Heat and humidity are two of the biggest issues when building an outdoor building for your basketball court. If your building is too cold, it won’t be usable, and if it’s too humid, things inside the building can rust and have other issues associated with too much water. I ran into both of these issues when I built my shed, so I wanted to make sure that I detailed my solutions for others who might have the same issues.
Heating
It can get really cold in the winter in a lot of places. First thing you’re going to need is some heat. But before you have heat, you probably need to have your building insulated, that will make a bigger difference than anything else. Before my building was insulated, it would get to a point where it couldn’t get any warmer no matter how long I kept the heaters on. After that though, I could heat up the building pretty well in about an hour with 13,500 watts of heat.
The main two heaters I used are 5,000 watt electric heaters from Cadet. I put one on each side of the main hoop and blew the air into the center of the court. It works really well during the winter. I have a video of it below:
I bought them from Amazon. I included an Amazon affiliate link below to them:
I’ve had them in place for over 2 years without a single issue. I run them at full power.
Humidity Issues
If you live in a humid climate like Florida or the midwest, humidity can be a real problem inside sheds. The problem is that the humidity gets ‘trapped’ inside, causing it to rust or corrode all metal inside the shed. How your shed is built can also have an effect. When mine was built, they forgot to put in a vapor barrier under the concrete, so I would get condensation sometimes on the concrete (not great). They also forgot to open up the attic ventilation as well, leading to a lack of air movement inside.
To combat these issues, I bought a dehumidifier to see if would really help the issue. It instantly made a huge difference. Previously, it felt like a sauna inside the shed with all the heat and humidity during the summer. With the dehumidifier going, it was still warm but not the humid type heat that really stinks.
I run it later in the spring and summer when the rain starts to fall and the humidity rises. I typically don’t run it all during the winter, and the fall is usually dry enough that I don’t have to use it either.
I made a video showing how I use it below:
I believe I bought it Home Depot, but it’s also available through my Amazon affiliate link below:
Make sure you get the pump, otherwise you’ll constantly be dumping water out of it (not fun). There are two models that look almost identical, one with the pump and hose, the other without, so make sure you get the one appropriate for you.
