Garage Evolution...lots of pics

[thelews]

My garage(s) has been an evolution of sorts. When we moved into the house in 1994, we had a three car attached garage. Nice, cluttered, attic, served all purposes. Painted walls, unfinished floor. In 2002, I did a redo...repaint, cabinets, UCoatit on the floor, workbench, etc. Since then I have cut a channel drain in front of the doors and redone the floor in industrial epoxy from www.cmscmr.com. Indestructible stuff. The Ucoatit kept lifting from hot tires.

In 2005 I began pursuing vintage cars and needed more space. Decided to build a second garage, as big as I could legally do within building codes. My concern was that it be functional, coordinate well with the existing house, and have a separate space for lawnmower, snowblower, compressor, etc., out of my main garage. The pictures detail the evolution...

Before: attached daily driver 3 car garage...

Refinished attached garage...

Cut down trees and layout of new vintage car/hobby garage...

Pouring footings below frostline...

Poured below grade walls...

Prep for bringing electrical and water from house to garage...

Framing...true craftsmen, father/son team...

Trellis, breezeway making the new garage "attached" so I could build it to 21 X 32, to my allowable setback limits...

Preparing for concrete floor...five drains, two directly under cars...

Exhaust outlet for winter engine work...

Construction of storage room...

This garage is built better than my house!!!

Shot blasting concrete in prep for epoxy slurry. About 1/8" thick with quartz thrown over it, allowed to settle and harden, swept off and finish epoxy coat applied. Showing a chip that came from the daily driver attached garage when the garage door installer recently broke off a piece removing the old garage door rails. The damage was easily fixed. All the Ucoatit was shot blasted off and the same process done in that garage.

9000 lb. two post lift...

The finished project...

 

[Chris05gto]

Nice job!!!!

 

[AndrewBigA]

awsome garage. i bet you love working in there on your old cars. enjoy it man!

 

[jonny01blaze]

Fantastic Build!! This is ver similar to the setup I hope to do one day. Did you have left over brick or did you just luck out? Nice car collection as well.

 

[JCQuick]

those don't look like daily drivers to me... but thats a very nice job. I'm curious about your problem with U-coat it i put it down 5 years ago and it has held up well i do park hot tires on it too

 

[bry@n]

Very nice. Thanks for sharing.

 

[blazemaster83]

very nice garage. this is one of my favs that i have seen on here so far!

 

[RbrtAWhyt]

Awesome job...jam up 'n jelly tight!

 

[Boyd Who]

Very nice job!

 

[tstukel]

Very nicely done. What are the dimensions of your second garage?

Love the 356; I had two of them a while back..

 

[Hardware]

Very Cool Love the trellis..

 

[thelews]

Thanks for the compliments, guys.

I do very much enjoy working in the new garage and am learning to do more things for myself on the vintage cars. Regular maintenance, tuning, interior work, detailing, general fixing is where I'm at now. I did pull the ****** on the 190 SL when the throw out bearing was binding and fixed that, but that's about as deep as I've gone. Suspension work, engine rebuilds, rear end rebuilds, brake jobs, welding, are all skills I need to learn. The problem is, other than paid professionals, I have no one to teach me. The guys who do the heavy lifting on my Mercedes, www.blackforestllc.com are a great bunch and top notch professionals. I'm very friendly with them and they're very helpful and willing, but, I can only make so much of a pest of myself. After all, they are running a business. I don't know qualified DIYers, locally, that want to just play on a weekend doing heavy lifting. My buddy for that is in Georgia. Anyway, I'll get there eventually.

Johnny, the brick is new. It's not an uncommon brick, but, I agree, I couldn't believe how it matched right out of the box. The house is 23 years old. The brick on the walks and aprons are the same, just the other surface.

JC, the cars in the pics are the toys. The daily drivers are in the other garage, the grey one that I did first. I think the UCoatit product is excellent. Water based and very easy to use. It lifted under the tires, but who's to say I prepared the floor as well as I should have. Also, there was some cement patching that was done that was not holding, no fault of the paint. After doing the hobby garage in the epoxy slurry, it was inevitable that I would eventually do the same in the daily garage. The stuff just performs unbelievably, I can't say enough about it. It's not cheap, but it is forever.

Garage is 21 X 32. Eight foot doors. Trellis, being attached, satisfied the city that the second garage is attached and allowed me to max out at those dimensions because of setback codes.

I've been fortunate to be able to pursue my hobby and build a garage I enjoy. I've been reading the "how does everyone afford so much" thread with great interest. I'm 56 now and closed a family business when I was 33 and just married. Had no money to speak of (I'd put it all in the business) and was living off my wife's $14K/year income. Took nine months off, it was some of the best time of my life. Went into the investment business, advising individuals and did well. I've never paid interest on a credit card balance and paid off the mortgages on my previous house and my current house (many years ago), the one you see. Since 1984, I have not had a new car. I used to buy cars for my wife and me for 6K, usually used Cadillacs, drive them for a few years and sell them for 3 or 4K. Just comfortable transportation. I started driving nicer cars in 1999, when I bought a '97 Mercedes with 6K miles on it. Three weeks ago, we just sold my wife's 1999 BMW 540i wagon that I bought in 2002 with 85K miles on it for $24K ($60K new). It had 200k miles on it and I got a whopping $4K for it. Bought her a 2004 Lexus RX330 with 28K miles on it for $19K. 4 wheel drive, hatchback, reliable...she'll be happy in the snow (unlike the BMW). What I've saved over the years not driving the latest and greatest, like many of my coworkers and neighbors, probably paid for the new garage. I live way below my means, save 50% or more of my after tax. No cleaning help, no landscape help, no snow plowers, one family trip/year, not a lot spent on clothes, no fancy private schools (although I'll have two in college next two years), not all the trappings that a lot of folks who can't afford it seem to need. I'm not depriving myself (as you can see), my wife and I just don't feel a lot of need for the things that end up being worthless. So, as someone in the other thread mentioned, sure, at today's mortgage rates, one conceivably could earn more on their money. But, it's not without risk. Paying off debt is the riskless investment. Without debt, a whole lot can go wrong, job, health, economy, weather, etc., before the trouble hits home for real. It's not how much you make (although it helps), it's how you choose to live.

 

[G-force]

You're land looks beautiful. And I absolutely love that covered walkway area.

Nicely done!

 

[daft_mx5]

Beautiful!
Love the SLs!

 

[356vintage]

Very nice garage space! I like your choice of cars.

 

[porschedude996TT]

Very nice, iteresting how you built around the outside post of the lift. Hop you can get service access to the pulley at the top of the post. Looks like you should be able to get to it...

 

[burtonbl]

WOW
Verry nice

What lift did you go with ?

 

[thelews]

Porsche and Burton. There is a finishing frame around the post, so removal opens it up pretty well. Worst case, have to cut away some wall board. When the installer came to put the lift in, he was appalled at having to cut into the wall board. I kept telling him to just do it, that it was designed to be done that way.

Don't crucify me, but for my purposes (a hobbyist), I went with www.americanautomotiveequipment.com import lift. Lift, shipping and installation ran me about $2500. 9000 lb., 2 post model, TP9A. I've had no issues and always use the locks.

 

[Nutty 5.0]

Very nice!

 

[ssleepingbeauty]

Very nice write up and a great build.

It's not how much you make (although it helps), it's how you choose to live.

Very well said

 

[junx069]

Quite impressive... really like the paver walkways as well. Very nice.

 

[chevazon]

I hate the layout of your garage. I hate the fact that you have a nice big house in a beautiful setting. I hate the 3 classic cars in your garage. I have never wanted to own anything like those 3 cars or a garage like yours.
I am not an intensly jealous person at all.



FFFAAANNNTTTAAASSSTTTIIICCCC !!!!
Love it to bits. (I`m really envious of course)

 

[Cool75280Z]

Very thoughful build. I could see that you were respectful of the home's architecture. The breezeway and landscape make the project appear seamless and "connected." I'm in the middle of my design and found more than one idea that I may borrow from your project. Thanks for sharing and have fun with your hobby.

 

[thelews]

Thanks again for the compliments, I'm pleased with how it turned out. I don't know if it's evident in the pictures, but the breezeway trellis is covered with a very mildly pitched roof. You have to be way back to see it, so it doesn't detract from the trellis look. However, it helps a lot when going out the the hobby garage when it's raining or snowing.

One of the best ideas came from my friend when doing his garage and that was to put a floor drain under each car space. It's great for washing, the water runs under the car, and, while I don't use it this way in this garage, if it's in a daily driver garage that sees winter, all the melting snow and slop runs under the car.

 

[bluesman2a]

Great space, and happy to see you're actually using it/learning. It's commendable.

I'm particularly interested in the posts you have going through the roof in this picture:

I have to do something VERY similar in the near future, and I'm interested in how you sealed around the post. Considering that wood will expand and contract, how did you connect the flashing to the post to keep the water out of the top?

Here's a link/pics of my situation:
http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=47507

Anything you can share would be appreciated, but if you could show some close-ups of the flashing around the columns where they go through the roofing material, it would really help me out.

 

[thelews]

This should help you out...once in the viewer window, you can click it again to get full size.

 

[thelews]

Some more...appears to work, heavy rains, lots of snow, no leaks. The trellis has a roof on it so the posts are exposed, but covered. Flexible silicone caulk around the top of the "boot." The wood is cedar.

 

[speedracer]

Beautiful house, garage and cars!!!! What year and model is the blue Merc? It is a real beauty.

 

[thelews]

Beautiful house, garage and cars!!!! What year and model is the blue Merc? It is a real beauty.

1961 190 SL No powerhouse, but, she is pretty. Merc's baby brother (sister?) to the 300 SL at the urging of Max Hoffman, the father of foreign sportscars in the USA, that Merc produce a more drivable and affordable alternative. About 26K were produced between 1955 and 1963.

The red SL in the garage is the next generation of the Merc SLs, designed by Paul Bracq

 

[GT_Rich]

I don't post on here much (although I look a lot), but I've come back and looked at this thread three times now. I made my wife look at it this time. Everything about your build is awesome. The architecture, layout, useful ideas, quality of the build....the list goes on. Nice job. Also, you have some extremely clean cars there! Congrats.

 

[TurnipTruck]

As a fellow snow country resident, this is a great idea!

 

[Jack Olsen]

One of my favorite body designs, ever.

Like you say, it's underpowered. But I think it's a better looking car than the gullwing.

 

[6 Grrrs]

I really love the finished garage & the Benz's are all really nice.

 

[Steve from Socal]

Very nice set up and good to see another Benz head here, I personally like 113 Pagoda's over 190's. I am a coupe guy myself 111, 124 and, 126. Had 54' 220 coupe but couldn't keep it(grrr) and I am on the look out for a 215 CL65

My first MB was a 1970 280Sl, sold it to buy my Bonanza. First love is hard to get over

Steve

 

[thelews]

Thanks again for the compliments, guys.

Turnip, what's nice is the garage is no less than 45 degrees. With the drain in the room, all of the snow melts off the blower(s) when we're finished and doesn't run all over the garage or freeze under the door. With the side door, it's in and out without entering the car space at all.

Jack, obviously I like the 190 SL design. But, the 300 SL roadster is one beautiful car that performs too. $700K buys a really nice one!

Steve, my 113 is a great driving car, I really enjoy it. It's significantly improved engineeringwise over the 190 SL. Pretty timeless design, while noticeable, still doesn't look overly vintage even today. The 111/112 coupes and convertibles are fantastic cars. Personally, I like the coupe, one of the nicest cars MB ever produced. Do you ever frequent www.sl113.org ? All Pagoda all the time.

 

[Steve from Socal]

Nah I have these urges to take a rusty 113 and put 124/129 suspension under it and stick a 6.0 M119 in it. I have too many things to finish before I can start looking at car ****.

Steve

 

[marty_p]

Looks like she's always been there!

Seamless transition, buddy!

 

[onewaydave]

I like the structure and design of the connecting walkway. Robust timbers make the look. Now the Mercedes? might need to clean 'em up a bit

 

[bmwpower]

Nice place!

Any worries with the suspension droop with the car on the lift? I assume it's there long term?

Did the township give you a hard time with the rear decking without a railing? Looks like quite a drop to the ground.

 

[thelews]

Nice place!

Any worries with the suspension droop with the car on the lift? I assume it's there long term?

Did the township give you a hard time with the rear decking without a railing? Looks like quite a drop to the ground.

During snow months, the 356 goes on the lift and the Benzes stay on the ground. I did not have a problem with the suspension.

Interesting about the deck walk, I never gave it a thought and the inspector did not say anything. You are right, you wouldn't want to fall off it.

Marty and Dave. Thanks. We really like the breezeway structure. The garage looks like it has always been there and I think the breezeway setup is even nicer than without it. It also sets up a focal point when you step toward the backyard with the structure tying the two garages together.