underground construction, but I would at the very least do it the same as above ground construction. Fill the corner holes with concrete and vertical rebar, and the entire top row should be filled with concrete and horizontal rebar. They make special top layer blocks for this with “U” shaped troughs to lay in a perimeter of rebar. You’ll probably find lots of YouTube videos on it.
Now to finish it off, you may want to slop some hot roofing tar on the outside walls to keep out some of the moisture and reduce the mold problem that is the bane of underground structures.
Shipping containers aren’t very strong and they’re definitely NOT designed to be buried. They only have vertical strength at the corner castings where they connect to other containers or the vessel carrying them. The sides and top are simply corrugated steel and are NOT structural. You’ll need to bridge from the corners to carry the load. Dirt is VERY heavy and it will cave in a container that’s not reinforced.
Simply digging a hole and burying the container is not a good idea.
I just got my April/May 2014 issue of Mother Earth news. On page 61 is an article on root cellar plans by Steve Maxwell. He also has a book “The Complete Root Cellar Book”. he seems to be a subject matter expert, a builder & stonemason.
Once you’ve decided on what materials you need - talk to the various owners/managers of the places you intend to buy from if you plan on buying in bulk/turn key from them.
When they realize you intend to spend some fairly big bucks, they’ll most likely be willing to bring down the cost of what you need, substantially - but you need to make that point, in a courteous manner. Being polite goes a long way in negotiation. Spending that kind of money deserves a discount and you need to let them know that. I know saying this sort of thing makes some folks kinda cringe, but it’s your money…better feel a little discomfort, with a fatter wallet as your reward…
Most likely, they’ll come farther down in cost than you thought…but you gotta ask…
What does it say about floors? The OP is talking about concrete, but from some preliminary planning I did a few years back, I seem to remember root cellars work best with earthen / gravel floors.
OP, reading through this I wonder if you need to decide which is the priority… root cellar or shelter… and optimize the plans for that. My opinion is that depending on your materials and construction type, you’ll get a good cellar that’s a so-so shelter… or a good shelter that’s a so-so cellar… or a compromise that does both only so-so.
For example, my own research makes me think a shipping container would make a terrible root cellar if you’re trying to store fresh produce. There’s quite a bit of “science” to cellars that you’ll want to look into, if you haven’t already.
The article says that a new unused septic tank works best. Eliminates the floor issue and are made to be buried. It goes on that you should get one without the partition and look for one that is a blem to cut your parts costs and not sacrifice safety.
From the article:
A 1500 gallon is 5.5’W x 5.5’H x 10’L and start ~$1,100
A 2500 gallon adds about a foot in height and start ~$1,600.
The article is good reading and has instructions for ventilation, roof, access etc.
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