Garage / workshop project

[gasstingy]

My garage build has officially restarted. I thought I'd keep a thread on the project to share what I am doing, and to help me stay motivated. (All long projects get old at some point.)

Here's the history. The foundation was started in the fall of 2008. The footprint is 24' by 36' and I have it situated with passive solar in mind. It will have a gambrel roof, and the area upstairs will be a 16' x 36' room. The plan calls for a 1/2 bath down and a 3/4 bath up (both to be completed later), 5 solar tube skylights to light the upstairs: bathroom (1 10") and open area (4 13").

The foundation is concrete blocks, backfilled and tamped, a layer of pea gravel to level it out, vapor barrier, 3/4" extruded polystyrene, rebar on a 2 foot grid, 3 Loops of 3/4" PEX tubing in the slab, connected to a Radiantec hydronic radiant floor manifold, buried in 4" of concrete with flyash. There is also 2" extruded polystyrene around the inside perimeter of the concrete blocks for a thermal break.

The delay in the continuation of the project was purely money. We couldn't scrape up enough to get it weathered in, so we didn't want to start "hanging lumber." That said, Saturday (4/10) I went to the lumberyard and bought 10 2x8x12, 30 2x6x12, 6 2x10x12, 100 2x6x8, 12 sheets of 7/16 OSB and 2 sheets of 1/2" thick 4x9 extrudued polystyrene.

My regular job is desk work so the process of rearranging my attached garage so all this would go inside for the build, plus unloading the trailer had me exhausted. It's great to be started, again! If any of you have suggestions or ideas you'd like to share, I'm happy to have them.

[Daox]

Sounds very nice! Thats a bit larger than my garage. And, thats exactly how I'd like to heat it too! Warm floors are sooooo nice, I'm quite jealous.

Had you not ordered the materials yet, I would have suggested doing a mooney wall setup instead of a conventional 2x6 construction. It probably would have saved you a few bucks plus been better insulated. This is most likely what I'll be doing.

What are you planning on using for roofing material?

[gasstingy]

I looked up the Mooney wall and it has some real merit. My plan calls for 5 windows 3' x 5' on the south facing wall for the passive solar benefit. On the outside of the OSB sheathing, will be 1/2" blueboard (extruded polystyrene) under the Hardiplank siding. On the inside, I am planning to have the walls and underside of the roof sprayed with foam insulation. My wife and I used it on our home and really like it.

Our plan, unless the money runs out, is to have a standing seam metal roof installed. I want to be able to hang solar panels on it without going to the effort to build a racking system. My real concern is, will the roof support the load of the solar panels? The outer roof pitch is 18.73/12 and the inner pitch is 3/12.

Last night I built my first door header, for the garage door opening. Triple 2x10x12, each separated by 1/2" extruded polystyrene for a thermal break as well as a spacer. Turns out that makes the beam 1/4" too thick, but I can compensate for the extra thickness when I finish the inside wall.

I came back and added this header picture, but it was before I dropped it and had to repair it. See notes in post #8, where I rebuilt the damage but left out one layer of extruded polystyrene.

[Daox]

Good idea with the foam.

Oh yes, I request many pictures!

[gasstingy]

I'll try to get to the pictures soon. I have a couple of the slab pour and of the garage door header.

It's been tough to make time working on anything, as close as it is to tax day. Last night I had to deliver a tax return, so time was limited.

I cut material to make the two regular door headers and the seven window headers for the garage (as opposed to the two upstairs windows). I'm making these differently. I'm using three 2x6's and making what looks like a C channel out of them. I'll stuff insulation into the void and cap it with thin plywood to keep the insulation in place, maybe. I did get the door headers nailed up, but there wasn't time to get the window headers nailed up.

Tonight's date night, so nothing will be accomplished on the project.

[gasstingy]

I found three pictures that I thought would give you some idea of how the slab was insulated and PEX tubing was installed. The slab was poured about a year ago, but after getting a materials estimate we had to put the project on hold. We saved more and got our tax refund back and put into the garage fund and now we're back at it.

[gasstingy]

Last night I finished the window and door headers that I started on Tuesday night. Next on my agenda, I have to start building walls.

I've also arranged to borrow a 1/2" drive drill with a really long 3/4" auger style bit for drilling the holes for the sill plates to attach to the foundation and for the wiring to be pulled through the studs. We're going to drill all the studs before we assemble the walls so we don't have to borrow or buy a right angle drill. I am a believer in borrow when possible. (I also believe in taking excellent care of borrowed stuff and returniing it in as good of condition as possible. If I damage it, I repair it, if I ruin it I replace it.)

[gasstingy]

Worked on cutting studs to length and drilling them out for running the wiring. Then tried to clear out room in the garage to build the first wall. Decided to put all of the completed headers on my front porch (I need the room to assemble the walls on the floor.) Tried to move the garage door header by myself. Not my best idea. I got my hand trucks and was barely able to stand the header up after sliding it out the door. While trying to put it on the hand trucks, I dropped it. Apparently I didn't have enough nails in it, because it bent a lot of nails and one of the 2x10's shifted by about a half inch. So, I spent a while prying that board off and iin the process put several stess cracks in the board. Since the header was now 1/3 lighter, I moved it to the porch. Then I cut a replacement 2x10 and took my compressor and framing nailer onto the porch and installed it. I'll go back this evening and put more nails in so I may not have this problem again.

Laid out the wall framing and realized that the way I planned didn't make sense, so I made some adjustments in the plan (Carpenter brother-in-law made some helpful suggestions). I'll go back to it this evening and try to make some more headway. It appears that I'm going even slower than I planned, but it's not like I'm paying for any labor:-)

[gasstingy]

Had second thoughts on the amount of nails that hold the big garage door header together, so I took my compressor / nailer to the porch last night and more than doubled what I originally put in it. I'll sleep better :-)

I also had to cut an inch off of every stud I had cut for the walls. I was surprised by how long it took to simply move the stack of lumber, mark an inch off the top, cut it off, restack it and sweep up my work area. I'd try to go faster, but I'd likely make more mistakes. And that wouldn't do.

[Daox]

Haha, not too long ago when I rewired my garage, we jacked up the header and lag bolted an lvl board to it to strengthen it and stop some sagging. There were a fair amount of bolts in that thing when we were done.