Between 705 & 1200 SQ/FT New 28' X 38' Garage Build in Portland

[lyonkster]

So after lurking here for some 15 years (time flies) and discussing some small projects, I'm finally ready to share a build - a new 28' X 38' garage! This is a fairly modest size compared to many other garages on this forum, but it's bigger than anything I ever had, and is the biggest size we can fit onto our property.

The goal is to have room for our two daily drivers, and a spot for me to work on a project car, with a lift. I am not a full time wrencher and don't expect to be doing anything crazy in the garage. But I do like to tinker and maintain my vehicles, so the extra space compared to what I had before will be great. I have a separate workshop in the basement of the house, so I don't need/want to have anything in the garage other than what's needed to work on cars, including storage for tools, supplies and parts, as well as a workbench and a sink.

Here is the configuration I finally settled on, after much discussion about layout options here:



And here is how the garage will be located on the property:



The garage will be stick framed, with raised tie roof trusses, to give me about 13 ft ceiling height in the middle section of the garage, which should be tall enough for a lift (most likely Advantage Lift DX-9000-XLT):



Here's the exterior view:



And the interior:



While the building design and structure have been finalized, I have not yet given a lot of thought to interior layout, so I'll be asking for suggestions on how to arrange some key elements I'd like to have in the garage, mostly along the back wall - tool chests, work bench, air compressor, sink, and storage shelves and/or cabinets.

I also still need to decide on lighting, outlets (including 220V), HVAC, floor finish, and I'm sure a number of other things I'm forgetting or haven't thought of yet.

To be clear, I will not be building the garage - I have a builder lined up who will do all the work. I do enjoy construction projects, but at this point in my life I don't want to spend years building the garage - I'd rather get it done quickly so that I can enjoy working in it, not on it .

I expect that once the builder gets started later this month, things will progress fairly quickly, so I want to be prepared to make decisions so as not to delay his work. Hopefully with inputs from the good folks here, I will be able to do that.

Thanks for looking, and here's to a fun build !

 

[ScottW]

Thanks for sharing, looks like a great design and plan! Following.

 

[Balor]

So after lurking here for some 15 years (time flies) and discussing some small projects, I'm finally ready to share a build - a new 28' X 38' garage! This is a fairly modest size compared to many other garages on this forum, but it's bigger than anything I ever had, and is the biggest size we can fit onto our property.

The goal is to have room for our two daily drivers, and a spot for me to work on a project car, with a lift. I am not a full time wrencher and don't expect to be doing anything crazy in the garage. But I do like to tinker and maintain my vehicles, so the extra space compared to what I had before will be great. I have a separate workshop in the basement of the house, so I don't need/want to have anything in the garage other than what's needed to work on cars, including storage for tools, supplies and parts, as well as a workbench and a sink.

Here is the configuration I finally settled on, after much discussion about layout options here:



And here is how the garage will be located on the property:



The garage will be stick framed, with raised tie roof trusses, to give me about 13 ft ceiling height in the middle section of the garage, which should be tall enough for a lift (most likely Advantage Lift DX-9000-XLT):



Here's the exterior view:



And the interior:



While the building design and structure have been finalized, I have not yet given a lot of thought to interior layout, so I'll be asking for suggestions on how to arrange some key elements I'd like to have in the garage, mostly along the back wall - tool chests, work bench, air compressor, sink, and storage shelves and/or cabinets.

I also still need to decide on lighting, outlets (including 220V), HVAC, floor finish, and I'm sure a number of other things I'm forgetting or haven't thought of yet.

To be clear, I will not be building the garage - I have a builder lined up who will do all the work. I do enjoy construction projects, but at this point in my life I don't want to spend years building the garage - I'd rather get it done quickly so that I can enjoy working in it, not on it .

I expect that once the builder gets started later this month, things will progress fairly quickly, so I want to be prepared to make decisions so as not to delay his work. Hopefully with inputs from the good folks here, I will be able to do that.

Thanks for looking, and here's to a fun build !

Will the exterior of the garage match the exterior of the house?

 

[lyonkster]

Thanks for sharing, looks like a great design and plan! Following.

Thanks Scott! I read your build with interest - the garage sizes are fairly similar, and you got similar lift to what I have in mind (Advantage DX-9000-XLT). How do you like yours?

I'm a little envious of the loft you have added to your garage, I sometimes second guess my decision not to have one. But I do want to keep open the option of placing the lift in any location, plus I know that if I add a loft, I'll just end up with more stuff that I don't need .

Looking forward to your feedback and comments!

 

[lyonkster]

Will the exterior of the garage match the exterior of the house?

Hi Balor, no, we won't be trying to match the house. The house was remodeled before we bought it with smooth stucco and wood siding:




The garage is a totally different style, and is far enough away from the house that we plan to just keep it "under the radar" - very dark, so it blends in with the trees behind it and does not detract from the house. We're planning on very dark gray Hardie siding, almost black.

The garage will go in the area where that playset is:

 

[BORING HOP YARD]

Greetings, it looks like the house has had some electrical service upgrade by the look of the PVC conduit going into the house. I say that hoping you have room in the breaker box for a branch circuit to go out to the shop. Can't tell if driveway is gravel or cement either way a trench will most likely have to be dug from the house to the build site going across the driveway. Hopefully your GC has some ideas to help with the timing of events and understanding the impacts to your family getting to and from the house during the build.
I built a shop in SE Portland 30 years ago and for the most part it was a positive experience. My cement was done by a friend that I had known since cub scouts, and he had some advice about placement of PVC after the inspections and prior to the pour. We put metal cans over the openings of the PVC, top of the cans were just below the surface of the finished cement. Once the building was up, I went back with a hammer and smacked the cement above the can and pulled the can out leaving a nice, finished hole for the PVC. Funny thing for me was one of the building inspectors who was buying off the ok to pour said after he signed off. With a shop this big 24x36 "you're going to want electricity, go get PVC now before the pour since it easier than after the pour"
My contractor and I just chucked.
I hope this make sense, looking forward to your build thank you for contributing.

 

[lyonkster]

Greetings, it looks like the house has had some electrical service upgrade by the look of the PVC conduit going into the house. I say that hoping you have room in the breaker box for a branch circuit to go out to the shop. Can't tell if driveway is gravel or cement either way a trench will most likely have to be dug from the house to the build site going across the driveway. Hopefully your GC has some ideas to help with the timing of events and understanding the impacts to your family getting to and from the house during the build.
I built a shop in SE Portland 30 years ago and for the most part it was a positive experience. My cement was done by a friend that I had known since cub scouts, and he had some advice about placement of PVC after the inspections and prior to the pour. We put metal cans over the openings of the PVC, top of the cans were just below the surface of the finished cement. Once the building was up, I went back with a hammer and smacked the cement above the can and pulled the can out leaving a nice, finished hole for the PVC. Funny thing for me was one of the building inspectors who was buying off the ok to pour said after he signed off. With a shop this big 24x36 "you're going to want electricity, go get PVC now before the pour since it easier than after the pour"
My contractor and I just chucked.
I hope this make sense, looking forward to your build thank you for contributing.

Thank you for the comments, I appreciate your attention to detail! Indeed, the electrical service was upgraded, and we checked that the breaker box has capacity for a breaker to serve the garage (we're thinking 100A service).

Our GC (who is based in your neck of the woods) has a plan for cutting through the asphalt driveway to put in utilities (water and electrical), and I think that will go smoothly. We'll see, I'm sure there will be some inconveniences along the way, but that how it goes.

Thanks for your comments!

 

[lyonkster]

So as I'm sitting here waiting for groundbreaking, I keep going over anything that I may have overlooked. One thing that keeps concerning me is the approach to the garage. Here's the view of the driveway and the garage. I'd be driving from the street (on the right), and then have to make a 180 deg turn into the garage:





I think it'll be fairly easy to swing into the two far bays, but the close bay will be a bit of a challenge. That's the bay where I think we would be parking the daily car, since it's right next to the man door out of the garage.

I drew a red arc to represent a 38' turning radius (diameter, technically speaking), that's supposedly a generous number. So it looks like with a bit of driveway widening to the white line, it should be doable. The other solution is to push the garage a bit to the right towards the trees - we prefer not to do that since we don't want to get too close to the tree canopy, or the roots. Those are 100-150 ft tall trees.

I think another option may be to park the daily in the middle bay, and do a three point turn to pull into the first bay when needed. Or to take this one step further, I could put the lift in the first bay, and have the dailies use the two far bays. The downside of that is that using the man door would then require squeezing past the lift, which could get quite annoying.

Any thoughts/suggestions on this?

 

[samb]

This is great, interested to see how you get on. I agree with your thoughts in regards to the turning circle. My house is at the of a long driveway and it means turning pad takes up a fair amount of the overall footprint, you've got the land for it, might as well add some additional tarmac to make it flow.

 

[Skellyii]

Question: Are you going to be backing a trailer into the garage?

 

[lyonkster]

Question: Are you going to be backing a trailer into the garage?

Good question! I don't think we'll ever need to back in a trailer, or to have a large truck. At most we'd be looking at a Tacoma size pickup.

 

[dmittz]

Could you turn the garage 90 degrees and move it back towards the parkimg area a bit so the doors face the driveway?

If you don't want to do that, perhaps extend the parking area to the side of the house so you can more easily turn around. Also if you just want to back into your garage (rather than drive in), then the current layout could work out nicely...

Defineitly make sure you have room to turn a regular full sized truck around as you never know what you'll drive in the future, plus that's a good feature for resale value.

 

[lyonkster]

Could you turn the garage 90 degrees and move it back towards the parkimg area a bit so the doors face the driveway?

If you don't want to do that, perhaps extend the parking area to the side of the house so you can more easily turn around. Also if you just want to back into your garage (rather than drive in), then the current layout could work out nicely...

Defineitly make sure you have room to turn a regular full sized truck around as you never know what you'll drive in the future, plus that's a good feature for resale value.

I considered having the garage rotated 90 deg, but it created some other problems:



The primary issue is that there is a slope from the street to the house along the driveway. So the grade at the last bay ends up being almost three feet lower than the grade at the first bay. Assuming the whole garage floor would be at one level, that would mean the first bay would have a drop of three feet from the driveway (point A) to the garage floor (point B). That's a pretty steep slope over that short a distance, which I'd like to avoid. I hope the sketch makes sense.

I think given all the constraints we have, the current configuration is the least of all evils, but I like the idea of adding a generous driveway sweep to allow for larger vehicles to swing into the garage.

 

[Geoff289]

I think even with a wider driveway that turn is going to be very tight and inconvenient with the single garage doors you're going with. Were the first two singles a generous double door you'd have more room for the last bit of the swing.

If you have time to check out my thread you'll see that my three wide garage is accessed by a driveway that is only one car wide at the street (only 25 feet from the garage) that starts in line with the right hand single door, fanning out to the left to access the middle and left bay covered by the double door. To put my weekend Mustang in the left bay involves a tight S bend from the street. Basically I couldn't do it in one hit if I had two single doors covering those bays. Here's a pic.



I think your best option is to relocate the man door, accept a longer walk to the house, and put the dailies in the middle and right hand bays.

Since I'm always happy to spend others money, another option would be a 360 degree turntable installed the driveway.

 

[lyonkster]

I think even with a wider driveway that turn is going to be very tight and inconvenient with the single garage doors you're going with. Were the first two singles a generous double door you'd have more room for the last bit of the swing.

If you have time to check out my thread you'll see that my three wide garage is accessed by a driveway that is only one car wide at the street (only 25 feet from the garage) that starts in line with the right hand single door, fanning out to the left to access the middle and left bay covered by the double door. To put my weekend Mustang in the left bay involves a tight S bend from the street. Basically I couldn't do it in one hit if I had two single doors covering those bays. Here's a pic.



I think your best option is to relocate the man door, accept a longer walk to the house, and put the dailies in the middle and right hand bays.

Since I'm always happy to spend others money, another option would be a 360 degree turntable installed the driveway.

Thanks Geoff, I had a look at your build - outstanding job, I'm envious (we planned to build a new custom home full of modern features, but for a number of reasons that fell through and we bought an existing home - without a garage!). At least that last part can now be rectified.

I completely understand your point about the tight turn, so I'm mentally preparing myself and my wife to either use the far two bays for the dailies, or to get used to making three- or four-point turns. But it took us eight long months to get a permit for this project, and making any changes at this point would set us back several months again. I'm not a spring chicken, and I don't currently have a garage to store my vehicles, so I'm reluctant to make any mods that would require changes to the permit or the structure.

So I think I'll try to make the most of the approved building design, and then play with driveway layouts to get as good an access as can be. And then I'll have in my hip pocket the option of moving the lift to the first bay, and having the dailies use the last two bays. I might ask the builder to put a header on the far wall in case I decide to put a man door on that side at a later date (though I know he'll push back because technically that's a shear wall).

 

[ohhimark]

It looks pretty decent as is. Idk why, but it feels like the "project bay" should be closest to the man door, and extra stuff furthest away.

With some mild alterations, you could drive right in with this plan:

 

[lyonkster]

It looks pretty decent as is. Idk why, but it feels like the "project bay" should be closest to the man door, and extra stuff furthest away.

With some mild alterations, you could drive right in with this plan:

Brilliant!

 

[bakmopar]

Most of us have had some type of constraint when building our garages/shops. Plans look great. Enjoy it. Once you get used to the access into the garage it will be a less of a concern. Don't sweat the same stuff.

 

[ScottW]

Thanks Scott! I read your build with interest - the garage sizes are fairly similar, and you got similar lift to what I have in mind (Advantage DX-9000-XLT). How do you like yours?

I'm a little envious of the loft you have added to your garage, I sometimes second guess my decision not to have one. But I do want to keep open the option of placing the lift in any location, plus I know that if I add a loft, I'll just end up with more stuff that I don't need .

Looking forward to your feedback and comments!

I really like the Advantage lift! First class heavy duty construction and no problems to date. I got the roller hydraulic jack with it and that has also worked well, I used it recently for a front brake job/rotor replacement on our SUV,

The concern about gathering too much stuff is real . Someone said that the shop is my dream and my children’s future nightmare lol.

On your garage/driveway layout can you extend it a few feet beyond your shop entrance? So you can drive a few feet past the garage doors, do a turning backup towards the house, then drive straight into your garage? When leaving you could back out and turn into the extension, then drive straight out down the driveway. I have sort of an arrangement like that on my house garage and it has worked well.

 

[lyonkster]

Most of us have had some type of constraint when building our garages/shops. Plans look great. Enjoy it. Once you get used to the access into the garage it will be a less of a concern. Don't sweat the same stuff.

Thanks, words of encouragement are always welcome! I'm the king of sweating the small stuff, so this is good advice for me to try to keep in mind.

I really like the Advantage lift! First class heavy duty construction and no problems to date. I got the roller hydraulic jack with it and that has also worked well, I used it recently for a front brake job/rotor replacement on our SUV,

The concern about gathering too much stuff is real . Someone said that the shop is my dream and my children’s future nightmare lol.

On your garage/driveway layout can you extend it a few feet beyond your shop entrance? So you can drive a few feet past the garage doors, do a turning backup towards the house, then drive straight into your garage? When leaving you could back out and turn into the extension, then drive straight out down the driveway. I have sort of an arrangement like that on my house garage and it has worked well.

Thanks Scott - I also plan to get the roller jack for the lift, maybe even two (if I have any money leftover after the garage build).

I get your suggestion about the driveway, makes sense. My plan is to wait until the garage is built, or at least the concrete is poured, then practice making turns into it with my 4Runner to get a feel for where the driveway needs to be. I know my wife is reluctant to have too much asphalt in front of our house, so it'll be a delicate balance.

 

[lyonkster]

Well we're getting to the fun part! Our permit was issued about 2 weeks ago, and yesterday we had the required "preconstruction" meeting with the builder, excavator, storm water runoff consultants, County grading inspector, and County Clean Water Services folks. Here's the whole crew checking out where we'll be tying the roof rain water runoff into the storm drain:




The builder is hoping to start in the next week or two, so we'll see real work. After a whole year of paper pushing (design work and waiting for permits), we'll finally see some construction - I can't wait.

Here's hopefully one last look at the current location where the garage will go:

And here's what currently passes for my "garage", a little sad:

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

So as I'm sitting here waiting for groundbreaking, I keep going over anything that I may have overlooked. One thing that keeps concerning me is the approach to the garage. Here's the view of the driveway and the garage. I'd be driving from the street (on the right), and then have to make a 180 deg turn into the garage:







I think another option may be to park the daily in the middle bay, and do a three point turn to pull into the first bay when needed. Or to take this one step further, I could put the lift in the first bay, and have the dailies use the two far bays. The downside of that is that using the man door would then require squeezing past the lift, which could get quite annoying.

Any thoughts/suggestions on this?

pull up to your existing house and back in

You always need to either back in or back out

Once you get used to backing in it’s no big deal

 

[thammel]

It's gonna get more and more exciting!!

 

[lyonkster]

It's gonna get more and more exciting!!

Yup! The builder came by today; they're going to put down erosion control barriers on Monday, inspection on Tuesday, and the excavator is coming on Wed to cut the pad and the trenches. Going to get real!

 

[Geoff289]

After seeing your existing garage i think you're gonna be as happy as a pig in the proverbial with the new one, whatever compromises it might involve.

Looking forward to following progress. We are loosely planning a trip to Western Canada later this year - my partner has relatives who have homes in both Canmore AB, and on Vancouver Island. Might have to venture a bit south and check out how your build is going.

 

[lyonkster]

After seeing your existing garage i think you're gonna be as happy as a pig in the proverbial with the new one, whatever compromises it might involve.

Looking forward to following progress. We are loosely planning a trip to Western Canada later this year - my partner has relatives who have homes in both Canmore AB, and on Vancouver Island. Might have to venture a bit south and check out how your build is going.

You're welcome here anytime! The plan is to have this done by end of May

 

[lyonkster]

I guess this makes the project officially underway!

 

[ErickForest]

It's a little tight with a 2019 4Runner.

 

[lyonkster]

One thing I need to decide on is the location of the sawcuts after they pour the concrete. I'm leaning towards this layout, with cuts (red dashed lines) about 9' apart:



Being OCD about things, I wonder if this would bother me, given that the cuts in the two outer bays are not centered with the doors. But centering them with the doors would put the cuts about 12' apart, which seems too far from what I've read.


Thoughts?

 

[mmsheb]

What about having them starting at the left side of your layout: 7', 6', 6', 6', 6', 7'
These distances would have them centered on the overhead doors and the two pillars. What would bother me aesthetically is the way you show it now one cut line is not centered under the lift.
I don't know if it's OK to have them closer together than your 9' layout. I'm just going on looks, not knowing about having too many cut lines.
Mike in WI

 

[Geoff289]

I take your point about the aesthetics of it but I would say having the cuts perform their intended function is more important. What flooring treatment are you planning? Racedeck or something like that would obviously hide the cuts anyway. If epoxy is planned you could fill the cuts with a suitable flexible product and smooth it over like a drywall join, then epoxy over. I have epoxy and wish I'd done that and probably will when it needs renewal.

Another thing - it may be within spec, but I'd be keeping a saw cut further away from the lift posts than that. Compromising the stability of the lift is not something to risk.

 

[thammel]

Do you really need that many sawcuts? Seems like one horizontal and 2 vertical would be enough.

 

[lyonkster]

What about having them starting at the left side of your layout: 7', 6', 6', 6', 6', 7'
These distances would have them centered on the overhead doors and the two pillars. What would bother me aesthetically is the way you show it now one cut line is not centered under the lift.
I don't know if it's OK to have them closer together than your 9' layout. I'm just going on looks, not knowing about having too many cut lines.
Mike in WI

That would certainly look more aligned with other features (below), but I think that's a lot of saw cuts? Not that it would hurt anything, but may look too busy.

Do you really need that many sawcuts? Seems like one horizontal and 2 vertical would be enough.

That would look pretty good, but some cuts will be 13.5' apart - I keep the rule of thumb is 10-12'. I can talk to the concrete guy and see what he says.

I take your point about the aesthetics of it but I would say having the cuts perform their intended function is more important. What flooring treatment are you planning? Racedeck or something like that would obviously hide the cuts anyway. If epoxy is planned you could fill the cuts with a suitable flexible product and smooth it over like a drywall join, then epoxy over. I have epoxy and wish I'd done that and probably will when it needs renewal.

Another thing - it may be within spec, but I'd be keeping a saw cut further away from the lift posts than that. Compromising the stability of the lift is not something to risk.

Hi Geoff, my current plan is to go with a GhostShield sealer, so the cuts will be quite visible. Otherwise I wouldn't obsess about it so much .

 

[lyonkster]

Work is starting in earnest now. The excavator started on the foundation area, and is about 3/4 done. The trenches for the footings are enormous, about 4 ft wide by 3 ft deep.




This morning the first dump truck came by to take some of the dirt away:

 

[mmsheb]

Congrats on starting your project! The size of those trees next to the person, excavating equipment, and truck is apparent. They are indeed huge as you previously mentioned. Thanks for not destroying them.
Mike in WI

 

[lyonkster]

Congrats on starting your project! The size of those trees next to the person, excavating equipment, and truck is apparent. They are indeed huge as you previously mentioned. Thanks for not destroying them.
Mike in WI

Thanks Mike! It's very exciting! And preserving those beautiful trees was one of our goals in this project. We were a bit concerned about how many roots will get exposed/cut during the excavation - I'd say it was less than I expected, which is great!

 

[lyonkster]

I started a separate thread on this, but might as well repeat the question here. I need to decide where to place the sink in the garage, before the contractor pours the foundation in a few days (the supply rough-ins will be come up through the foundation, and the drain will need to be roughed in).

I haven't yet finalized how I want to arrange storage, workbench, tool boxes, floor jacks, etc, so I have to guess at where the best place for the sink will be. I envision most of the "stuff" to be arranged against the back wall.

One thought is to put the sink somewhere near the middle, which would give me "elbow" room on either side:

Another option is to push the sink into the corner, which would help control splashing all over the place:

Would appreciate thoughts or comments on these options, or some other suggestions!

 

[lyonkster]

They're done for the week, the slab location is getting better defined:




As for the layout, I think I'll have rough in the sink in the left corner, closer to the man door. Something like this:

 

[lyonkster]

Congrats on starting your project! The size of those trees next to the person, excavating equipment, and truck is apparent. They are indeed huge as you previously mentioned. Thanks for not destroying them.
Mike in WI

Mike, here's a better view of the beautiful trees we have in the vicinity. It's what sold us on this property, so we are happy to be able to keep them!




So far we've had nothing but sunshine for this build, not something we could count on in Portland in January. But we'll take it!

The builder said that he is changing the approach a bit - rather than pouring all the concrete, including the slab, and then framing, he now plans to pour the foundation, then frame the walls and the roof, and sheath the roof, before pouring the slab. That way the slab will get some protection from the elements during the pour and finishing work, which makes sense to me.

 

[nmk_61802]

That would look pretty good, but some cuts will be 13.5' apart - I keep the rule of thumb is 10-12'. I can talk to the concrete guy and see what he says.

Personally I do this, but add another cut to your 28' to get the grid down to 9'-4" in that dimension.