Expanded Attic!

I'm a bit of a hoarder when it comes to sheets of wood. I bought a few sheets from a guy on craigslist a while back (along with a large galvanized bucket, and a fertilizer spreader). I also pick up various chunks of sheet goods that others are tossing out. I finally put some of that stuff to good use.

Out upstairs attic is a bit cramped. Not room for much else other than the A/C unit. After measuring out this end of the attic, I decided to add about 16 square feet of floor space.

Added board seen in bottom portion

The edge of the existing floor went flush to the edge of the joist, so I had to piggyback a 2x4 up against the joist. I used a board from a pallet so you can see the stripes a bit, but only until the plywood goes down on top of it.

Boards ready to haul up

Sadly a 4'x4' piece of plywood won't fit up the small drop down attic door. So I ripped the piece into two 2'x4' sheets. This probably was for the best anyways because it would have been really difficult to move a large sheet around up there.

I moved the insulation around a bit to make it even. The previous owners just threw boxes up here compacting the insulation down. Not only is this a bad idea because it reduces the effective r-vaule of the insulation, but it also puts undue weight on the sheetrock. (I really dislike all of the half-done jobs of the previous owners) Anyways, I slid each piece in and nailed it down separately to make it easier on myself. I'm glad to have the extra space. At the very least it will make it easier to reach the filter for the upper A/C unit.


While I was up here I wanted to add a small shelf just behind the hatch. Again the previous owners had just thrown stuff on to the slanted portion of the attic, so I had to fluff up the insulation. I added some riser blocks and some longer boards  resting on the existing joists to hold up this big piece of MDF. The MDF was pulled from a pile that a neighbor was throwing out. It's about 20"x54", so it's about 7 extra sq feet of usable storage; more that that, it will keep us from throwing stuff up there like the previous owners, haha.

I think the total cost was probably about $15, and about 3-4 hours.

(half a sheet of plywood and 5 inches of a 2x4 I bought. The rest of the 2x4s were pulled from the trash)