A Place For my Stuff - 1425 SqFt Workshop Build

[Car_Guy]

After getting the wife to sign off on the plans we are finally starting on my new workshop next to the house. It will be 1425 sq ft, 2x6 construction, with a 14’ ceiling inside. I am contracting it all out, as much as I would love to do it myself, I just don’t have that kind of time. I am sure I will find things that I will wish I had done differently, but I think my Garage Journal reading has helped avoid some of those. Hopefully these pictures are interesting at the least and maybe informative for others.

Here is the first day where they cleared the land:

Digging the footers:

Rebar ready for concrete:

Concrete footers:

Stem Walls:

Dirt starting to be filled in:

4wheeling in the garage:

 

[LXCam]

Most excellent, congrats and good luck!. Not that this means **** but I on that same skid steer, yours or the contractors?.

 

[Car_Guy]

Most excellent, congrats and good luck!. Not that this means **** but I on that same skid steer, yours or the contractors?.

Unfortunately the contractors. I would say it would be nice to get one in the future, but I have a long list of wants, and I am not sure it is high on the list for the projects I have around right now (I do need to actually drive on sometime though it looks like a lot of fun)

 

[Car_Guy]

Rebar prepped:

Concrete was poured this morning. Took 2.5 trucks to fill it all. Thankfully the rain seemed to hold off for the day.

 

[M-technik-3]

Nice view, are you planning on have a deck to enjoy the view?

 

[Car_Guy]

Nice view, are you planning on have a deck to enjoy the view?

Thank You. I already have a nice patio/deck/pool behind the house so I don't think I'm going to do one off the back of the garage, but I will have three windows looking out, they will be 6' wide x2' tall, so I hope it gives a good enough panoramic view (that is one of those details I spent a lot of time thinking about but won't know if it was right until it is done...)

 

[vette66bob]

I hope you find time to work on your projects with the perfect views out of your windows. Nice space and good ceiling hight. I am looking forward to watching the project.

 

[Car_Guy]

I hope you find time to work on your projects with the perfect views out of your windows. Nice space and good ceiling hight. I am looking forward to watching the project.

I hope so too... it will just be nice to be able to leave things setup. It is such a pain to have to drag all the saws out to do a quick project then have to put them all back away.

 

[CNGsaves]

Great start on nice shop !! The VIEW is gorgeous !!

Where are you located ?? Maybe Colorado ??

Update GJ Profile with our location and keep greats pics coming. Good luck.

 

[upndown]

I'm guessing AZ or NM.
Great pics! Lookin. Forward to the rest of the build.

 

[JimL]

Cool! Nice view too! Will follow along!

 

[LXCam]

Ya man, looking great. My guess, if it ain't az, how about north of palmdale.

 

[Car_Guy]

Well there are a few winners above, I live in Tucson, AZ. I'll try to get new pictures up as things progress (I know my hard drive is filling up with pictures). It sounds like the framing will be starting next week so it should really start to look like a garage soon.

It is weird watching the different steps of construction and seeing what days the garage looks big and what days it looks small.

 

[Car_Guy]

Today they got most of the framing done on the ground (they only have two panels to complete tomorrow) the trusses also showed up. It will be a flat roof, but they were able to get a pretty good slope on it.

 

[yaidunno]

Spectacular views you've got! Looking forward to seeing the build progress.

 

[Car_Guy]

They got all of the wood walls put up today, the front wall will be all block. It looks taller than I thought it would inside (a good thing). It was days like today where I don’t feel so bad contracting the garage out, framing itself is not complicated, but watching how the crew worked on the top of the walls reminds me why there are so many injuries in construction. (plus it took more people than I would have been able to con into coming over to raise walls)
Also, it is good to know my air nailers should last forever the way I use them, I couldn’t have told you that the back end works as a great hammer… (or at least that the nailer part continues to work long afterwards)

 

[bluehatchy]

It's HUGE! Looking forward to seeing more.

 

[Strouty]

How much snow load are the trusses rated for? (LOL)

Looking good! That is a great view for sure.

 

[matt_i]

Wow, I have not seen balloon framing used ever in a "modern" project. I thought all the timber long enough for that was done by the 1940s

Looks like you have plenty of height, very nice.

 

[Car_Guy]

How much snow load are the trusses rated for? (LOL)

Looking good! That is a great view for sure.

Snow... that is why I love AZ, the few times we get snow it only last long enough to see it on the ground then it goes away, no shoveling required.


The last few days have been less exciting, sheathing a few walls, but today was a good day, they brought out a large crane truck to lift the GLB (glue laminate beams) into place. The largest is 32 ft long and weighed ~1000lb! I was just a big kid out there today watching the crane lifting stuff and placing it up on the roof. They also started to get the electric laid out.

Here is the view out of the back two windows:


The crane work:

You can now see the size of the doors, the little one is a 10x10 and the big on a 16x13.

 

[Richard Cranium]

looking good, Look forwards to seeing it complete..

 

[1/2 Cup]

One awesome build, well done.

 

[Car_Guy]

Today they finished most of the roof and started on the electric. Based on my reading here on the forum I had everything put above plywood level so they should stay accessible.

 

[thetastelingers]

Looking good! The view out the two windows is killer!

 

[j p smith]

That is looking very good!

 

[Car_Guy]

It has been a few days since I have added photos, but it is getting to the point where the progress is slower in picturs. They have finished most of the sheathing now, framed the inside of the front wall, installed the man-doors, and started the electric. (Thankfully I caught them before they mounted the panel and could remind them that it was supposed to be a Square D QU box.)

 

[Car_Guy]

It has been a busy week. They finished the roof, (well short of the white reflective coat) prepped for stucco, finished the wiring culminating in insulation today. I spent the last weekend running copper air-line in the walls, some cat5 and speaker wire. I grossly underestimated the time to run all of the copper pipe by myself, so I had to take Monday off work to sweat it all together. It should be well worth it once it is finished though.

 

[JimL]

Looks good, is that stucco or efis?

 

[Car_Guy]

Looks good, is that stucco or efis?

I'm fairly sure they are using regular stucco

 

[Talha]

Excellent build. Good luck.

 

[Car_Guy]

My contractors seem to be flying right along. They got drywall up, and this morning got to mudding it and getting the “browncoat” of the stucco up.

 

[Sunbimmer]

Really nice space

 

[lowspeed_highdrag]

Awesome! No bathroom though?

 

[aroslv]

What are you doing for cooling?

 

[Car_Guy]

Awesome! No bathroom though?

Unfortunately with a septic system on the opposite side of the house it was going to be too expensive (quotes were something like $10k to add it... and there are lots of shrubbery around)

What are you doing for cooling?

Right now I am counting on airflow from the door and windows being open, but I have a power line run so I can add a mini-split with two heads eventually.

 

[Car_Guy]

Smaller update, they have the walls all ready for painting now, and they started the work to upgrade the electric to my house to 400 amps. Next week they should be running a 200 amp line from the garage to the house.

 

[mountainman72]

Great space. Looking forward to seeing it built out on the inside. Congrats on your new garage.

Brett

 

[bww_mnm]

Just catching this build and really enjoyed the 37 posts so far! Echoing many other replies, that is a heck of a view you have. Thanks for sharing your build.

 

[hardly]

And the sunsets complete the package! Congrats..

 

[Car_Guy]

It has some color now! (well shades of brown and white…) The garage doors are up. I had them put a highline kit on the smaller door so I could keep clearance under it when/if I ever put a lift in that bay.