[Closed] Mouldy garage mdf shelving.

Seal the Mdf or whatever you replace it with with paint or varnish

Fitted shelves in a customers garage a few years ago on returning a year latter they had gone greenish mould and twisted quite badly like bananas,sealing them may help, or use timber planks

If the MDF is mouldy now it always will be. Plywood should be fine but as above seal with varnish or something. You might be better off with MFC if you can't be arsed painting.

How big are the shelves? If they're small then palletwood makes a solid shelf that'll last forever. If they're big then solid wood gets expensive so painted ply, or marine ply, or even simple furniture board like contiboard is good if you have that spare.

What's causing the damp

If it's not moisture resistant MDF it will probably have soaked up water like sponge.

Replace with moisture resistant MDF or ply sealed with something. If it's really damp, even ply will delaminate at the edges eventually.

I had made some shelves in S/steel to replace the decades old wooden ones in a butchers i used to work for.

They were in the chill and wood just wasnt what you're really supposed to have in there and after a couple of years of trying to clean the damn things I found a metal working company and had them all replaced in metal.

Admittedly this was 20 years ago but at the time it cost 90 quid for 3 at about 10" deep by 4' long, and were made in a folded box section to remain rigid.

These are the shelving sets you can get off ebay fairly cheap.

Shelves are 90 x 40 cm. 5 on a rack and 3 racks so 15 new shelves needed. Was thinking of some cheap plastic panelling from Wickes or something similar.

MDF goes mouldy very quickly. Varnished Ply will last forever.

I'd go to B&Q and get some 18mm ply cut to size.

30 years ago we bought a job lot of Dexion shelving for £1, we had to dismantle it all and borrow a big van to take it all away. Enough to do our garage, shed, loft, my dad's big workshop and more recently my daughters shed
The shelves are galvanised metal full of holes. Still looks as good as when we got it.
I wouldn't want to use wood after using this

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These are the shelving sets you can get off ebay fairly cheap.

Shelves are 90 x 40 cm. 5 on a rack and 3 racks so 15 new shelves needed. Was thinking of some cheap plastic panelling from Wickes or something similar.

The mould is just a bit of mould. unless the the shelves physically don't work anymore  - unless they're disintegrating  - just paint the MDF, or varnish it, or oil it. They'll be fine.

My mdf cheap shelves in my shed are mouldy. They still support the rubbish I've put on top of them. I've just put more stuff on top so I can't see the mould. It's a shed, it's not damp or leaking, it's just cheap mdf.

Depending how mouldy, I'd just consider cleaning the surfaces of the shelves as best as possible then varnishing or painting to seal them.

It would be worth finding out the source of the mould/moisture though.
I've got quite a bit of mdf in the garage & none of it has gone mouldy. Some of it's been in there for years, so I imagine your garage must be quite damp?

OSB

I had exactly this, huge blooms of mould and spores coming out of the hardboard (effecively cardboard) shelves that came with my generic shelving unit. Must have been in the board itself, it was staggering.

OSB (orientated Strand Board), AKA sterling board is designed to be wet.
Its whole point is it can be soaked and dried out several times, and therefore can be used for flat roofing jobs that are going to take a few days to complete and might get rained on, or as concrete shuttering.

Ply, while it has less tolerance than OSB and will delaminate if it gets too wet, will probably be fine for your purpose.

OSB is dirt cheap though.

Also, fix your damp. Where is it getting in?

My single skin shed was horrifically damp when it was built. I used two products on different sections both of which have been excellent

For red brick we wanted to keep red brick:
Thompsons can be applied with a garden sprayer, and is basically nikwax for brick. Its almost invisible (a slight satin sheen when dry) but water beads off it. Very quick to apply, though i anticipate having to redo it every couple of years. I have been told that different versions of this use different fomulas, so if you choose one you have to commit to it, as they repel each other.

For Concrete block walls:
Sandtex masonry paint, which is exactly what it looks like.
Dont do what i did and mess about with a roller thinking it would be quicker, you need a thick masonry brush and plaster it on like double cream. Takes a few days to dry but ends up effectively a coat of plastic. Very long lasting.

Cheers all,

The garage is the end garage in a row of about 8. The shelves are against the single brick outside wall which looks ok to be honest but there is signs of damp at one bottom corner. The guttering for the whole row is crap and sends all the water down my side.

When I replace the shelving in a direr weekend I might move it to the other side of the garage which will hopefully help a bit.