Above 1200 Sq/FT Kail's 40x40x16

[Kail]

Like many of you, I have dreamt of this building since I was a kid. I worked at many hot rod shops and even owned one for a few years.
Now I am pretty much a retired Hot Rod / Motorcycle builder. I took a business development position with an automotive part manufacturer and now I am building the hot rod shop just for me.

Here she is after the building erection:



I decided to use Big Buildings Direct / Eagle Carports.
I ran through many situations and this worked out best for me. I looked at a Mueller Red Steel building kit that I would build, framing a wood building, pole barn etc.
My neighbor down the road had one done and gave me the run down and it made sense to me.

This is a square tube building and the price came delivered and installed for less than the materials for the Red Steel building. Now yes the Red Steel building is stout, but this tube building has all of the engineered ratings to hold up to the heavy Texas winds and honestly it is what I can afford. I hope I don't have to have any arguments over my decision, I am happy to share details on my experience for those of you trying to decide what to do for your self.

One reason I didn't do a pole barn is A) the rep I had rubbed me wrong, B) I didn't like the concrete setup and the price was more than the tube steel with the concrete done my way.

So here is my journey so far.

This is the site before we broke ground, I had a shed and a shipping container here plus a few trees, everything had to go.. well except the shed, it got moved. I couldn't be cluttering up my shop with lawn equipment now.


Then I narrowed down the concreted.
So I had them do a 40x40 pad, with a little extra as a "Rat Barrier".
I did 2' footers and grade beams and all the necessary rebar. 6" thick and 5000 psi concrete.
I decided to build it this way so I never had an issue with lifts, and so I can run heavy machining and metal forming equipment. Also our land is **** clay that moves around like crazy.

In addition to the pad, I did a retaining wall with room for diverting drainage, and then a decent size driveway that has just a slight slope so I can push things around my self when needed.





Final finish was smooth on the pad, and a light brush on the driveway

 

[Kail]

From this point Eagle carports has me send them pics of the pad so they know its ready, and less than 2 weeks later I had a crew they contracted out to deliver and erect the structure. Nothing was painless, I am smoothing over a lot of things, for instance when they showed up they said it couldn't be done because they couldn't just fork lift the trusses into the back yard, and they wanted more room on the sides of the building. I was up front about all of this prior to purchasing. With my guidance we figured it out and things got started.




I did not like the basic doors and windows the building company provided so I purchased my own from McCoys.
Also you can see the 2 pipes I stubbed up for electrical and data

 

[Kail]

So here is one of my gripes with this crew and Eagles program.
They request a 7 ton telehandler. I find that they want it to move parts and use as a man lift, with no fall protection btw. This equipment is grossly oversized as the trusses could be carried by a 3-4 people which they did.
The reason this makes me mad? I asked these MF'rs to be careful about driving on the edges and corners of my driveway as it is only 4" thick and not that old.
What do they do? The drive this beast and twist the wheels right on the corner of the driveway, and guess what, it cracks. I told them to watch out, they did it anyway, guess what.. after I reprimand them.. they do it again. Then they said they didn't drive on the corner and that they were just close and that my pad didn't have rebar. Well I have camera footage of them doing it, photos of the tire tracks, and photos of the pad with rebar.





The crew wanted $500 to cover the install of the windows and doors, which I would have paid them no problem. But I withheld that as some sort of retribution for the negligence.
They could have easily done this with a lift that was half the weight and size, and maybe paid attention to my suggestions on what to be careful on.
Aside from that, the crew did a great job, and I wouldn't put this on Eagle as the crew was subcontracted, but I would suggest Eagle instruct these crews to get smaller lifts.

 

[Kail]

Had to paint the door black, Krylon satin black matched the trim really well.



Then I started planning out the skinning of the walls.
Here is something I would have planned with Eagle, All of the tubes are too far apart to be used for any off the shelf plywood or drywall. I could do a metal interior skin but that is twice the cost of doing plywood. Plus the metal skin is hard to hang things on.
So my solution was to add these 2.5" metal sheet rock studs every 4 feet so I can match the width of the plywood.


Here are the studs installed.


At this point I hired a company to do spray foam. I chose the foam because it seals the building up really well, adds some structure, and it was hard to find batts in sizes that would not have to be cut to fit for each section.
The front and back wall are 2.5" thick, I believe this foam will perform better in that tight space better than fiberglass, plus it seals and covers better. Once skinned I think it will be pretty efficient.









I am now waiting for my roll up door, so this tarp will help maintain some sort of climate control for now...

 

[Kail]

One thing I realized is the foam grabbed the outer skin and sucked it in. You can see the line of screws above the garage door, the beam ls behind these screws and is not appearing to be bulging because the skin above and below it sucked in.
It is really only noticeable in certain light and was a struggle to even get it to capture on camera, I am trying to not let it bother me.

 

[Kail]

Against my fathers suggestion I painted my ceiling black.. I know it won't reflect light but some things just have to look cool. And I will supplement with more lights..

I used waterborne acrylic dryfall paint. Here it is with one coat, still wet. It will take a second coat but waiting until the conduit is in place so I can paint that with it.




Thankful to have an active but retired father who was an electrician for most of his life. 75 years old and still swinging out of the scissor lift like a kid. He is helping wire the building while I do my day job. Here you can see the dry ceiling, and the much needed second coat.

 

[Tbender78]

Nice looking building.

 

[billconner]

Neat build! Just curious if you know if the foam on steel voided the warranty, as has been brought up on GJ?

 

[Kail]

Neat build! Just curious if you know if the foam on steel voided the warranty, as has been brought up on GJ?

My warranty/agreement made no mention of applying insulation, the grey area is that they do not warranty modifications to the structure. With that said, the spray foam could be just as much a modification as drilling a hole to hang a picture. I think I could work my way around it but was not going to let a warranty stop me from having the building I want.

 

[JohnBloom]

I like everything about the project. I hope to do something similar myself but we are retiring in the next 5 years and haven't settled on the destination. I want to only do this once. Keep giving us updates.

 

[jarhead]

looking forward to updates.

 

[jcarapet]

Greetings from the North side of town! Building looks great and like that you were still able to preserve some trees on the property. Sorry to hear about the assembly subcontractors. Unfortunately that seems to be more the norm from my experience.

Spray foam is next on my list, may PM you on your experience if that's alright.

 

[Kail]

Greetings from the North side of town! Building looks great and like that you were still able to preserve some trees on the property. Sorry to hear about the assembly subcontractors. Unfortunately that seems to be more the norm from my experience.

Spray foam is next on my list, may PM you on your experience if that's alright.

Happy to help.

 

[Kail]

Was able to do the second coat of ceiling paint, covered the conduit as well.
Also notice we did a gutter box up top so we could run only 2 larger pieces into the box and keep the smaller conduit up top.
This is going to make some growth easier later.

 

[Kail]

Getting behind on updates.
Working on skinning the walls with 1/2” plywood.
Got the LED lights up inside.
Installed 1 of the exterior barn lights which is on the Leviton smart dimming switch, this is great because I can time it for sunset and always have a lit path out to the shop from the house.
Was trying to run the lights on the same switch with a Leviton power extender to reproduce the dimming signal to a 0-10v dimming for the high bays.
Also added a picture of the new panel with the Donkey D*** cable we ran out from the house to underground conduit into the shop. I was a little worried about pulling it but with a bunch of lube it came right through.

 

[Kail]

Cleaned and sealed the floor

 

[Kail]

Door finally came and of course the window section that was supposed to come black showed up as plain aluminum.
Also waiting for them to install perimeter seal.
But no more tarp.

 

[onsail]

That's gotta be an amazing feeling to be this close to done. looking great!

 

[jb3]

I did not think i would like that black ceiling as much as i do, nice job!

You are right, it does look cool

 

[Kail]

That's gotta be an amazing feeling to be this close to done. looking great!

I’m allowing my self to be excited now.

 

[Kail]

I did not think i would like that black ceiling as much as i do, nice job!

You are right, it does look cool

Thanks, after I sprayed it, the room was darker, and I started to wonder if I did the right thing.
But out up the lights and it’s no issue now. Gives it a studio feeling I think.

 

[Mavawreck]

I dig it, find myself making in the process of making similar building choices. Do you mind sharing what gauge paneling Eagle used? Curious if there is a thicker option that wouldn’t pull as I’m planning to foam.

 

[catldavis]

I'm trying to settle on a manufacturer, did you look at Eversafe? If so, how did they stack up on price?

 

[MacTexas]

Nice looking building.

 

[Kail]

I dig it, find myself making in the process of making similar building choices. Do you mind sharing what gauge paneling Eagle used? Curious if there is a thicker option that wouldn’t pull as I’m planning to foam.

I believe it was thin, like 29 gauge, my quote only called out 14gauge box tube for the structure.
I suppose 24 gauge could resist the warping some.
I am really ****, and honestly, it doesn't bother me as much as I expected. It is most noticeable in the golden hour when the light hits it just right.
Maybe I just rewired my thinking because not much I can do about it now..

My question is what would it cost to do 24 gauge to combat this, and what is it worth to you.

I also wonder if there are other variables such as temperature or method of application. But this stuff seems pretty straight forward. I know it is 2 part, maybe they ran the mix hot. These are questions for an installer before the fact.

 

[Kail]

I'm trying to settle on a manufacturer, did you look at Eversafe? If so, how did they stack up on price?

I did not, I looked at Mueller and Versatube. After Mueller gave me a pretty inflated rate I decided I could adjust to a box tube style.
Reason I went with Big Buildings Direct / Eagle Car ports. Well I had been dicked around by other companies, and my neighbor had a good experience. Plus the cost of the building installed was the same if not better than the cost of materials for other methods or brands.

I would do it again for sure. But I would request that the vertical tubes be 4' spaced instead of 5' and also ask them to guarantee spacing distance. This would have made it easier to insulate and skin the interior.
I also would not have got the damn giant lift they said they need. Still mad about the cracked concrete. I probably should have waited longer for it to cure, or maybe poured driveway after...

 

[Kail]

Some updates. This was back in April 2023, Didn't document this too much, but I dug trenches around the building and installed drainage pipe. Tried to dig down in the back corner and install a water basin but hit rock bed. So I ended up doing larger pockets of drain rock back there.
2 Years later and this was all very worth the effort. Standing water has not been an issue, even without having gutters yet.

 

[Kail]

6/2023 Started moving in, and installed a mini split 36k Mr Cool Unit. Funny thing is I bought 2 of these because the maths said so. I installed one and got it running while I planned the other install. It worked so well, I returned the 2nd and never installed it.
2 Years later and the 1 unit keeps it at 80 or below with around 25% humidity when its 90's-100's out. If I put the fan setting on high I can get it to about 78. I plan to add another unit when I build my mezzanine because I like it cold, and when I get to the upstairs height its pretty toasty still.

 

[Kail]

More Lights going up for the driveway.

 

[Kail]

Working on the site getting the dirt in place, and supporting the house.

 

[Kail]

Got some tools in the shop.

This old Pexto throatless stomp shear, which was seized up but after some soaking and minor adjustments is back in service.

Also new Belt sander and MB pan Break

 

[Kail]

Enjoy the ambient light in the morning, these North facing windows always provide light but no direct sun so it doesn't warm it up. One of my favorite features.

Frank T. Cat enjoys some of the more direct sun spots.


I enjoy lighting, this old Medical Light was great find.

 

[Kail]

Got some limestone down around the building to take care of the mud issue, this side area is now my trailer and extra car storage.

Walk way around the building. Still a ton of landscaping to be done.

 

[Kail]

About this time last year, got a driveway installed. This was such a good investment.
Next will be the gate and fence.

 

[st4ngster]

very nice set of toys
I really love the lighting with the pictures on the walls and the living room area is awesome.
It works perfectly together

 

[Just Puttering]

Your vintage Pexto shear is awesome!!!

 

[Meames01]

Door finally came and of course the window section that was supposed to come black showed up as plain aluminum.
Also waiting for them to install perimeter seal.
But no more tarp.

How can a company that makes doors, provide one all black and think, "yeah, I'm sure they want a mill-finish window section"....... aggravates me to hell. Shop looks great though !

 

[Kail]

How can a company that makes doors, provide one all black and think, "yeah, I'm sure they want a mill-finish window section"....... aggravates me to hell. Shop looks great though !

Well this particular company that ordered it wrong is not doing so well, and a year later I was able to get them to swap the panel out with black. Thankfully I withheld 50% of the payment and refused to pay until it was made right.
Its all black now, and I am happy.

 

[vhol5]

I'm planning on a 40x40 soon. Are you satisfied with the size?
I know we all wish it was bigger...

 

[Kail]

I'm planning on a 40x40 soon. Are you satisfied with the size?
I know we all wish it was bigger...

It was what I could fit in the area. I still plan to add a mezzanine on one side which is why my ceilings are high.

With that said I make one suggestion. If you are pulling multiple cars in, make it deeper. Right now if I want to pull in my Silverado, and I have a car in the shop already, I have to pull it within an inch of the bench on the back wall, and then my truck fits with just a couple inches of clearance on both sides.
I would at a minimum go 45' deep for this reason,