Does the extra few feet make a difference?

[Hilly]

Hello to all the GJ followers out there! I am the typical lurker that has been hanging around and is ready to start his build soon. Currently I am limited to 1000 sq. ft. and need some guidance from experienced wrenches.

My home is in the city and 25'x40' spaces the garage away from the house perfectly. My concern is that the 25' width might be too narrow and 30' is definitely too wide for my lot. Looking for input as to if going 26-28' will provide a significant advantage at the expense of extra bench room at the back of the garage if I with less than 40' deep?

Personal experiences gentlemen?

Thanks for your input-Hilly.

 

[Falcon67]

Depending on what you park in there, yes it will. This is 24' deep with 16'ish intermediate size cars - cars have enough room to scoot by the tail section.

Shop is 24x40 with the area pictured 28' wide. Materials and money fixed the size, but 26' or 28' deep would make a big difference. I have some pickup work to do, which will take up a 19' space. There is good room to work, but would not turn down 2' LOL.

 

[bczygan]

There are times in life where an extra inch or two makes a difference.
There are times when an extra few feet make a big difference too.

This is one of them.

 

[sberry]

Agree, get all you can.

 

[rburke65]

Go as large as you can. There is a reason You'll never hear anyone say,"damn.....I should have built that 2' shorter"!

 

[Hilly]

There are times in life where an extra inch or two makes a difference.
There are times when an extra few feet make a big difference too.

This is one of them.

Hahahaha!! That's the truth!

Thanks for the input. Im now leaning towards going 27' wide which would give me 37' of depth for 999 sq. ft. total. My father suggested continuing the roofline out 25' behind the building, pour a slab, and make it a drive through garage.

This would give me the option of enclosing it in the future and having both a "clean" and "dirty" side. There Is a thread on here by the name of "The M House" and he has something similar to that which I really like.

 

[ratmotr]

Make it as big and long as you are allowed you never know what the future holds. I built mine 46' deep and it's lucky I did because I just bought a '73 Coupe de Ville and it and my Excursion just fit nose to tail.

 

[ddawg16]

Before you lock it in....do some mental layouts.....

At 27', you 'could' get 3 cars in there.....but it would be tight....do you really want 3 cars? If you do...go 28'....

What are you going to be doing in there? If your doing any woodworking, then you want to be able to isolate the woodworking area from the rest of the garage....otherwise, you will be sharing all of the saw dust with everything else.

For the most part....side space is best for storage...not really enough room to work on stuff....front space (area in front of cars) for working....

 

[kartracer23]

I'm just finishing up my 24' x 28'. Hindsight being 20/20, wish I would have gone 26' wide so I could have put 9' doors. It's 3' wider than my previous, and that seems like a lot, but it ends up with most of that 3' extra down the middle (double doors). If I had gone with a single door, probably wouldn't be that big of a deal. With 8' doors, I have to be a little careful pulling in. With my widest vehicle, I have about 6" clearance from the mirrors. For the depth, the 28' is honestly plenty (and max in our town without a variance). I put a 5' room in the back and still have room in front of the cars for a 24" deep workbench without too much trouble.

*And the reason I didn't go wider was that I thought it would take up too much of my yard - the 24' wide + the 1' the building inspector made us shift it over already took up an extra 4', or maybe 25% of the yard I had left.

http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=153348

 

[KPSquared]

No man (that still has a pair) has ever uttered the words "oops I built my garage to big"

Go as big as you are allowed and as big as you can afford, then find a way to go bigger.

I'm working on my 30x36 and I know I'm going to run out of space fast, but that's all I could get on my lot. . .

 

[darkk]

I'm almost done with my 30x30 and I knew it was to small before I started. All I could build per town zoning. Take all you can get and try to slide a couple extra in there....

 

[Charles (in GA)]

Use sizes that make the most of materials, proper stud spacing, etc. Don't want to be cutting off most of a sheet of t1-11 or hardie board 4x8 sheet to get a 1 ft tall strip because of an odd size.

Dont forget eaves and overhangs, wouldn't want it overhanging the neighbor's place.

Charles

 

[Steevo]

I went with 24x40, because that is all I could fit where I could build a shop. I also had to go with an "end-load" design because of its location. If I had my choice, it would load from the long side, and be 28 deep by more than 40 wide. I'd even take an extra foot in any direction, but as stated above, that results in lots of odd material cuts and waste.

 

[Cryptic1911]

build it as large as you can afford and legally fits in the space. The extra two feet will definately be nicer. One thing you'll want to figure is where you are going to put a workbench.. figure on 2ft of bench, then a couple feet for standing room, or maybe like 3ft if you have a stool. That always seems to get forgotten. People build a garage 22 feet deep, and have a 20ft long truck, then have no room for a usable bench

 

[Falcon67]

This is what 24' deep looks like with a 16' race car resting it's back bumper against the overhead door and 2' chewed up in front by bench/tools box/etc. You can pull an engine, it just takes a little patience and care.

 

[csp]

People keep telling the OP to build as large as he can. Did anyone read that he's limited to 1000 sq ft?

The question is does he sacrifice the planned 40' depth to get additional width (more than 25'). He's not asking how big it should be.

The answer is it depends on what you're parking in it or working on.

 

[cabranch47]

I built my shop about 7 years ago, 30' X 32' with a decked attic space. Ran out of room, presently adding 14' X 28 to the side for more room (would be bigger, but ran out of lot. Make is as large as you can the first time.

 

[akdiesel]

I'm going to jump on both sides of the fence here.
Charles has the correct rule of thumb when building. Size it in even numbers. Dimensional lumber comes in even sizes so to help with waste make it 26' or 28'.
Now the other side, not sure if easements were mentioned. Neighbors may not like the idea. I know it is your property but they can make an impact on your living if you make them mad.

 

[Falcon67]

3rd on the even dimension deal. I went 24' deep because I intended to stick build my joist/rafter units. Once you get over 24', you get into trusses. Just a regular truss costs about 2.5 times (using my local estimates) a stick build up to 24' - after that, it can be a wash because a big ol' 2x12 that long is going to be high buck if you can even get it and weighs a bunch. (mine were right at 100 lbs per board) Example - I wanted to use 2x10x24 but I would have had to buy 40 because they are non-stock in this area. Plus delivery. I needed 19. So I went with what was available in the local yards.

Another suggestion, which I also did. Like, did for weeks until my wife was about nuts. Go to the home store and get a bundle of grade stakes, a 500' roll of nylon cord and a 100' tape measure (with crank handle to reel it in). Stake out a dimension - say 28x24 - then string it, square i up, stake off some doors, then benches, etc. Get something on the ground and you can visualize the space pretty easy. You can spin the building, change layouts, check access, and anything else you think of with the stakes and string. About half my original ideas went out the window after laying the thing out a few times.

 

[jvitez]

Think about how you'll use the garage and what you want to do in there. Depth is very important if you want a workbench and working space on a vehicle parked nose first. Width is important if you want storage, or you'll be doing much body work/interior work with doors open, etc. Play with Sketchup, or the old standby of graph paper and cut-to-scale workbenches, vehicles, toolboxes, etc, and move them around various sized spaces and see what you think. Falcon67's idea is also excellent.

 

[larry_g]

Before you lock it in....do some mental layouts.....

At 27', you 'could' get 3 cars in there.....but it would be tight....do you really want 3 cars? If you do...go 28'....

What are you going to be doing in there? If your doing any woodworking, then you want to be able to isolate the woodworking area from the rest of the garage....otherwise, you will be sharing all of the saw dust with everything else.

For the most part....side space is best for storage...not really enough room to work on stuff....front space (area in front of cars) for working....

+1 on the above. What are you doing in there? Parking cars then go for 3 wide. Building a car from scratch then long and narrow will work as you have fab in the back and workspace in the front for the car. So is it a parking garage or a workshop? You can have a work and parking area in 25' wide if your willing to leave the parking car outside during work hours.


lg
no neat sig line

 

[Orange65]

Yep- depends on what you are doing in there. I moved from a 20' x 30' (deep) shop to a 24' x 24'. When I pull an engine, I have to turn the vehicle diagonally across the shop to be able to manuver the hoist and engine out. I didn't have to in my 30' deep shop and I even had a work bench across the back wall. So, yes a few feet makes a difference. It just depends on where you want the few feet.