Asha'man
Member
I've been into cars since I was 16, with the obsession growing year by year, and spent plenty of time wrenching in apartment parking lots, but always knew that I wanted my own garage or shop. When I and my then-girlfriend (now wife) decided to move outside of town six years ago, we started looking in the mountains west of Denver, but quickly found that the population density was too high and the potential for having a shop building and a garden were not great. We ended up picking up twelve acres on the plains about an hour southeast of Denver, with plenty of room to build both a shop and a garden. I painted a car and did plenty of wrenching in the 30x30 detached garage that was already in place, but as her desire for a woodshop grew, we decided that I needed to have a big shop building so we could both pursue our hobbies without trampling all over each other. Finally, in early 2013, I lined up the money and pulled the trigger on a pole barn package from Hansen Pole Buildings (www.hansenpolebuildings.com). After checking out as many buildings as I could in the area, I decided on a 40x60 with a 12' overhang running the length of one 60' side, for a total of 52x60 (3120 sq ft) under roof.
The build began for real in late May 2013, with my buddy doing the site prep. Began with grubbing the organic surface off of the area.
Brought in two dump trucks of road base.
The site looks flat, but actually had about 10" of fall toward the far end. Fortunately we were able to generate our own fill by digging down in the middle of the field.
Where'd the tracksteer go?
Grading, grading.
Checking the grade.
Trackpacking as a final step.
A couple days later, the steel showed up on the coolest truck I'd probably ever seen. The canopy rolled back and the crane folded out, and it was ready to go.
Doesn't look like a building.
The lumber truck showed up the next morning with everything but trusses. There were a *lot* of boards here.
And then the truss truck finally showed up. There was almost a week's delay due to poor communication on their end, but they finally came down from Wyoming on the roller truck.
I was a little trepidacious about just sliding them off and dumping them on the ground, but it's an acceptable method and seemed to work just fine.
Then it came time to lay things out. Apparently it's a good thing when your building is square.
It was really windy while my wife and I were doing the string lines, so we actually did a fair amount of it at night when the wind died down. Frustrating, but it worked.
Headed into town to rent the augers for the column holes, as well as a couple of tall ladders from work. Right around now was when I started to realize that as great of a truck as my Tacoma was, it wasn't quite big enough.
The augers, along with the neighbor's skidsteer. I believe they were 18", 24" and 36".
Laying out column hole locations.
These holes ain't no joke, especially in this prairie hardpan clay. The big ones took a couple of hits and being easy on the auger throttle, but it got 'er done.
One of the holes was apparently in the way of an ambitious vole, who dug right through the wall and landed in the hole.
The dog was enthralled.
Look at the digging claws! Very impressive. Unfortunately, they don't do much against a border collie mix who wants to play.
Enough vermin shenanigans. Time to lay out some columns! Many thanks to my neighbor for the loan of the reachfork.
The wife tacking on cross supports. These will reappear later as roof purlins.
Getting there. Look at the squat on the Taco, with a bed full of purlins. Truck is just too small for a place like this.
At least they're straight!
And they're all up! Like a forest of milled timber. To the right, you can see the shorter columns that will support the roof overhang. Overhead door will go in the front.
Goin' muddin'.
A gaggle of columns in curing concrete.
It's a big step in the right direction, and deserves a delicious summer beer.
Supports removed, skirt boards in place. Lots of time with a rented transit level to get the skirt board lines right.
Due to the skirt boards, now was the time to drill the holes and insert the rebar hairpins for future concrete.
Trusses in a bundle on the ground.
First end truss going up! You can see the purlin brackets in place. Those were a lot easier to put on on the ground, but still a giant pain in the ***. Four nails from the palm nailer, per bracket, times 20 or so per truss, and they had to be measured perfectly off the ends of the truss. We got the hang eventually, and the wife did a lot of them because it was ground work, but time consuming to say the least.
Look at the slack in the straps - it's sitting there supported, like it should be.
A thing of beauty.
Just a taste of the weather we got that summer. It seemed to rain only on the weekends, when I was working on the building, and would pour torrentially in the afternoons, leaving a base of greasy mud in which to try to stand on a 12' ladder. I even got the reachfork stuck once. Also take note of my recently reacquired '86 SVO, which I had sold several years earlier but which had just popped back up on eBay. I couldn't resist.
Look at those sodden ruts.
After a ton of time flattopping a 12' ladder while juggling a palm nailer and trailing an air line, and a couple of weekends of assistance from some good family friends, all the trusses were up and bays were filled with purlins. There are a *lot* of purlins, every one with four nails holding it at each end into a bracket, itself held to the truss by four nails. Mofo should not be coming apart any time soon.
Not bad for a phone picture.
I wish I had more pictures of this part. Squaring the building took a lot of straps and even more measurements. I had a long cable with a strap at the end going from corner to corner across the roof purlins as well, to take up any misalignments in the diagonals. It took me a few evenings after work to get it all dialed in, but I felt pretty good that I never had more than a 2" difference in square across the roof.
Did I mention that we were also planning our wedding during this summer? Asked my lady of nearly five years to marry me in May, and we set the date for September 7th. "We'll have the shop done or nearly so, and it'll be a great place for the reception. No problem!" Well, naturally things took longer than anticipated, as they tend to do, and a couple weeks before the wedding, we still didn't have a roof on the building. My parents were hosting the wedding at their place in the trees, and we needed at least a roof for the reception at our place, so my dad hired a few guys to help us with the roof.
And it has a roof!
The build began for real in late May 2013, with my buddy doing the site prep. Began with grubbing the organic surface off of the area.
Brought in two dump trucks of road base.
The site looks flat, but actually had about 10" of fall toward the far end. Fortunately we were able to generate our own fill by digging down in the middle of the field.
Where'd the tracksteer go?
Grading, grading.
Checking the grade.
Trackpacking as a final step.
A couple days later, the steel showed up on the coolest truck I'd probably ever seen. The canopy rolled back and the crane folded out, and it was ready to go.
Doesn't look like a building.
The lumber truck showed up the next morning with everything but trusses. There were a *lot* of boards here.
And then the truss truck finally showed up. There was almost a week's delay due to poor communication on their end, but they finally came down from Wyoming on the roller truck.
I was a little trepidacious about just sliding them off and dumping them on the ground, but it's an acceptable method and seemed to work just fine.
Then it came time to lay things out. Apparently it's a good thing when your building is square.
It was really windy while my wife and I were doing the string lines, so we actually did a fair amount of it at night when the wind died down. Frustrating, but it worked.
Headed into town to rent the augers for the column holes, as well as a couple of tall ladders from work. Right around now was when I started to realize that as great of a truck as my Tacoma was, it wasn't quite big enough.
The augers, along with the neighbor's skidsteer. I believe they were 18", 24" and 36".
Laying out column hole locations.
These holes ain't no joke, especially in this prairie hardpan clay. The big ones took a couple of hits and being easy on the auger throttle, but it got 'er done.
One of the holes was apparently in the way of an ambitious vole, who dug right through the wall and landed in the hole.
The dog was enthralled.
Look at the digging claws! Very impressive. Unfortunately, they don't do much against a border collie mix who wants to play.
Enough vermin shenanigans. Time to lay out some columns! Many thanks to my neighbor for the loan of the reachfork.
The wife tacking on cross supports. These will reappear later as roof purlins.
Getting there. Look at the squat on the Taco, with a bed full of purlins. Truck is just too small for a place like this.
At least they're straight!
And they're all up! Like a forest of milled timber. To the right, you can see the shorter columns that will support the roof overhang. Overhead door will go in the front.
Goin' muddin'.
A gaggle of columns in curing concrete.
It's a big step in the right direction, and deserves a delicious summer beer.
Supports removed, skirt boards in place. Lots of time with a rented transit level to get the skirt board lines right.
Due to the skirt boards, now was the time to drill the holes and insert the rebar hairpins for future concrete.
Trusses in a bundle on the ground.
First end truss going up! You can see the purlin brackets in place. Those were a lot easier to put on on the ground, but still a giant pain in the ***. Four nails from the palm nailer, per bracket, times 20 or so per truss, and they had to be measured perfectly off the ends of the truss. We got the hang eventually, and the wife did a lot of them because it was ground work, but time consuming to say the least.
Look at the slack in the straps - it's sitting there supported, like it should be.
A thing of beauty.
Just a taste of the weather we got that summer. It seemed to rain only on the weekends, when I was working on the building, and would pour torrentially in the afternoons, leaving a base of greasy mud in which to try to stand on a 12' ladder. I even got the reachfork stuck once. Also take note of my recently reacquired '86 SVO, which I had sold several years earlier but which had just popped back up on eBay. I couldn't resist.
Look at those sodden ruts.
After a ton of time flattopping a 12' ladder while juggling a palm nailer and trailing an air line, and a couple of weekends of assistance from some good family friends, all the trusses were up and bays were filled with purlins. There are a *lot* of purlins, every one with four nails holding it at each end into a bracket, itself held to the truss by four nails. Mofo should not be coming apart any time soon.
Not bad for a phone picture.
I wish I had more pictures of this part. Squaring the building took a lot of straps and even more measurements. I had a long cable with a strap at the end going from corner to corner across the roof purlins as well, to take up any misalignments in the diagonals. It took me a few evenings after work to get it all dialed in, but I felt pretty good that I never had more than a 2" difference in square across the roof.
Did I mention that we were also planning our wedding during this summer? Asked my lady of nearly five years to marry me in May, and we set the date for September 7th. "We'll have the shop done or nearly so, and it'll be a great place for the reception. No problem!" Well, naturally things took longer than anticipated, as they tend to do, and a couple weeks before the wedding, we still didn't have a roof on the building. My parents were hosting the wedding at their place in the trees, and we needed at least a roof for the reception at our place, so my dad hired a few guys to help us with the roof.
And it has a roof!
