Has anyone built a small (2-3 rack) datacenter? I'm thinking about it.

Using a throwaway because my normal username includes info that when combined with what I'm going to say here might make my normal account too easy to doxx.

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I've been in the networking world for 15+ years. I have three friends who together have done server (admin) support for 10+ years, server (hardware) support for 10+ years, programming for 10+ years (and is also now AWS certified). My next door neighbor is a certified electrician working for the city. We could practically run our own full service datacenter. Even though there are cloud storage monsters dominating the network there are still lots of smaller companies that don't trust the cloud and want to own their own offsite storage, or offsite routers/servers for backup links and disaster recovery, etc.

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I tossed out the idea over beers one night and we all started brainstorming. One (huge) problem would be getting a loan to renovate (or build) a building. Part of that problem would also be the need to have (relatively) a lot of rack space rented on day one to start paying back the loan. So we started scaling back the plans. Maybe we could build a smaller proof-of-concept data center, and if that works then leverage that into a larger one.

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I own a home in a hurricane-prone location. I plan to purchase a generator to help in case of a hurricane. The house came with a cement pad I plan to place the generator on. I have the space to build a "storage shed" large enough to house three 19" 42U racks. What if I built that, had the generator installed, and got redundant internet circuits?

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I quickly realized 3 racks full of servers would require so much power and HVAC it would take up the space of the 3rd rack. (Economy of scale helps larger datacenters, we wouldn't have that at the start.) I'd probably have to install a security system. I'd have to to place the "storage shed" near the street to allow access outside normal business hours. I may have to deal with zoning issues. I'd probably have to run all power and data cables above the racks.

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I thought I'd post here. Is anyone else doing this? Any lessons learned? Any information I haven't thought of, etc?