Between 705 & 1200 SQ/FT Double Bee Garage (28x40 stick framed, 12ft ceiling with 10/12 pitch floored attic)

[robb1887]

So after many years of designing, reading building code, AutoCad revisions, and dreaming, I realized that my time to value ratio to get my garage-mahal built myself was likely impossible. Although capable, life changes, two kids and more things to do than time allows I finally broke down and had a contractor come out and quote my plans. Long story short the 3-ish years of planning and designing the perfect for me garage doesn't align with the current climate and my wallet.

Fast forward a few weeks later and I have signed a contract with the previous mentioned contractor to get a garage built. He is a no-frills detached garage specific contractor to build dried in boxes with no accessories. Expected to start sometime in March and take approximately 45days start to finish.

Basics:
28' Deep
40' Wide
6" CMU foundation wall (4 row)
2x4 framed walls
12' Interior ceiling height
2x 10x8ft high lift garage doors to left on south wall
1x std man door right on south wall
3x 3'x4' awning windows on North wall, set high
2x W12x26 I-beams for completely clear span floor
10/12 pitched roof
Completely floored "attic" 1/2 story
1x double hung on east gable (1/2 story)
2x double hung on west gable (1/2 story)
Internal stairs in North east corner to minimize floor space impacts
Siding and roof to match the house
14'x26' pad in front of the two garage doors

After the fact I'll have an electrical ran, with plans to insulate, drywall and condition the space at a minimum in the near future.

Expectations is the left garage bay is to be segregated car storage parking with a 4-post lift.
Right will have provisions for a mobile 2 post lift (Targeting a Triumph C7000)

I do a lot of automotive work, but dabble in wood working, and metal fabrication. I've started a side hustle, "Double Bee Garage", I plan to have based out of this space as well.

Dreams of a 3/4 bath and mop sink have been nixed due to cost to retrofit into my current septic system.

I am excited to have:
Dedicated shop space
Daily Driver inside parking

I should have realized this years ago when I was starting to plan and semi overwhelmed but I am stubborn and wanted to DIY. I could have had this done over 3 years ago (before COVID hikes) and been using it all this time in lieu of dreaming, but here were are.

More to follow when things really kick off, but I wanted to share my excitement of my signed contract and hope to provide updates sooner than March.

I welcome any an all shoulda coulda woulda advice for best execution.

 

[PugetDude]

Stub in the rough plumbing now, even if you don't connect it. You will get tired of walking to the house every time you need water or a bathroom break. Can always finish it out later as time and $$ allow.

Good luck on your build.

 

[jarhead]

10/12 pitch, WOW

 

[Adaylate]

PugetDude has it right. Stub it in now, and start saving.
My carbarn also has a 10-12 pitch with an upstairs. Yup, it is steep!
That's why guys younger than me are doing the roof!
What part of the country?

 

[robb1887]

Middle Mid-Atlantic near the coast.

I had considered plumbing originally, but long term plan at this house and investment to install it doesn't math. I'm on septic and would required a grinder/lift pump to get the plumbing tied into my existing system. The pit and pump alone are $3k+ to meet my county requirements. I may still stub in the plumbing through the foundation, but don't expect it to ever be hooked up by me. I will be putting extra conduit through for growth in electrical/communcation needs 100%.

10/12 allows for a usable "second story" and is nearly optimized angle for solar on my latitude, though with the same scenario as the plumbing don't expect it to ever be flexed under my tenure but wanted to provide the possibility. And yes, had I even GC'd the build myself and done most of the work the roof and foundation would have been sub-ed out to professionals.

 

[robb1887]

I'm a few weeks late to keep this updated but my garage started back on May 7th. It was very slow going at first but as of today we are flooring the "attic"/second story.

May 7th:
The team showed up to dig and set-up for the footer
Start of the day:


Preps for the footer





Steel beam footers with reinforcements




May 8th:
Code inspector stopped by before lunch, footers were poured that afternoon. I had previously discussed with the owner about adding additional conduit but it wasn't written into the contract as he verbally said it was no issue and this happened faster than I thought to talk to the foreman and missed my opportunity. If I need to expand, I'll just add service access on the back wall as it has near zero visibility for 99% of people.







May 13th:
Blocks were laid, to keep costs down and get to 12ft interior ceilings, there was an extra row of block added above ground level.


May 30th:
There was a big gap for reasons unknown, I figured they needed to wait for the CMU to setup fully before getting the interior slab done but I wasnt expecting 2+ weeks. They finally came back out and setup for the interior slab pour. I had to talk to the foreman to move the expansion seam from the photo'ed location for a planned 2 post list in the middle bay and don't have documentation of the footers they dug post these photos with reinforcements as that happened while I was at work but the wife said she saw them digging and cutting stuff prior to pouring.






Planned 2 post is a Triumph C7000 mobile 2-post lift, reading about on here and my intended uses I placed the center of the base plates 12.5' from the front wall edge and 130" outside edge to outside edge. They are 15x18" baseplates and my foreman stated they dig 24x24" pads 8" deep so I should have some wiggle room for placement once I get to pull the truck in if I decide to shift it a little bit.

June 4th:
Pad was poured and cut. Also, the required cavities in the CMU wall we grouted.




June 5th:
Lumbar delivery (5'-3" wife for scale if you can spot her)


June 10th:
THE big day for really seeing some progress. Walls up, headers in place, one I-beam in position and some initial sheathing done.








June 11th:
After the progress made on the 10th, I felt like yesterday was a huge let down as just some sheathing was added and the 2nd I-beam was still MIA. Then I turned and noticed they had precut all the rafters and eaves for assembly and staged the posts for the I-beam.

 

[PugetDude]

Nice! Looking forward to seeing it framed and sheathed.

 

[robb1887]

June 12th:
Second I-beam got lifted into place and the attic deck was completed & eave ladders assembled

I also had my neighbor his is a commercial AC&R guy come over to check out my space and get some ideas on how/what makes the most sense for heating/cooling.




Uncut staircase

 

[robb1887]

June 18th: All the wall sheathing got finished and the rafters were raised








June 19th: Roof was sheathed and holes cut out for the windows/doors/stairs












June 21st: stairs, windows and exterior wrap went on









June 24th: Man door, awning, stair case railing and a bunch of clean up






June 28th: Vinyl delivery



July 2nd: 1st round of vinyl/trim








July 3rd: Roof in a day!






July 5th: 2nd round of vinyl/trim, This crew was very messy day to day which was not exciting since we had just cleaned up for ~2hrs on the 4th before people came over.







July 6th & 7th: 3rd & 4th vinyl/trim. The heat was pretty back they guys were coming very early and leaving at lunch time (11ish). I was lucky enough to have 6 sticks of vinyl left over from when I built my shed and stored it as they would have been a box short to finish yesterday without them. The replacements will be paid back in 3 weeks or so. Roll up doors are scheduled for Thursday and they expect to form out the exterior pad sometime this week but its dependent on when they can schedule a truck and their other workload availability.









I've started to plan out my electrical layout based a lot off Delta Garage.

Happy to hear experiecnes from wiring/light/electrical decisions from anyone.

Also curious as I plan to heat and cool this space, is it worth the effort to get the CMU wall filled with something to fill the empty cavities that I can get to? I assume anything is better than nothing but I cannot find any good data on a product to use that I could get ahold of or to ask the insulation/drywall guys when I talked to them after electrical

 

[thammel]

Great looking build! Your siding looks identical to mine. Mine is bottom beaded Heartland (now ProVia) in antique white.

wiring: I did it all myself after minimum done by electricians. I even changed out the panel for one with more slots. I ran two separate 20 amp lines to quad boxes about 54" off the floor. Put them about every 6-8 feet or so. I also ran the line down from the top to make insulating around them easier. Be sure to think ahead of everything and more. Lift, compressor, welder, future electric vehicle charging, wired internet, ceiling fan, sound system speakers, overhead lights, outside flood lights, exterior outlets, power for mini -splits, etc.

lighting: I'm very happy with my overhead 8' long led t8 based lights. I have four 8' lights above each bay and these are separately switched. I light the 5000k lights and buy frosted bulbs but plastic not glass (no breakage concerns).

I did all the insulating myself. I will say that the garage and attic above are better insulated than the house. Maybe the 6" walls make a huge difference, but the attention to detail when insulating also makes a big difference.

 

[robb1887]

July 12th:
Exterior pad form was put up, unfortunately to date the weather has been exceptionally wet so nothing has been laid down. They also removed the support stud in the middle of the attic.





July 15th:
Door company showed up. I also stopped and picked up a few studs to start framing out the knee walls upstairs to get an idea of who much and what height I wanted to make them.






I've been surfing the electrical subforum and will be playing around with the software if its still available shooting for the benchmark 100FC. The dual I-beam makes my layout a little more complicated than similar sized 28x40x12' flat roofs unfortunately

 

[robb1887]

July 24-26: I started roughing out the knee walls. I ran out of time on Monday the 26th and have a bit left to finish on the south wall. I also started hanging the random assortment of electrical boxes downstairs to get a rough visualization of layouts and how many more I'll want (unphotoed).





I also met with an electrician to get estimates for him to do the wiring work, I suspect based on their rough numbers without a full estimate they will be out of budget and I will be doing the majority in sweat equity as I cannot justify their costs. At a minimum he'll get me the load letter I need to get my power company talking to me for my options from them to assist and get the power out there as they want me sucking off the "teet" of the grid the sooner the better.

July 30th: The weather finally gave us a break and their schedule aligned to get the exterior pad poured.

 

[robb1887]

Welp... I've done a terrible job of paying back with updates what I've gotten from GJ, so I'm going to start getting this thread back current. The contractor I used for the structure offers exactly zero auxiliary, no electrical, no plumbing, etc. As soon as they said they got the final inspection done and I got a electrician contractor through a family friend come take a look.

He gave me an outrageous quote to just supply the shop with the power feed which included tearing up my existing driveway and fence to get to the main panel in the house without repairs in the neighborhood of $8000 to get it end to end. This included zero work in the shop past installing the sub and wiring the feed into it. At that point I realized I would become an electrician.

I have had my yellow team drill/driver/impact for years but getting through these columns let the smoke out at some point and I ended up making a red team switch. The Milwaukees are fantastic.

So we started with a TON of holes in my brand new studs in August 2024.



I think this is the final photo of the drill when it let the smoke loose


Upstairs got its holes done as well.



Red team entered the chat:


October managed most of the planned boxes and semi move some stuff from the attached garage to make some space. This included the MCoupe that is the primary resident of the Shop.



Mid-October I began running the lighting circuits (14/2). Downstairs will be on 4 circuits. In my head the downstairs is 3 "bays". I wired it for "entry" lights which has 2ea 8ft LED Barrina lights (https://amxn.to/3GhoN0O) at each end of the 3 bays. and then each bay has a switch for the additional 4 lights per bay





I used a set of saw horses and PVC pipe to suspend the roll to pull all this alone, it worked out well enough.


Upstairs has the homerun for the stairs and 2 circuits for the (front and back) for the 2nd floor.


It got a 14/3 ran down to have a 2-way switch top and bottom of the stairs


I also ran a 14/3 for a 2-way switch for the entry lights to have a switch between the garage doors as well as the man door in case I pull into a dark garage with an car opener in the future



Switches upstairs but in, I later temp installed the "front" upstairs lights, stairs, and entry downstairs lights to allow night work in the space


I grabbed the wrong switch, or was in the wrong box and I wasn't paying attention so the 3rd from the left was a temporary left over from a previous project to get things hooked up until I could get the correct one


Entry 2-way switch between the garage doors


Lower stairs light circuit


It was supposed to be for very temporary use but I hotwired the end of an extension cord to the panel to allow the temp lighting to work of a very long cord from the house. While it worked, it's not really recommended and I unplugged it at the house anytime I wasn't actively working in the shop. I just hopped the hot wire to both phases to allow use 120V on either side of the LC. This ran 13 LED lights and 2 outlets until the feed wire got installed (much delayed in June 2025)


Downstairs lights temp installed



Upstairs has primarily the same Barrina lights but in 4fts (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07Q49DNGS/?tag=atomicindus08-20), I had 2 extra 8fts from the sets downstairs that I targeted to what I hope to be a large scanning/clean assembly table area. I also used the 4fts for the upper and lower stairs lights.


We're into November 2024 now
I have 4ea 20A outlet branches downstairs daisy chained ~4-6 ft (Circuits A,B,C,D) and 2ea 20A branches upstairs (Circuits 1, 2). The only circuit wiring I wasn't able to pull by myself was this 6/4 I put in for possible powder coat oven usage. Luckily my neighbor was home and available to help me push while I pulled the last 3 floor I had just enough of the 6/4 left over that I threw in a box just next to the LC later for possible EV plugs in future use?






For the large gauge stuff I was lucky to have VIBRANT AN hose shear set that worked well


I ran a bunch of 10/3 for known 220 circuits that didn't need a 4 wire. But at the time also didn't know what I would need in the future and wanted to "pre-wire" some options so I went ahead with 3 10/4 branches downstairs and 2 upstairs for future expansion which came in handy as just last month I picked up a nice mill and lathe.





I ran 2ea 6/3 outlets for plasma/welder options in opposite corners



I realized way too late into the project that these Irwin Speedbore supreme would take an 11mm socket and any standard 3/8 extension to make it any length needed. I would have gone this route from the beginning and skipped the non-supremes as they got very tired at the end of this project unlike the big boy "supreme" version.


This particular stud group required the innovation due to odd spacing with the I-beam column on one side and the odd spacing for the headers.


Load Center filling up:


Threw a soffit outlet for Christmas time as I love to hang lights


And EMT tube for exterior camera power feed and future TV expansion



Rough in wiring cable totals:
1050ft of 12/2
1000ft 14/2
250ft 10/2 (some left over)
250ft 10/3
125ft 6/2
125ft 14/3
50ft 6/3

That's what I have currently for electrical photos for interior rough-in. I moved onto some insulation/air sealing in December that I'll post up next.

 

[robb1887]

Insulation and air sealing:

So when I was planning to build the garage myself I caught the "full air sealed" building concept for efficiency as I plan to heat/cool the space year round here in the Mid-Atlantic 4 season weather. My no frills builder wanted nothing to do with Zip sheathing and or Zip systems, so I did my best to do it retroactively. This included all visible sheathing seams being foam sealed, and creating DIY soffit to ridge vents in the rafter bays to exclude the 2nd story space from the roof deck heat.

All the pre-packaged rafter vent solutions for insulation installation were cheap(er) Styrofoam with horrid reviews or well reviewed and ungodly expensive. After some napkin math I found that the foil faced 0.5" thick poly-iso sheets with a 1.5" spacer would fit into my 2x10 rafter bays and result in a 2x8 rafter bay cavity for R30 rockwool.

So we made a BUNCH of 1.5" spacers from 1x2 strapping


The spacers were stapled to the rafters with the 1.5" length vertical to provide more than double the required minimum ventilation area required from soffit to ridge. The 0.5" polyiso was then stabled to the spacers.



In December it wasn't a large differential, but when ambient were 65 outside this seemed to be pretty good, all in all. (more to follow when I finished installing this air sealing in June)



Wash, rinse, repeat



Sheets were butted and extended past the 2x6 collar ties.





I was a little ADHD and ordered my R15 2x4 stud bay insulation late December. It was a little dicey on the trailer but made it home fine. I did have to go back in and buy better straps when I picked it up.



Air sealing the sheathing now that I had the rafter bays foam boarded as I didnt know how far each can would go of the spray foam








I also foamed all the corner joints of the rafter bays


R15 getting thrown up, I hadn't had my electrical rough-in inspected yet so the first bits were installed not to cover any electrical.









A buddy lent me a heater to make the winter months more comfortable.


Upstairs going in:




Headers got foamed as well.


Rough in/concealment approved electrical was approved at the end of December and allowed me to cover all the wiring



Inspector wanted some nailing plates installed in a few places so we went around with those





I also added a air compressor drain line to the exterior so I wouldn't have to worry with it with a small p-trap under the insulation.

Air "vent", dryer drain, solenoid valve tank drain ports upstairs.


With the heater running and most the insulation in the downstairs got pretty comfortable to work in even in January.


And I'm not sure anyone had noticed but my knee walls had no access into that space in the prior framing as I had originally just "written it off". I later came to my senses and think I will be making accesses in the downstairs 3'rd from the long wall floor joints to run future services across the space and these also can "come up" into the knee wall attics, so I made access openings which required re-routing some of my circuit wiring.



I also finally decided to install some exterior lighting so I could see coming in and out in the evening






And the Minisplit disconnects outside (or at least one, the second I'm waiting for my buddy to get me the matching one)


R15 installation continues to completion save for a few spots I still needed access to foam or the temp "staging" over the stairs to access the overhead








And a few bags of "waste" R15 I may shred and shove in my CMU cavities.


Anyone have good, efficient, easy suggestions to better R-values in CMU voids?

More insulation and air sealing to come, but we'll finish this post at the R15 "completion"

 

[thammel]

Great work! Reminds me of my electrical work and insulation. It all takes time! I saved my homemade unspooler and have used it on occasion. Are you going to (or have already) run any telephone or ethernet wiring?

 

[robb1887]

Great work! Reminds me of my electrical work and insulation. It all takes time! I saved my homemade unspooler and have used it on occasion. Are you going to (or have already) run any telephone or ethernet wiring?

None ran yet. I buried a 1" conduit from the house to the shop over the power feed that finished this last Monday. I expect an Ethernet out to the shop and possibly some low voltage alarm for smoke/heat alarms back to the house maybe. My mesh wifi network wasn't strong enough when testing nodes out there.

 

[robb1887]

Insulation/air sealing continued.

As previously mentioned I planned the rafter bays to be filled with R30 Rockwool. When I placed my order with a local supply yard for my 2nd story Rockwool I planned R30 for the bays and R23 for the Collar ties as they are 2x6, their was too good to be true and long story short their supplier wouldn't fill the order due to their quote error after I asked the supply house to validate the pricing was valid before paying. Fast forward to having to re-order through a standard box store they had order minimum quantities and multiples. The minimum of R23 was way too much and the multiples of R30 didnt align well. Taking a look at the sqft coverage I needed if I combined the two aligned very well so I ended up furring out the 2x6 collar ties to 2x8 sizing with riping a 2x4 in half and nailing it to the top of the collar ties before adding my foam board and planned to use R30 throughout. The "attic" space received 1.5" R-9.6 foil faced boards as well to keep as much heat out of this space as I plan to use it for storage and clean/electronic work space

Feburary-ish:




R30 delivery:


Shop work halted as I have a yearly car event that I had a BUNCH of work to get done so fast forward to May when I took Shop work back up continuing the 1.5" boar installs.




Sealing off the bottom of the rafter bays at the soffitt:


Sealing off the top of the rafter bays at the "attic space":


This is when I was able to get REAL heat reduction of the foam board install efforts at the end of May 2025:

Attic space/roof deck temps:


The similar surface of the thinner 0.5" R-3.2 foam board:


I then realized my electrical permit was going to turn into a pumpkin at the end of June and switched gears some. I had a circuit branch planned to jump over to the shed so I could add some lighting and a few outlets for a tickle charger or if I planned to go electric yard implements keep the chargers and batteries together.

I tried hand digging this one at about 20ft, 18" depth in 1.25" conduit, the building contractor did put that bit of conduit stubbed in at least but it wouldnt have fit my 2/0-2/0-1-4 planned feed to the shop so I repurposed it for the circuit out to the shed.




And the 8k quote had me thinking creatively for getting under the driveway as I really didnt want to patch it after cutting and trenching so I dug the 26" depth holes on either side to get under the existing driveway.



Stabbed into the subpanel with a conduit body and buried the conduit at the shop to 24" depth


And a random side quest opportunity presented itself the beginning of June where a car friends brother-in-law's small marine shop was closing up and he had a 50's/60's mill and lathe that was likely going to be abandoned at the end of the lease. Long story short I now have a 12x36 Sheldon Lathe and a Millrite Powermatic mill.




The mill has an issue in the motor gearbox, but it was too good a deal to pass and I can figure out a motor replacement worst case.

Now back on project, I had issues figuring out how to tie in the MHF 2/0-2/0-1-4 into the house's main panel and the GJ delivered with the adivce of using a 4x4x12 trough to get a "junction box" that would allow me to zig zag the wires in the wall without switching to a SEER or having too much issue getting around the exterior meter base/conduit and into the large KO in the existing LC.

The KO was on the right side of the bottom of the panel that more or less aligned with the meter base's conduit on the exterior wall. And the top of the meter overlapped the bottom of the LC.








The MHF I had already in hand, USE-2 needing to be in conduit when ran inside of course.


Weather didnt cooperate with me and got really wet for a while so I wasnt able to keep working outside to get the feed done so I switched back to R30 work.

Moving it all upstairs:


Finalizing some air sealing work:



And focues on getting the sunniest side of the roof insulated



Can you spot the rafter bay that was a little "wide"?




The weather finally broke around the 20th of June, 10 days before I had to be DONE with all my permit checks. I ended up smashing a PVC sch40 pipe through the clay at 26" (24" required) from end to end with the use of a string from hole to hole to aim left/right and a level to get up/down. Over the 15ft length the 26" depth I migrated about 3" right of planned line path which was promising.

I used 3ea 5ft pieces with couplings glued to one side and screwed to the other and extended my hole to ~6.5 ft in length and smashed them through with my sledge.





To pull the PVC back out I used a ratchet strap tied to the end of the pipe and used my shovel as a lever to drag it back out of the sticky clay.

Starting to make up the house connections:



I redid the PVC smashing tunnel at ~16" for a 1" conduit for communications. The amount of clay at that depth was significantly less and the process was significantly easier. (Don't mind the frayed wiring, its just telephone which in 7-years has never been in service since we moved in)


A little zig and zag later of the conduits and they are made up into the house:



And left open at the other end of the driveway until I could go get a trencher



Enter the trencher:




I was lucky and didn't find any legacy fence post concrete blocks that was about 1ft in from the fence we put in closer to the property line (about 7"). Why the PO had it so far set back from the edge was unknown.

And finally the feeder pull itself on the 27th for the inspection scheduled for the 30th.







125A subpanel breaker installed:


and made up in the shop



I've got to upload the photos for the comms conduit install to go further. But the inspection went without issue. They passed me and only mentioned that the "spare circuits" terminating but unconnected in the LC could cause an arc fault concern and suggested putting wire nuts on the ends of the unused wiring.

 

[robb1887]

So mostly present day, I don't have any photos of the trench backfilled, but yall can use your imagination.

The final electrical inspection went smoothly, the feeder was buried ~4" then had caution tape laid down with a little extra dirt on top. The 1" conduit was then put in at ~14-16" depth for whatever future need I have.




I'll have more 1" conduit running into an access space in the stud bay overhead somewhere, be it the 2nd story "kick wall attic" or just in the floor joist space


Bend at the driveway up front, and down the turn down the fence line.





I'm trying to find a local supply house where I can get Perlite masonry fill insulation locally (and reliably) and looking into Drylok Extreme for the CMU sealing to get the foundation squared away.

Looking to contract the drywall out at a minimum for downstairs but possibly both depending on the cost. 5/8 sheets will be difficult ans slow to hang myself where they can knock it out in a couple days. I want to get moved in already.

 

[robb1887]

Well good news. I found a local supply house, a local Feed and Seed style mom and pop shop that had 4cuft bags of Perlite in stock. I snagged a few on my way home to see how it would work and so far, well enough. I'll see how far these first 5 go for the fill and supplement up to the 10 estimated from what I can find online calculators for void fill volume.

Fun fact, and proof why men have a hard time throwing boxes away, the AEM gauges I ordered for the Coupe are the perfect size to fabricate a make shift funnel and scoop to get this stuff installed. Definitely wish I would have known about it during newcon, but I should be able to get the majority filled without much issue, but there are a few that will be tricky to get to around the staircase landing and under the 2x6 bottom plate of the south facing wall that covers the 6" CMUs nearly completely.

 

[HogDude]

Well good news. I found a local supply house, a local Feed and Seed style mom and pop shop that had 4cuft bags of Perlite in stock. I snagged a few on my way home to see how it would work and so far, well enough. I'll see how far these first 5 go for the fill and supplement up to the 10 estimated from what I can find online calculators for void fill volume.

Fun fact, and proof why men have a hard time throwing boxes away, the AEM gauges I ordered for the Coupe are the perfect size to fabricate a make shift funnel and scoop to get this stuff installed. Definitely wish I would have known about it during newcon, but I should be able to get the majority filled without much issue, but there are a few that will be tricky to get to around the staircase landing and under the 2x6 bottom plate of the south facing wall that covers the 6" CMUs nearly completely.

I had never heard of Perlite before. The interwebber says it is good for insulating, both sound and thermal. Let us know why you chose this and how well it works. Nice build!

 

[Mr onetwo]

From our friends at the Perlite Institute

 

[robb1887]

Initial inspections with my laser thermometer were a ~5° differential from the center of 7 filled voids at the bottom row to an empty void just past the filled ones. I suspect over the ~215sqft of filling the advantages will be notable. This was on a 96° day on the north wall which only sees off angle afternoon sunlight (in the afternoon). Heat index was in the triple digits and was showing 83 vs 88° on the interior surface.




Edit: I reshot these same spots in the morning and there was negligible difference on the interior surface, so the perlite is mostly effective on the direct sunlight heat soak. I imagine, once the space is conditioned it will be effective keeping the space insulated

I'm still attempting to make it through my first 4cuft bag to see how far it goes to get a good guess on final amount needed. I've been doing a few minutes here and there in my free time since it does not take a significant setup/tear down to get a few scoops thrown in before I've got other obligations.

 

[txvwnut]

That's the same stuff the walls at the day job are filled with. We thought they were solid concrete filled until I made hole for an airline to pass through.

 

[Aladinsane07]

Awesome project! I'll be following along.

 

[robb1887]

Perlite fill is going very slow due to limited access, definitely a plan ahead thing for future/new builds as this would have been WAY easier before the framing.

I had some hours in the day yesterday without wife/kids so I went back to the R30 install upstairs.





The R30 mountain is getting smaller at least. One more full day I think it will be finished up. The ceiling will be slower due to all the electrical I have to cut around.


The rafter bays at the end, need more careful cuts hence why they are open still and the one in the center needs the lineset for the ceiling mount mini-split before it gets filled.

 

[CrimsnTide]

Very Nice!! Gives me some inspiration on pursuing doing mine. With these types of builds, I'm sure many are curious as to cost. The electrical bid you received was a lot, but probably the norm. Would you care to give a cost or breakdown to your project? (Minus the mill and lathe of course). In "planning" mine and getting some rough estimates, I am getting some serious quotes - just for the slab/concrete work. I'm in need of some stem wall work as my area is a bit uneven. But with digging foundation, laying the block and pouring slab, I am getting bids NORTH of $30k... Again, just for the slab - no plumbing... (I'm located in East Tenn.) So, I am curious if there was a breakdown from your contractor? Slab? Framing? rafters? Wrap? Roof? You've done an excellent job documenting and I can see where you have done work to eliminate some some expenses that keep coming. I've got more questions if you are willing:
1) Was there ANY discussion on going with "Attic" trusses vs. contractor doing themselves?
2) Any discussion on the engineered joists instead of the 2x10(?)
3) I am assuming from the steel I beams this was engineered. Your plans? Contractors? Would you recommend architect? Who submitted to city/county?

Any information you could provide would be helpful and informative. Again, GREAT job and nicely memorialized....

 

[robb1887]

Been a whirlwind of a few months with family, funcar and shop work... I'm going to switch to "project grouping" some of the updates as I bounced around the last few months as things got "stopped" or "prioritized" due to weather.

Insulation: DONE
I finished the last bit of insulation just this week, finally. What a pain. The last of it was around the upstairs ceiling cassette that I still wanted the insulation later from the roof deck, so I had to build a 2x8 box to house the R30 rock wool. This of course got a 1.5" sheet of faced poly iso on top. I will say my level of effort was low here for the sake of getting done and did not fully seal or polyiso wrap it (sides). The roof deck when doing the finals was 96° the top of the poly iso was 87° and the insulation bottom layer was 63° from the cool fall days, which was a cool last final check of the effort.

I also ran some hard board in the knee walls to keep the insulation protected if I ran services or storage through the kick wall areas which is their targeted purpose for cutting the accesses. It also got a quick bit of lighting as once the drywall is up, these areas would be pitch black. As this was done hind sight, they had to be ran off the 20A outlet circuit, which less cost effective, I didnt want to mess with getting them back to the upstairs 15A lights feeder line.



I had to rip each 4x8 sheet in half unfortunately to get it to fit into the space, while not ideal, it works for the need.







And the last of the insulation save for the mini split accommodations at this point



I ran the inside conduit for any communication service wire into the "services floor joist" that will have access panels across the ceiling and pass throughs into the knee walls above


This was around July/August and while the insulation was working it was still 85+ and humid. A buddy lent me a window unit to keep it reasonable which worked surprisingly well even in the large space. The air tightness and insulation efforts once again proven effective.

Temp installed:


Kept me from turning into puddles finishing these panels out.


I also realized I could cut out these bottom plate to better roll in and out of these spaces


Lighting:


I ordered some "Green Hinges" to better seal the roll up doors. They accidently sent two of #2 sets and no #3s but quickly fixed the error without any hassle


I blocked out the floor joist access points for running air lines or whatnot across the shop and over the i-beams


Caution flags are just for reminders for the drywallers

Neighbor is helping me with these


2.5 ton upstairs, 1.5 ton upstairs

I'm running all the upstairs line in 3" PVC in case they freeze or what not and it will drain outside from the soffitt vent instead of soaking the insulation.


Neighbor had a high lift drywall jack, so I threw up a panel to mount the wall unit downstairs. After doing this one partial panel, I definitely am NOT doing the 140ish 5/8 throughout. Yes I know it's not required. I want the added thermal mass & sound deadening. Its a few hundred up front for long term gains.





The outdoor unit universal mounts are all junk and mount the units low after hanging. I wanted mine up off the ground and attached to the CMU wall. So I got my own 3" angle and made my own.






I got all of the CMU that were not grouted filled in perlite, it took 11 and smidge bag, I suspect I would have been closer to 12 but the short wall between the man and roll doors was fully grouted after I had taken the original block photos.


My hole saw paid the price finding 4 of the supposed to be empty voids were fully filled before giving up on that section, the bottom plate was a 2x6 so I could not see inside the cores of the 6" blocks.


And of course the last hole around the stair platform ate my hole saw. I suppose its better than the first or second, but I tried for a couple hours before giving up and burying it in perlite



If you have to mount epoxy studs into your CMU wall, don't be like me and believe your battery operated "hammer" drill will do the job. I suffered through 6.5 of the 8 required holes before I was lucky my neighbor's fencing contractor offered his real hammer drill that took about 30 seconds to finish the last 1.5 in 30ish seconds vice the 1ish hour I had been at it. Go rent a real one or buy it. Anything but use a red team battery operated one.





304 SS 1/2-13 studs set 4.5" deep with Simpson 2part epoxy ET-3G (the caulk tube looking one). One tube was barely enough, but I had to make two mesh screens for hitting voids in the CMU with the hammer drill even though I was targeting the webs.


Before I mounted the minisplit mounts I wanted to seal the block. The weather took a good turn and I had to switch projects again, I dug out the stem walls down to foundation slab and then Drylock extreme coated the entire perimeter.


The most unsatifying back breaking work, painting gray blocks gray.



Fit check of the final mounts before powder coat. All 8 studs were targeted from the holes on the mounts but somehow all 4 lower studs weren't even close to correct so I ended up plug welding, retargeting with blue check and re-drilled.


Vibration dampers from McMaster-Carr PN: 9213K252


Mounted back from powder. They asked me if this color the had left over was "close enough"




Back inside to get that one panel mudded for a bit of paint behind where the unit will hang so I dont have to worry about painting around it later.



I poorly planned the previously mention insulation 2x8 pop up box above the upstairs unit, but made it work. The 2x8 landed where the studs needed to go to mount the unit, a few drilled holes later and an addition 2x4 and the hanging mount studs were all in place. I cut out the 1.5" polysio and blocked it with some 2x4 scrap to ensure any weight was transfer to real wood.



Catching up to yesterday finally, the last of the insulation is in and i just need to put the last of the panels in the north knee wall



Hope to have the mini splits running in the next week or two and then turning over to the contractor for drywall before Christmas.

Hope to move in the first of the year after paint and trim.

 

[robb1887]

Very Nice!! Gives me some inspiration on pursuing doing mine. With these types of builds, I'm sure many are curious as to cost. The electrical bid you received was a lot, but probably the norm. Would you care to give a cost or breakdown to your project? (Minus the mill and lathe of course). In "planning" mine and getting some rough estimates, I am getting some serious quotes - just for the slab/concrete work. I'm in need of some stem wall work as my area is a bit uneven. But with digging foundation, laying the block and pouring slab, I am getting bids NORTH of $30k... Again, just for the slab - no plumbing... (I'm located in East Tenn.) So, I am curious if there was a breakdown from your contractor? Slab? Framing? rafters? Wrap? Roof? You've done an excellent job documenting and I can see where you have done work to eliminate some some expenses that keep coming. I've got more questions if you are willing:
1) Was there ANY discussion on going with "Attic" trusses vs. contractor doing themselves?
2) Any discussion on the engineered joists instead of the 2x10(?)
3) I am assuming from the steel I beams this was engineered. Your plans? Contractors? Would you recommend architect? Who submitted to city/county?

Any information you could provide would be helpful and informative. Again, GREAT job and nicely memorialized....

Sorry for the late reply, I didn't get a notification and hadn't checked in in a few months, obviously.

My contractor was "turn key" for the building, dryed it. I made a few selections for upgrades, the 3x4 awning windows downstairs, the second I-beam for zero posts and the 12ft ceiling. The total was provided with no break down, the price was reasonable that I didnt ask for one, knowing already from my shed and own leg work the number was reasonable. Your slab work bids are nearly half of my "box" up front cost, my contractor does ZERO mechanicals though and the conduit they put in the foundation was too small for my feeder which resultsed in the wall penetrations I was trying to avoid.

1) We discussed, they preferred building on site, it kept more stuff in their control and they've been doing it in my area for years the same way so I didn't argue.
2) None, the 13ish foot spans really dont need engineered joists
3) They had pre-engineered plans for my floor layout to submit for the permits. Again they are turnkey and did all the permitting, I had a hell of a time trying to find an engineer or architect that would do single person one job work for any kind of reasonable price.

 

[robb1887]

We're close to heat.

My neighbor who does commercial AC/R came over and got started on the mini's install and got a list of parts needed to finalize. I'm hoping to have the lower running by the end of this week.




The Gree unit upstairs has a wired thermostat and I could not for the life of me find any off the shelf rough in box available to fit the mounting plate. The joy of 3D printers and CAD, is anything is possible, so I designed and printed a PETG-CF box for the thermostat to mount.


The upstairs cassette is in place but unwired/plumbed to ensure we can do everything we need to be able to before the drywall is hung.


I painted behind the lower wall unit before final installing the mount. The through hole was made and the moutning bracket hung (but was unpictured)


Since the last of the insulation was run after the upper unit PVC duct for the line set/cables/drain was put in the raftors I was able to install the last of the insulation covers in the north wall knee attic.


Last year I was running the temp lights off a very long extension cord from the house which let me run the Christmas lights on the same timer as all the rest of my display. This year I ended up having to set up the new WLAN that is just able to bridge from the house to the shop enough to operate a smart switch for the soffit outlet. This node, will eventually be hard wired into one with a much stronger connection through the communication conduit but its operational for the short term.



The switch will live in the north knee attic:

 

[M-technik-3]

Great Space and I love the Clown Shoe. Is it S54 or S52 powered?

 

[robb1887]

Great Space and I love the Clown Shoe. Is it S54 or S52 powered?

Twinscrew S52

 

[M-technik-3]

Twinscrew S52

Cool, my M3 is S50 with a C38 intercooled. But Thinking I'd like to do a B58 swap on it.

 

[robb1887]

The last 3 months have been a little hectic.

The mini's got (nearly) finished installed.

When planning the lower unit's head we thought the lines could zig-zag behind the unit and then out the wall, unfortunately that was a false assumption found after hanging the single sheet of sheetrock and cutting the through hole to clear internal and external interferences. So the head hung off the prepped sheet. Regardless it was installed and operational which has been amazing.



the inside temps came up nice, even with the upper unit not operational (temps are shown upstairs, amazing heat rises)


The upstairs unit was a little more tricky. The unit apparently comes with 2 different covers that you must order separately, so we're still waiting on that order to come in, but the rest of it was okay. I had to pull the unit completely up on the top side threaded mounts to clear it above the drywall that they will cut out later and then I'll set it to the proper reveal in the ceiling.




As I prepped for drywall (the only thing I am contracting out), I had to reconfigure the banister and railing to accept the sheetrock better as well as some landing structure.

Railing was reconfigured to 16OC spacing, and the 2x4 crosses were to ensure in ensure my kids don't kamikaze through it even after sheetrock.




I notched the banister and guards 5/8" deep to allow the sheetrock to slide beneath them as I'm not sure I'll be leaving that railing system forever, wanting the walls to be continuous now.





I really wish I had time to better find a solution for this mid-span stringer support but I figure I'll just come up with some storage system under the stairs that incorporates it. I thought about bracing it to the doubled floor joists from above and removing the lower half but didn't think that would be a good idea long term.

Temp blocking to reattached them between these mods and the drywall install



Supports for the inside of the i-beams


Final preps for the drywall contractors, which has been a long story but it's nearly done now so that's what's important.





Long story short, they were supposed to start on Jan 20th after I scrambled the weekend prior to get final preps done and have been holding the space hostage since. I expect they will be finally done this week. It was a turn key hang and finish contract. They finally started on the 12th of Feb after a bunch of lies of when they were coming. Its now day 9 (they started delivery of material on the 10th) of what was sold as a 3 day job.











First day of mud:







And that is present day... I'm surprised they havent shown up today, but maybe they are letting everything cure a day before coming to sand and finish/clean the last bit. I'm not the professional.

---

---

 

[Aladinsane07]

Sorry your interaction with the contractor was a headache; it seems like most are. But your place looks incredible now! Seriously an inspiration.

 

[robb1887]

Sorry your interaction with the contractor was a headache; it seems like most are. But your place looks incredible now! Seriously an inspiration.

Yea it's unfortunate how bad the GC has managed this, the drywall crew is pretty nice and do good work. But it's still faster than if I were to do it myself so trying to stay glass half full

 

[robb1887]

They finished sanding last Friday








37 days after they were supposed to start what was sold a 3-day job, they have at finally cleaned out the trash.





The two piles of junk that were left for a week, for the record, it was done in entirely 5/8 sheetrock so this is the heavy stuff



They finished sanding last Friday, and of course decided to come collect the last of their stuff on the rainy day of the entire week and get stuck up to their axle in a 2WD Tahoe to tote off likely 2500lbs of scraps/trash and they attempted to do it nearly in one trip.


I'll start cleanup tomorrow in preps for paint as I wait for a delivery.

If anyone has any successful methods for cleaning all the dust off the concrete, I'm open to all suggestions on success stories

 

[rothwem]

If anyone has any successful methods for cleaning all the dust off the concrete, I'm open to all suggestions on success stories

Dust has been my garage nemesis since it was built--the drywall is one factor, but our cars bring in a ton with the open doors, and the concrete and knee wall blocks also produce some dust.

I used a leaf blower/shop vac/wet mop strategy immediately after the drywall was installed but the dust keeps.coming.back.

One of these days I'll seal the floor and knee wall blocks with epoxy, but I put stuff in the garage already and its so tough to do floors in that state. I'm also not sure how I'd mitigate the dust from the cars coming in and out.

 

[robb1887]

Yea I have a feeling it will be a lot of wet moping cycles to get all the drywall dust off the pad. I know I'll have some use dust, but I'll be painting all the drywall very soon and densifying and sealing the concrete to keep that dust down. I have considered applying a single coat of drylok to the inside (as its already on the outside) of the foundation walls just to seal them as well but wasnt sure if that was a good idea for "breathing" purposes.

My main focus currently is getting the drywall dust up so I can do the concrete sealing process without trapping all that in there

 

[robb1887]

So we had a nice day so I opened up the shop and gave the third bay a pressure wash/light scrub/squeegee and it came out about 95% which was promising. I'll likely hit it with a quick wet mop and then head to the degreaser next chance I get but I want to get the ceilings painted and lights hung permanently.


Monday we started preps for paint and while I know spraying will be faster, I loathe masking/taping etc. and decided to roll it all. The work itself for me isnt frustrating other than the sheer amount of it. I enjoy the work of applying paint to fresh walls. I focused on the upstairs ceiling first so I can final install the upstairs mini split in the ceiling and get it running as temps are starting to warm up here in VA.

Lights down/temp ran and holes filled and sanded


Sealer going up. If you have access to a Sherwin-Williams retail store and any sort of LLC that allows you to establish an account with them, I'd highly recommend it. My 10 gallons of primer and 5 gallons of ceiling to get me started was roughly 20% off big box store pricing.



I burned the late night oil and just kept priming upstairs here as I didnt want to switch trays/roller/applicators etc. so one of the two vaulted sections was primed.


First coat of top coat did about 90% of coverage needs, but I know the ceilings are likely the only wall that wont get covered with stuff so I decided to reapply after the 4 hour recoat time.


The photos don't do it justice but the 2nd coat was a lot better at making the mud lines vs bare drywall disappear


While I was waiting for the recoat time upstairs I also started on the edge cut ins for the downstairs bay 1 primer


Roughly 12 hours in with preps and applications so far. Depending if the wall coating needs 1 or 2 coats I'm estimating another 60-80 hours of painting which is a heck of a mountain. The shop was too small until I had to paint.

 

[Overboost44]

That is the most time that I have ever spent on a thread with 38 posts! Very detailed and well done. I got into this because I am not too far from you if I am guessing right. My beginnings started out like you. Years of drawings and plans that covid wiped out with lumber prices that quadrupled. I am now ready and hope mine does not take as long as yours. Look forward to the final few pics and stories to come.

I am prepping for a 26x40 attached garage. You provided some things that I look forward to, others that I don't, and yet more that I had not considered. Overall, your Double Bee garage is close to what I will be doing. I have the same siding but in white to match my house. Loft space but over only 1/2. Lift, 12/12 roof, 9' walls. I could learn a lot from you on your epic electric journey. I would not be prepared for an $8k quote.