The Snake Pit - single car garage

[Fastphil]

Hi all,

I've been lurking on this site for a couple of years now, but never had a reason to post as I didn't own a home or a garage... until now.

I know pics are what keep people coming back to your thread, so here's a few to satisfy that craving. I'll fill in some more info later. For now, my goal was to clear enough space in the garage to park my 2003 Mustang Cobra in it. Lots more to come.

I went from this:


To this:


For now, the plan is to continue making room to be able to work on my car.

This is a single car garage, attached to a split-level house that I just bought with my girlfriend and our two daughters, who are 6 and 8 years old.

The garage measures about 23ft. long by 14ft. wide. I actually never measured it, but I did measure the clear floor space yesterday at 19 feet long and 9 feet wide. At the back of the garage is a staircase that leads down about 4-5 feet to a door that goes into the basement of the house, so that eats up about 4 feet of the garage's length. It's all in cement, so it's pretty much permanent.

Along the sides of the clear floor space, the previous owner left several racks with shelving, a desk, and a good-sized workbench. Eventually I will probably remove all of it, with the exception of the workbench, which will be relocated slightly. Here's a pic of the workbench:


The garage does have a window in the long wall, as well as a man door at the rear with an opening window in it.



The house is on a street corner, which I've always loved. My parents' home which I grew up in is also on a street corner. There's just something about it that I find so great! The lot is a generous 12,000 square feet. In this area, that's about 1.5 times bigger than most.



In the above photos, our property stretches off to the left of the garage, to just beyond the edge of the picture. I think there's about 30 feet of land there. In the long term, I'd love to either extend the garage toward the left to make it a two-car garage with a bit of room to work around each car, or to use the left rear corner of the property to build a separate two-car garage. But none of that has been discussed yet.

For now, we've been quite busy around the house. Before we moved in, we completely renovated the main bathroom. It took 6 weeks (and it's still not 100% done, although it's functional), and the garage was being used as a workshop for cutting wood and tile. Just the 12,000 s.f. of property kept us busy today. We raked up 14 bags of leaves and dead grass because the house had been uninhabited since May 2012. It looked like the bare minimum of yard work was being done to get the house sold.

What's that, you want to know more about the Mustang Cobra? It's a 2003 which I've owned for almost 6 years now. It's been featured on a couple of different websites. Check it out:
http://www.canibeat.com/2011/10/bagged-cobra-ruffling-feathers-ford/
http://www.airsociety.net/2012/05/custom-cobra-philip-law-bagged-ford-mustang-svt-cobra/

If you're interested in knowing more about the car, I've got a build thread going since I installed the air suspension here:
http://www.stanceworks.com/forums/showthread.php?t=18585

I've also got a 2005 Saab 9-2x Aero which I bought in November 2012 as a winter car. It's stock, and I enjoy it as it is. Besides regular maintenance, I have no plans for this car.

The girlfriend has a 2012 Scion xB. It's stock, will remain stock, and is usually quite dirty inside and out. Good car though.

So there you have it. I'll be posting up whenever I have something worth sharing. If you have any comments or questions, I'd love to hear them. Looking forward to sharing my garage journal, and learning from or just enjoying others' garage journals!

Phil

 

[irish44j]

nice, I'd love to be able to expand to the side myself, but sadly my garage is already as close to the property line as it's allowed to be.

Looks like you have decent ceiling height - possibly do a loft over half of it for extra storage?

 

[Fastphil]

nice, I'd love to be able to expand to the side myself, but sadly my garage is already as close to the property line as it's allowed to be.

Looks like you have decent ceiling height - possibly do a loft over half of it for extra storage?

Yeah, the extra land is pretty sweet. We're allowed to build up to 1.5 meters (about 5 feet) from the edge of the property, so there's a good bit of useful land there. Some mature trees may have to be cut, I'd ave to check out the local regulations for that.

The ceiling is just 8 feet. Being 6ft. 8 in. myself, I am really not a fan of putting anything overhead. The attic has space to store whatever fits through the hatch, as long as it's not too heavy. It's just not that practical.

 

[dare23]

Recognize your name form StanceisEverything (I'm a lurker there). Your Cobra is sick, love the ccw's, the color and air ride of course!!

 

[dubber]

Welcome, thats a pretty generous Single you have there, lucky u haha. BTW love your 9-2X slash secret WRX

 

[Fastphil]

Recognize your name form StanceisEverything (I'm a lurker there). Your Cobra is sick, love the ccw's, the color and air ride of course!!

Thanks man, glad you like it. Dave and I will be collaborating on something in the next couple of months, but you'll have to wait and see.

Welcome, thats a pretty generous Single you have there, lucky u haha. BTW love your 9-2X slash secret WRX

Thanks, I took a look at your GJ last night, I can see why you think mine is generous! In fact, I started this thread with a lie: I briefly owned a house with a single car garage that measured 11 wide by 31 long. It wasn't quite long enough to fit two cars, so it was a single with a spacious work area. Less room forces more creativity, as you've demonstrated.

The Saab is a fun car, as are most Subarus. I previously had a 1999 Impreza 2.5RS coupe, but I needed more room. I miss the down-low torque of the NA engine, but the turbo's thrust is fun if you can actually get to use it. Compared to my Mustang, the Saab is enjoyable because it's quiet and provides worry-free driving.

 

[dubber]

Thanks, I took a look at your GJ last night, I can see why you think mine is generous! In fact, I started this thread with a lie: I briefly owned a house with a single car garage that measured 11 wide by 31 long. It wasn't quite long enough to fit two cars, so it was a single with a spacious work area. Less room forces more creativity, as you've demonstrated.

The Saab is a fun car, as are most Subarus. I previously had a 1999 Impreza 2.5RS coupe, but I needed more room. I miss the down-low torque of the NA engine, but the turbo's thrust is fun if you can actually get to use it. Compared to my Mustang, the Saab is enjoyable because it's quiet and provides worry-free driving.

The Cobra is obviously a beast, but its sweet to have a fun/practical daily. I had been searching for one a couple years ago but they are rare to find the X model.

Are those CCW's on the cobra? A couple of my friends are rocking those on euro applications and they are ballin' for sure.

 

[Fastphil]

The Cobra is obviously a beast, but its sweet to have a fun/practical daily. I had been searching for one a couple years ago but they are rare to find the X model.

Are those CCW's on the cobra? A couple of my friends are rocking those on euro applications and they are ballin' for sure.

Actually, the Cobra is my daily driver in the summer. The Saab only serves in the winter, except for this spring where it was quite useful to run to Rona for the renovation stuff.

Yes, the Cobra is on CCW Classics. 18x11 rear and 18x9.5 front.

 

[holland_patrick]

Nice work

 

[Fastphil]

I've had a productive couple of days in the Snake Pit. Well, maybe not productive, but at least satisfying. Yesterday I did some minor organizing in there, with the main focus on the workbench. I finally wiped it down, removing all the residue from the tile and wood cutting. And as such things so often go, while I was cleaning, the weather did its best to provide more work for me. It's been so windy the last few days, that the garage is now full of leaves and yard debris.

Yeah, yeah, I'm aware that the bench doesn't actually look clean in the pics below!




I was also in and out of the garage, working in the backyard with my father over to help out. We cleaned up around the pool, which I'm working on getting up and running for the summer. The previous owner left lots of stuff in the garage and in the shed. Mostly gardening stuff. My friends Michel and Jo-Ann (who are also my girlfriend's uncle and aunt) helped me clear up some more room in the garage by taking some of the gardening stuff. I'm not even sure what all she took, as I didn't bother to inventory anything. I just told her she could take whatever she wanted!

A bit of backstory: Michel used to work at the same company I work at as a long-haul trucker, although we never knew each other there very well. His wife Jo-Ann somehow took a liking to me anyways, and set up her niece on a blind date with me. And as they say, the rest is history.

Michel and I have common interests, cars and functional garages being near the top of the list. Michel was instrumental in the air suspension installation on my Cobra. It all took place in his garage. Since then, I've helped him with work on the restoration of his 1972 Corvette (454 with a 4-speed), as well as consume large quantities of his beer, his food, and his time. Thanks Mike!

When we first visited this house, we decided to bring Michel along for the second visit as a mostly impartial observer who could provide knowledge on things I, as a first-time buyer, wouldn't think about. On that visit, Michel spotted an old sewing machine in the garage.





Michel expressed interest in having it so he can tinker with it. He did some research online and found that such an old sewing machine is worth a whopping... $10. It's kind of neat, but it's not something I'm interested in, so I loaded it into the Saab and will run it over to his house tomorrow. While I'm over there, I'll grab my toolbox, which has been in his garage since I moved into the apartment with my girlfriend. Now that I have my own garage, it's coming home!

Yesterday I finally got around to swapping the all-season tires back onto my girlfriend's Scion. I usually do this early to mid-April, but with all the home-buying and renovations going on, it just took a back seat. It only takes 20 minutes, but sometimes it's just so hard to find the time to do it.

Today, I finally got to work on the Cobra in my own garage. As a Christmas gift, my girlfriend bought me an Accuair i-Level module (how cool is that!). It's just a plug-and play installation, so it only took a few minutes. I can now control my air suspension via my iPhone! It's fun to watch your car go up and down while you're sitting 50 feet away.

I also ditched a few items the P/O left. There was a blue desk, which you can see on the left side in the pic below. I emptied the drawers, which were full of pool stuff and other miscellaneous stuff, and moved the desk curbside for Wednesday's large-items pickup. Along with it went about 20 feet of ABS drain tubing, in diameters ranging from 1.5 to 3 inches. We just completely renovated the bathroom, and have no intention to use this any time soon. However, if I had known that this stuff was in the garage, I could have saved a few bucks on the renovation materials. Oh well.

That's about all.

Phil

 

[safexcrane]

I have seen to many garages but your garage is totally different that what i think.

 

[dubber]

Great (useful ) relative/friend to have.

 

[Fastphil]

Great (useful ) relative/friend to have.

Yeah, they're both really cool. Family is important to them, and I guess I treat my girlfriend well enough for them to consider me as part of it! They live only 4 km away, we have permission to enter their house whenever we like, even when they're not home, and they feed and entertain our family regularly. I'm really lucky to have such a great extended family.

 

[Fastphil]

I have seen to many garages but your garage is totally different that what i think.

I'm not sure I understand, can you elaborate please?

 

[Fastphil]

I hauled the old sewing machine over to Michel's place today and brought back my toolbox. Now I can actually wrench on cars in my own garage! That's what I'm planning to do tomorrow. Or maybe later today.

 

[Fastphil]

After conferring with my friend Michel, I've decided I (or we) will create some kind of shelving above the staircase on the back wall of the garage. Eventually it would be an ideal location for an air compressor, but that's not in the budget yet.


While I haven't made much progress in organizing the stuff in the garage, I have managed to consolidate some of the mess to get it out of sight and out of the way. In the short run, a lot of stuff that I don't want in the garage will have to stay there for lack of a better place to put it. All of the stuff for the pool is in the garage right now, as is a bunch of gardening stuff. There are also two bicycles in addition to the old one that's hanging on the ceiling. Ideally all this stuff will end up in a shed that's much bigger than the one we have currently. But that too is a project for another day.

I have a Manaras garage door opener. It works fine, but we only have one remote for it, and no keypad on the outside of the door. It's inconvenient to either have to run around looking for the remote, or go into the garage through the house or the back yard. I'm hoping to find a second remote for it. Ideally, I'd swap the whole opener out for one that works with an iPhone app. If anyone knows of a place that I could find another remote for my opener, I'd like to see it. So far I've found this site, but they don't have my remote pictured:
http://www.northshorecommercialdoor.com/magadooptr.html


One thing I did try to work on this weekend was the neon lights. I have two 8-footers side by side lengthwise and a 4-footer crosswise between them. One of the 8-footers was inoperative, so I went and bought two new tubes for it. I sawpped them out, and now one of them lights up with a loud buzzing noise. It would also intermittently shut off for a few minutes and then come back on. So back to the store I went to buy a whole new housing. It seems it's not worth swapping out the ballast. I'll get that up next weekend.

In the meantime, now that I have my toolbox, floor jack and jackstands, I was able to work on both of my cars over the weekend. I changed the oil on the Cobra, and I investigated why I was having an error code on the left rear ride height sensor on the air suspension system. On the Saab, I dismantled the windshield wiper mechanism to change one of the plastic pall cups that kept popping off.


The more I read on this Forum, the more ideas I get. Sadly, my budget will never be able to keep up with my mind. I realize that there's so much to learn and that mixing other people's ideas with your own tastes, needs and desires is what gets people to come up with their own great ideas. It's a never-ending cycle I guess.

Someday, I'll get around to doing line drawings and photoshopping pics of my garage so that it's more visually appealing to people who visit this thread.

 

[Fastphil]

Almost nothing new to update you on.

I got fed up with having only one opener for the garage door, so I went ahead and ordered a second Chamberlain universal clicker, as well as a Chamberlain universal wireless keypad to put outside the garage door. Now I won't have to labyrinth my way through the house or the yard to get into my own garage when my girlfriend or the girls "misplace" the only remote.

I was also on the fence about buying a new shop vacuum. I'm now leaning way over that fence towards the new vacuum. The previous owner left a Shop-Vac, but I can't find the hose for it. Obviously not very useful without the hose. I know I could just buy a new hose, but I just want a new vacuum! I'm looking at the Ridgid WD1680 because it has a detachable blower.

On the car front, I spent a couple hours under the Mustang yesterday, scraping a melted garbage bag off the exhaust system. It was melted along the whole right side exhaust, from the downpipe to the muffler. What a mess. There was literally nothing left unmelted of the bag. I couldn't leave it on there, because there was always a smell of melting plastic every time I came to a stop. It's even less pleasant in a convertible. Glad that's taken care of.

The Saab is due for an oil change and a set of shocks and struts, so that's on my to-do list. I'm on vacation this week, so I'm hoping I can get to work on that tomorrow. I scored a used set of four low-mileage stockers for about $100 recently. While the 9-2x is essentially a WRX, the shocks have Saab-specific valving, and I'm glad to have found a set of stockers for cheap.

Long-term plans for the Mustang call for a new rear diff seal because it's leaking now. While I'm in there, I'm probably gonna swap the gears from the stock 3.55s to a set of FRPP 3.73s for a little extra pep off the line. I'll take care of that over the winter. I'll pull the pumpkin out of the car (Cobras have IRS, remember) and take it to a shop to have the gears swapped and properly aligned.

I also eyeballed the yard beside the garage a couple weeks ago. I was glad to note that there are no mature trees that would need to be sacrificed to expand to a two-car garage. And that's the best news I have to share today, so I'll end it there!

 

[banana cognac]

Phil, what a cool little garage. I'm actually quite familiar with your car being a Mustang enthusiast and my brother having a slammed VW Scirocco. Hopefully all goes well adding on to the garage!

 

[Ray Kelly]

Nice house and garage. Nice Mustang, too.

 

[Jagmandave]

Why do you have all that non car stuff in the garage at all, when you have a basement stairs right there? Take all that stuff down to the basement, including the bicycle...you'll be amazed at how much nicer it is to work out there, or just park your car without all that stuff on the sides.

Keep the workbench, toolbox and assorted car stuff and maybe one small set of shelves for car related storage, everything else goes down the stairs. At 5 steps it's no hardship for a young guy....

My 2¢ and worth exactly what you paid!

 

[Fastphil]

Phil, what a cool little garage. I'm actually quite familiar with your car being a Mustang enthusiast and my brother having a slammed VW Scirocco. Hopefully all goes well adding on to the garage!

Thanks man, I hope you check back in often because this is where the car will bed down from now on!

Nice house and garage. Nice Mustang, too.

Thanks, we're very happy with the house. The grass looks much better now than it did in the pics above.

Why do you have all that non car stuff in the garage at all, when you have a basement stairs right there? Take all that stuff down to the basement, including the bicycle...you'll be amazed at how much nicer it is to work out there, or just park your car without all that stuff on the sides.

Keep the workbench, toolbox and assorted car stuff and maybe one small set of shelves for car related storage, everything else goes down the stairs. At 5 steps it's no hardship for a young guy....

My 2¢ and worth exactly what you paid!

Thanks for the input. The basement had the girls' bedrooms, so it's not appropriate to store garage junk down there. Eventually, a bigger shed in the yard will free up space in the garage.

 

[LCG]

ahhh that cobra! I remember that pic from stanceworks

 

[dubber]

Looks like your space is getting more and more usable. A shed will definitely help a lot of woes space wise.

 

[Fastphil]

Looks like your space is getting more and more usable. A shed will definitely help a lot of woes space wise.

I thought I was a genius when I put the garbage can inside the two stacked 18" tires I have for the Mustang, the can fit in there perfectly.

With a bigger shed, I figure I could get rid of 80% of the stuff in the garage. That would indeed help hugely.

 

[dubber]

I thought I was a genius when I put the garbage can inside the two stacked 18" tires I have for the Mustang, the can fit in there perfectly.

With a bigger shed, I figure I could get rid of 80% of the stuff in the garage. That would indeed help hugely.

It's funny those little things can put a huge smile on your face and then your reaching to pat your own back. When i was doing a re-org of my garage those moments of insight were huge. One that i can think of now is the shelf i put above my garage door rail and was able to put three Rubbermaid containers up there.

Keep it up!

 

[HSpencer]

LOL I see you have your cans of paint. I do as well, lots of them. Sometimes I really do think if I were a guy who was smart, I would have the answer to every question in the world except one: "What to do with left over paint"?

I like your house and the garage is really nice!! Looking good!!!!

Best Regards
Herb Spencer

 

[Fastphil]

LOL I see you have your cans of paint. I do as well, lots of them. Sometimes I really do think if I were a guy who was smart, I would have the answer to every question in the world except one: "What to do with left over paint"?

I like your house and the garage is really nice!! Looking good!!!!

Best Regards
Herb Spencer

Yeah, the cans of paint are a bit of a conundrum. Keep them, and they probably will never be needed. And if they're needed, what are the chances the color will still actually match? Toss them, and you'll never get an exact match if you do end up needing it, plus you have to pay for the privilege of nonmatching paint. Then you end up repainting the whole house, which resets the cycle.

EDIT: I actually tossed several cans after we painted some of the rooms before we moved in, so there's fewer cans there now than there were before. But... there's a closet full of paint cans and supplies downstairs.

 

[polexican23]

I will be getting a smaller garage than yours on Thursday 8/1 when we close. Cant what to play hide the junk.

I did talk to a builder friend of mine here in the states, He said that building a whole separate BIGGER garage would make more sense "for me". A slab concrete floor would be cheaper and easier than tying into the existing foundation and roofline which would have to be done. Do I take his word as scripture? No. But he is also frugal (poor) like me, so I dont think he would steer me wrong.

 

[Fastphil]

I will be getting a smaller garage than yours on Thursday 8/1 when we close. Cant what to play hide the junk.

I did talk to a builder friend of mine here in the states, He said that building a whole separate BIGGER garage would make more sense "for me". A slab concrete floor would be cheaper and easier than tying into the existing foundation and roofline which would have to be done. Do I take his word as scripture? No. But he is also frugal (poor) like me, so I dont think he would steer me wrong.

Congrats on your new house! I've yet to explore the option of a separate detached garage, but it would involve at the very least the removal of two huge mature trees and take up a huge piece of our back yard. I'm not sure I want to do that. There's a couple of houses on my street that have had a second garage added to the existing attached one, one of which is just wrapping up construction. I'm hoping to chat them up sometime and get a look at how they did things and why.

This evening, I was able to turn some wrenches on my Saab. I swapped out the rear struts for the set of low-mileage used ones I acquired recently. It went well, considering I don't have power tools at the moment, and I had to jigger a setup to loosen the top nut of the strut. One of them was so shot that it would just collapse on its own. (A good strut is supposed to extend on its own.)

I also completed an oil change on the Saab, the first I've done on it myself. It wasn't any more or less messy than the oil changes I do on the Mustang so I'll say it went well too.

I might get around to doing the front struts tomorrow. After that, I'm gonna have to borrow a ladder because I want to swap out the T12 ballast that's on the fritz more often than not. Then I'll use the ladder to get up on the roof to clean the gutters out. Fun times.

 

[Fastphil]

As stated above, I got to finishing the front struts on the Saab a couple weeks ago. Things went smoothly.

I also replaced the 8-foot T12 that wasn't working properly. The new one was about half the weight of the old one, making it far less awkward to install alone. Now it works like a charm, and I have a good amount of light in the garage to work with. Most of the light is concentrated at the far end of the garage from the door though. That's a problem for another day. (And yes, I also used the ladder to get on the roof and clean the gutters. They were long overdue.)

This evening I programmed my new second remote control for the garage door opener. The Chamberlain KLIK1U universal remote is the same as the one we had when we bought the house, so it was a simple matter of setting the DIP switches as they are on the old one, and programming it following the instructions. Now we have two working remotes.

Things weren't quite so smooth with the KLIK2U universal wireless keypad though. I followed the instructions to the letter, but it's not working. There are several options for different types of openers, but only one is relevant to the 12-DIP-switch setup mine has, so at the moment I'm scratching my head. I may have to call their customer service on Monday to see if I can get an answer if I don't solve it myself tomorrow. I'm hoping there isn't some kind of 2-remote limit on the opener. If that's the case, I guess I'll have to live without the keypad (or change openers).

I also got a hand-me-down hand-soap dispenser from my friend Michel. Couple of screws should get it installed above the sink. So easy that it makes me wonder why I haven't done it yet. What's the best liquid soap for greasy garage-hands? (It's not a fancy soap dispenser, just a basic type that you see in cheap restaurants, doubt it could handle anything with grit in it.)

 

[Fastphil]

I've taken a bit of a new approach for this thread. Instead of boring you to death with a ton of minor updates, I'm letting stuff accumulate until I have a good batch that might actually be interesting to hear about.

Big news: I bought myself a Ridgid WD1680 wet/dry blower/vacuum. I had been stockpiling little piles of dirt and debris so that I could pick them up with the vacuum! lol I was gonna pick up the vacuum regardless, but when Home Depot dropped the price back down to $99 from $119, that sealed the deal. Plus, I was passing through Delaware, which has no sales tax, so I grabbed it there to save another few bucks. The same vacuum sells for $169 here in Canada, plus 16% sales taxes.


My 6-year old was eager to lend a helping hand in the garage this evening, so I had her attach the casters. Then she got to cleaning (not that I expect that from a woman)!



The landing of the staircase leading to the basement has a carpet that was there when I bought the house. One end of it was jut bunched up against the wall, and that's the kind of thing that just drives me nuts over the long term. So I whipped out the utility knife and sliced it down to size.

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I also relocated some of the junk that was up on top of the shelving unit on the left wall. Some of it was moved onto the top of the lumber rack on the right side, while other stuff was put out to the curb. In previous pics, you can see a bunch of flower pots. We put them out with a sign stating "1 for $3, 2 for $5". One day later, half the pots were gone, and no money was to be found. So much for the honor system. I tossed what was left in the trash. It's not a huge improvement, but subconsciously it does look less cluttered now. Baby steps...



I found a bottle of cleaning product on the shelf, so I thought I'd give it a try. Turns out that it actually does a great job, so I used it to clean the inside of the garage door and just about any other non-drywall surface. I was expecting it to not handle the tougher-looking spots, but it removed just about everything. And as an added bonus, it actually cleaned the microfiber towel I was using after some rinsing! Again, baby steps...

On the car front, the Cobra has been leaking from the differential for a while now. I decided that I'd be able to work on it over the winter, so I started researching prices for a diff rebuild kit. I figured that while I'm in there, I might as well upgrade things. So I was on the hunt for a rebuild kit, a set of FRPP 3.73 gears and a FRPP diff cover/girdle. I wasn't expecting to buy right away but I came across a deal I couldn't pass up, so all three items are in the mail.

The Saab recently received a couple of new stickers to go over the hood and trunk emblems. Apparently, Saabs are infamous for factory emblems which lose their color, and end up being a chrome circle. Sadly, the stickers I bought don't seem to be sticking very well. I tried heat, pressure, and both. For $10, I don't mind too much if they come off eventually. But today I did come across a good deal for a new factory emblem for the trunk, so I pulled the trigger on that. I'll be keeping my eyes open for a good deal on the hood emblem.


That's about it for now. Whether this was a worthwhile update or not, I will let you be the judge.

Phil

 

[HSpencer]

Rigid is a good product. I don't have the vac, but have several Rigid tools. Good quality at a reasonable price. "Saving Money" is my middle name. I opted for a wall mount vac, and I sure do like it. I use it all the time. I really like your garage and it will be very nice when you are finished. I see a lot of stored lumber you will no doubt find handy for shelves and cabinets. Your looking good in there!!

Best Regards
Herb Spencer

 

[dubber]

Don't remember the last saab that i have seen with a mint logo, they all seem to have that same disease.

 

[Fastphil]

Rigid is a good product. I don't have the vac, but have several Rigid tools. Good quality at a reasonable price. "Saving Money" is my middle name. I opted for a wall mount vac, and I sure do like it. I use it all the time. I really like your garage and it will be very nice when you are finished. I see a lot of stored lumber you will no doubt find handy for shelves and cabinets. Your looking good in there!!

Best Regards
Herb Spencer

Thanks Herb, I'm glad you like it. I've yet to formulate a plan for the lumber, but I did use some of it the other day on a small home project. Winter will be the time to get some work done on the cars and the garage.

Don't remember the last saab that i have seen with a mint logo, they all seem to have that same disease.

Indeed, they all peel. As stated previously, I bought some 3D stickers to lay over the stock badge, but they don't stick very well. When they come off, I'll pull the old emblems off and install the new ones I bought on eBay.

I also received my FRPP diff parts, and I scored a killer deal on a set of big-size impact sockets for the axle nuts. I only needed a 36mm for the Cobra's halfshafts, but I got a set of 6 brand-new sockets for pretty much the same price as what only one would cost me. So now I have 29, 30, 31, 33, 34 and 36mm impact sockets, pretty much all I need to do just about any halfshaft job!

I'm still hoping to find an air compressor before winter, but the budget is tight right now. If the right deal comes along, I may just pull the trigger and deal with the financial end of it later. That's what credit is for, right? I'd sure love to get a 60-gallon, 5-6hp setup, but physical space is limited, so I may settle for a 30-gallon. I don't really need huge capacity anyway.

Besides a little more cleaning up and organizing, nothing new in the Snake Pit.

Phil

 

[Fastphil]

Wow, almost 2 years since I've posted in this thread. How time flies. Also, not much has been going on in the garage. I sold the Cobra, and now own two Audis, an A6 Avant 3.0T and an A3 3.2.

Otherwise, I finally installed the Chamberlain KLIK2U wireless keypad that I bought over two years ago. I was stumped by the coding of the keypad, even though the instructions were quite detailed. In the end, I discovered today that I was trying to program it with a 12-DIP code instead of the actual 9-DIP code. Once I discovered that error, it was just a matter of punching in a few numbers on the keypad, and now it works! At least now I don't have to use a key or unlock a car to access a garage door opener.

I've also managed to reduce the clutter in the garage somewhat. I just had a look through this thread and was horrified at how messy the garage used to be.

I donated the bicycle that was hanging on the ceiling. One day while I was out working in front of the house, I put it and one of my daughters' old bikes out front with a "FREE" sign on them. Within minutes, an older gentleman came by and looked at the small bike, explaining that it would be for his granddaughter because her dad doesn't have a lot of money and can't afford to buy her a bike. This encounter really warmed my heart. I've always enjoyed riding a bicycle, and I'm thrilled to be able to pass that privilege on to someone else. The big bike took a little longer, but someone picked it up. I told him it would need some work before being rideable, but he was happy to have it.

The other bikes have found a place in the shed, and the scrap lumber was also donated to someone who had creative plans for it. The drywall sheets were sold to someone doing a small home renovation project, and other random stuff was either sold or tossed.

Eventually I'll get around to clearing out one wall and fixing up the drywall and painting it. Then I'll shuffle everything around until all the walls and ceiling are painted. I'm thinking white mainly because I have a gallon or two left over. Are there better options?

Money is tight right now, but that's OK. The garage is not a high priority, but there are plans on the back burner. Meanwhile, I'm enjoying living life with my family now that I'm home every day.

 

[razrbak94]

Digging the Termi!
My little "fobra" project.

 

[Fastphil]

Digging the Termi!
My little "fobra" project.

Nice! Keep plugging way at that, sometimes the build is more rewarding than the final result. Someday I'll have time, money and space for a little fun-time car. Track, drag, lapping, not sure yet.

 

[razrbak94]

Nice! Keep plugging way at that, sometimes the build is more rewarding than the final result. Someday I'll have time, money and space for a little fun-time car. Track, drag, lapping, not sure yet.

Thank you. Just the wrapper is ugly at this point. Full MMS "maximum grip" & many other goodies. Has turned out to be a very fun & competent little fox. A little peak as the motor found its home... hci 347.

 

[Mannyf]

I like when I come in looking for garages and find mustangs in them.
razr, fox is coming along nicely.
Phil, lets see a side shot of the termi so I can see the wheels.

 

[Fastphil]

Phil, lets see a side shot of the termi so I can see the wheels.