Garage / workshop project

[TimJFowler]

Originally Posted by gasstingy

Thanks for the good advise. I wish I'd known that before I added 40 bales of Lowes blown in stuff in 2008. I won't use it in the barn if I can remember long enough. {This is me making myself a note for future reference} I read your write-up on the EcoNewMexico site.

Just make sure to read the label/info for the insulation. The big-box hardware stores source their cellulose insulation from different manufacturers in different regions. The stuff you bought could be borate-only or have sulfates depending on where you live.

Originally Posted by gasstingy

Then I noticed that today it is 94% relative humidity there. Wow, that sounds like the Southeastern US. I didn't think the Southwestern US had that kind of relative humidity.

It must have just finished raining. The humidity right now (3pm) is 13%.

[gasstingy]

This weekend was more dedicated to housekeeping and such than anything silly like installing doors, siding or trim. We worked on cleaning up the garage and making room for the siding to be stacked after we painted it. Pictures are of me building the rack with my daughter’s (Jennifer) help. We wanted to be able to paint enough siding at one time to do a complete wall before we start hanging a wall. I spent almost a minute dreaming up the rack design and so here’s the idea behind it. I took a 2”x4”x8’ that I had laying around for the upright and cut up scrap OSB for the “shelves.” I had 1’x4’ and 2’x4’ pieces left over from siding and roofing. I cut the 2’x4’ pieces into a pair of 1’x4’ pieces until I wound up with 9 of them. I set my table saw fence to cut 3 ½” wide 12” long pieces. Then (picture 1) I spaced them at 3 ½” intervals and nailed them on with 3 nails each. I used a paint paddle to mark the ~ 1” I wanted to space the shelves out from the back, so I wound up with a bit over 9” poking out. I had a 1’x4’ piece of OSB that I didn’t cut up to use as a spacer from the wall (at the bottom) and stood the racks up (picture 2), flushed up the top of the 2”x4” with the inside edge of the wall stud and put one nail in the top to hold it in place. I used five for the front rack (built it first) and four for the back rack. (Five seemed like overkill.) We took the 12 pieces of already painted siding and loaded up the front rack (picture 3). We finished cleaning up the floor, passed all the full sheets of plywood & OSB up to the upper room and swept up. Then I parked our 16’ utility trailer inside as far back as we could make it fit. We’ll be able to lay 5 strips flat on the load floor, and with a little support, should get at least a dozen across the trailer rails.

We also picked up some Hardie soffit in vented (x6) and unvented (x14) to do our overhangs early Saturday morning. We got some white paint and primer as well. We’re going to put aluminum screen material on to help keep bugs out of the vented panels and when painted, hang the soffits before the siding. Oh yes, my new Solosiders came in the mail Friday. They appear well made and I’m looking forward to trying them out hanging siding.

Today is the 4th Monday of the month, and that puts me going to the AEC Board of Directors monthly meeting. I “have” to go and ask them again to join the TVA Generation Partners Program, so I can turn my solar array back on. I wrote a letter to the editor of our local paper last week to encourage everyone to choose wisely our 3 board members who are up for election / reelection. Our AEC Annual Meeting is this coming Saturday. I really don’t visualize much work getting done this week other than some painting. Saturday after the meeting should give some free time. I hope to hang soffit boards then.


mrd, I'd focused on the Solosider's and not given enough attention to the rest of your post. Sorry. As for air leakage, I'm going to be caulking all of the joints between sheet goods and trying to get all of the missed nails as well. At some point, I'll be having spray foam insulation downstairs and I'm still arguing back and forth in my mind on what to do upstairs. (Kind of like the old series "Inside Hermans Head.") As for the 2" insulation, yessir, you can look right at it. I find that unsettling, and have been trying to devise a solution to cover it that I can live with. I'm not there yet. The best I've come up with so far is to get some Quikrete that is a latex based patch and put a coat over the insulation. There's so many down sides to that plan, I'm not even going to start listing them. I'll try to make time to get a picture or two of that problem so someone smarter than me can offer up ideas. I greatly appreciate suggestions, even when I can't use them immediately. I certainly do NOT have the market cornered on ideas. That's another reason I'm here.

[gasstingy]

Last night I took a couple of pictures to share. First off, I started with a couple of the 2" extruded polyurethane. This was designed to completely isolate the slab from the outside perimeter of the foundation, and it does. What it doesn't provide is peace of mind that it won't be damaged and cause real problems down the road. The edge of it is exposed to the hazards of everyday use. So, if any of you have an idea on how to protect it from harm, I'm all for fresh ideas. I'm also ready to entertain suggestions on how to insulate the concrete block foundation walls. The only plan I have is to use some kind of adhesive to glue 3/4" thick pieces of extruded polyurethane to the inside walls and possibly use a plastic type covering to protect it. So there are my two problem areas that I am soliciting help for.

The last picture is of the vented Hardie Soffit material wearing its first coat of paint. I don't like their recommendation to use smooth shank nails to hang soffit material, so I'm considering predrilling it before I hand nail it in place with ring shank nails. Have any of you used smooth shank nails to hang a soffit before? Does it come loose over time? They do recommend using an air nailer to install this and the siding, but not one that uses clipped head nails. My DeWalt framing nailer uses clipped head nails. Ain't that a hoot! I have a scrap of Hardieplank that I plan to try out nailing before I go to the real installation. I have to know what to expect before I get started. I have some smooth shank nails that I'm going to try on it. If they don't break the piece I have to test it on, I'll buy some smooth shank galvanized nails like they recommend and press on.

[mrd]

You could insulate the inside of the block wall. Either a short insulated framed wall in front of it, or more rigid foam. I'd guess the block wall wicks water from the ground, in which case I'd glue up 2" of rigid foam to the inside. Then glue drywall over that. That would also take away the least amount of floor space while insulating, and no thermal bridges.

You could cap off that short wall with a sill of sorts running around the inside. You could use it as a small shelf. The glued foam/drywall wouldn't support the sill, so you'd need to run short blocking, nailed to the studs just above the sill plate, cantilevered 2.5" or so outward. Then you could nail a sill trim piece over the cantilevered horizontal plane, and run the drywall up along the vertical end-grain of the blocking, possibly with a small piece of trim at the intersection of the drywall and a slight overhang of the sill. That would look nice.. hopefully that description isn't too hard to decipher!

A short framed wall would support a sill on its own.. though you'd still want to anchor that wall somehow, not sure if the ends of the studs would provide enough surface area for gluing to be sufficient. Plus that wood & insulation is in contact with the wicking block wall, so you'd want PT wood and probably mineral wool or rigid foam would be the only insulation I'd put in those damp cavities. Maybe you could attach a vapor barrier between the block wall and the short framed wall, though if it leaks you could have problems..

Just throwing ideas at you You probably want to insulate that block wall though, it is a good heat conductor.

[gasstingy]

mrd,

I like the idea of the short framed wall cantilevered out from the top of the block foundation wall. The foam board insulation is the only way to insulate that makes sense to me, too. I'm not going to put sheetrock there though because it defeats the purpose I originally intended for the 2' block foundation wall, which is to be able to hose the floor down when I clean up my mess. I'll have to try a different finish material.

I tried using my framing nailer on a scrap of HardiePlank and had no trouble at all with it. As a matter of fact, I tried it using smooth shank and ring shank nails. Some I drove correctly, some I drove extra deep just to try and break the sample piece. No problems. I'm going to have to buy some galvanized smooth shank nails and start hanging siding soon.

I could not escape the dreaded lawnmower on Saturday after the AEC Annual Meeting, so not much was done this weekend. OTOH, AEC finally ageed to join the TVA Generation Partners Program and announced at the meeting that they would "soon be taking renewable energy, at least solar." That was a hallelujah moment there! I felt so good about that announcement that I called the guy who designed my system and asked him to alter the original plan to include two more modules/inverters and lets get them on order. Going to go from 700w to 1050, filling my rack up.

I've cut up some aluminum screen and wanted to start gluing it to the back of the HardieSoffit material, but the weather was lousy Sunday.

[Daox]

Originally Posted by gasstingy

OTOH, AEC finally ageed to join the TVA Generation Partners Program and announced at the meeting that they would "soon be taking renewable energy, at least solar."

Woohoo! Congrats, thats a big win!

[gasstingy]

I know it doesn't look like much progress has been made recently, but that's only because not much progress has been made. I'm still enjoying working on the barn {my wife and I agreed to refer to it as the barn to reduce confusion with the garage attached to the house}, but the detail work is less evident to take a snapshot of.

I've been plugging away at painting soffit and siding planks and installing screen on the back of the vented soffits. I feel it will be worth the effort to install screen material, since I don't want to think about trying to get the flying critters out of the under-roof areas. I'm using scrap lumber to hold the screen in place while I apply liquid nails to hold it. That second picture has three pieces showing, one without liquid nails, one with liquid nails completed and one with the screen material cut and just layed in place. When it's installed on the barn {hopefully this long weekend}, the trusses will add a clamping force to the screen material.

I counted the painted siding planks and there are 32 of them with 2 coats of paint on them and I expect to have 5 more done this evening, ready for the weekend. That should be enough for the rear wall. I'm looking forward to trying out my new Solosider's, but I plan on learning how to hang siding on the back of the barn.

On a side note, Daryl {my solar guru} told me the wiring diagram was updated on my solar array and by the tracking number, my two new 175w Sharp panels should be delivered today, and the Enphase inverters should be delivered on Tuesday! As I used to tell my wife, "A Mark is a busy person!"

To all of you, I hope you have a great weekend! Try and be safe this Labor Day weekend.

[Daox]

Good update. It seems like stuff gets done slowly, but theres tons of work that goes into this stuff. Great to see it moving forward, even if its not at break neck speed.

[gasstingy]

The work on the barn went on all day Saturday and Monday. On Saturday, I got all of the vented soffit boards installed. You have to predrill and then hand nail the nails at each end of the soffit boards. The nail gun breaks out the soffit boards when you get to close to the ends, or edges. {I made a support to help hold the soffit boards up, a 2x4 with a 6" x 2' piece of 5/8" OSB.} My wife came out and looked at the finished result and she didn't like the install 100%. She pointed out that when the barn was framed, the trusses at the back were spaced to leave a gap for the planned stairway. The actual gap is 46 1/2". She felt there needed to be another 2x8 put in the overhang to support the soffit boards. This would be where it should be had it stayed at 24" on center. Of course, I disagreed and then I figured out how to install a 2x8 there anyway. After I got that board installed, I found the HardieSoffit was drooping about 1/2" in midspan. So, it appears she was right (again) and I feel better about adding those supports.

We took Sunday off, sort of, but after church, went to Home Depot and bought some HardieTrim for the corners of the building.

Monday, Ricky was available, so we measured and cut to length the HardieTrim, followed by putting two coats of paint on it. We spent some time with the cut off excess Hardie trim, trying to figure out how to premake the corners. We couldn't use regular ring shank nails. They would go in and turn, and then break out the backside every time. I wound up using my brad nailer with 18 guage 1 1/4" wire nails (brads). This worked right every time. I was surprised that those brads were galvanized, but that is what I needed. Then, I ripped a piece of siding into 1 1/8" strips to go around the bottom of the barn. This is to make the bottom piece of siding tilt out like all of the subsequent rows will on the way up. BTW, the guy at Lowes said HardiePlank should be cut with a fine tooth blade, like one for paneling, OSB and veneer. He was absolutely wrong. That was a mess, and I reverted back to a regular carbide tipped combination blade. All went smoothly after that. Well, except for that cloud of concrete dust. I didn't get a single piece of siding up on the entire three day weekend.

We tried to fix our two door openings so we could install the two walk in doors. The plan we were using was to use concrete nails to nail support boards onto the face of the foundation blocks to support the front of the threshold. That only proved to break out the blocks where both of the nails were being driven. The newest plan is far less destructive. I am going to surface the opening with fresh concrete patch and after it cures, wedge a piece of pressure treated 2x8 across the bottom of the opening on a bed of silicone caulk, nail it to the boards that support the header and call it good. We'll try to get something more done every chance we get.

[gasstingy]

I have done some this week to the barn, namely trying to get more accomplished on the overhangs. As the overhangs/soffits are 20 1/4" wide, it takes two rows of 12" wide material (cutting the non-vented soffit narrower) to close in the soffit. All of the vented soffit material has been up for over a week, but my help disappeared for the time being. I think that is going to change this evening, at least for a little while. I have two of three pieces of narrower (cut to 8 1/4") soffit installed on the south overhang and with help, I hope to install the third and (praying a bit here) maybe get some of the siding on the fascia.

My fascia is about 13" tall, so we are going to put siding on it instead of wrapping it with aluminum. It's already painted white and ready to hang. I've measured and cut the soffit boards for the rear overhang and hope to get them painted and put up this weekend. I also dearly want to get the three narrow soffit boards for the north overhang cut / painted / installed. So much to do, but very hard to do solo.

Speaking of solo, I have yet to try out the SoloSiders by hanging siding. Grrrrr. There's only so many hours in a day and it is getting dark earlier and earlier. These excuses seem particularly lame to me too.

OTOH, I've also been working on my solar array, too. I'm trying to have it ready before the next monthly AEC Board of Directors meeting. The solar panels were delivered on the 3rd and the inverters showed up on the 8th. With Ricky's help, we hung the panels on Labor Day, and last Saturday (9/11), between rain showers, I wired the inverters up. Turned the system on and they didn't show up at all. Monday, e-mail Daryl, explain problem, he replies "Maybe we'll have to see about getting the monitoring unit to search for the inverters." (In my best Homer Simpson voice) "DOH," we went and pushed the scan button and in a little while, it identified the other inverters and read 829 watts. It was partly cloudy so that seemed about right. We turned the system back off, awaitiing approval.