Above 1200 Sq/FT My 30x50 build

[Hilltopmasonry]

Well, it’s been a long time coming!

we purchased this house in the West Chicago burbs back in 2013 with the plans of putting an addition on with an attached garage after about three years!

so we are currently about seven years behind schedule!

Haha

Tomorrow it’s officially starting.

Currently, the house is approximately 790 ft.² with a detached two and a half car garage. It’s a two bedroom one bathroom house with a full size basement.

Our plans are to basically double the square footage of the house and attach a 30 x 50 garage with 12’8” high ceiling and a 10’ high overhead door to get my van in

When the house is done, it will actually be a four bedroom four bathroom house with one bathroom and bedroom in the basement and a half bathroom in the garage!

Tomorrow they are coming to blow down the garage and start with some excavating. We are in a time crunch to get it under roof before the cold weather

Concrete guy told us it should be approximately two weeks for him to get the foundation dug and finished and the carpenters will be right behind them

I’ll post the progress

Here is are overhead drone pictures and a color sketch of the new addition and garage

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

And the garage is down!

 

[Xti04]

Congrats on getting started! Not sure about your weather up there but good luck getting in the dry before cold weather hits!

 

[captain14]

Good luck.I Hope the weather holds for your build.

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

Congrats on getting started! Not sure about your weather up there but good luck getting in the dry before cold weather hits!

Yes We are definitely starting this much later in the year than I would prefer

The concrete contractor is going to stay with the project until it’s completely finished and the Carpenter contractor is coming in right after him so I should be able to get it under roof in a reasonable time. Most importantly before a hard frost hits.

Hopefully

My main concern is pouring concrete in freezing weather and protecting the footers from frost. But we should be covered up well before the hard frost set in

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

Well the footers on the new section of the house basement are formed and will be poured tomorrow!

This contractor crew is killing it

they really go above and beyond. After they completely formed the footers, they actually hand dug about 4 to 5 inches deeper to create a key in the existing clay for the footers to lock in to

Most guys pour the footers right on top of the existing soil

Here is a drone pic, what you see is just the house and the mudroom footers, they have not started to dig the garage yet

Those footers will never move

 

[john.k]

I have a similar size ,33x50 ........approval , kit delivery ,and concrete went quickly............then I could not get the shed put up..........the kit was supposed to be a 'turn key' with everything by the kit suppler .........$20k of shed kit slowly sinking into the dirt ...........seems no one would be available for one year ...due to the plandemic...........after a year it was put up ...the wrong way round .......rollerdoors at the wrong end.

 

[thammel]

You will love the addition and garage! I have one recommendation....put a full bath in the garage (add a shower). That's the one thing I didn't do and oh I wish I had done that. Messy after yard work or car work - it would be so nice to clean up before coming into the house.

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

You will love the addition and garage! I have one recommendation....put a full bath in the garage (add a shower). That's the one thing I didn't do and oh I wish I had done that. Messy after yard work or car work - it would be so nice to clean up before coming into the house.

We already have a bathroom in there

We like to entertain and have a pool so it will be nice for people to use that one

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

They poured the basement footers today

The garage hasn’t started yet, it will be right around that skid steer

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

Sorry for the lack of updates but we were in key west for 8 days for my daughter’s wedding, when we were gone, the concrete guys completely finished the foundation for the house

And yesterday dug and formed the footers for the garage, I’m sure this is where you guys will start to get excited!

So here we go! On Monday they will be back to form the garage foundation, with inspections on Tuesday and pour Tuesday afternoon

 

[Riley]

Congrats on the wedding! Great looking project too. Looking forward to following along!

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

The garage foundation walls are done and backfilled, it’s starting to take shape now!

Tomorrow, the concrete guys are going to be back to form the curb where my new addition meets the old section

This curb is needed because my new basement is going to step down to 8 feet ceiling height, instead of seven like the original house to give the entertainment area of More headroom

I’ll try to get a fresh drone picture over the next couple of days

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

Well the house is completely gutted down to the studs and The carpenters are making good progress on the new section.

Unfortunately the garage section is on hold for a bit due to the cold, I need to build the walls up with split face CMUs and it’s too cold for the mortar. The carpenter said it doesn’t matter since he didn’t order the trusses yet and they will take 4-6 weeks anyways so they are only focusing on the house and will do the garage separately


Here is a couple of quick pictures

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

My house got a crew cut yesterday, they took the roof off of the existing house and basically got the interior walls framed up

The house is moving along! The garage will start to take shape when I get some temperatures above freezing

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

Carpenter’s started framing the roof on the house today

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

They are making good progress on the house and with this warm up in The weather it has enabled me to start the garage walls!

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

We were able to get more of the split face CMU stem wall built today.

Unfortunately it was a little bit too much work for us to finish in one day (these suckers are heavy) and the weather is going to get cold tomorrow night. so there will be no work tomorrow because the mortar will not have enough time to dry before it freezes.

But it is finally starting to take shape. It is going to be cold for a few days, but in the long range forecast, I am seeing we are back in the 40s of course it will be over Christmas, but I should be able to finish it at some point next week

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

we finished up the stem wall and filled it up with concrete yesterday

I finally got everything out of the way and was able to park my truck in the new garage area today!

The carpenters should start framing it in a week or so

Happy new years everyone!

 

[kitdoctor]

so we are currently about seven years behind schedule!

Nothing worth doing is ever easy nor on time!

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

Well the work is progressing on the house, plumbers started yesterday and most exciting is they starting framing the garage! They will finish the framing on Monday and the trusses are being delivered Thursday and will have a crane here to set them on Friday!

The garage is looking real now! These 12’8” high walls are huge!

I’m sure the neighbors are talking about them as well! Haha

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

Making good progress

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

Truss day today!

They had a crazy long crane to reach the back

I built them a scaffolding to walk down the middle

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

More crane pictures

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

Work is progressing nicely, sorry I haven’t been updating much because between getting a horrible case of the flu and this miserable cold weather we’ve had I haven’t hung outside much for pictures

The electricians have finished the conduit and wiring, roof is completed and the house plumbing electric, and HVAC are mostly done

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

Here are a couple of inside pictures

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

The concrete guys were over to prep the gravel for the concrete, they are getting a pre-poor inspection tomorrow and the insulators have been going to town

I believe they are going to try to pour the concrete this week, depending on weather

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

Drywall is up!

 

[Jayman17]

Way to sequence that, now the concrete will cover all that drywall dust. Smart!

 

[LXCam]

Kickass HT! I luv seeing a successful project, it’s a rarity here. Count me in on following along.

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

Way to sequence that, now the concrete will cover all that drywall dust. Smart!

Yes, it actually worked out, but we really didn’t plan it that way, unfortunately the weather turned and I was never able to get the garage floor poured before winter set in so here we are!

But the concrete should be going in sometime soon hopefully this week because we’re at a point to where I need to get it done so I can finish framing the garage bathroom and keeping the project moving ahead

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

This past weekend, I got all of the insulation and remaining drywall debris picked up and ready for the concrete crew to pour the floor. The only thing left in their is my mortar mixer but that’s easy to move

The concrete company has been a little bit slow getting back to me, I know they’re probably getting really busy right now because the weather is finally in our favor to get construction projects done.

At this point, the garage floor is kind of holding me up and I’m hoping it gets done this week

 

[MrScott99]

Way to sequence that, now the concrete will cover all that drywall dust. Smart!

No doubt! I wasn't able to do that with my shop and even with the sheetrockers covering the floor while they worked it has taken HOURS of work to get the floor cleaned up.

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

They prepped the floor yesterday and it was poured today, they did a real nice job!

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

Now that the garage floor is poured, they were able to frame out the garage bathroom today

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

So there has been a lot of progress at the house, I have not posted much because the biggest step forward was the brick work on the exterior.

I am a mason contractor so I have been doing the work with a few bricklayers that have been available the last couple of weeks to help me out, So I have been busy as heck putting all this brick on.

It has approximately 10,500 full brick and about 8500thin brick for the entire house.

But both the plumbers and the electricians roughed in the garage bathroom

Inside the house the hardwood floors are in, the tile guy has both the heated floor and tile in the master bathroom and the tile in the other bathroom done.

The cabinets were delivered yesterday so those should be going in shortly

Here are a couple of quick photos of the garage but I’ll upload more today when I get a chance. It looks like it’s going to be a rainy day today so I will have a little bit of rare free time.

 

[WI/MI Border]

Beautiful brick work. I have a question about brick laying. I have a 50+ yo home and have brick wainscot on the front of the home. I'm building a garage and wanted to "match" the brick wainscot as close as possible but the local brick supplier (Hockers, Green Bay) doesn't have anything real close in size and pattern.

I have more than enough concrete paving bricks that are closer to the home base color than anything I can buy right now. Is it a bad idea to use those concrete paver bricks for my garage wainscot? They are solid, no holes, and close to the same dimensions. Can you tell me if future problems would develop if I used them? Thanks... Tim

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

Beautiful brick work. I have a question about brick laying. I have a 50+ yo home and have brick wainscot on the front of the home. I'm building a garage and wanted to "match" the brick wainscot as close as possible but the local brick supplier (Hockers, Green Bay) doesn't have anything real close in size and pattern.

I have more than enough concrete paving bricks that are closer to the home base color than anything I can buy right now. Is it a bad idea to use those concrete paver bricks for my garage wainscot? They are solid, no holes, and close to the same dimensions. Can you tell me if future problems would develop if I used them? Thanks... Tim

Is that a bad idea? No.

The only issue with bricks that do not have holes in them is They are more difficult to lay. bricks from 80+ years ago did not have holes in them either

when you spread mortar and lay a brick with holes the mortar squeezes into the holes when you set the brick, but if they do not have holes, you have to spread just the right amount of mortar. Otherwise the motor has nowhere to go and what happens is you have to “beat” the brick down to the line and that typically causes the brick course underneath it to also “swim” or move

It’s usually not an issue with an experienced Mason, but it can be a little frustrating

Bricks used to be made completely solid, but then the brick manufacturers started putting holes in it, which also helps the mortar bond to the brick

but in all reality over the years the brick manufacturers started putting bigger holes in the bricks to save clay in the manufacturing process. Of course they said it’s for better bonding but that’s BS they are just saving clay

 

[WI/MI Border]

Thanks for the reply. I'm a few months away from installing the brickwork so will continue to search for clay but I am happy to hear that concrete will work with some care during mortaring. It's only around 40 sq ft so I'm sure I can finesse the mortar without too much difficulty.

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

Well, it’s been a very long time since I last updated this thread, it was a crazy year between completely renovating the house with the addition and the garage.


It’s not just the actual work. It’s crazy how time consuming it is to go pick out furniture, hardware, and the thousand other things that need to be decided on when you’re doing a project like this

My nice large garage turned into a massive dumping ground for all of the construction stuff, and our old furniture.

We decided to purchase all new furniture for the house so we had a lot of stuff that just got placed in the garage and as of two months ago, I could barely even walk in my 1500 square-foot garage. But now you can see it is still a hot mess but at least I’m able to get four cars in there

The cold weather enables me a little bit of free time to go through everything and start throwing stuff away or selling stuff online


Just wanted to get those that are following this Build a quick update!

I was able to get the bathroom, fully plumbed and up and running so the garage has a working bathroom. The bathroom has a small electric heater in there to keep it from freezing but currently my garage is not heated, but I do have a big torpedo heater to throw some heat in every once in a while to keep it above freezing.

The garage is fully insulated and retains a lot of heat even with that big massive garage door opening occasionally, I am trying to decide which direction to go with heating wise, and I am kind of leaning towards radiant tube heat