PA garage/bank barn build

[hockey88fan]

First off I gotta say I love this site, a wealth of info here, I've been lurking for a while trying to get ideas. We started the excavation this weekend for a 1.5 story garage, my buddy knows a freind who rented us his trackhoe so we started the dig, took us about 6 hours with this machine to dig out the site. Because of space issues the garage had to go at the rear of my house built into the bank so I've decided to have a half story upstairs that you can drive into from the rear to store mowers, hunting buggie, trailer, treestands, etc. The garage will be 29x34, to keep it under 1000 sq feet, built right into the bank with the back and side walls being poured concrete, the first floor ceiling height will be 11'. Because the first floor is 11', I'm leaning towards a 5' framed wall upstairs so the building doesnt appear to be a skyscraper with it being relatively close to the house. I was going to go with laminated floor trusses for the floor upstairs to get a full span across the 29'. I was also going to go with scissor trusses upstairs to give the needed head room. The area to the left of the dig, where the mini is presently parked, I plan on putting a 10x20 porch, and retain the dirt behind it with some sort of stone retaining wall.

My plan was to do the construction myself, with the help of the same friend who is a builder, but after this weekend I am a little overwhelmed with what seems will be a long road to completion. As you can see a lot of my yard is ruined with the piles of back fill around the excavation site. I am going to call a local amish barn/garage builder this week to come out and give me a price on what it would take for them to build it then go from there. I was thinking of stick building it because most of the first floor is walls are concrete anyway, but if I can get a decent price for him to pole construct it I just may do it that way.

On this site, I cant get enough of the posts where people are showing the progress of their builld with pictures. I will try and do the same if the forum members would like, if I'm showing too many pics just let me know, I'll cut it back.

Any comments or suggestions are welcomed as you can tell I'm not quite set on the design or how I want to proceed with the build. Keeping within a budget is a real concern in my situation as well.

 

[banzaitoyota]

Good start, keep the pictures coming!

 

[malibu101]

Welcome!!
Where abouts in PA are you? In near Allentown. About an hour northwest of Philadelphia.

Great looking start to a nice project. I'm sure we all look forward to progress pics.

 

[Motofixxer]

You can never have too many pics.

 

[hockey88fan]

Welcome!!
Where abouts in PA are you? In near Allentown. About an hour northwest of Philadelphia.

Great looking start to a nice project. I'm sure we all look forward to progress pics.

I'm close by, just outside of Hamburg, which is about 15 minutes north of Reading.

 

[malibu101]

I'm close by, just outside of Hamburg, which is about 15 minutes north of Reading.

Well nice to meet you neighbor. The web can be a small world.
I get near your little burg a few times a year between going to Cabelas and Rt.61 is my shortest route to head out to Maple Grove Raceway.

See ya around the site!

 

[rieferman]

Nice! I'm in collegeville just down 422 from reading

 

[dwljpl]

Near Harrisburg here. Keep the pics coming, I doubt you could have too many.

 

[92xjcowboy]

I was in Macungie (rt 100 just south of 78) until I started school on the other side of the state. I wont be coming back though, Im moving to TN after school.

Good Luck with the build.

 

[Chuckleins]

Looks good - thinking of doing a similar build - would want to use the upstairs as a heifer barn. Near New Holland

 

[hockey88fan]

Footers dug ready for concrete!

 

[malibu101]

And so it begins!
Best of luck with the build!

 

[hockey88fan]

Walls poured this week, 11' high in the rear, 10" thick all the way around. The progress may slow down some now as we can't back fill the big walls until the concrete is fully cured, which we were told is 28 days.

 

[Chuckleins]

looking good

 

[rburke65]

Good for you....no turning back now. At least you have started!

 

[JB22]

comin along nicely

 

[jktruck150]

Make sure you put a waterproofing coating on the outside of the wall! Lookin good so far!

 

[Chuckleins]

anything going on?

 

[JC23]

Walls should be cured by now. Updates?

I wanna see this job...

 

[hockey88fan]

It's been slow going, mainly due to the weather, that's why I haven't been posting. I get mainly weekends to work on it, and they've all been rainy since the beginning of august, so frustrating. In that time I've backfilled the lower walls, tamped the fill down with a plate compacter, layed and leveled 23 tons of stone, put in 2 floor drains, put down 6 mil poly, 2" insulation on the floor and perimeter, put down wire mesh, layed pex tubing, mounted the manifold, and now have the system under 50lbs of air pressure. There were a couple leaks at the connections at the manifold, I think I found them all and tightened them up. They're coming to pour the floor first thing Monday morning. Next weekend I will hopefully be backfilling the big walls and start framing the first floor. Here are some pics.

 

[930dreamer]

Keep the pics coming.

 

[red]

Glad you're back. How did you make out with all that rain? Ran drainage pipe and pipes for my rain gutters, when I buildt my garage. Best money I spent on the whole project.

 

[hockey88fan]

If you zoom in on the last pic the white pipe sticking up in the front corner of the garage is for the gutter, there's one at the other corner too, they run into a perimeter drain then out to a box that collects them all. That masonry box will have a 6" pipe that will take all the water down the yard.

We made out alright in the rain, our house is kinda on a hill, our neighbor below us is still pumping water out of his basement. We got like 8" of rain from Sunday to Thursday. I was worried the dirt wall that surrounds our garage, that I have yet to backfilled, was going to cave in around the garage with all that rain, it didnt thank goodness.

 

[hockey88fan]

Concrete slab poured today, finished smooth. They seemed rough walking on the pex and throwing down boards for the wheel barrow but the pressure in the radiant system held during the pour. Now I'm trying to decide how to cure the slab for the next week or so. So many schools of thought on this. I think I'm going with, do nothing for the first 24 hours, then water 3 times a day and keep covered with burlap, put a sealer on after a week. That's what the concrete company said to do anyway.

 

[bsakal]

Looking good so far! Hello from a fellow PA resident!

 

[hockey88fan]

Got a nice crack across the man door threshold in less than 24 hours, uurrrggg!!

 

[hockey88fan]

Took all day, but got the water collection basin done Saturday with the gracious help of my pop, I was the "mud man" haha. The 2 floor drains, the down spouts, and the perimeter drain all go into this basin, and then there is two 4" inch pipes that will take the water down the yard. I like the idea of the basin, I can visually check that all pipes are flowing and have a place to clean them out if I have to.
This garage will take forever to complete when the projects like this take up a saturday and we still have to run pipe down the yard. And did I mention it won't stop raining.

 

[hockey88fan]

Gonna frame up the first floor tomorrow morning, the crane is showing up at 11:30 to lift the trusses, talk about pressure, not much time to get the first floor done. I know I won't sleep tonight, haha.

 

[hockey88fan]

Busted **** today got first floor done right when crane pulled up, my wife and kids think I shouldn't have put the second floor on, makes the building to tall, oh well too late now.

 

[AZ Pete]

very nice

 

[OhioSiouxFan]

Great build into the hillside. Can't wait to see the finished result!

 

[AutoXRacer]

subscribing!!

 

[MarcB]

Looks great to me

 

[colt zantop]

wow....looks great! keep those pics coming.....

 

[hockey88fan]

FYI, the second floor inside walls are 5' high, then goes up to 8' down the center of the second floor. I could have made those inside walls at 3', which would give a smaller area down the center at 8', and it would have brought the over all height of the building down 2'. We live in a 2 story home and the new garage is positioned right behind our attached garage, so when your driving up our driveway, you see the new garage over top of the roof of our attached garage, which in perspective makes it look tall. Also notice our vehicles parked outside our attached garage because it is packed to the gills, haha.

 

[Lookin4'67Galaxieconv]

Interesting build. Don't know if I've seen one built into a bank before on here.

Keep 'em coming.

 

[hockey88fan]

Here's where we are thus far...

 

[hockey88fan]

A little farther along......

 

[Chuckleins]

Looking good - Can you post any pictures for the upper side?

 

[Farmer Joe]

Its come a LONG way so far. Looking good. Can't wait until you get that finished off, I'll be waiting

Makes me wish I had some land to work with and handy friends, unfortunately most of my friends are in management positions in different customer service related jobs, in comfy offices. I don't think they could even lift a hammer lol.

Good job so far!