My 80x50 garage needs help

[nico]

I'm new here but I think I may have come to the right place for some tips and ideas

Anyway, a couple of years ago I bought and old supermarket building and started turning it into a garage. I removed some non-bearing walls and put in a garage door and that's basically it. Right now I have 5-6 long term parking spots, 2 long term shop spots and one short term spot for eg maintenance on the daily driver. In the basement is another parking spot and a dirty job spot eg for sanding. Other than there are 2 storage rooms in the basement, a shower, toilet, and compressor room. On the main floor there's a small hallway which I currently use to store material from the walls I removed (never know when it might come in handy), and there's a kitchen.

Now in theory this all sounds good, if it weren't for the fact that the buildings layout is not really optimal for garage purposes. On top of that I'm not the neatest person around, I do have my moments though.. Every now and then

Basically I think my garage could be so much better than it is now. Right now it works, but I think I would get a lot more done if I had some order in there. I want to have a garage with a bit of atmosphere, a nice place to hang out. Right now I usually want to get visitors out of there as soon as possible because I'm ashamed of the way it looks.

So, on to the pictures then. I took some panoramic pictures, I hope it gives a bit of an impression of how things look. Right now the mess is a bit more than usual, I took apart a couple of junk cars recently and I'm planning a new storage system in the basement which needs to be done before I move all the parts laying around everywhere.
Click on the pictures to get a larger version.

First a pic of what it looks like outside.. This is an old pic, and the white bit is where the door is located now.


This is the shop area. It's about 50x30 and the roof about 13-14 ft at the highest point. To the right is my one and only workbench, you can see how well organized it is Left of the bench I have a trashcan and some other stuff, and closest to the door are shelves that are filled with cleaning stuff and right now also parts.
The Chevelle is standing in the short term spot. Then on the left of it there's a pillar right in the middle of everything. There's one long term spot on the left of it, and another one on the right, which right now is also filled with parts.


Here's a view from the opposite side.
The white curtain is there to seperate off the shop part from the parking part, it closes all the way if needed.


Now we go through the opening in the curtain and we see this
Here we have parts again... Winter will be here soon and then it'll be filled with cars.
You see one of the problems I have.. This thing was built in the 1930s and the pillars you see are very much needed I'm afraid. And they are obviously in the way. The outer walls are something like 2 ft of concrete, and putting doors in there for every spot would be way too expensive. Once the cars are in there all is fine, but the pillars really don't help when parking the cars.




And finally here's my little Doo collection, I have 2 more at home


There are some more pics here.

Well, I think you can see that I need some help here Some things are pretty obvious, like finish painting and get rid of all the loose wiring. I'd really like to do some compressed air plumbing as well, and more power outlets.

I got a lot of inspiration from other garages on the forum, but all ideas are welcome!

 

[cyclopsblown34]

I have no real suggestions but think that is a neat use for an old grocery store.

 

[PurdueSD]

That is a really neat space... I would suggest you build some work benches and some rolling storage/ work tables. You dont seem to have that much storage- maybe dedicate a room to storage and build shelving around the walls. It really doesnt need a whole lot to make it very usable.

 

[nico]

Thanks

Yea, rolling tables are almost a must with a garage this size, I've realized that much. A nice rolling tool cabinet is high up on the wishlist as well.

As for storage space, you're right, I have too little. I actually do have a dedicated storage room but I'm king of collecting parts so I ran out of space there.. I have made some plans though. In the basement I have a room that is about 16x32 ft which I plan to turn into a storage room filled with shelves. Then I have another room which I'll use for parts that are too large to be put on shelf.

The 16x32 room


The other room (current storage room)


And then on this wall on the left, I want to put up shelves all the way. Maybe 2 on top of each other, close to the ceiling. Having stuff on the floor there is bad when parking the cars.

 

[Finley]

a bed, a microwave, and youre all set!

 

[sam 8]

Just a thought, but I think I would want to keep the parts and pieces for the short-term project cars near the area where you are working in them. If you have a car that is apart and goin to be that way for awhile, or have collected parts for trading, etc., these would be the items to go downstairs.
Running back and forth across a shop or down and back upstairs in the middle of a job to grab parts and hardware is a pain, and wastes time as well.

 

[nico]

I don't really have any short-term projects, I always manage to get way more work on my todo lists while trying to get rid of stuff on them :/ But you're right, sometimes it's just impractical to move things downstairs, especially heavy and/or large parts, or really small things like interior screws.

I have these shelves in the shop area and I do use it for storing parts for the ongoing projects. Still it wouldn't hurt to have a bit more space to store stuff like that.


I've been looking at some tool cabinets now, it might be time for some investments

 

[uparms]

Just skimming over this post, I have a suggestion.

Prioritize projects. Least important to th back, most important to the front.

Nice size but does need some sectioning off with just one more entry point added.

 

[freewheeler]

another suggestion would be to get wheel dollies to put the cars on to park them. You would not need as much room to move them around as you would if you are depending on the steering to get where you want them.

 

[Druro]

Wow... most impressive space.

I think I need to go find an old shopping center.

The only comment is the same as the last one, that another entrance would make things easier to move things around.

 

[Quasarcoupe]

Wow, thats a cool garage, but yet everything said is right, you will need to better organize your area, and the odd shape of the building isnt helping all that much, you are going to need shelves galore, I would try to keep most parts near the car to be worked on, if you are restoring one you should have a space for the car and another space about the same size next to that bay for the parts, most of the time with a restore you need 3 bays for one car to make sense of what you have, especially if you are like me and buy many parts when you see a good deal on them, then pick the best and sell the rest later. thus i have 4 grills for a 1964 cutlass which are not a very easy item to come by in good shape. If the walls that separate bays are hollow you might try making cabinets into them as they look fairly thick/deep. As stated before i would make another opening to ease getting cars and parts in and out. other than that its a very cool set up

 

[russlaferrera]

Without seeing a floor plan it's hard to make suggestions. Would a 2nd garage door on the other end be better . This would allow you to have angle parking in 2-3 bays on each end with storage and rebuilding area in the center of the building. Make the angle parking between the pillars.

 

[nico]

I dug up some old papers and now I have a floor plan It was a bit of a pain scanning it, the paper was 2x4 ft or something.
Turns out I'm not that good at estimating sizes.. The shop part was 25 ft instead of 30.

So here's the original plan, shelves and all included. Click for larger pic.


And this is what it looks like now.


I'm thinking of getting rid of the office and the wall between it and the stairs. I'm not using it anyway, and it's too small to use as a real office. Removing it gives me a lot more space there.

And I'd also like to get rid of this ridiculously placed toilet that the previous owner put there. He actually had the same plans as I have, turn the building into a garage. But then decided to move so I bought it from him.
God knows what he was thinking with this toilet, I mean there's a toilet and shower in the basement, who needs 2 toilets in a garage? It's not like it was an easy job either, he had to drill holes through the floor to do the plumbing.. His crazy plumbing started leaking as soon as I got the water reconnected, so I disconnected that part. To tip it all off, the door to it can't be locked and has a huge window in it.

He's also the one responsible for all the loose wiring everywhere btw..
So, the toilet is not in use and I'd love to just get rid of the entire room, but on the left wall there's a sink so that'd all have to be moved as well, and I'm not sure if I'd actually gain that much from removing one wall there.

 

[hidollartoys]

Dude you need to get orginized!!!!!!!!! Really, I have had 3 oddly shaped and located shops in my years. I would recommend that you "DO SOMETHING" even if it does not entirely work out. Most shops (professional) I have worked in were constsntly changing because at any given time your priorities will be changing. I believe there is no perfect shop except those that you do not work in.

Clean up the areas, store parts as far away from the work areas as possible, desiginate work areas based on type of work (paint/fab/clean/motor/electrical/etc), locate support equipment(jacks/benches/machine tools/parts cleaner/etc)so that these are not in the way but are accessible to work being performed in that area. These are some ideas that I use when laying out a shop. Think about the projects that you are doing and the stages that each project has to go through to finish. IE do you need a perminate paint booth? do you do a large amount of welding/fab? Is most of your work dedicated to motors or is it upholustry?

This is a graet building but you will have to lay it out to fit your NEEDS. If you are always going to be working on stuff then you are not going to store stuff in the same areas and visa/versa Just some random thoughts.

 

[nico]

Hehe, I know.. That's exactly why I came here, to get some help getting this mess organized
What you say makes a lot of sense. So far I've mainly been using the space I have, just to get something done on the projects, but pretty much ignored the building itself once it was accessible. But if I'd spend some time on getting the building organized I'd probably work a lot more efficient, and it wouldn't look like **** either.
What you wrote + this toilet thing gave me an idea.. I'll sarcrifice the parking spot in front of the toilet, remove the wall where the door is and get rid of the toilet. That gives me a nice 15x8 ft corner for some stations and machines. And gain space at the same time as there won't be any cars sticking out there.

Freewheeler, thanks for reminding me about the wheel dollies. I've wanted to get a set of those for a long time but keep forgetting about them until the next time I need them.

Putting in another door won't make much of a difference I think, maybe for the spots to the left on the plan but otherwise not much. Luckily the parking problem is a season thing, it's not like there's cars coming in and going out every week. I rent out parking space during the winter, so the cars come in november, and leave april-may.

 

[nico]

Ok, what do you think of this?
I'll create a new area, outlined with blue on the plan. What is now the toilet is about 7x8 ft, and the bit outside of it about 12x11 ft. That leaves about 14 ft for the cars to pass through, which should be plenty.

Inside the new area I was thinking of a welding table (all the way in, no sparks flying around), electrical station, part cleaning bench, and probably some cabinets or shelves to store stuff needed for those things.



Which looks like this on picture.

 

[RbrtAWhyt]

If I were you I would keep the bathroom...I would love to have one in the shop...

 

[tfi racing]

I would get rid of all the walls and plumbing in that bathroom area and close in the hallway as shown in that diagram and use it for your fab area.I would also get rid of that office and just have enough wall around the stairs to keep it safe,probably should have a door for fire code.I also recommend getting rid of as much stuff as posssible,if you haven't touched it in three months-dispose of it you probably don't need it.With a bit of organizing you will have a pretty cool shop!

 

[nico]

If I were you I would keep the bathroom...I would love to have one in the shop...

The thing is I have a fully functional and nice toilet in the basement, so I really don't need another toilet. I'd rather use the space for something else and walk down the stairs when I do need it.

I would get rid of all the walls and plumbing in that bathroom area and close in the hallway as shown in that diagram and use it for your fab area.I would also get rid of that office and just have enough wall around the stairs to keep it safe,probably should have a door for fire code.I also recommend getting rid of as much stuff as posssible,if you haven't touched it in three months-dispose of it you probably don't need it.With a bit of organizing you will have a pretty cool shop!

Getting rid of the plumbing will be easy, and I'm thinking of converting the hole in the floor for the toilet into a floor drain, that might be the nicest solution.
The walls around the stairs are concrete blocks, so they'll stay. There's no reason to remove them as I won't gain any space with it.
I went over to the garage yesterday and checked the toilet wall I plan to remove, and unfortunately it looks like it's about a foot of concrete. I was actually counting on it being wood and easy to remove, this changes things a bit. Not all is lost though, I could turn it into a parts washing room (it has "waterproof walls" or whatever it's called so easy to hose down the entire room) and other than that go with the outlined area as I planned, it'll still be pretty big.

I also started working on a rolling cabinet/bench yesterday, using some material I have laying around. It'll be about 5.5x3 ft and about 3.5 ft high. A bit bigger than I originally planned, but I found a really nice board that happened to be that size.

 

[porschedude996TT]

What is wrong with the pictures?

 

[nico]

What is wrong with the pictures?

What do you mean? They work fine here. I'm doing some maintenance on my server though, so they might load a bit slower than usual. Should all be back to normal soon though.

 

[chammyman]

I'm insanely jealous. I wish I had a spare supermarket to work on cars in, i'd be crazy rich quickly

 

[pearltsi]

Do you have any pics of it as a supermarket?

 

[nico]

Unfortunately I don't. I hardly remember myself what it looked like as a supermarket. It went bankrupt about 5 years ago, a year after I moved here. I bought the building 2 years ago and most of the supermarket stuff had already been removed by then.

 

[freewheeler]

I would be very carefull if you do decide to remove that concrete wall. It may very well be a load bearing wall being toward the center of the building like that.

 

[Frank Elson]

I'm insanely jealous. I wish I had a spare supermarket to work on cars in, i'd be crazy rich quickly

ex-car showroom, fits 20 cars, plus workshop with four bays and flat above went for £150,000 in Accrington, Lancs two years ago.
The guy is "gradually" replacing all that plate glass with blocks...
I want to cry every time I drive past it.
If I'd had my house for sale at the right time I coulda bought it for cash and had a nest egg left over to spend on it.

 

[nico]

ex-car showroom, fits 20 cars, plus workshop with four bays and flat above went for £150,000 in Accrington, Lancs two years ago.
The guy is "gradually" replacing all that plate glass with blocks...
I want to cry every time I drive past it.
If I'd had my house for sale at the right time I coulda bought it for cash and had a nest egg left over to spend on it.

£150000, wow.
In case anyone is wondering, having a relatively large garage doesn't mean I'm rich or anything. Real estate prices over here are ridiculously low, or at least they were a couple of years ago. I paid just under $15000 for this building.
I guess it's one of the benefits of living "out in the woods", I live about 30 miles from the nearest traffic light

 

[Druro]

£150000, wow.
In case anyone is wondering, having a relatively large garage doesn't mean I'm rich or anything. Real estate prices over here are ridiculously low, or at least they were a couple of years ago. I paid just under $15000 for this building.
I guess it's one of the benefits of living "out in the woods", I live about 30 miles from the nearest traffic light

See.. this is where jelousy is... $15K for THAT!!! wow, i am more impressed, as that is one hella building.

 

[Zoobee]

Ok, let's specify the comma here.

$150,000

or

$15,000

I will kick your shin if it's the latter.

 

[nico]

Ok, let's specify the comma here.

$150,000

or

$15,000

I will kick your shin if it's the latter.

$15,000.
Fifteen thousand dollars, no typo

Like I said, real estate is cheap here.. I bought my house for about the same price.
The reason for the low prices is that for most people it's quite unpractical to live here. The town has about 1500 inhabitants spread over a lot of sqr miles. Most people want to live closer to the city (30 miles from here) because that's where all jobs are. I work from home so I couldn't care less about that. Another drawback is the temperature during the winter, -40 is not exceptional but most of the time it's around -10 to 0 F during the coldest months. Still cold as hell but I got used to it pretty quick.
Most people from other parts of the country think I'm insane, but I love it here!

 

[e-tek]

Great space - love it. Climate sounds like here in Saskatchewan, Canada - nice to hear this is not the only "coldest place on earth"!
I'd love to have that space. I built a 1000sq ft and am trying to figure out how to get three cars and lift in there - and be able to move them around without opening the doors when it's -25C!! Don't think it can be done though. On the other hand, you could test drive vehicles in there!!
Can't wait to see it more organized.
BTW - Whats your fave project - beside snow-mobiles?

 

[Vinko]

I like that old Volvo stationwagon you've got there. I was thinking about getting one when my current beater bites the dust.

 

[nico]

Great space - love it. Climate sounds like here in Saskatchewan, Canada - nice to hear this is not the only "coldest place on earth"!
I'd love to have that space. I built a 1000sq ft and am trying to figure out how to get three cars and lift in there - and be able to move them around without opening the doors when it's -25C!! Don't think it can be done though. On the other hand, you could test drive vehicles in there!!
Can't wait to see it more organized.
BTW - Whats your fave project - beside snow-mobiles?

Hehe, I usually refer to my part of town as the coldest place on earth as well Our town is divided by one of Swedens largest rivers (about half a mile wide here). My part is kind of a suburb with about 150 inhabitants, the main part of town is on the other side of the river and is also a lot higher. So because of the difference in height it usually is a lot colder here than in the other part. A real "cold hole" as most people call it Luckily the building is very well insulated even though it's old.

It's hard to say what my favorite project is, last winter it was supposed to be working on the P210 but instead worked on the Elan most of the winter. So far the P210 has been quite fun though, but it's only just begun. I need to reorganize the garage first because there's going to be a lot of fabrication from now on.

I'm also looking forward to working on the Chevelle, but it's an expensive car. I paid about $24k for it, a bit more than I was hoping to spend but they are hard to find, especially when my demands were a 66 2DHT with bigblock. The closest I came to finding one was a 66 SS but then it was blue and way too expensive. So when this one showed up, I just had to buy it even though it was a bit expensive for the condition it's in. The 454 was a pretty big convincer It's not rusty but needs a lot of attention before I'll be satisfied with it. As if the 24k wasn't enough, my wishlist soon grew to another 6k worth of parts and then I haven't even started on engine parts yet, and paint isn't included either. I placed the first order last week, only big and heavy stuff that will be shipped from the US in a container and should arrive around . It's going to be a lot of fun putting all those things on the car.. A power steering kit, disc brake kit and suspension kit amongst other. And hopefully it'll improve the ride quality a bit but I won't find out until spring.

I like that old Volvo stationwagon you've got there. I was thinking about getting one when my current beater bites the dust.

The wagon is actually a pretty rare one It's a 1979 265 GLE, so far all original except for lowering springs in the front because it was way too high. It's 1 of 35 in the country, and 1 of 2 in traffic last year.
Right now it has the original 2.7l V6 but the engine is a bit tired (160k miles). I bought a 2.8l instead which has run 40k miles and serviced every 1000 miles or something, it's been in an ambulance. Everything looks like new inside! On the outside it looked quite bad though, so I've taken all covers off and I've started sanding and painting and replacing some parts.
Some fun facts about these engines.. They were originally supposed to be V8s, but then some fuel crisis came and they cut off 2 cylinders but kept the 90 degree angle. It's also the same engine as used in the DeLorean DMC12 (back to the future).

 

[1991Syclone]

Damn. You know how much it would cost to do that much terrazzo flooring now... You got a steal on that.

 

[nico]

Damn. You know how much it would cost to do that much terrazzo flooring now... You got a steal on that.

Actually I hate the floor Or at least the fact that it's speckled like it is, it makes it hard to find stuff if you drop anything. But I guess I can't really complain

 

[nico]

So, today I worked on a rolling workbench.. It's not quite done yet, but it works.
It came out a bit larger than planned, actually it's pretty gigantic.. About 3x5.5 ft and 40'' high. It's not the best looking thing ever, but I built it from material I had laying around so it didn't cost me anything.

I hereby present to you this elegant piece of craftsmanship, a true marvel of engineering, the rolling workbench!





Testing... It didn't fall through so I guess it works!


I'll add a shelf inside, some doors, paint, and it's good to go

 

[russlaferrera]

I would relocate the office and bathroom. The bathroom could be replaced with a urinal and a sink on the on the other side of the kitchen wall. The kitchen could be made into an office/kitchen.

 

[nico]

I finally got started on the new storage room in the basement now..

The first thing was to get some lighting in there..
Before..


And after, much better.


I'm moving all the supermarket remains to the small room in the back, and I'll be throwing some stuff away as well.

Got my hands on these as well 21 light boxes.. Not the latest or best but fully functional and they were free I'll put some of these on the wall between the shelves (vertical) to get some good lighting on the shelves.


So I got started on the frame.. the top shelf is at about 6 ft, I'm 6'6'' tall so I can easily see what's on there. Each shelf is about 10x4 ft.. 4 times that + the floor makes about 200 square ft of storage space, I plan to have 4 of these things eventually.
I was expecting some trouble with sturdyness but I can hardly move it at all so I think this will work fine.

 

[birdman1]

Even if it is a bit disorganized (as my shop is also)you have a great space there, don't mind me if I am glowing GREEN with envy.
Mike

 

[voetsek]

I'd say by looking at the pictures, in terms of short term "large" projects the top half of the shop is pretty much useless. It appears that you are using the shop area by the door for a long term restoration. I would suggest you think about using the areas to the left and right of the stairs as either long term project areas or specific job areas. Welding, paintbooth setup, machine tools that will need to be used on a frequent basis, etc. Also, as above, longer term project areas that will not need to be moved that much.

This would allow you to have the long straight shot from the garage door for items that need to be moved in and out with a greater frequency. Another issue is the walk and movement space. You need a walkway going down the center of the free space as the stairs, dividing room, etc. so you won't want to build out too far from either side so you have good access to your projects.

Depending on what you are working on on a regular basis another thing to think of is the placement of a lift if you so desire. The ceilings look like they won't take a full height lift, but a half height like the new Bend Pak or a scissors lift would work well. Placed half way down would allow for a nice work area down where the snow machines are (specific area for that need?) but still allow a car to pull into the garage behind the item being worked on.

If you do any wood work, and depending on the available access, the basement rooms would make a nice division between wood and metal. Keeps the grease and dust separate.

The bathroom w/o the toilet but with a big stainless sink, a good drain with a trap in the toilet hole to catch anything that shouldn't be doing down the drain, and a parts washer would contain the mess that can come from cleaning and washing stuff. It's always good to have a room to get stuff wet without worrying about powered appliances...

If you have heavy stuff to lift I have seen several instances of bridge cranes that look like they would be really nice to have and you could possibly hang one between one of the posts and the outside wall.

Best thing I can say from my experience is figure out what you want to do and (especially here) make up specific areas that require a specific set of things. If you have a car taken apart for restoration in one part, you probably want another section to work on the daily driver or other projects, and other areas for doing things like relaxing and watching the snow fly.