Garage door placement

[air cooled]

Hi,

I am building a pole barn in the Spring of 2016 (I'll start a new thread for that) and am in the planning stages.

72' X 42' with 15' high walls.

The building would fit best on my property if the 42' endwall faced the driveway. I could turn the whole building 90 degrees but it would cut off the bottom of my property a bit and require more fill.

The garage will be mainly used for hobby car and truck restoration with vehicle storage for future projects as well.

My current plan is to put both a 14'h X 12'w and a 12'h X 10'w overhead door in the endwall.

The larger 14X12 door is for general barn access and the 12X10 door is just for the 2-post lift.
I have included a diagram of the idea but have a few questions:

1- I put both overhead doors close together to give me more storage along the walls but I wonder if they are too close together (4' between doors)?

2- Should the lift be placed farther into the building from the 12X10 door so I could get a vehicle out that door if the bigger 14X12 door was blocked. Doing so might give me less storage area however. I will use high-lift overhead door tracks to keep the tracks out of the way of a truck on the lift.

3- Perhaps I should shift both doors to the North (in the direction of the smaller 12X10 door) and use the Southern wall for more storage.
Shifting both doors 3' to the North would give me 5' around a vehicle on the lift and 11' on the South wall to park cars

4- I currently don't have plans to put another overhead door in the barn because I would have to bring in a lot of fill to make this a drive through barn.

Any suggestions / experience would be appreciated.

Brian

 

[astroracer]

Where you have the doors right now looks good. Plenty of room around the hoist, plenty of room along the walls and 4' between doors is okay. 6' between the doors may be better just because the hoist is going to be in the way of door opening on the other parked vehicle. You can do a rough layout of your doors and hoist positions with some garden hose and a couple of buckets. Layout it out in the driveway as close as you can to scale and see what kind of room you have. I think you'll probably push the doors another 2' apart.
I wouldn't move the doors any closer to the north wall then 6'. Having the two narrower areas for storage is better then one deep one where items will get buried behind other stuff. The hoist itself will cut about 2' off the "walk-a-round" room anyway so that will leave you about 4' of working room. You will probably end up with a bench on the north wall anyway for tools and working room for the hoist.
If you THINK you may want to add another door in the future it is easy to frame for it now and add it later.
Mark

 

[air cooled]

astroracer,

I may do as you suggest and just move the smaller door 2' to the North to get a little more room between the two overhead doors, in case I ever have to park next to the lift.

I have considered deep storage along one wall because most of that would be vehicle storage.

That's not a bad idea, frame for a 12'X10' door now just in case.

I also staked out the barn dimensions today and 72'X42' seems smaller in real life than it did on paper.

 

[dfiler2]

Keep in mind the space in middle is basically wasted space, I personally would go with option 1.

 

[Dick in Wisconsin]

2X on making sure you have enough room between the hoist and what you put next to it that goes through that other door. I don't think you'd have room for a Class A motorhome with the slides extended for example.

8' feet of storage or whatever between the door opening and wall is enormous. Make sure you need it all. How big of a lift do you plan? Do you really need a door that big for whatever is going on the lift or what you could drive through the lift?

You've got two doors. How often will you want to get stuff from the back of the garage out? There are only two ways out.

A lot depends on who you will use the garage. Only you know that. We're pretty good at second guessing! Good luck!

 

[air cooled]

dfiler2, good point.
I probably want just enough room for two cars to be parked next to each other, with room for their doors not to hit each other, or the lift, when opened.

****,
No plans for a motorhome but I get your point.

I plan on getting a fairly tall and wide lift, for my F-350 and COE's.
I could drive through the lift to the back of the barn if I had to.

I would prefer a door on the far wall for a drive through garage but the topography of my site makes that expensive (lots of fill to a depth of 4' on that end of the garage).

 

[6768rogues]

I would use 16-feet for the height. Most building materials are in 4-foot modules, so 15-feet could mean cutting a foot off your material and throwing it away. 16-feet will give more room if you want to put a loft in part of it or if you want to store 16-foot items on end.
Also, a 14-foot overhead door will need special low ceiling hardware or track for a 15-foot ceiling. Standard parts and track will work with a 16-foot ceiling height.

 

[shortykorte]

For the drive through just jump it Dukes of Hazard style.

 

[PelicanPines]

The space between the doors can be utilized by an air compressor and vacuum system. Always hand items near the doors.

I mention this because I put those things in the south corner and to me it wasted wall space.

It's also a good spot for a tire changer.