Above 1200 Sq/FT 2 Stroke Ranch Garage

[drz400smoto]

Last fall my wife and I moved out of the Northern Colorado suburbs and bought a place west of Denver (near Conifer) in the mountains. It has always been our dream to move into the mountains with some property and it finally came true! We were originally building a new house on a smaller lot, but had to cancel that after getting our construction estimate back. The estimate was more than 50% over our already stretched budget. Long story short... it all worked out for the better! We ended up selling the property and finding an amazing property with an existing house and detached garage. This place is about 15 minutes further from Denver, but has much better privacy, more land, useable land, and great southern exposure. Until this winter I had no idea how important and valuable good southern exposure is while living at 8300' elevation. While this might not be considered a "ranch" in western US standards; I've always wanted to have a cool ranch name. Meet the 2 Stroke Ranch!


The garage: 5 Car / about 1325 SF. The upstairs is completely unfinished and ready to be built out.


The house:


First order of business was to trim the weeds down. This house sat empty from when it hit the market in June, until we moved in during late October.



The neighborhood fox "Max" made himself comfortable and moved in while the house was empty.




First snow! Luckily we were able to get the house roof replaced and garage roof repaired just before the storm hit.


There has been lots of wildlife so far. Mule deer are in the yard frequently and the elk come down and we can see them across the road occasionally.

 

[drz400smoto]

More winter time visitors!

 

[Kevkx125]

Sweet set up you got there drz400smoto. I too like motorcycle's of all kinds. Can't wait to see how you finish out the garage!!

 

[drz400smoto]

Now on to the garage details!!
It didn't take long to full up the garage with the vehicles and toys. Luckily most of the toys will go upstairs once that's completed.


The first upgrade was lighting.
220V 50A plug in garage
~30 New can lights in garage
New circuit upstairs and added outlets
~30 New can lights upstairs
I still need to decide on temperature for the lighting. I'm thinking 3k for the garage and 2700 for upstairs. I'm just using temp bulbs for now.


The bikes:


This is the upper section completely empty and ready for insulation. I'm also insulating the ceiling of the garage.


Garage prepped for insulation. I decided to cover up the shelves instead of emptying everything out. The dirtbikes are being stored in the basement of the house and everything else will be pulled outside and parked.

 

[Xti04]

Had a 400 sm back in the day. Loved that bike. Look forward to seeing what you come up with.

 

[drz400smoto]

Insulation completed! Installed a plastic sheeting to cover the insulation on the garage ceiling. The original plan was to drywall this immediately, but due to the time of year and limited storage we are just going to focus on upstairs for now.

Drywall materials arrived yesterday. We are scheduled for install next week!

 

[drz400smoto]

Had a 400 sm back in the day. Loved that bike. Look forward to seeing what you come up with.

Sweet set up you got there drz400smoto. I too like motorcycle's of all kinds. Can't wait to see how you finish out the garage!!

Thanks guys! Upstairs will definitely be dirtbike focused. There's a mandoor on the house side with a side hill that I can push or ride the bikes up and bring them right in. Trying to decide on my final colors for the racedeck flooring now.

And yes I had a drz sm back in the day... many many bikes ago, but back when I became active on forums. Now the color of choice is primarily orange.

 

[Boostingaz]

@drz400smoto

That is a great looking spot you got!!

 

[DeeDubz]

Dang thats a sweet place. How many acres do you have? Beautiful country out in your parts. How do you like that bobcat?

 

[86turbodsl]

Mmmmmm.... ktms.

 

[drz400smoto]

@drz400smoto

That is a great looking spot you got!!

Thanks!!

Dang thats a sweet place. How many acres do you have? Beautiful country out in your parts. How do you like that bobcat?

5 Acres. We love it up here!
The Bobcat has been great. I picked it up in December to help maintain everything up here. It's a 25 horse. Primary uses will be snow removal, driveway maintenance, mowing, and unloading materials. So far I just have pallet forks and a bush hog. Still looking for a box blade and snow plow. The cash price at the end of 2022 was hard to argue. I was looking at Kioti's and used Kubotas, but this was even less brand new with a warranty. I could probably use a little more power since I'm at 8300' but the next step up has the tier 4 emissions.

 

[DeeDubz]

I couldn't afford new. I just got a Kubota Tracked loader on the used market. Kubota had some good deals. A work buddy bought a tractor brand new 0% and I wanna say he spent under 30k for it. I dont so a whole lot of bobcat tractors out here mostly skid steers. Nice piece of land you got.

 

[drz400smoto]

I couldn't afford new. I just got a Kubota Tracked loader on the used market. Kubota had some good deals. A work buddy bought a tractor brand new 0% and I wanna say he spent under 30k for it. I dont so a whole lot of bobcat tractors out here mostly skid steers. Nice piece of land you got.

Yea the cash price was under $20k for this model. It's the compact model so the same chassis as the bigger HP models. I felt the sub-compact would just be too small/light for much work up here.
Thanks!

 

[drz400smoto]

1st day of drywall install completed! The crew knocked this out in about 8 hours.

 

[rd65]

I have a brother that lives in Fruita, nice area, I could live there. Current off/on road choice. There are a few others floating around the shop, but this is the one I choose to ride these days.

 

[drz400smoto]

I have a brother that lives in Fruita, nice area, I could live there. Current off/on road choice. There are a few others floating around the shop, but this is the one I choose to ride these days.

The western slope is a great area of the state. It's a little dry and desert like, but a very good location for different activities all year.
I bet that supermoto setup is a blast on the street! I had a Yamaha 250F set up with 17's back in the day to rip around my college town.

 

[rd65]

Just got the SM wheels in the fall. The tires are VERY old (2013 front, 2014 rear) and I still need to do some gearing work and would like to lower the bike. The older I get the shorter the inseam seems to get.

 

[JbTech]

My dad and several of his friends who still live there, lived near Evergreen. Beautiful area. Love to visit when we get the chance!

 

[drz400smoto]

Tape and sanding done!!

 

[rd65]

Nice beam and posts. Do you get to leave natural like that? We had to cover the one in our garage with drywall to fireproof it.

 

[MacTexas]

I like your place.

 

[drz400smoto]

Nice beam and posts. Do you get to leave natural like that? We had to cover the one in our garage with drywall to fireproof it.

We are doing this under the radar since it's not living space. So yes we are going to leave them natural. I might do a light stain to seal them since it's so dry out here.

 

[drz400smoto]

Texture completed! Hoping for final clean up today or tomorrow then I will start painting this weekend.

 

[Maxcustody]

Congrats on a Great house, garage and property!!! We lived in Denver in 2003, we loved it. Much different then when we went back in 2017.................. Looking forward to your updates.

 

[drz400smoto]

Congrats on a Great house, garage and property!!! We lived in Denver in 2003, we loved it. Much different then when we went back in 2017.................. Looking forward to your updates.

Thanks!! Yes Colorado is growing like crazy. That's one of the main reasons we couldn't wait any longer to get out of the front range (specifically northern CO) and run to the hills. It's a little more driving/time for work and running to stores, but it's so worth it to get to live up here and away from the madness.
Your place in WV is awesome as well! I've been following your shop build. The land looks great. It reminds me of growing up in MD with 20 acres back in my high school days.

 

[Maxcustody]

Thanks!! Yes Colorado is growing like crazy. That's one of the main reasons we couldn't wait any longer to get out of the front range (specifically northern CO) and run to the hills. It's a little more driving/time for work and running to stores, but it's so worth it to get to live up here and away from the madness.
Your place in WV is awesome as well! I've been following your shop build. The land looks great. It reminds me of growing up in MD with 20 acres back in my high school days.

Thanks, We love living here......................peace and quiet.

 

[drz400smoto]

Update:
Started painting everything a few weeks ago and the drywall developed quite a few cracks at the seams. So I had to pull off and wait for the contractor to come make repairs then retexture those spots. As of now I'm hoping to wrap up the paint in the next week or two. I did borrow a paint sprayer from a friend and it make quick work of almost 15 gallons of primer. Unfortunately it didn't work as well with the top coat so I have to roll the final top coat to cover up the tails I was getting with the gun. Little teaser pic of the KTM orange accent wall.




Repair areas:


KTM Orange! I will do this full end wall in orange.

 

[drz400smoto]

Moving forward!
RaceDeck showed up


Paint is done and I've cleaned up the floor to start installing tile this week. Did a quick layout test on the design.

 

[virtualdanno]

Oof, this hurts my heart. I drooled over this house when it was for sale. If it had waited just a LITTLE longer, I would have put an offer in on it! You're doing exactly what I was planning to do and probably better and faster than I would have done it. We ended up not selling in DFW until about March though, and we bought in Conifer off Shadow Mountain, so a little ways north of you off of 73. Looks amazing, keep it up!

 

[drz400smoto]

Oof, this hurts my heart. I drooled over this house when it was for sale. If it had waited just a LITTLE longer, I would have put an offer in on it! You're doing exactly what I was planning to do and probably better and faster than I would have done it. We ended up not selling in DFW until about March though, and we bought in Conifer off Shadow Mountain, so a little ways north of you off of 73. Looks amazing, keep it up!

Yeah we jumped on this place when they did the last big price drop. Sounds like you aren't too far away then. Come by and have a beer and check out the garage space, I'm always happy to meet new neighbors up this way. I post an update soon, the garage loft space is done for now and we've moved most of our furniture and boxes over to now start the major house remodel this week.

 

[drz400smoto]

Catching up from traveling for work for the past few weeks. Racedeck is 95% installed, I will come back and trim the tiles for two of the walls to finish it out. We have also moved most of furniture and boxed up items from the house over to the garage so we can start our house remodel. So unfortunaltley this space will be a temporary living area and storage area for the next few months. I will move the bikes and gear up this fall. I was able to get the pool table professionally moved from the house to the garage so that will stay.

 

[cnc-me]

I was expecting a big KTM banner right where the fish is.

 

[RaceDeck1]

what a cool space! thanks for choosing RaceDeck

 

[drz400smoto]

Well the garage loft is working out great for our house remodel. Can't wait to get all of this house stuff out of here to set up the shop. Also got 8 loads of rocky fill to help build up the driveway.
On the house side we are making good progress but probably have another 2 months to go until 100%. I have 500+ pics so I'll have to see if I want to do a writeup this winter.

 

[Garcky]

To drastically understate: Nice!

 

[drz400smoto]

Well the house remodel is coming along! Looking forward to being able to organize the garage and loft room above once this is all done. I broke my wrist a few weeks back so it's limiting what I can move around and clean up now. Luckily contractors are doing most of the significant work!

 

[Boostingaz]

Awesome. Thread. Can't wait to see more pictures.

Envious of your property/environment you got there!