First time home owner gets his first garage...

[EricJ@AMS]

And it just happens to be a 24x30 with gas heat, 220v, and air compressor already included!!

The bad is that they left all of this **** in there, no insulation, no drywall, no ceiling, wiring is a mess, and there is no organized lighting to speak of. This condition won't last long though. I am pretty much finished organizing the house and it's time to start on the garage!

I'll pull the trigger on a floor coating system within the week, next will be wiring and lighting, drywall/ceiling, and finally new storage/organization. After all the dust settles, I would like to re-engineer the low ceiling above the middle bay and put a low-rise 2 post lift.

I'm a full time ASE Master tech that works in a super clean/well organized performance shop/manufacturing company. I am so used to a sorted work space that the garage MUST match it or I will be declined to work in it.

Here are some pics as it stood as I moved in and a few as it sits with my 3 rare white junk boxes in it.

It's a good start, but there is much work ahead. Wish me luck!

Regards,
Eric Jones

 

[bradweingartner]

Galant VR4s?

Trust me, you're better off with a blank slate like that. You can do whatever you want with it!

 

[Wanna Ride]

Thats a nice garage for someone who's never had one before. Keep us updated with pics!

 

[EricJ@AMS]

Two Galant VR-4s, 1901/2000 is the nicer one, 430/1000 is gonna get parted out, and a rare 89 Colt Turbo with the super super rare cruise, power window option package (probably 50 imported like that max).

 

[nismomans13]

does @ams refer to the same AMS that builds badass Evo's?

 

[EricJ@AMS]

Yes sir, I've been there since 2004 and drove the silver drag evo to its first 9 sec pass on Sept 2005.

Lately we've moved our focus more towards bad *** Nissan GT-Rs and LSX platforms!

 

[Red Leader]

I agree, the blank slate is nice because you have plenty of time to think about how you want all the guts in the walls like electrical.

Once you have that, then the fun begins! Insulation, sheetrock, paint, etc!

Have you thought about what kind of electrical you want out there? Lighting? Do you know how big your service panel is and how many open spots you have?

That is where I started. Once you get that down you can start chomping away.

 

[WhatThaFrig]

does @ams refer to the same AMS that builds badass Evo's?

That was my first thought.

Very nice VR4s! I'm a Subie guy, but am envious of your EVO work.

 

[sscustom]

wow thats a nice sized garage you have and congrats on your first garage you'l love it

sam

 

[nismomans13]

Yes sir, I've been there since 2004 and drove the silver drag evo to its first 9 sec pass on Sept 2005.

Lately we've moved our focus more towards bad *** Nissan GT-Rs and LSX platforms!

thats pretty sweet, i always liked the drag evo and time attack evo. I'm actually building a 240sx drag project now, solid axle, full drag suspension, haven't decided on motor yet. I might go lsx, its doubtful i'll throw a sr, rb or ka in there though.

 

[n2ocamaro]

Looks like my garage when I moved in. AMS Performance? You must know Larry Hamilton.

 

[JMURiz]

Lucky dog, that's a great space...even for us that have garages. Good work, and now you can make it your own.

 

[flybefree]

That is an excellent starting point, looking forward to what comes next.

 

[EricJ@AMS]

Yup, I called him "Larry the dang'r guy"!

 

[mustanginky]

awesome setup you have there. like said, blank slate is perfect for doing what you want with it. love the cars by the way!

 

[EricJ@AMS]

mustanginky, your SN looks familiar. Your on 502streetscene aren't you? I'm GSNT on there.

I cleaned out the right side of the garage today. Removed the random shelving, decimated a colony of ants and spiders, removed a ton of cobwebs, and swept the floor. I took advantage of Harbor Freights tent sale this weekend and picked up some stuff (Snap-On tool box and Weber grill obviously didn't come from there!).

At some point I'm gonna have to rip the siding off the garage and replace all this crappy particleboard with plywood. It is flimsy, not very secure, and has some rodent holes in areas. You can see in some spots they replaced some of the really bad stuff with plywood before siding it last. At this point I'm gonna prep to coat the floors and put insulation in the walls before the winter hits.

 

[wish2345]

Nice looking garage Eric, What all did you get at Harbor Freight ? i need to stock my garage with stuff and know they have some decent stuff and then they have junk

 

[Falcon67]

Looks like great workspace from here. Nice size too. I have one of the HF engine stands. I modified it by welding a 1/2" nut over the locking hole and made a T handle for it out of a 1/2" bolt and chunk of bar scrap. Makes it a little easier to use. Mine needs a collar to locate the engine mount plate and tube so you don't have to wiggle it around to locate the position holes. I also have the parts washer and it's worked well for me.

 

[EricJ@AMS]

Nice looking garage Eric, What all did you get at Harbor Freight ? i need to stock my garage with stuff and know they have some decent stuff and then they have junk

Basically what you see in the picture plus a few more things. You just have to go in and look around. I wouldn't expect $10-15 pneumatic tools and cheap impact sockets to last all that long, but there is nothing wrong with a cheap oil funnel.

 

[Wingnut65]

Nice looking place, Eric. Don't complain that it is bare. Some shops have the drywall up and elec in, but not where needed or nearly enough. You have the opportunity to make this what you want it. You can never have too much lighting or receptacles.

wish2345: For the HF Tools, be sure to hit the "The Harbor Freight PASS/FAIL Thread...". There are many tools that get the PASS rating and many more that are to be Passed on by. Check it out and wee what others have learned the hard way. (BTW, Welcome to GJ).

And now back to the previous thread line...

 

[EricJ@AMS]

Still up in the air on who to use for floor coating. I've tried calling Legacy twice now and they don't pick up. Working for a company that lives and dies on telephone sales, that really rubs me the wrong way.

Is polyurea that much better than epoxy? It seems to be touted as such!

 

[illmatyk]

Very nice place! I've seen clips of AMS work and it is outstanding. Really dig the Time Attack Evo you guys did.

 

[EricJ@AMS]

I pulled the trigger today for 1000 sq ft of 100% solids epoxy kit from Epoxy-Coat.com If I'm feeling frisky enough (and don't drink too much), I might do the job over the Holiday weekend.

 

[couchmechanic]

Trust me, Wingnut is right. The sheetrock gets in the way when your stringing wire.
What he said for me too! It looks good.

 

[EricJ@AMS]

Epoxy showed up today. I think I will start cleaning out the garage on Saturday and prep the floors. It's looking like Sunday or Monday will be the day of the coating job, the weather is supposed to be in the low 70's either day.

 

[ace028]

Any updates? Love your work, I follow it over on 6speedonline.com. For somereason it will not let me post there.

I'm building a datsun 510 and was hoping to get some of your input and help with the build. Going for a s15 sr20det swap.

Sorry to get off topic, good luck with your garage, I recently just bought a home too, but I'm now deployed so I can't work on it or my car, so I have to live vicariously through all these awesome builds and garages lol.

 

[EricJ@AMS]

Yup! Epoxy coat is done and despite the pretty terrible condition of the slab, it turned out pretty nice.

 

[EricJ@AMS]

Here are a few crappy cell phone pics. To be such a highly touted cameraphone, the HTC Evo sure does take terrible pictures in low light.

There is obviously a ton more work left. I've basically just coated the floors and moved everything back in. I still have to rewire the place, insulate, and drywall before winter.

 

[EricJ@AMS]

This evening I tore down the crappy shelves along the back wall and purged a lot of the previous owners ****. My boss gave me an extra enclosed cabinet that I put fluids, paints, etc into and I painted and mounted the big corner shelf seen in the first pics into the opposite corner. One of many steps to get the place organized. The next big step is purging the big wood table of all the previous owners junk and deciding if I'm going to keep it or chop it up into firewood.

New wiring, insulation, and drywall will be going in about 3-4 weeks from now.

 

[Joeydabomb]

Looks good, I remember seeing this on 502ss a few weeks back.

 

[EricJ@AMS]

Been a while since any updates. I got a dealership job that supplies their own tool boxes so I got to bring my monster roll cab home. The floors are getting plenty of use and don't look as good as when I laid the epoxy. I got a hell of a deal on a very solid solid steel welding bench that you can see in the left corner. The hanging heater didn't work so it got scrapped and replaced with a new floor furnace that heats the garage very nicely despite the insulation not being all the way finished.

A new Atlas BP8000 2 post lift should be here in two days. I'm roughing in the new wiring and prepping for drywall. Hopefully by summer it should start looking more like some of these super sweet garages I keep seeing on this forum that make me so jealous!

 

[EricJ@AMS]

It took a while, but I finally have a lift, new windows, and some drywall! Next steps are taping/mudding/paint, drywall the ceiling, and keep working on electrical.

 

[dubber]

Perfect choice for your first house/garage, nice work, I'm liking the recent progress.....Keep it up!

 

[LShee778]

That looks awesome. The lift is something I wish I had ceiling height for.

My buddy has one of AMS's SRT4 motors. Curently in the middle of swapping it in with a PT 6262 setup and some other goodies. Not many of those motors around from what I'm told. Maybe only 4 or 5?

 

[EricJ@AMS]

I barely have the height. It's just a regular height hip roof and we moved ties to make room. I can only get SUVs about 42" off the ground. I have to take the trunk lids off Evo/STi/SRT-4s if they have a big spoiler to get them up far enough to easily work under them.

Is that motor new? The last one they built and shipped out had to have been something like almost 3 years ago! I'd be shocked to find that there is ONE that hasn't already been installed in a car.

 

[LShee778]

That motor was BRAND NEW still on the original shipping skid/crate. Never installed. Fully documented. I was very surprised myself. He bought it last year sometime. It came from Texas somewhere I believe.

 

[audifirst]

wow awesome garage congrats