Building Types
50x120 Helicopter Hangar
- Width
- 50 ft
- Length
- 120 ft
- Floor area
- 6,000 sq ft
- Perimeter
- 340 ft
Use
How a 50×120 Helicopter Hangar May Be Used
Door span
The clear door opening, not the footprint, is usually the governing dimension.
Tail height
Required clearance is set by the aircraft, and it drives eave and door height.
Maintenance area
Working space around the aircraft is planned separately from the parking envelope.
Apron access
Approach and taxi access affect where the opening is placed.
Example
Example Configuration
Quick dimensions
At a Glance
Width
50 ft across the gable end.
Length
120 ft along the sidewall.
Floor area
6,000 sq ft of clear floor.
Eave height
14 ft at the sidewall on the stored profile.
Configuration
How This Building Is Configured
Configuration summary
| Building type | Helicopter Hangar |
|---|---|
| Footprint | 50 ft × 120 ft |
| Floor area | 6,000 sq ft |
| Eave height | 14 ft |
Planning
Footprint & Space Planning
Footprint
Width and length are chosen together: width is usually fixed by what has to fit side by side, length by how many bays are needed.
Height
Eave height is commonly the governing dimension here, because clearance for the tallest item sets the door and the wall.
Access
Where vehicles and people enter changes the whole interior layout, so access is settled before anything else.
Doors and openings
Opening width, height and position are specified with the supplier; they affect the frame and the wall bracing.
Site
Slope, drainage, access for delivery and erection, and the foundation are confirmed for the actual property.
Expansion
Extending along the length is usually simpler than changing the width later, which is worth deciding up front.
Access
Doors & Access Considerations
Opening width
Across a 50 ft gable end, the practical opening width is limited by the frame and confirmed with the supplier.
Opening height
A 14 ft eave sets the ceiling on door height before any frame change.
Drive-through
Matching openings at both ends avoid reversing, at the cost of usable wall.
Similar sizes
Other Sizes for a Helicopter Hangar
50′ × 100′
5,000 sq ft
50′ × 140′
7,000 sq ft
40′ × 120′
4,800 sq ft
Related
Related Building Types
Aircraft Hangar
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Clear Span Building
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Commercial Building
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Industrial Building
Explore
Example configuration — for planning purposes only.
FAQ
Common Questions
50 ft × 120 ft is 6,000 square feet of floor area before any interior partitions.
Length is usually adjusted in bay increments, and width is a larger design change. Both are confirmed with the supplier for the final design.
Site preparation, foundation and erection are commonly quoted separately from the building package. Confirm the scope of any quote you receive.
Compare nearby sizes
Related footprints for this building type
Each page works through one footprint for one building type.
Overview
A 50x120 helicopter hangar planned as a hangar planned for extended maintenance rather than overnight storage
This page is ordered around movement between the apron and the parked position, because on this footprint operating time is governed by what has to be moved first.
The footprint holds 15 maintenance zones — 3 across by 5 deep — and the remaining 6 feet is marginal: there is nowhere separate for removed components, so parts occupy the aircraft perimeter and the perimeter stops being a working band.
Efficiency is the useful number here: 400 square feet of enclosed floor per maintenance zone, against a 320-square-foot module. That leaves working slack around each position. The count of working positions, not the headline area, is the figure that survives contact with the operation.
A 50 by 120 footprint is a long corridor of a plan: 6,000 sq ft enclosed by 340 ft of wall, at a 2.4:1 length-to-width proportion. Along its 120 ft dimension it takes 6 runs of maintenance zones at 20 ft, leaving 0 ft over — the 0 ft is where the argument about this size actually happens. Taken purely as arithmetic, 50 by 120 gives 2 maintenance zones across the 50 ft dimension once 14 ft is reserved for movement, and 6 deep along the 120 ft dimension. Run as a a hangar planned for extended maintenance rather than overnight storage, 4 ft across is below the 12 ft this use needs to be worth planning, so there is nowhere separate for removed components, so parts occupy the aircraft perimeter and the perimeter stops being a working band Doors are opened and closed far more often than a hangar plan assumes, so the ease of that operation matters as much as the clear width.
At 50x120 the operating question is a specific one: when an aircraft is in the building for weeks rather than overnight, what does the plan need that a storage hangar does not? That is a different question from the one a helicopter hangar of another shape has to answer, and it is why this footprint is planned as a hangar planned for extended maintenance rather than overnight storage rather than as generic covered area.
Areas, perimeter, roof area, ridge height, slab volume and the maintenance zone counts on this page are computed from the stored 50x120 record and this platform's planning module for the helicopter hangar category.
Openings
Openings for 3 maintenance zones across
Openings are the pinch point here. With 2 feet of spare width the gable cannot host 3 separate doors, so access is either shared or moved to the 120-foot sidewall. The mezzanine that is added afterwards is the change order that reprices the frame.
The 50 ft ends and the 120 ft sides offer very different opening budgets: 50 ft of end wall has room for one wide opening or two modest ones, while 120 ft of side wall can carry several without the openings competing. On this plan the deciding factor is whether extended maintenance planning or component and parts area should be the first thing reached from the door.
Framed-opening sizes, headers and the structure around them are engineered for the specific building. Confirm every opening with the door supplier and the building manufacturer before ordering.
Configurations
Configuring 15 maintenance zones at 50x120
Nominal bay division computes to 5 bays at about 24 feet, wider than the 16-foot module — so a position can sit inside a bay without a frame line splitting it. Where the building sits on the site changes how much of this floor is genuinely reachable.
With 5 rows deep, the rear row is behind the front one. Without a route past it, those maintenance zones become storage positions rather than working ones — the real cost of depth at this width. Snow, wind and site exposure change what this shape costs to build long before the interior plan does.
Extension is cheapest along the 120 ft dimension, where each added bay repeats work already framed; widening past 50 ft is a different frame rather than a longer one. Growing to 50 by 140 adds a 7th run of maintenance zones — useful if the constraint is maintenance zones rather than the 0 ft already spare at the far end.
Configured as a hangar planned for extended maintenance rather than overnight storage, 50x120 is judged on whether the 15 maintenance zones it holds match the operation, and on whether the 2 feet of spare width leaves the route this mode depends on.
- Does the work need three lanes and a working lane, or two lanes with an interior work hall between them, or does it need a second lane that this 50-foot span cannot give?
- Is the 120-foot length being bought for depth, or for the repeated bays — a long repeating bay sequence, so segment boundaries are set by bay lines rather than by walls?
- Are blades folded or spread when the aircraft passes the door?
- Does the handling path from the pad keep rotor clearance the whole way?
Bay division shown here is a planning module computed from the stored length. Actual bay spacing is set by the manufacturer's frame design for the building.
Usable area
How the 6,000 square feet divides at 50x120
Computed maintenance zone fit for a 50x120 helicopter hangar
| Measure | Computed at this footprint |
|---|---|
| Maintenance zones across the 50-foot width | 3 at a 16-foot module |
| Leftover width | 2 ft (240 sq ft as a full-length strip) |
| Rows along the 120-foot length | 5 at a 20-foot module after 14 ft of circulation |
| Leftover depth | 6 ft (300 sq ft across the width) |
| Total maintenance zones | 15 |
| Share of floor committed | 80% |
Module footprint used here is 16 by 20 feet, this platform's planning module for a helicopter hangar. It is not a code minimum or an engineered clearance.
Example allocation of the 120-foot length — planning model, not survey data
| Zone | Length along the building | Computed area |
|---|---|---|
| Aircraft parking area | 84 ft | 4,200 sq ft |
| Maintenance and equipment space | 24 ft | 1,200 sq ft |
| Office, parts and utility | 12 ft | 600 sq ft |
Shares applied to the stored 120-foot length; areas computed against the 50-foot width.
Module footprints and allocation shares come from this platform's use typology and are published as example planning models. They are not recommendations and do not describe a majority of projects.
Allocation
Dividing the floor for a hangar planned for extended maintenance rather than overnight storage
The hangar pattern this footprint could equally be operated as is a wide operational hangar planned around movement in and out: there is no staging depth, so anything positioned near the door blocks whatever is behind it and the building operates one movement at a time. The floor divides between an aircraft zone that is deliberately over-provisioned and a support zone that is walled or clearly separated. The separation matters because the support zone stays organised only if it has a boundary.
The 6-foot leftover depth falls under the 12 feet this platform treats as usable for a helicopter hangar, so there is nowhere separate for removed components, so parts occupy the aircraft perimeter and the perimeter stops being a working band. Access, not area, is what makes a plan feel small once it is in use.
Width is fully committed at 50x120. With 2 feet spare, wall storage and passing room compete with the maintenance zones directly. Set the openings before the interior, because the openings cannot move and the interior can.
Compared with a 50 by 90 of the same width, the extra depth here adds run rather than reach: it buys about 6 maintenance zones in line, and every position past the second is retrieved by moving what stands in front of it. Spent as a square 77 by 77 instead, the same 6,000 sq ft would stand 3 maintenance zones across rather than 2, and would trade this plan's length for parallel access. That is the width-against-depth decision this footprint has already made. At this size the building becomes a shared resource, and shared resources need a written rule for who parks where and which door is kept clear. The longest internal travel on a 50 by 120 plan is about 130 ft corner to corner, and the shortest useful one is the 50 ft cross-run. For a a hangar planned for extended maintenance rather than overnight storage that matters where extended maintenance planning sits, because shortening the 50 ft run to serve it lengthens every trip along the 120 ft dimension. A hangar with no separate personnel entrance routes everyone across the aircraft floor, which is a habit the building teaches on day one. That movement pattern, not the 6,000-square-foot total, is what decides whether the leftover 6 feet is useful here.
Height
Interior height for a 50x120 helicopter hangar
Span drives headroom at 50x120: 50 feet of width on a 3:12 pitch puts 20.3 feet over the middle and 14 feet at the walls, so where a tall item stands matters as much as how tall it is. Fire separation, egress and occupancy are determined for the specific building and can reshape this plan entirely.
Height serves overhead access and lifting. Any specific provision for lifting equipment, its clearances and its structural support is determined for the specific building by the design professional.
Clear height below purlins, bracing and lighting is lower than the eave height. The usable figure comes from the manufacturer's framing for the selected building.
Comparison
What changes at adjacent footprints
Computed comparison of nearby footprints for a helicopter hangar
| Footprint | Floor area | Maintenance zones |
|---|---|---|
| 30x80 | 2,400 sq ft | 3 (1 x 3) |
| 40x60 | 2,400 sq ft | 6 (2 x 3) |
| 50x50 | 2,500 sq ft | 1 (1 x 1) |
| 40x70 | 2,800 sq ft | 4 (2 x 2) |
| 30x100 | 3,000 sq ft | 4 (1 x 4) |
Areas computed from each stored size record; maintenance zone counts computed with the same 16 by 20 foot planning module.
- 30x80 moves the count from 15 to 3 maintenance zones (1 across by 3 deep), which is the reason to choose between them.
- 40x60 moves the count from 15 to 6 maintenance zones (2 across by 3 deep), which is the reason to choose between them.
- 50x50 moves the count from 15 to 1 maintenance zones (1 across by 1 deep), which is the reason to choose between them.
Nearby footprints read for a helicopter hangar: exact change in area and in planning maintenance zones
| Footprint | Area Δ | % Δ | Maintenance zones at that footprint | What changes for this use |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 80x80 | +400 sq ft | +6.7% | 24 (6 x 4) | +9 maintenance zones on the same planning module. |
| 50x100 | −1,000 sq ft | −16.7% | 12 (3 x 4) | −3 maintenance zones on the same planning module. |
| 60x120 | +1,200 sq ft | +20% | 8 (2 x 4) | −7 maintenance zones on the same planning module. |
| 40x120 | −1,200 sq ft | −20% | 10 (2 x 5) | −5 maintenance zones on the same planning module. |
Areas are arithmetic on two stored size records; maintenance zone counts use this platform's 16 by 20 foot planning module and are not a capacity statement.
Because this footprint is planned as a hangar planned for extended maintenance rather than overnight storage, the useful next reads are different from the ones a differently shaped helicopter hangar suggests: extended maintenance planning, component and parts area, hangar support zone.
Visualization
Reading the 50x120 footprint as a helicopter hangar
FAQ
Questions about 50x120 helicopter hangar projects
A 4-inch slab across 6,000 square feet computes to 74.1 cubic yards before thickened edges, piers or waste. The final design comes from the foundation engineer.
Reserving 14 ft across the 50 ft dimension for movement leaves 36 ft of working width, which takes 2 maintenance zones at 16 ft. Along 120 ft it takes 6 runs at 20 ft. That is 12 positions out of 6,000 sq ft, and the remainder is circulation, walls and the margin every plan needs. Whether that count is enough depends on when an aircraft is in the building for weeks rather than overnight, what does the plan need that a storage hangar does not. These are planning figures computed from the footprint, not a quoted layout.
4,760 square feet of wall and 6,185 square feet of roof at a 3:12 pitch — the roof exceeding the floor by 3%.
Enclosure keeps it organised and lets it be conditioned separately, at the cost of flexibility. Any separation, ventilation or fire provision for a specific arrangement is determined for the specific building.
The width leaves 2 feet spare after 3 maintenance zones. That margin absorbs wall storage and passing room. Width is the dimension that cannot be extended later.
Methodology
How this page was produced
Sources and methodology
Find Steel Buildings dimensional records
Find Steel Buildings · Primary platform dataset · Tier 1 — code authority, standards body, primary dataset or manufacturer engineering
Supports: Stored nominal width, length, eave height, roof pitch and slab thickness for this subject.
International Building Code and International Residential Code
International Code Council · Model code · Tier 1 — code authority, standards body, primary dataset or manufacturer engineering
Supports: The framework of adopted codes and local amendments that decides permitting, separation and opening requirements. Cited as the governing framework, never as a local requirement.
- Dimensional figures: Width, length, eave height, roof pitch and nominal slab thickness come from this platform's stored record for the subject. Floor area, perimeter, wall area, roof area, ridge height and slab volume are computed from those inputs rather than transcribed.
- Maintenance zone fit: Counts, leftover strips and per-module areas are computed from the stored 50x120 record against this platform's 16 by 20 foot planning module for the helicopter hangar category, with 14 feet allowed for circulation. The module is editorial planning typology, not a code minimum or an engineered clearance.
- Allocation model: Zone shares come from this platform's use typology for aircraft storage and maintenance and are applied arithmetically to the stored 120-foot length.
- Allocation and layout models: Layout splits are arithmetic on the stored footprint, published as example allocation models. They are not survey findings and do not describe what buyers most often choose.
- Clearance and opening guidance: Clearance and opening statements are planning guidance. Final dimensions depend on the selected door system, header detail and the manufacturer's engineering for the building.
Methodology notes
- Prices: No price figure appears on this page. Cost data is published on this platform only with a documented inclusion basis, a collection date and a named source.
Cost drivers
Quantities that move the estimate at 50x120
Quantities, not prices, are publishable here: roof cladding runs 6,185 square feet — 3% above the 6,000-square-foot floor at a 3:12 pitch — with 74.1 cubic yards of nominal slab beneath it. Storage expands until it meets a wall, so give it a wall on purpose.
The support side carries the cost difference: bench work, parts storage, lighting quality across the whole floor, and conditioning if work continues year round. The shell difference against a storage hangar of the same size is comparatively small.
- the clear opening width for the rotor arrangement
- the door system chosen and the end frame it requires
- height above the rotor head
- the pad and ground handling path outside
Drawn to scale
Plans and dimensions
Every drawing below is generated from the exact dimensions for this building, so proportions and areas are accurate.
Compare 50x120 helicopter hangar configurations
Review the allocation models for this footprint side by side, then estimate the configuration you intend to build.