ebay UK self build

[simon g-s]

After lurking since I joined the HAMB a while back, I can now make a contribution. I have struggled to build Hotrods for years in the street, in a rented 16 X 8 council lockup and recently in a drafty, cold barn with dodgy electrics several miles from home.
With all the kids having finished University and moved out, we sold up and moved out to a village on the edge of the Fens, a big sky, flat bit in the east of England.
Being a bit on the skint side the only way to build the garage I wanted was do it myself and buy most of what I needed from ebay.
A fairly popular way to get a cheapish and functional garage in the UK is using concrete sections, usually 6.6"x2 ft that bolt together, the builders can put one up in a day ! The 16x12 garage I had already was built this way so it seemed locgical to use this method to extend to 50ft long, the most I thought I could get away with .
Heres a couple of pics of what I started with, digging some out by hand and making a real mess with a small digger. More to follow.
Cheers Simon.

 

[Mr Bingo]

Best of luck Simon! Love your dog. Cheers! Jay

 

[AeroNautiCal]

Hello & Welcome!

Yours looks to be quite a build project, and I'm looking forward to seeing it progress.

 

[bazzateer]

Cool! Another UK member! Hope it all goes well Simon. Bring that digger down to Watford, I've got a little job for you ;-)

 

[compo7000]

I have struggled to build Hotrods for years in the street, in a rented 16 X 8 council lockup.

I too have been there, know the problems you have had working in a council lockup and street.

Best of luck, keep us updated on the build.

 

[crazytrain]

Looks like fun! Good luck on the build. What will the final size of your new garage be.

 

[simon g-s]

Thanks for positive response. The finished garage will be 50x12 ft, long enough for 2 hotrods and a project/workspace at the far end. I plan to insulate floor walls and roof, double glazed windows to keep working through the winter, maybe a woodstove in one cornrer. I hired the digger from a local farmer over a weekend to dig out the bulk of the earth, about 6" topsoil and then yellow clay. Topsoil saved for a vegatable plot and clay taken away, quite a mission to fill 2 skips !
More pics later, Simon.

 

[Krash Kadillak]

This will be interesting....

BTW, what's a "council lockup" - a shipping storage container?

 

[simon g-s]

In the UK we have a lot of council owned houses and garages that are rented. I guess in Merica you would call them social housing. Council garages were often built several years after the house in blocks as the houses were built before thetypical tenant, an hourly paid (blue collar ) working man could afford to own a car. They tend to be very small, just big enough to fit a car in and not much else. My first full build was in a lock up.You can see the row of garage doors with flats above. Luckily a good mate lived above my lockup and drilled a hole through the floor to fit up a power supply. I chose a topolino as it was the smallest car I could find to make a decent hotrod from, wouldn't want to do it again though, took 7 years !

 

[bazzateer]

I'm currently renting 2 of those lock-up type garages, one is full of spares, the other has a car plus tools etc.

 

[simon g-s]

Hired a minidigger over whitsun weekend after moving the crappy patio into a heap of ********. The digger made short work of taking off the topsoil and pilling it up for use later. You can see my dogs were a great help ! The clay was harder work, especially when it started to rain. Got it all piled up on a the lawn with a tarp to try and protect the grass.
Heavy rain delayed work for a while, It took 2 weeks to barrow it around the house and into a skip, well 3 of them at £135 a go ! 30 tons has cost me a couple of inches off the waist, I need new jeans !

 

[bazzateer]

£135/skip? Damn that's cheap compared to around here (usually about £200).

 

[Bib Overalls]

Dirt is an exception to the law of supply and demand. There is more of it than just about anything else on earth. But when you need some you have to pay through the nose to get it and when you have too much you have to pay through the nose to get rid of it.

Save your jeans. If my experience is any indicator lost weight always finds it's way home.

 

[41ratrod]

SIMON G-S I sent you a PM

 

[simon g-s]

Started to spread the ******** I already had and Bust a gut scrounging up some ******** and then smashing it with a sledge hammer, THEN found out the skip hire place had a glut and were giving it away, FREE and CRUSHED. Got a ton at a time in my trailer and bent the axles !
Took afew weeks to do this as we had RAIN, lots of it. Apparently the wetest summer for 100 years, just my luck. Bought a pump and put it too work.
Also put a little retaining wall in to stop the niebours garden sliding in to ours, put a 18" deep soakaway in along the side too as the garge slab is below garden level, hence so much muck away ! Got 6 to 8 1nches rammed down, had the wacker plate hired for the weekend but did the whole thing in a couple of hours, so kept the niebour happy as he spent the rest of the week end refurbing his gravel drive. nearly ready for concrete !

 

[simon g-s]

Forgot some pics.

 

[dittle fart around]

Taking care of the fiddly bits. Looks good so far.

 

[simon g-s]

Got the best price I could find on ebay for 42 foam and reinforcing mesh, took the prices to my local builders merchant who matched the price and delivered for free ! Good result !
Got it all laid in the hole after some shuttering, just need concrete and a pump now, 100ft from the road to barrow 6 yds of concrete, dont think so !

 

[simon g-s]

Well the concrete guys turned up early, I'd warned all the niebours there could be some noise, I was still in bed ! I needed a pump as the slab was inaccessible to the concrete truck, more expense as the only help i could rely on haveing moved out into the country was my son, didnt want to end up the 2 off us wheelbarrowing 6 cubic metres up hill. Raked it all into place and tamped it level, all done by 9.30, time for breakfast !

 

[simon g-s]

I gave the concrete slab a couple of weeks to harden off, had a bit of tidy up and got rid of 10 tons of spoil, mostly clay, about 100 barrow loads.

The construction i have chosen to use bolt together pre-cast concrete sections, a fairly common "budget " choice here in UK. I'm going even lower budget, buying 44 sections of ebay for £345, less than £10 each. New ones are £70+ so quite chuffed with my bargain. Hired a truck with a tail lift and went to collect my score from Nottingham. I have to thank Russ who gave up a long day to help out and apologies to his lady as he wasn't there to meet her off the train.

Some pics soon of the build, goes together like lego with 200lb blocks !!

 

[AeroNautiCal]

Great progress (and workout!).

All the trails and tribulations of the prep and build will be far outweighed at the utter joy of having your spacious workshop so close to home.

Thanks for sharing.

 

[simon g-s]

Had my brother in law come over for a day to lend a hand. Made a good but slow start getting the first few panels up. The ebay panels I bought were a different thickness to the the existing garage panels, and of couse the bolt hole spacings were different spacing, nothing that couldn't be sorted with an SDS drill.

Id bought a load of all thread to bolt em up with but hadn't reckoned on the shape of the panels. Being cast they have bevelled edges so they dont bolt up square, solution was to wege the gaps and cut wooden blocks at the same angle as the internal bevel so the bolts all pull up square. The blocks will also double as fixing points for the internal cladding, hopefully second ply from ebay, or OSB. Wish I could get it for what you 'mericans pay. £13 a sheet here in UK .

The window frames were another ebay score, £10 each, got to get the rest of the slabs bolted up first though.

 

[simon g-s]

Finally got pics off the camera to show progression with assembling the concrete sections.
I soon got the knack of lifting the panels , walking them into position and slipping the bolts into place. I cut some wood blocks to accomadate the bevel edge of the slabs and provide a fixing point for the interior cladding when I can afford it. The props were essential as the wall is 34 ft long and wobbles alarmingly in the wind. Im told by a neigbor ( clerk of works at Lincoln castle ) that once the roof is on that will brace it all and make it good and solid. I'm not 100% convinced and have a back up plan to brace the walls and roof with a welded A frame that I can hang a weston differential from, maybe 2 of them with an I beam and dollie between them.
Anyway, all up now and ordered some roofing Trusses.

 

[bazzateer]

Coming along nicely.

 

[simon g-s]

Hoping to finish the roof this weekend. Got a load of quotes from ebay for roof trusses but went with Jewsons in the end for the best deal, delivered within a week !
Got the wall plates up and bolted em down to the sections with 1/8" strap iron. Worked a treat and helped stabilize the wall and tie it all together, gives a nice even surface to put the trusses on.
I got half the trusses in place in a day, then another 1/2 day to get the purlins cut and fixed.
Doing it half at a time as this is really an extension to the back of the existing garage. When the roof is on and weather tight, the old roof will come off ( sell it on ebay! ), move all the ****, fix wall plates , truss and roof, job done !
Been a bit delayed last week as rain has stopped play but good forecast this weekend, hope to get all done as I have a day off on Monday too!
Pics not uploading, will try again in the morning.

 

[Zeke]

Love the stand up concrete screed!

 

[simon g-s]

Some pics of the roof getting started.

 

[bazzateer]

Updates required!!!

 

[simon g-s]

No photos yet but making good progress witha weeks holiday. Got the roof on, electrics connected and started insulating and boarding out.
Pics in the next few days. back to work Monday so slow progress till Xmas.

 

[Bib Overalls]

I'm told by a neighbor ( clerk of works at Lincoln castle ) that once the roof is on that will brace it all and make it good and solid. I'm not 100% convinced and have a back up plan to brace the walls and roof with a welded A frame that I can hang a weston differential from, maybe 2 of them with an I beam and dollie between them.

If you use solid sheeting on the roof and run diagonal braces under the truss joists (or solid sheeting) you will create a very strong brace for your walls. The welded up "A" frame may be overkill structure wise but a hoist is always useful.

 

[simon g-s]

Had a busy weekend and made significant progress, got all the wall boarding up done AND painted !! Roof to do next spring when Ive saved up, got some big bills coming in. Paint makes a huge difference and worth the effort. Ive had years working in a drafty barn with poor lighting so I know what I want.
The lights were a great ebay score from a bowling alley, £2.46 each.

 

[AeroNautiCal]

That's a lovely workspace you've created.

 

[simon g-s]

Just finished the second coat of paint, all done !!! It looks great. Interior measures 50X 12 ft nearly all ready to move my stuff in. I have a couple of things to do over the weekend so will not get time to do much except get a couple of benches from my old barn workshop, cant wait to get set up!!!

 

[bazzateer]

Excellent work! Boarding and painting the walls is how I'll be doing mine as well.

 

[Justanoldguy]

I'm curious at how you seal the bottom of the
concrete panels, given that the floor level is below
grade. Also how do you seal the vertical joints in
the panels. Close up pics would be cool. Love the
build, by the way.

 

[simon g-s]

Hiya mate, love the Lincoln and the potential these old motors have when you start mucking about, no rules. Have you seen this on the HAMB ?
http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=272171
Quite inspirational, I want one, might have to sell my hotrod first though.
Sealing the concrete garage has worked.. mostly... got a couple of leaks but I know where its getting in and how to fix it, when it stops raining that is.
To seal the base and between slabs I used a bitumen based mastic, I think it was intended to seal gutters, drains and flat roofs. I bought 4 cases of out of date mastic from ebay. Had to heat soak the tubes for a while on a radiator to soften it up enough and used a pnuematic gun to get it out. Put the mastic on both sides on the base and followed up with a stong mix of mortaron the inside. On the outside I dug a soakaway and filled it with gravel. It leaks where the new slab meets the old with a DPM inbetween, fix will be to grind out the joint ouside and seal up with mastic, should work...I hope ! Couldn't find any pics Im afraid.

 

[simon g-s]

Well been a while. Had a grandson born 10 weeks early so done a few miles to and fro to the prem unit in Cambridge.
Got some of the roof insulated and boarded up but ran out of cash so have started bringing some of my **** over from my rented barn. Paint is cheap so pimped a few starage cabinets up when I had time . Scored a decent sofa of the local freecycle and a heat lamp to keep the dogs warm, not got above freezing for a few weeks.
A few pics and more later when I get my hot rods and electric car project ( VW polo ) moved over.

 

[bazzateer]

Jus' Chillin'

 

[simon g-s]

Pics coming soon!!!
I have spent far to much time sorting out the ****, scapping some of it and bringing the good stuff home from the old barn. Got 3 hotrods in residence now, my Austin pickup truck, Buick V8 roadster and a mates T bucket project. All need work but when the T bucket is rolling and steering its going and I can get stuck in to a new project, a Willys gasser with a Hemi.

 

[bazzateer]

Pics coming soon!!!

Define "soon".