It only took me from the time I started driving & working on my first car in 1980, until 1997 to break ground on my own garage. I used a one car garage at my parents house for a long time, then rented a few spaces after that. Once I had enough money put aside, which was about 8 years after buying my own place, I finally designed & built my garage, & some of it with my wife's help.
I started out with plans for a 24' deep by 28' wide 2-1/2 car, with one level, but my wife said I'd never be happy since it was too small. Who's to argue with that reasoning?
So, I went to a 36' wide one with a second floor. Originally it was to be a foundation with a footing, but after getting 3 concrete quotes that were insane, I changed the plan to a pole building. I never tallied up an exact amount, but the difference in savings was probably $5000.00 or so.
This is the layout of the 1st & 2nd floors. It was designed for 3 cars, but I was able to fit 4 in a pinch. That came in very handy one year when I had a parts car torn apart & snow outside on the ground. The rear wall is staggered to stay within my rear property line setback, & far enough back from the main distribution pipe in front for my septic system.
The layout is a bit different now that there are 2 lifts inside. There are 5 cars in there now, & room to move around. So much for a 2-1/2 car I thought I was building, my wife was right.
Sorry there isn't any pics of the beginning phases back in 1997, but my wife's ancient & manually operated, 35 mm Minolta, looked as though it had film in it.
She felt horrible that she didn't notice, but oh well. We did get started with an actual roll of film once the framing was done & most of the roof was on.
First floor framing with I-beams. These were actually a lot easier to put in than they look, but my wife was a nervous wreck... LOL. I rented a platform hoist, dragged the beams into the building with a cable puller, raised them up on the hoist, & rotated them with a lazy susan from the bottom of an old TV cabinet. (Seriously)
This is me, I'm just about done with the roof. I had finished the last of the shingles on New Year's weekend that year. I had to bring in all the shingles I used to cover the ridge vent & put them by the coal stove to soften them enough to bend.
Second floor room on the right, which is packed with car parts. The rest is more parts & misc stuff you'd find in the attic at your Grandparent's house.
Here it is finished on the outside. The front is all cedar to match the house, & the rest is vinyl. There are only 4 fixed windows on the first floor that are up on the wall about 10 feet off the ground for light. The 2 overhead doors are 16' x 8' & insulated. The outside is a rough sawn, hardboard that looks exactly like cedar. I have to clean & seal it again now, it looks awful with some black streaks on it. There were no nice looking steel doors I liked at the time I installed these.
Doors open at night, but this was before the second lift was assembled. The floor was to be 5" thick, but I was running out of time before the concrete was to be deliverd. I couldn't get more item 4 & compacted in time, so I upped the concrete quantity. (A total of 16-1/2 cubic yards.) The center of the garage has about 7" of concrete, & it's 4000 PSI, fiber reinforced, & with wire fabric. The amount was dead on with no waste after making the form by the service entrance 3' x 5'.
I'm hoping to have more insulation, sheetrock up, & then maybe by next year heat installed.
So this one is for everyone with working shops of ....let's say 3+ cars in size. Looking forward to seeing the " big ones".
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