Above 1200 Sq/FT Garage build in South West B.C

[dmittz]

Did you not remember which site you are on?? This is the Garage Journal, where the only acceptable answer is a 48 light in ground, dimmable, wireless zone controlled, multi-spectrum, LED system.

I guess you better get to hammering out your floor.




I honestly have no idea lol, I'm still over here jealous of your lift.

haha

Oh my I never realized about the in-floor lighting! I'd Better get the concrete saw and jackhammer out right away. lol

 

[dmittz]

These are what I use. https://www.harborfreight.com/2100-...lack-59170.html?hftm_sc=369&utm_source=google

I have three of them I love them so much. Means I always have one that is charged and they are extremely bright. I rarely use them on the highest output unless I an trying to light up a room to work on without power or outside. I used two on max power when rebuilding my fence to work past sunset outside with no issues.

You can also buy this awesome bar for working under the hood and in the interior of your car. https://www.harborfreight.com/2100-...in-extendable-underhood-floodlight-58990.html

Thank you so much for sharing your lighting solution, both options look like they could work very well for me!

 

[dmittz]

Well guys I've continued work on the calipers and got the first front one finished. I'm real happy with it.




In other news, I got a call from my bsmt tennats at 10pm last night saying their toilet wouldn't flush.

Anyhow after having a plumber out to scope the waste lines we determined the septic tank was backing up. Which was odd because I have always pumped the tank out each year and the last time was only 1 month ago. Additionally there was no signs my septic field was failing.

I took my deck apart and confimed the tank was not draining. I had the tank pumped and a septic tech come out.

Turns out a beenie baby had some how made its way into the effluent pump chamber and got sucked into the lift pump, caused it to burn out!


As to how that got in there is anyone's guess.

Anyway whoever did the pump last time had done it all hard piped and no unions, so we couldn't even just pull the pump out, the tech had to reach down inside the effluent tank and cut the pipes all out and then put new pipes with unions in and a rope attached to the pump, so that if the pump ever fails in the future we can just pull the pump put and repace it without needing to also pump the tank and redo the piping.




Not my favorite way to spend money but at least its fixed and the tech scoped the field and said it looks fine.

I also had an septic alarm pre-wired but will need to bring another ciruit under the deck before it is functional.

 

[Just Puttering]

tech had to reach down inside the effluent tank and cut the pipes

That’s why plumbing techs charge what they do. Nice it wasn’t you reaching around in there.

 

[dmittz]

That’s why plumbing techs charge what they do. Nice it wasn’t you reaching around in there.

oh totally!

I installed a seperate new septic system for the workshop with permits, so I know a bit about septic...But ya I kinda draw the line when it comes to doing work in a used nasty septic tank!

Althought if it ever happens again I can now swap pumps without reaching into the effluent, but lets hope this new pump last a good long time!

 

[SilverJimmy]

First rule of Plumbing…….
“NEVER BITE YOUR FINGERNAILS”!!!!!

 

[rd65]

First rule of Plumbing…….
“NEVER BITE YOUR FINGERNAILS”!!!!!

When I worked in the Sewer & Drainage Dept at work, the 6 second rule was the 6" rule. If it is within 6" of the floor....

 

[dmittz]

Hey Friends,

So my dad kindly built me some top cabinets for over my work bench. I brought them over the other day and am applying coats of Polyurethane to the inside of them. Once that's done the outside and doors will be painted to match the lower cabinets.

 

[SilverJimmy]

I am so envious of the guys who can build cabinets! I had to spend a large chunk of $$$ for the cabinets in my new shop. It was a chore finding a cabinet maker who would just build me “shop” cabinets, most thought I was building a mansion and needed cabinets to suit, with the corresponding price! Very cool your dad built you yours, I’m sure you’ll treasure them forever.

 

[Xti04]

Nice cabinets!

 

[dmittz]

Thanks Guys, ya i'm very happy with thr cabinets it'll definietly provide some much needed space for a lot of small items.

Its also super amazing my dad built them. As you guys might recall from last Sept through this Feb (6 month period) he had to have first a very major hernia surgery, then concurrently was battling cancer, followed by a quadruple open heart bypass. Throw in a kidney stone, shngles and some sorta fluid sack in his knee bursting. I wasn't sure he's still be around. But looks like he has a clean bill of health and several months out he's back to working in his shop, yard work and still working full-time also!

So him suprising me with the cabinets great but its also nice to see he's now able to carry on after so much health issues.

 

[Just Puttering]

But looks like he has a clean bill of health and several months out he's back to working in his shop

Wow, sounds like your Dad is one heck of a tough character. The cabinets he built look great

 

[SilverJimmy]

I miss my dad every day, so glad yours is still there for you, being “Dad”!

 

[dmittz]

Wow, sounds like your Dad is one heck of a tough character. The cabinets he built look great

Yes he certainly is!

I miss my dad every day, so glad yours is still there for you, being “Dad”!

Yes I'm very glad I get to have my dad around for longer.

I'm sorry your father's not around any more.

 

[dmittz]

A few things have happened since my last update.

The upper workbench cabinets got 5 coats of polyurethane on the interior surfaces and shelves and all exterior surfaces and doors got primer and two coats of grey paint. The cabinets are now installed. Although there is a few more things yet to be finished.



So the missing door will be installed soon, one of its hinges was defective so I have to exchange that for a working hinge.

So As you all proabbly recall, there is a sewer pipe coming down the wall from the upstairs loft. Instead of just cutting the cabinet and having the pipe visible in the middle of the one cabinet my dad instead opted to box off the area around the pipe, but still managed to design a space for spray cans in front of the where the pipe is.



Because these are 'workshop' cabinets they need to be strong so in addition to being screwed to the wall they also are notched out and physically rest on and are screwed to 2x4 'rails' near the top and at the bottom.

I opted to set the upper cabinets a bit higher above the bench then you'd see in a kitchen, to allow more room for working on things and also so I could put a 8ft long x 5.5in wide shelf under the cabinets for putting small parts on from things that are being worked on. The shelf was actually a left over piece of 'barn wood' from the bathroom. But being as its all nicely vanished I figured this was a good use for it.



The wrench holders were in my attached garage but I hadn't used them there once in over 4 years so I thought they might be handy in this spot being as I often have to walk over to my tool box by the lift where my automotive hand tools are just to get a wrench.

And I've also been working on the corvette, the brakes are all done now except for bleeding the brakes



Additionally, I replaced both front wheel bearings and I recently replaced the driver's side half shaft u-joints


Which is something I have to do yearly since having more than double the original hp seems to stress the u-joints so they don't last long. I plan to do the passenger's side halfshaft soon.

 

[dmittz]

Ok guys, I got that last door on and got the under cabinet wiring put in.


I decided to just go with a simple easy to service setup for the undercabinet lights.


They just plug in the this recepticle that is activated by a switch on the wall above the bench. Its a simple setup and easy to fix/replace if anything ever quits working.

 

[Xti04]

Cabinets look great! I need more cabinets in my shop, its on the list of never ending projects.

 

[cccoltsicehockey]

Cabinets came out great and really complete that workspace. Nice touch your dad did with the small shelf for spray cans vs a gap in the cabinets.

 

[Jayman17]

I hate to make a suggestion that will cause more work but you might want to paint that 2X4 ledger under the cabinets red to restore that red stripe around your shop. Sorry!

 

[dmittz]

Just a small project, but my wife wanted some roll-outs for one of our kitchen cabinets. I had a bit of leftover plywood and 1x4's so I was able to make a couple roll-outs as requested.




I'm actually going to make a couple more but didn't have enough leftover plywood. My dad says he has a partial sheet kicking around so once I pick that up i'll make the last 2.

 

[dmittz]

Hey Friends, So I moved over a lot of my remaining smaller tools and all my painting/autobody supplies from my parent's place. Happily it all fit in my new upper cabinets with tons of room to spare

Anyhow. So I had to do some work on my wife's cadillac.

New battery...

Changed the engine oil/filter, transmission oil and differential oil...

That was folllwed by a new engine air filter and spark plugs...The plugs are a bit of a thing as you have to remove the intake manifold and a ton of hoses + electrical connectors to gain acess to them. But aside from it taking 3+ hours everything went smoothly and it runs great.


I'll be bringing her car back in the shop in a few weeks for a bunch more work once some more parts arrive.

I gotta say having the car lift is a real game changer!

 

[cccoltsicehockey]

Lift really is a game changer. I couldn't believe how much more enjoyable it makes doing even basic maintenance work.

 

[dmittz]

I hate to make a suggestion that will cause more work but you might want to paint that 2X4 ledger under the cabinets red to restore that red stripe around your shop. Sorry!

Oh don't worry I did paint it. Just forgot to get a picture!

 

[dmittz]

Must have been a the season for batteries I just had to do one in my truck this morning as didn't want to start.

A new battery solved the problem.

 

[Xti04]

My diesel gets fussy if I dont start it at least once a week. Glad you are liking the lift. It would be a hard tool to go without once you have one.

 

[dmittz]

My diesel gets fussy if I dont start it at least once a week. Glad you are liking the lift. It would be a hard tool to go without once you have one.

oh man I don't know how I did it all these years without a lift. Having one is amazing!

 

[dmittz]

Its been a busy few days around the shop.

Mowed the lawn and mulched up the last of the leaves for what I hope is the last time until next spring. So I pressure washed the underside of the mower deck. That was followed by an engine oil and filter change on my tractor.
I also got over the my parents place and changed basically all of the fluids and filter on my dad's tractor.

I'm not sure how but despite having had open heart surgery, major hernia surgery and beat cancer this year my dad still found time to put near 500hours on his tractor just this summer and fall! So basically everything was due for service.

Also managed to get my truck up on the hoist a couple evenings


Changed the engine oil and filter, with Rotella T6 as well as an engine air filter and a fuel filter. Additionally I changed the fluid in the front differential and the transfer case. That Borg warner T-case fluid was pricey!



Finally I was able to make the 3rd and final planned roll-put for our kitchen in the house

 

[jollygreengiant]

I'm very jealous of your green grass. We have enough here that the dog has to jump just to get around the yard lol.

 

[dmittz]

I'm very jealous of your green grass. We have enough here that the dog has to jump just to get around the yard lol.

Yes so far its been a very mild winter I don't think we have even touched freezing once. Most days this Dec have been around 10C its been quite nice and warm compared to recent years.

Although we did get a lot of rain that caused some major flooding that took out a bunch of our highways in BC again. Thankfully I'm on high well draining ground so flooding is not a concern here.

 

[dmittz]

Well guys with it being the holidays I decided it was time to tackle the project on my wife's SRX.

So on the Agenda was new wheel bearings front and rear, new ebrake components, new rotors, new calipers, new pads and all new brake hoses.

Nothing on the car was actually failed or in need of imediet repair but given the age and mileage I thought it would be good to do.

hubs removed and axle splines cleaned of corrision.

new ebrake components

New hubs and ebrake (rear) I used lots of anti-seize on the CV shaft splines and anywhere else I could so hopefully nothing gets stuck togther in the future.

Rear brakes back togther, with anti-seize between the hub and rotor!

New hubs on the front too..

front brakes back togther with new parts


Now I just gotta recruit someone to help me bleed the brakes and the SRX will be back in service.

 

[dmittz]

Brakes on the SRX are bleed and it drives perfectly so one more item off my list

 

[dmittz]

Well friends I've been busy working on the corvette lately and its been giving me grief lately!

So I took the door panels off because the lock cylinders were very stiff. I was able to correct that issue, it was mainly that most of the joints in the internal linkage had grease on them that had dust from when I had the car painted all mixed it. So lots of cleaning and some dry lithium lubricant got that probkem solved.

I noticed when the door panels were off that body shop when they took the car apart to paint it had broken a whole host of small wire retainers, clips and small plastic brakcets and had neglected to reinstall the anti-rattle pads on the windows further more they had damaged my door speakers badly.


Anyhow this was like 3.5 years ago I had the car painted and I knew there was some stuff not right inside the doors but just got to it now. So I ordered all the small replacement items and installed them all.


Ordred new speakers:



When I tested them the speakers didn't work, turns out no power is going to them...not sure how long that has been going on since the old speakers were damaged by the body shop, but anyway I'm going to put a new head unit so I'll investigate that more when I replace the headunit.

Next up I went to move the corvette and it cranked over but wouldn't start. Seems like the fuel pump isn't activating...I changed the fuel pump relay and checked the fuse and still nothing.


So I've ordered a fuel pressure gauge and power probe 3 so I can start to do more in depth diagnostics... The fuel pressure gauge has arrived but i'm still waiting on the power probe.



meanwhile I noticed the weatherstrip was getting bad so I pulled it off and found, the body shop had just Siliconed it to the body, and lost the retainer brackets causing the weatherstrip to fail/tear early because it was only held on by silicone and not the brackets ...So I had to order some used ones from a salvage yard and refurbish them before putting new weather strip in.

Also I found some surface rust under the weatherstip on the window frame...cleaned that up and am in the process of repainting the window frame...



I will say the ceiling exhaust fan with fresh air inlet has been awesome, it clears out the paint fumes within a few min after I finish spraying!

 

[jollygreengiant]

Glad to see I'm not the only one who has projects that snowball into something bigger lol.

That body shop really wasn't very attentive to detail with your car.

 

[dmittz]

Glad to see I'm not the only one who has projects that snowball into something bigger lol.

That body shop really wasn't very attentive to detail with your car.

Ya things do tend to snowball!
I've not attempted electrical diagnotics before so this will be a learning experience for me.

Ya Its a bit frustersting about the body shop, I paid good money so I expected more attention to detail. I proabbly should have investigated sooner, but I got tired of taking it back to have small items fixed by them and was busy building the shop so just got to it now.

 

[dmittz]

OK guys I had a few min and was able to diagnose the corvette. A fuel pressure gauge confirmed no fuel pressure at the fuel rail, and using the power probe I confirmed the fuel pump is getting power. So looks like the pump is dead.

 

[SilverJimmy]

Have you tried tapping the tank with a hammer? If you tap the tank you can jiggle the pump enough that the motor will turn enough to get past the bad spot and get it to run. Then the motor will skip over the bad spot until I finally stops there again. Trick I learned from my customers for getting a car with a failing fuel pump into the shop to work on it. And, of course, every vehicle that had a bad pump also had a completely full tank of gasoline too!

 

[dmittz]

Have you tried tapping the tank with a hammer? If you tap the tank you can jiggle the pump enough that the motor will turn enough to get past the bad spot and get it to run. Then the motor will skip over the bad spot until I finally stops there again. Trick I learned from my customers for getting a car with a failing fuel pump into the shop to work on it. And, of course, every vehicle that had a bad pump also had a completely full tank of gasoline too!

That's a good tip, if I ever get stranded somewhere due to a fuel pump I'll keep that in mind.

Thankfully the corvette's fuel pump was very polite and decided to quit while the car was parked in my workshop during the winter so its right where it needs to be for repairs, so I'll just change the pump so it doesn't quit again somewhere less convenient.

 

[dmittz]

So friends, I have good news. The new fuel pump is in and the corvette is running again now!

 

[dmittz]

Well friends I've been just enjoying the workshop. Helped some friends do repairs on their vehicles. and I also did a little more on the Corvette.


Replaced the O2 sensor for my air fuel guage and that got it working and I also had noticed part way through this last summer the oil pressure gauge was pegged at 80psi any time the car was running and showing 15psi when it was off. Replaced the the oil pressure sender and now the gauge shows about 40psi at idle and it increases with rpm which seems about right. Since LS engines make more oil pressure than the original sbc i'm wondering if that is causing my oil pressure senders to wear out prematurely as this is my third sender in 5 years. On the positive side they are not expensive and it took only 5 min to replace once the car was on the lift.

i also did a very different little project the other day. My son's wagon had a 'bearing failure' of course being from amazon its not like you can buy replacement parts and buying a whole new wagon seemed wasteful.

This wasn't the 'wheel bearing' itself but the bearing that allows the wheel to swivel. It needed to be a very unusual shape to and I also needed to replace the retainer cap that had fallen off somewhere.

Any how I bought a little piece of bronze and got to work in my 'little machine shop' Drilled out the center so the wheel shaft could insert in the 'bearing' and cut the piece down a little to the length required.



Then used my lathe to make the very unusual '3 step' piece.



and then used a washer and a removable pin to retain the bearing that is pressed into a plastic insert.

The finished product:

Seems to work well and I think it'll be much less likely to break than the original flimsy parts.

Finally I decided that i need to bite the bullet and do a new roof on the house this year before any leaks occur. So i've hired a roofing company.
They brought the materials yesterday and put them on the roof.

I'm told as soon as we have 3 consecutive dry days in the forecast the roofers will be out to install it. The weather forecast isn't showing any 3 day dry spells in the next 2 weeks but hopefully we will get some soon so the new roof can go on!

These are the exact single that are.on the workshop so the two roofs will match, and hopefully this summer i'll also paint the house to match the shop as well.

 

[rd65]

I believe your north of me and we have snow in the forecast pretty much every day next week. No dry days in the near future.