Single car 16x21 makeover.

Over the past 6 years, my wife and I have had to downsize twice and as a result I've gone from an oversized 2 car garage with 12 foot ceilings to a single car 9 foot ceiling garage. Over that time period we've also built our first child so all of his "stuff" also has to occupy this garage space along with my Syclone, the beach toys, the yard stuff, etc. Space is really at a premium and I've moved shelving from house to house in order to be able to get things off the floor.

Last night I was trying to actually do some work in the garage and got overwhelmed at how little space I actually had to work in. Trying to fix a bimini top with all sorts of **** in the way is difficult. I have a lot of boxes at another garage that will be sold shortly so all of that will have to come home as well, so I'm really not going to have any room.

Here are a few pics of how the garage currently looks and I'll explain a little more:

As it sits now












The Workbench

I got an 8 foot long solid core door from a construction project years ago that didn't use it. I've built a cabinet on the left hand side to hold bigger tools and left an overhang on the right that I can slide my table saw under and get it out of the way.








Overview

As you can see there are 3 doors in the garage. When we first moved in, the brown door with the yard tools in front of it lead to the unfinished and ratty laundry room. We have since finished off the laundry room and added a pass through from the house to the laundry room so this door is basically useless. The door to the left leads to the outside and is never used, so there's all sorts of **** stacked in front of it.

The wall with the wire shelves and clock on it has a slight step in it (about 1/2 - 1") where it transitions from concrete block to frame wall.


Electrical

I'm not looking to add any outlets, just switch out some lights. From what I can see right now there is one feed line that comes into the garage to the single light. The light is controlled by a switch by either exit door.

From the single light the line branches out two ways:

first run: this runs to a duplex outlet, the to a light switch that operates the outside motion detector light.

second run: this runs to a duplex outlet, then to a a light switch that operates both an outside outlet and a 100w metal halide security light on a pole in the driveway.

Somewhere along the line someone added a half *** outlet from the single light to a duplex outlet that would run a garage door opener. Since we don't have a garage door opener I plan on taking this out.

I haven't had any issues blowing fuses. I run a power strip off one outlet that charges 2 cordless drill batteries, had a computer running, chop saw, etc and haven't seen any issues.

I want to change the single light out for some T8's or similar to add more lighting. You can see that not all of this is "up to code"...




Needed Repairs

Before we moved in there were a number of roof leaks that eventually destroyed some of the drywall as you can see below (I haven't repaired it yet since I haven't decided what to do yet). That's the worst of it right now.




Attic

I already have non essential items stored in the attic (24" on center studs), but the way the roof is shaped, I do not have a lot of room.



I have enough height to fit a tupperwear storage box in height and that's about it. I typically put unused car parts up there.



I might be able to get smaller items to fit between the studs, but they'd have to be fairly light so that they don't come through the ceiling




Ideas

First off, a shed is not in the plans. I'd love to have one to move a lot of the **** out of the garage, but I have to work with what I've got and spend the least amount possible. Plus the boss has said negatory on that one.

I'm thinking of moving the work bench to in front of the brow door. I'd pull the trim off from around it and then mount some peg board to the wall to cover the door and hang stuff from it. I'd then move the yellow cabinets to the block wall in front of the door and stack them to the ceiling.

There are three floor cabinets, two wall cabinets and one tall cabinet. I have just enough room to fit two cabinets side by side and not block the light switch. I might be able to mount the hanging cabinets on the back wall above the workbench as well.

I am going to clean out the rubbermaid storage cabinet and put it outside to store all the paints and flammable stuff (ie: extra grille tank) to free up some room.

I will probably end up building some cabinets out of b/c plywood and paint them white as well so that I can use the wall spaces more effectively. One big pain in the *** in the bicycles. Hanging from the ceiling isn't really effective since they hang down enough to not make any spare room. Once the rubbermaid cabinet is out I may be able to hang them on that back wall out of the way.

I've also noticed that the wire racks leave a lot of extra space between them that I could be using. I may replace that with some home made cabinets so that in can simply stack rubbermaid containers on top of each other.

So, this is where I am starting. I welcome any ideas from people who have worked in such a small space in order to make it a productive workspace.

That tiny bit of insulation is enough in Floriduh? Wow! Why did they even bother?!

nate379 said:

That tiny bit of insulation is enough in Floriduh? Wow! Why did they even bother?!

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That's R30 that was left over when we redid the laundry room. Since this is above the garage there was never any insulation.

I am in a similar situation. Six years ago moved from a house with a purpose built 3.5 car garage/shop to a typical 2 car garage. Too much stuff.

I know you said no to a shed (or the better half did) and mine did to but she did to consent to one of these. I haven't build mine yet but I will build something very similar and will match the house/garage.

This won't hold as much as a shed but will get plenty of lawn stuff out of the way. Plus, will 'blend' into property much better.

First things first

Make sure that the better half goes out of town taking the youngster with her so that she won't complain about the garage barfing all of it's contents into the house for overnight storage.

Clearing the way

Empty everything out of the garage. The tool box could be rolled around and the solid core workbench top was too heavy to lift so I had to wait for some assistance.




Moving things around

I decided that I wasn't going to use either the old laundry room door or the man door to the outside, so blocking them with a workbench and cabinets wasn't an issue for me. I still have the main garage door and the door into the house that we use all the time so it's no loss.








I wanted to get the drill press to the top of the upper cabinets but it's about 1 inch too tall. I just realized I may be able to open the top up to get some extra space, and if not, I'll use a chop saw on it and shorten it a little to make it fit.

I also realized that it would be more space efficient to get rid of the wire shelving and stack all of the Rubbermaid bins on top of each other rather than on the shelves.

I had a bunch of long items that were stored under the wire shelves on the ground, but looking at the space constraints I knew that I couldn't stack anything higher than the garage door tracks, so I decided to install some hooks at the same height so I can store everything up off the ground.





On the back wall I planned on putting a 4x8 sheet of peg board so I can store tools that get the most use, but it's tall enough that I can also store seldom used items (like nail guns) that I don't use often, but don't have a better storage solution for.





Blowout

I typically use ear muffs, safety glasses and safety gloves while working in the garage just in case. I also use the gloves while doing edging/weed eating in the yard so I picked up a set of Mechanix gloves at AutoZone a few weeks ago. I've used them to mow/edge the yard twice and they're already worn through.



That was the end of day 1. It must have been about 110* in the garage with 80% humidity. By this time I was beat down and ready to go have a cold one. More on day 2.

Day 2

Day 2 started off with stocking all of the cabinets and getting everything organized that was in the garage before. I went through all of my supplies and discarded anything that had an expiration date and that date had passed. I also moved the stand up rubbermaid storage cabinet outside to the other side of the man door and put all of the small gardening tools, propane tank, fertilizer, etc. This also made some space next to the garage door where I can hang up the bicycles.

Sorry for the quality of these pics.







I don't have a close up picture yet, but I built a stand for the tall Stanley cabinet in front of the A/C handler to get it off the ground. Underneath I am able to store big coolers and my jack.

My next step is to get up into the attic and bring down all the **** I've stuck up there and organize it. I'll then take anything that's long enough to span 2 joists and put it back up there. I've got cable TV/network drops in the attic waiting to be used so I will have some creature comforts in the garage.

I'm also debating installing an attic fan since it's sweltering hot in the attic after a day of the sun beating down on the roof. It has to be over 120* up there mid-afternoon. I still need to determine which breaker the garage is on and how many outlets are running off of it before I decide if it's possible.

Looking good you freed up a lot of space. Nice cabinets. Good luck!

looks good btw are the black and yellow cupboards stanley?

sscustom said:

looks good btw are the black and yellow cupboards stanley?

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Thanks for the compliments! It has made it a lot easier to move around in the garage and I'm not finished yet. I'm just hoping that the wife doesn't see all the extra room and decide that she has to start storing more stuff in there.

Yes, they are. I won an auction on eBay about 6 years ago for a fantastic price that included shipping. I believe it was Stanley liquidating their old inventory since they were switching the design to the stainless and getting rid of the yellow door versions. They're actually made by Zag cabinets.

The only thing I don't like is that the legs of the cabinets serve double duty to keep the bottom shelf attached to the sides. For the tall cabinet I didn't want to use the legs so I had to cut them flush with the bottom of the cabinet in order to keep it all together.

yeah they look good ,keep up the progress

I have a 16x30 here in FL, same type of attic.

I find it better to leave the rolling toolbox up front by the door, that way if there is something in the garage or out, you can still get to the tools you may need just outside the door.

Christmas stuff = attic. It gets used once a year.

Bikes. I have 4... They take up less room when the like sized ones are stored back to front, and you can make a rack out of 2x4's to stack them up and closer to the wall, Kids bikes go on the ground. buy an extra wrench that loosens the handlebars and twist them sideways to store them flatter, tie a string to the wrench and hang it from the rack too, then you aren't looking in your toolbox for it.... and you don't have to put it away... That is, unless you use the bikes everyday.

Label the blue totes or get clear ones... it's a PITA to have to pull them all out to find something.

If you know anybody in the HVAC industry, have him save a few blowers out of replaced air handlers... Put them a caster, wire them to a cord, they work great. Mount one to the ceiling blowing out...

Build a shallow shelf to that hangs above the garage door to store flat wood and long stuff, like tent poles, fishing poles, etc.

The rails of your garage where they stick out past when your door is up also make great storage for clamps... Then you use them to secure the door shut when you go on vacation too.

Casters are your friend... if you need room in the shade, roll stuff you won't be using out into the driveway. Speaking of driveway, get yourself a cheap $99 EZ up, you've now extended your garage (and the shade) 10' x 10' temporarily, and you can still work when it starts raining.... every day... like clockwork.

4t64rd said:

Christmas stuff = attic. It gets used once a year.

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All of the old wire shelving is going up in the attic along with spare car parts that get used less than once a year. Once I figure out what I'm going to get up in the attic, the last thing to go will be Christmas stuff/decorations. The biggest pain in the **** is getting the containers through the attic access and not hitting the truss.

4t64rd said:

Bikes. I have 4... They take up less room when the like sized ones are stored back to front, and you can make a rack out of 2x4's to stack them up and closer to the wall, Kids bikes go on the ground.

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I have three vertical hangers coming (similar to this one) that will store them vertically next to the garage door.

4t64rd said:

Label the blue totes or get clear ones... it's a PITA to have to pull them all out to find something.

Click to expand...

All the blue totes contain Christmas/Halloween stuff. Other totes are clear. I've color coordinated them so I don't have to think about what's in each of them. Besides, switching out all of them wouldn't make economic sense.

4t64rd said:

If you know anybody in the HVAC industry, have him save a few blowers out of replaced air handlers... Put them a caster, wire them to a cord, they work great. Mount one to the ceiling blowing out...

Click to expand...

That is a good idea. I do have a large fan that works wonders in the garage.

4t64rd said:

Build a shallow shelf to that hangs above the garage door to store flat wood and long stuff, like tent poles, fishing poles, etc.

Click to expand...

I looked into this, but there's only 2-3" between the top of the garage door and the ceiling when the door is up, so I wouldn't be able to fit anything up there. All of the long items are stored up along both block walls.

4t64rd said:

Casters are your friend... if you need room in the shade, roll stuff you won't be using out into the driveway. Speaking of driveway, get yourself a cheap $99 EZ up, you've now extended your garage (and the shade) 10' x 10' temporarily, and you can still work when it starts raining.... every day... like clockwork.

Click to expand...

Unfortunately the driveway isn't paved. All crushed shell up to the house. In the last set of pictures you can see I do have a 10x10 pop up shade tent there, although I just got a text from my wife with an attached picture of the tent completely mangled from a storm that passed through. I just had this one up temporarily as it had a few bent poles and it couldn't withstand the winds (mind you I hadn't had the chance to anchor it yet). I'll inspect the damage tonight.

Thanks for the good ideas.

wheres the Pics of the truck? theres a few syclone/typhoon owners here

1991Syclone said:

Yes, they are. I won an auction on eBay about 6 years ago for a fantastic price that included shipping. I believe it was Stanley liquidating their old inventory since they were switching the design to the stainless and getting rid of the yellow door versions. They're actually made by Zag cabinets.

The only thing I don't like is that the legs of the cabinets serve double duty to keep the bottom shelf attached to the sides. For the tall cabinet I didn't want to use the legs so I had to cut them flush with the bottom of the cabinet in order to keep it all together.

Click to expand...

I was probably bidding against you on ebay for those Stanley cabinets - that's when I bought all of mine. No wonder I didn't get those last 6 I wanted!

Seriously, I don't see many of them on this website so they really stand out to me when I run across them here. Man, I still can't believe what a great deal that was!

If you look around, you can still find matching caster kits and extra shelves for them. The caster kits come with pieces to replace the legs and the new pieces are flush with the bottom of the cabinet, and the casters mount to them. The shelf kits come with the matching channels that snap into the cabinet. Both 14 and 18" channels are included so it fits either the shallow or deep cabinets.

I wanted most of mine off the ground so I made a plywood rack system that hung on the wall and the cabinets inserted into it. The ones on the ground have casters attached to let them roll out when it is time for a good cleaning.

Good luck with the project!

warmpancakes said:

wheres the Pics of the truck? theres a few syclone/typhoon owners here

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Once I'm done I'll get them. By the way, do you still want that Haro FST? I've finally got a box big enough for it.

shopnut said:

I was probably bidding against you on ebay for those Stanley cabinets - that's when I bought all of mine. No wonder I didn't get those last 6 I wanted!

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Hahah, probably! I think I paid $300 for all of them including shipping back then. It was such a good deal I couldn't pass it up.

I'll have to look for the flat bottoms and see if I can find them. Thanks for the tip!

The shell isn't too bad as long as you never have to work under your car... we had a river rock over shell YARD... Ugh.

That's too bad about the door, mine is 1 pc door and it is about 12" off the ceiling.

EZ ups don't handle the hot FL sun too well when left up for even as little as 2 weeks, mine got threadbare. I see a harbor freight EZ up in my future... The blue tarps have about 3 month lifespan here before the neighborhood is covers in little blue ribbons.

Check Big Lots before you go to HF for the EZ up. HF usually sells them for $99, but Big Lots should have them for $80, but the last flyer I got in the mail had them for $64. I need to get a new one. Got home last night and it was completely mangled. Mostly due to the fact that it had fallen down before and bent some of the aluminum. It doesn't help that all of the joints are made of plastic.

Here's the tent for $64

So last night I was reorganizing the attic crawl space and putting more stuff up there. I moved some plywood I'd put up there when I was running the wiring and realized that there's an outlet box up there where the wires terminate to nothing.

I've got a white, black, and red but couldn't figure out if it was hot, so I went and bought a Greenlee tester at Lowe's tonight. Not bad for $23 bucks. Turns out all of the wires are hot, so I need to crawl around a bit more to figure out what it's attached to.

I might use this for some workbench lighting.

*EDIT*

Ok, I went up into the attic and traced the line as best I can and it looks like it goes back uninterrupted to the panel and simply ends in this box. So I have to start flipping breakers tomorrow and see what stops working to determine if anything else is on this breaker.

If not, I may drop a line down to a switch/2 outlet box and maybe an attic fan.

Dude, I'll pay you $50 to come clean out my hell hole !!

Found that the unused line in the attic runs off of the same breaker as the rest of the garage and a few other outlets/lights in the house. It's 15AMP so there should be enough for a few more lights.

I did go into the attic and remove the previous owner's attempt at installing what was probably a garage door opener outlet. It was real safe... Electrical tape and all.



What I would like to do is replace the existing bulb fixture with a 2 outlet plug and use my 2 4 foot fluorescent lights plugged into it and attached to the ceiling but there's a lot of action in that box.



The two reds I believe are to the switches on either side of the garage, two neutrals tied together. Then I have 3 live and 3 neutral tied together with 1 live and 1 neutral going to the light. There's also two grounds tied together in there.

I'm typically not too worried about dealing with electrical until it gets to something like this with a bunch of connections going to all different places. I guess I just need to label everything and make sure it all goes back together the same way it came apart...

I've gotten back to working on the garage and ordered a few things to help get organized. I've got all of my tools readily accessible on the peg board and that's freed up some room in my tool box so that helps keep things organized.

There wasn't enough light so I picked up a plug in with pull chain to hang over the workbench and I've got all my loose hardware stored in bins.








I've installed a few hangers on the wall to get some various pieces of wood off the floor.




And finally in the corner where I had a small pegboard setup I've hung the bikes and various helmets and beach stuff.