aqr81
Well-known member
I have lived in the Central Valley for 15 years now and dreamed of building a garage/shop since moving here. It seems many of the great folks in this community live in areas where there is a lot of land and ample room to build up to your desire and budget limits. In California, we typically don’t have a lot of much size; my prior home in Southern Ca was like living on a postage stamp. I currently live on a ½ acre lot. The layout of house on lot, backyard and pool area, only allows the RV access area along the side of the existing garage and house to use for this construction project. The permit is for an RV Garage.
As is always the case, I have been working with the city and county on the various zoning issues. I wasn’t aware that 01/01/10 in my area, you can no longer add anything to the property that will exceed the highest existing roof line on the property. This resulted in my having to lower the wall height from 16’ to 14’ and changing the roof pitch from 6/12 to 4/12. The biggest holdup for me has been the utilities (electrical and gas). The poor economy in Ca has caused significant budget shortfalls for cities and counties; resulting in huge increases in fees and reduced work crews causing time delays.
My plan was to turn existing panel box into a sub panel, install new box and meter head on new garage and new circuits for garage/shop. The new service panel would then power the sub panel and in turn, the existing wiring. They would not allow this, saying we could not “redirect their power”. They insisted that their crew would need to do all the work and pull new wire at a cost of $8,000-$12,000. The gas company wanted $4000+ to relocate the meter.
Long story short, we went back and forth with them for over 2 months, presenting them with alternatives in an effort to resolve differences. Two weeks ago we finally agreed that we’d have everything exposed (all underground here) and they agreed to do the plan that we originally proposed. Additionally, they agreed to do it for $3000-$4000 electrical and $1500-$2000 for gas. I was finally put in line with them and am 6-8 weeks out.
I am squeezed for space with only the available RV access and staying within the required distance to property lines. I’ll only be able to get slightly over 18’ inside width. My plan for the garage/shop is 18’ x 46’ x 14’. The front 20’ will be used for parking 2 vehicles and the remaining 26’ will be shop area. Above the parking area will be a full 18’ x 20’ storage mezzanine. There will be an 18 x 20 overhead storage mezzanine at 11’ height above the parking area. Behind the shop will be a continuation of slab for an additional 24’. This rear slab will be covered by roof continuing off the shop. The overall length of garage/shop and covered slab is 70’. There will be 16’ X10’ door on front entrance and 12’X 9’ on rear leading out to covered patio. A 4 post lift (with casters) will enable work to easily be done inside or out during for most of the year. I’m using scissors trusses to maximize ceiling height.
I am re-roofing the entire house, going with CertainTeed – Presidential TL Ultimate (triple layer 480 lbs per square, Lifetime warranty). I have always thought that when I re-roofed I would look into solar. The payback is much more favorable now and I have decided to go with and install a 6.3 kW solar system on garage/shop roof. I will be doing all of this in one large project.
Additional considerations and decisions made from my research, primarily here, include:
• Good lighting levels using Lithonia 8’ fixtures (4) 4’ tubes each – [12] in shop & [6] in parking area
• Air distribution system probably black pipe for price still undecided on this or copper. 2 or 3 drops inside and one outside
• Sound via Yamaha RX-V467 speakers/wiring/gang wall plates/connectors from Monoprice.com for surround sound and gaming.
I’ll also use a pair of Sansui SP-2000 4 way 6 speaker boxes purchased on R&R in ’79 that I have kept all these years. These will be used both inside shop and the outside work area when receiver is set to normal stereo
• I’ll run cable out for TV and computers both hardwire & wireless access to my network
• Still have to meet with electrician but have a pretty detailed idea of what I have planned
• Liftmaster 3800 jackshaft openers on both doors
• Fully insulate garage/shop and am also required to re-insulate the attic area of house
• Insulated garage doors
• Utility sink in shop area
• I’ll be building some cabinets later on
• Still undecided on floor covering – I continue to read all the postings and discussions on epoxy and I’m just not sold on going that route
As is always the case, I have been working with the city and county on the various zoning issues. I wasn’t aware that 01/01/10 in my area, you can no longer add anything to the property that will exceed the highest existing roof line on the property. This resulted in my having to lower the wall height from 16’ to 14’ and changing the roof pitch from 6/12 to 4/12. The biggest holdup for me has been the utilities (electrical and gas). The poor economy in Ca has caused significant budget shortfalls for cities and counties; resulting in huge increases in fees and reduced work crews causing time delays.
My plan was to turn existing panel box into a sub panel, install new box and meter head on new garage and new circuits for garage/shop. The new service panel would then power the sub panel and in turn, the existing wiring. They would not allow this, saying we could not “redirect their power”. They insisted that their crew would need to do all the work and pull new wire at a cost of $8,000-$12,000. The gas company wanted $4000+ to relocate the meter.
Long story short, we went back and forth with them for over 2 months, presenting them with alternatives in an effort to resolve differences. Two weeks ago we finally agreed that we’d have everything exposed (all underground here) and they agreed to do the plan that we originally proposed. Additionally, they agreed to do it for $3000-$4000 electrical and $1500-$2000 for gas. I was finally put in line with them and am 6-8 weeks out.
I am squeezed for space with only the available RV access and staying within the required distance to property lines. I’ll only be able to get slightly over 18’ inside width. My plan for the garage/shop is 18’ x 46’ x 14’. The front 20’ will be used for parking 2 vehicles and the remaining 26’ will be shop area. Above the parking area will be a full 18’ x 20’ storage mezzanine. There will be an 18 x 20 overhead storage mezzanine at 11’ height above the parking area. Behind the shop will be a continuation of slab for an additional 24’. This rear slab will be covered by roof continuing off the shop. The overall length of garage/shop and covered slab is 70’. There will be 16’ X10’ door on front entrance and 12’X 9’ on rear leading out to covered patio. A 4 post lift (with casters) will enable work to easily be done inside or out during for most of the year. I’m using scissors trusses to maximize ceiling height.
I am re-roofing the entire house, going with CertainTeed – Presidential TL Ultimate (triple layer 480 lbs per square, Lifetime warranty). I have always thought that when I re-roofed I would look into solar. The payback is much more favorable now and I have decided to go with and install a 6.3 kW solar system on garage/shop roof. I will be doing all of this in one large project.
Additional considerations and decisions made from my research, primarily here, include:
• Good lighting levels using Lithonia 8’ fixtures (4) 4’ tubes each – [12] in shop & [6] in parking area
• Air distribution system probably black pipe for price still undecided on this or copper. 2 or 3 drops inside and one outside
• Sound via Yamaha RX-V467 speakers/wiring/gang wall plates/connectors from Monoprice.com for surround sound and gaming.
I’ll also use a pair of Sansui SP-2000 4 way 6 speaker boxes purchased on R&R in ’79 that I have kept all these years. These will be used both inside shop and the outside work area when receiver is set to normal stereo
• I’ll run cable out for TV and computers both hardwire & wireless access to my network
• Still have to meet with electrician but have a pretty detailed idea of what I have planned
• Liftmaster 3800 jackshaft openers on both doors
• Fully insulate garage/shop and am also required to re-insulate the attic area of house
• Insulated garage doors
• Utility sink in shop area
• I’ll be building some cabinets later on
• Still undecided on floor covering – I continue to read all the postings and discussions on epoxy and I’m just not sold on going that route
After calling all day long, they finally returned the call late this afternoon. The contractor had words with them and told them they were holding things up and the needed to get out here. He also got after them for not calling back after numerous calls throughout the day just stinging everyone along. Blah, blah, blah and they agreed to be out her at 8:30 tomorrow morning. We’ll see how that goes.
They look in the hole and say, oh yeah those lines are in the way for the work around that large footing. (Q) Is there enough slack or can you move the wires so we can work on it? (A) No, you are going to need a temporary power pole. (Q) How long will that take for you to do the hook up once it’s in. (A) Oh, we can do that right away. That is the lunacy of this utility; they originally indicated it was a 4-6 week wait to move the power to the other side of the garage. Now suddenly, to hook up a temporary pole, they can do it right away. That makes no sense as it’s basically the same thing for them to do and we’ve been waiting almost 3 weeks just to hear this! In that amount of time we’d be half done with this thing. We’ll contact the company that rents the temp poles and try to get it out her tomorrow. We did receive solid answers and good information today and we can start moving forward.
