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Steel Building Brand Recommendation?

DanH

Legacy Member
Mentor
Ms. Patti and I hope to build a hangar home in the not too distant future, something nice with an all-in-one footprint. I don't know much about steel buildings, certainly not in detail. Are there particular brands considered to be better quality, or particular features which are highly desirable?
 
Two of our neighbors

also used Morton and seem very happy. The home being built now is absolutely gorgeous. My wife was wishing we had done the same. The contractor that erected many of the hangars here, including mine, told me that in the end you will end up with a nice building no matter which manufacturer you choose just some require a more circuitous route. I wish I had asked him before I selected the manufacturer I did. His recommendation to both of my neighbors was to use Nucor. Happy hunting!
 
Building

Check local guys in your area. Morton makes a nice building but you are going to pay for it. The locals that I checked with build a very similar building without the up charge for the name.

I planned on a moisture barrier for at least the ceiling. I have used miracle truss in the past and it is a nice building but the vertical trusses will make the interior walls a bit of an issue.

I also like the higher power hangar door. Really nice door and self supporting, which makes the building structure simpler…
 
Two problems with Morton.
1/They are VERY expensive. 2/They are NOT a steel building. They have a wood structure covered with steel siding.

I've built 2 steel hangars; one is a "Red Dot" and the other is an "Athens Steel".

I built the Red Dot in 1990 and the Athens Steel in 2003. They both have held up very well

Many people like the Morton. I don't particularly. I got bids from them both times.
 
A fellow RV builder and I built a row of 10 nested T-hangars at our airport (HAO) to sell about 12 years ago. We did quite a bit of research before undertaking this project. We settled on Fulfab for a couple reasons. They have been building hangars, including box hangars for a very long time, they design and build their own doors, and they have crews to erect the building that know what they are doing and therefore are pretty fast. They erected our building with a crew of 5 in 5 days, including insulation. We had a local concrete contractor build the slab according to Fulfab specsThere is a truss above the bifold doors where the motor resides, which takes stress off the door motor because the motor is not lifting its own weight. The 42’ X 12.2’ bifold doors weigh about 1500 lbs.

http://www.fulfab.com/

My hangar that I’ve owned for 21+ years and I’m in still, has a Schwiess door. The heavy motor and gearing is bolted on the bottom of the door and rides up and down with the door. Also, when the door is up and it is raining, water ends up rolling inside the bottom half of the door. On my Fulfab doors, it is designed to shed water when up like a giant awning. Most steel building manufacturers that we found just build the building. The door is a separate thing. For us, the doors cost as much as the building. If you end up going that route, I can recommend Wilson aluminum frame doors. I helped put one of those up on a friend’s 50’ X 50’ building on his grass strip and it went together very well and was relatively easy to put up because of the lighter weight.
 
World Wide Steel

They bought the assets of Miracle Steel/Miracle Truss several years ago out of bankruptcy as I recall.

My hangar was Miracle Steel and I am very happy with it. It is a hybrid steel frame with wood purlins and girts. My son is building a hangar now in Minnesota and he is using World Wide. Very similar construction to mine, although his is all steel trusses, columns, purlins and girts.

I think they give a substantial discount to AOPA and/or EAA members.

I can recommend John Turner as a sales rep. He did both mine and my son's.

[email protected]
 
Steel is stupid expensive right now, 2x+ what it was a year ago and still going up. I'm contemplating building a hangar also, and had a quote a month or two ago for an all steel one, ouch. Lumber down quite a bit from the high. Good luck with sorting through the choices.
 
I just added on to my hangar. I wanted a 41'X45' hangar, 2 walls, 1 10'X40' open wall (for hangar door), 14' eves.. With NO door. I was quoted $95K to $120K for a basic steel hangar, concrete floor, no electrical or water no door. The locals suggested called Pole Barn builders. I called a few and was quoted $35K for the same building in a Pole Barn. You can't tell the difference, same steel siding and roof, etc. It's a wood skeleton instead of steel. Had it built, I built the 10'X40' door.... Done.. Saved nearly $100K
 
I can recommend Wilson aluminum frame doors. I helped put one of those up on a friend’s 50’ X 50’ building on his grass strip and it went together very well and was relatively easy to put up because of the lighter weight.
I also have a Wilson door, but their assets were acquired by Schweiss a few years ago.
 
Steel is stupid expensive right now,

Yep. I'm definitely not placing an order today.

Recent bulk prices have been in the $1900~$2000 per ton range, but domestic futures are trading below $1100 for late 2022, and dropping. I suspect the key to watch will be shipping capacity, re imported steel. For example, last week Russian mills dropped below $1000US.
 
Yep. I'm definitely not placing an order today.

Recent bulk prices have been in the $1900~$2000 per ton range, but domestic futures are trading below $1100 for late 2022, and dropping. I suspect the key to watch will be shipping capacity, re imported steel. For example, last week Russian mills dropped below $1000US.

my father built two of them. there really is nothing special about steel buildings. most local fabricators can build just as nice a building as a national company, for less money. one variable is foundation and site work, if the company scrimp on that you could be in for problems down the road.

the big thing to me is the door. some local companies built there own, some don't. the company that built my dads last one did there own doors and a few of the other hangars at the airport had them, he went with a Schweiss hydro on that one and I think it was a much better door than the local built door. schweiss strap lift on his previous hangar and it was also a great door.

your right prices are sky high right now.
 
I also have a Wilson door, but their assets were acquired by Schweiss a few years ago.

Yes. We installed a used Wilson Bi-Fold but could not get any parts or support as they are effectively gone. So we did a Schweiss strap conversion. They provide a whole conversion kit for retrofitting Wilson and other brands. I have two more bi-fold doors, a set of Horton stack fold doors and a double-stack sliding door, used. Sitting in organized piles. I bought 4 hangars and 5 doors from the West Texas Airport when they closed it down. At that time (about 5 years ago) that was bad economics as most of the cost was in the slabs and the steel building portion was very reasonable. So the cost of dismantling, organizing and re-assembly would come out a wash, leaving extra holes in sheathing and tolerance fit up issues (I go back and fill extra fastener holes with steel pop rivets with a power riveter). But now the cost and inflation has made it come around to having been worth it.

I like the look of the rustic patina on the old panels. The interiors and nice and new with LED lighting and all the amenities but they look like heck from outside. Keeps the revenuers at bay.
 
I have a Morton pole building and a no-name steel building. something to think about is if you are going to do any welding in it the all steel will not catch fire as easy or maybe not at all. I built the steel one in1995, at that time steel was cheaper. In 2013 the wood pole building was much cheaper. Now with the price of wood what it is I do not know.
 
If I were building a hangar today I would do the following:

1. Slab with in-floor heat.
2. Walls would be constructed from SIPS panels.
3. Conventional wooden truss structure 4' on center with steel roof.
4. Steel siding.

I built our home with SIPS panels. 20 years later still very happy that I did.
 
If I were building a hangar today I would do the following:

1. Slab with in-floor heat.
2. Walls would be constructed from SIPS panels.
3. Conventional wooden truss structure 4' on center with steel roof.
4. Steel siding.

I built our home with SIPS panels. 20 years later still very happy that I did.

What brand of sips panels? What insulation is in the panels? Where did they come from? Did you have trouble finding a contractor to put it together?
 
What brand of sips panels? What insulation is in the panels? Where did they come from? Did you have trouble finding a contractor to put it together?

FischerSIPS
Styrofoam

I was the contractor. SIPS construction is very simple.
 
Recently finished steel hangar

I recently finished putting up my 50x50 hangar, with standing seam roof and slab heat. With the help of friends did everything but the roof and stucco.

Rhino Steel Building Systems were great to work with and surprisingly gave me the lowest bid, even lower than R-panel roof of competitors. Nicest hangar on my airpark as they include a lot more finish trim than others and the floor angles come galvanized. Very happy with it.

Good luck.
 
I recently finished putting up my 50x50 hangar, with standing seam roof and slab heat. With the help of friends did everything but the roof and stucco.

Rhino Steel Building Systems were great to work with and surprisingly gave me the lowest bid, even lower than R-panel roof of competitors. Nicest hangar on my airpark as they include a lot more finish trim than others and the floor angles come galvanized. Very happy with it.

Good luck.

Is the Rhino Steel hangar a second hangar for you?

Did you ever build your ICF/SIP hangar from your 2006 post.

Just curious about the process/experience/hindsight, etc.
 
Is the Rhino Steel hangar a second hangar for you?

Did you ever build your ICF/SIP hangar from your 2006 post.

Just curious about the process/experience/hindsight, etc.

Nope, my only hangar. I would still prefer ICF, but I had 2 issues that made it impossible. First was I had trouble finding someone to put a roof on it. Nobody local would do it. If you go ICF I would talk to whirlwind steel and see if they would design and kit a bolt up roof. I did not try due to issue number 2. I did not anticipate how expensive the pad would cost just to build a hangar. Turns out that took up 1/3rd of my budget with 8 ft corner wall and 300yds of fill. Icf was $10k more than steel with no roof, so I had to go with steel.
 
I too have built with SIPs. They are very easy and quick to go up. What I did was coordinated with the local metal building supplier to design just the exterior wall columns and trusses / pearlins. So basically a metal building without sheeting. I ordered the SIP panels with pre-cut openings for windows and doors. Then I installed the SIP exterior to the steel structure using very long self-tapping screws. The walls and roof were all 6" foam sandwiched between OSB. The attached photos show an elapsed time of about 3 days including initial steel erection. All steel structural items shown were ordered in hot dipped galvanized finish because this was a pool house. It was finished out with green color sheet rocked interior walls, R-Panel roofing and stucco exterior finish. If it looks like the SIPs are one-sided that is because we pre-painted the OSB ceiling sheets with elastomeric white paint but they truly are a full sandwich. And some were painted white on the wrong side (half the roof). The SIPs provide so much shear strength to the steel that I removed the diagonal bracing cables from the steel after the panels were installed. This would be an excellent way to make a hangar.
 

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