Considering a make over

[xrdad]

Hi everybody..

I'm new to the forum, kinda found it by accident. Anyway, I was looking for some ideas and after seeing some of the things that have been shown here, I'm pretty much decided on starting from scratch!!

My shop is pretty small (18x18) and is attached to the house. Like most, I repair cars/weld/woodwork and have a couple of motorcycles torn down on the odd day

I've attached some pics of where I left off last fall. I'm considering remove all the cabinets and doing what I originally wanted to (after seeing someone else here do it... question on that in a sec).

I need to maximize the space to do all the different jobs + store my restoration project and bikes at the end of the day.
I need to keep a MIG, Oxy/Acetylene torches and other equipment at the ready but safe.

I'm also planning on adding a curing oven for powder coating.

Question: I was impressed by a build done by someone here with a late 60's red Camaro. An epoxy floor, black cabinets with pot lights and if memory serves me, the shop was 24x24. BUT I can't find his posts anymore!! Can someone direct me, as I have a couple of questions for him.

Thanks

 

[28HopUp]

Question: I was impressed by a build done by someone here with a late 60's red Camaro. An epoxy floor, black cabinets with pot lights and if memory serves me, the shop was 24x24. BUT I can't find his posts anymore!! Can someone direct me, as I have a couple of questions for him.

Thanks

Here ya go -

http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=45022


In terms of your existing open shelves, you could enclose them with hinged doors, or perhaps make sliding doors from 1/4" Masonite. Jack Olsen's 12-Gauge garage features sliding doors on his soffitts, whose idea I have copied for enclosing my workbench. I ripped channels into 2x4's with a table saw. I made the top one deeper so I could lift the door into the top track and then drop it into the bottom one.

 

[xrdad]

Many thanks! I love this setup.

I was planning something similar, but got lost in the clean up and ended up where I did. The doors are already made for those open cabinets, but in plain white. I ended up with boring and my shop is cluttered with stuff I'll never use or need. The stuff that is good, I can't find because it's hidden behind all the junk.

Thanks again for the link and I'll put up a proper build thread when the project starts!!!

 

[Jack Olsen]

I'd offer two suggestions: one is building a shed to store bicycles and other stuff that's going to be constantly getting in your way; the other would be to think about fold-down benches, which not only allow two different ways to utilize a piece of space, but also force you to keep the work surface cleaner than you would if it was a permanent bench.

 

[xrdad]

Hey Jack, thanks for looking..

Actually, it was your garage that got me into the forum. I was looking for folding workbench wall mounted - and saw what you built. Very clever and I will be using parts of your plan. Then when I saw the finish product of that garage mahal... Well.. the wheels started spinning.

Your shed plan will likely find it's way onto my property and a combination of soffit storage + folding workbench is the likely scenario.

Quick question for you Jack.. the tile floor. Looks like you work in your shop just like me. I like it clean, but it has to work. And I'm on a very tight budget. The tile floor is really nice and may be just what I will do. Regrets/Advice?
My wife says we're broke, but that if I do something to do it right! So tile or epoxy?

 

[Jack Olsen]

Epoxy is thin, hard to repair or touch up, and expensive. Its durability is largely determined by whatever you've got underneath it. Using inexpensive epoxy is like using paint -- it'll look good, but require recoats on a regular basis.

Tile -- for me -- was the only way to go. I had a damaged, not-moisture-protected pad that had been poured in 1925. Subsequently-added sections had sunk about 1-1/2". I used vinyl patching concrete to somewhat adjust the inconsistencies. The tiles were .59/sf. I've been very happy with it.

I might go with porcelain, if I did it again, because it's technically more durable. But I haven't had any problems with the tile yet, and it's been there for years.

How about the gratuitous photo...

 

[xrdad]

Sweet shop, beauty car!

gotta be at 24x24, eh?

For me, it's a new home (3 years now) and some minor settling cracks. The new top layer (tile or whatever) will keep water from getting into the cracks and causing further damage due to the frosty nature of our Canadian environment. I will be shopping for a heater this year to go along with the build. I have a kerosene one now.. it works well, but looking for a cleaner finish. Gas is the way to go!! Thanks again for the advice!

 

[Snake87]

Epoxy is thin, hard to repair or touch up, and expensive. Its durability is largely determined by whatever you've got underneath it. Using inexpensive epoxy is like using paint -- it'll look good, but require recoats on a regular basis.

Tile -- for me -- was the only way to go. I had a damaged, not-moisture-protected pad that had been poured in 1925. Subsequently-added sections had sunk about 1-1/2". I used vinyl patching concrete to somewhat adjust the inconsistencies. The tiles were .59/sf. I've been very happy with it.

I might go with porcelain, if I did it again, because it's technically more durable. But I haven't had any problems with the tile yet, and it's been there for years.

How about the gratuitous photo...

I'm also curious about the tile. I love the look of epoxy but my slab is absolutely destroyed. Cracks, uneven surface, I'm not sure I can fix it and what the epoxy would look like on concrete this damaged.

When you say damaged, how badly was it damaged? Do you happen to have a before picture? Did you do anything to level the surface before putting the tile down or was it already pretty level? The cracks in my floor have at most a 1/8" height difference and I'm trying to determine what to do with it.

 

[Jack Olsen]

In this picture, you can see the leveling I did before I started with the thinset. The wet section at the mouth of the garage was where the building had been extended forward. The new section had sunk as the dirt below it compressed, so that was where there was the most fill. But I only used 200# of concrete for the filling. I wasn't attempting to correct everything.

The tiling itself is pretty straightforward. You want to 'double butter' the tiles for this kind of application, which means applying thinset both to the floor and also to the tile. This will reduce the number of voids underneath it, which in turn would make the tile more prone to breakage. This is one of the big differences from how you would install tile in a bathroom, where installers often just dab thinset and allow lots of voids.

Now, I live in earthquake country -- and I'm also in an area of Southern California famous for subterranean bitumen bubbling up whenever and wherever it wants to and forming lakes of liquid asphalt -- I'm two blocks from the La Brea Tar Pits. Weirdly, my little 1/8-acre plot of land generates about $600 a year in oil revenue (huh?!).

Which is all a way of saying I'm not on a particularly stable piece of ground.

And the pad itself was poured to whatever standards were prevalent in 1925, which means no rebar for starters. So in this picture, you can easily see the undulation I had to accommodate in setting the tile. It is NOT flat. But the thinset corrects for minor inconsistencies, and you'd never think about the lack of flatness when you're walking on it.

 

[A1an]

Jack...is that the ceramic tile that is typically always on sale/special at HD or Lowes for well under $1/sqft?

 

[Jack Olsen]

Yes. I bought the cheapest they had. At the time, it was marked down to .59/sf. I've also seen it frequently for .68/sf.

 

[A1an]

Good to know. Looks like it has a pretty good texture to it too. Any issues with it being slippery when wet?

 

[Jack Olsen]

None.

Tiles are rated for hardness, coefficient of friction and moisture content. My tile is up to code for commercial use indoors or out.

 

[Snake87]

Thanks Jack. A lot of usable info in that post. I appreciate the effort, and it will help in making a decision.