Introduction: Very Sturdy Duplex Dog House for Under $300.00

I built this for my wife's nephew to house his two rather large female hunting dogs.

It has two 2'x3' doorways with a partition in the center.

Each dog has a separate 4'x6' area.

Corrugated tin was used for the roof and walls and an existing 12' x 7' slab was used for the base.

2x4 lumber was used throughout rather than the traditional 1x4s over 2x4 framing so fewer studs were needed and the tin was attached directly to the horizontal 2x4 'slats'..

Materials list:

1 bag 1-1/2" roofing screws

2 small boxes of 3" star screws (70 screws/box)

(all lumber is treated)

6 - 2x4x12'

21 - 2x4x8'

2 - 12' sheets corrugated tin

9 - 8' sheets corrugated tin

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The walls were constructed first and consist of three vertical studs per wall 2x4x36 spaced evenly.

Over these were placed three 2x4x93 horizontal slats spaced evenly.

At all joints two 3" deck screws were placed diagonally.

These walls were erected and supported six feet apart by 2x4x144s to hold them plumb for the next step.

One 2x4x72 joined the sides previously constructed on each end making sure everything was plumbed.

The 2x4x144 braces were removed at this point.

Two 2x4x36s were attached to the 72" rail, 24" from the outside edge to make the left and right rough-ins for the doorways.

Four 2x4x24 slats were spaced evenly vertically on the left and right of each doorway to complete the end wall structure provide a surface to attach the tin.

A recycled solid-core door was used to make the partition to separated the dogs and cut to fit.

The length was about 66" and the height about 32".

A 1/2 sheet of 3/4" plywood cut to 36x66 could be used for new construction and attached with 3" screws from the center side upright studs.

Six rafters were constructed from three 2x4x96s and their peaks cut at 65 degrees.

Each pair of rafters was attached at the peak with one 3" screw then the pair laid over the top of the side walls and spaced evenly.

Where the rafters touched the top outside edge of the side walls, two 3" screws were used to join rafters to the top plates.

Six 2x4x141s were laid horizontally over the rafters, spaced evenly and centered left-to-right.

These were fastened with single 3" screws at each joint.

On the gable ends 2x4 rafters were attached with the 4" dimension upright.

Their lengths were determined by measuring from the center of the peak to the outside edge of the lowest roof slat.

The angle measure for cutting the peak ends of the 2x4s was 65 degrees.

The outside ends of these rafters were left square.

Six 8' sheets of corrugated tin were each cut into 4' lengths to make the roof covering.

The bottoms and outside edges of the panels extended beyond the framing by about one inch.

There were1" overlaps between each sheet and the sheets were fastened with three screws each - not fastening the top ridge section which was later covered with a ridge cap.

The ridge cap was screwed down over each vertical joint of the roof panels and its ends trimmed flush with the outsides of the roof panels.

The side panels consist of three pieces -

left and right panels with the low side 37" and the high sides 48".

The center panels over the doorways are 15" on the outside edges and 25 1/2" at the center where it meets the inside peak of the roof slats.

I ran out of roofing screws for the last few end panels but these are protected from the weather by the roof overhangs so plain screws were used instead.

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