Recent content by mschmitz

I installed a radon fan myself. Rented a 4" concrete hole saw and cut a hole in my basement floor. I cleaned-out around 8 gallons of gravel/soil under the slab (a large shop-vac works well for this) and attached PVC pipe, sealed hole with expanding foam. Ran PVC outside and attached a radon...

No. I borrowed the scaffold from my carpenter friend. Yes, It makes life much easier. Update: I splurged and added a brick patio in front of the shed. Mark

The most important tip I can mention is to take your time with every detail. Make sure you plan everything out in advance. Don't take any shortcuts. I've learned to triple check measurements now. I ended-up with a lot of ruined material because I made the wrong cuts. I ordered a set of...

Thanks. It's been a satisfying summer project. There seem to be lots of little details that I need to finish. Next year I plan on running electricity (130 ft buried). The Keller aluminum stairs came from Menards. $169. 22.5" x 54" R.O.. Mark

Tom, The pull-down ladder width is 22.5" so I had to cut one of the bottom truss chord and frame it out. I added 3 additional joists to strengthen the opening where the truss chord was cut. You could space the trusses at 24" OC which would allow stair installation without cutting any bottom...

Been finishing-up the barn. Got the doors built and mounted. I used 2x4's and 2x6's for the door frames. I ripped them on the table saw to remove the chamfer on the corners and then assembled them with pocket screws. Then glued the T1-11 panels to the frames. Finally trimmed out the exteriors...

I finished shingling the roof today. I went with 3 tab shingles over a heavy duty ice and water shield. Also installed a continuous ridge vent since I plan on using the loft for storage. Mark

I haven't totaled the materials cost yet but I'm guessing around $1500 so far (not including the concrete work). I still have to buy a majority of the shingles. The most expensive part so far was the T1-11 siding ($30 x 20). The siding sucked-up 6 gallons of good quality stain at $30 a gallon...

After last weeks rain I have decided I need to install gutters. The drip line in the soil tells the story. The mud splattering on the siding is one thing but I hate having all that water getting under the slab. Can't be a good thing. Mark

Got the soffit and fascia mostly installed this weekend. Bought a Hitachi 15g finish nailer on sale and it really made installing soffit fast and easy. It also came in handy for tacking trim pieces before nailing with heavier nails. I ran out of soffit material so I have to pick up another...

The trusses are 19.2' OC. Walls are 16' OC. I'm borrowing the scaffolding in the pictures. It should make roofing a lot easier. Going to be working on doors and trim this weekend. Mark

We made a lot of progress last weekend. We got the siding installed, roof sheathed and dried-in. To answer the question, we installed sub-fascia on the ends of the bottom chords of the trusses. We also installed 7" gable lookouts to provide a little weather protection (and to make it look...

Today we framed up the new barn. A great day to be outside banging nails. I went with 8' walls instead of 7' and I'm really glad I did. We installed 5/8 OSB panels on the bottom chord of the truss to form a storage attic. Loads of storage space. Tomorrow we hope to get the T1-11 siding...

Thanks for all the kind words. The nice thing about this truss design is the top and side 2x4 pieces are all identical. They are 5' long with 22.5 degree cuts on each end. I made a miter saw table so I could setup stop block and mass produce the cuts. The biggest cost so far has been the...

OK this doesn't really qualify as a garage but I think a lot of people here are interested in smaller projects. I've finally started building my new shed. It's going to be 12' x 16' with a 6' storage loft (I'm limited to 200 S.F. for storage sheds without submitting plans). Going with 7' walls...