The Flying Shop

[phred]

I've posted several photos of my shop in various threads giving ideas/examples to solve problems and have been asked about a build thread so I'm gonna attempt to piece one together. A little history. I've got a few cars and trucks and work on a lot of stuff for other people. I live in town. As in the heart of Atlanta. The neighborhood is 3 miles from the city center and was established in 1920. Although not designated historic the city is pretty strict about what you can do (basically they charge you more to do anything outside the norm). Our house is a restored 1926 bungalow. A 2 car attached garage was added to the basement behind the house and blends into the vernacular of the architecture very well. Owning 4 trucks and my wife's car meant I had a lot of $s sitting outside or in storage somewhere. In 2013 my wife and I decided to enlarge to attached garage. I'm an architect and construction consultant so did quite a few studies on making the garage large and useable while keeping it as unobtrusive as possible. Once we had 3 workable designs I ran the costs. Surprisingly the most expensive option was the most realistic to build. It's basically is an elevated structure on a steel frame detached from the house. It eliminated the need to restructure the main house and provided the most usable area.
Wow this intro is long!!!
Some pics and then more story
The little bungalow and the crowded 2 car


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[phred]

So we now have a plan and a budget. I make the trek downtown in July of 2013 to start the ball rolling and I get the ole red tape shuffle. The permit department needs "x" the planning dept needs "y + x". How large is the detached structure? You're going to have to have a variance! How is the building supported. We need engineering drawings before we can become the variance process. Are you removing any trees? We need a survey locating all the tree and the critical root zones. On and on it went for several hours. When I left that afternoon I almost decided to just forget the whole thing but I plowed forward. Called a landscape architect friend and a surveyor and had them come over and start making measurements. Add 7500 to the budget. Call up an engineering buddy to design the steel frame but he has to design it to stay out of the critical root zones of the trees. Add another 3500 to the budget. Oh the trees are kind of important. 1 my wife likes the fact that our little 1/4 acre in town is almost completely wooded so no cutty the trees. Also the city charges you recompense for each mature tree you remove. 500 to 2000 each depending on the size. To make it more expensive there is nowhere to drop a large tree in my yard so they would have to be picked with a crane. We did the math and a 1000 ton crane would be needed to reach over the house and pick the giant poplar that is now 1 foot from the new shop. So we did cut any trees because the 25000 in tree removal cost is going to be used for other. I had to develop the entire permit set before I could begin the approval process. It involved neighborhood meetings (3 to be exact). One city council meeting (zoning board review) and have 12 neighbors signing an affidavit that they had no issues with me building a detached garage. All of that just to be able to apply for a permit. This process took 11 months. Applied for the permit in June of 2014. Permit issued late November 2014. I promise actual construction photos soon


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[fatkidracer]

WOW! this is why i live in the country!

thanks for taking the time to try and post something about your garage as i feel it will help me in my endeavor!

 

[rattle_snake]

JFC, what a nightmare. Glad you persevered and are moving forward. Adapt and overcome.

 

[phred]

Ok here are the drawings and engineering. There were a lot more drawings, surveys, letters etc to actually get the permit. The most frustrating thing was trying to get the arborist for the city to understand how the shop was not going to affect the tree roots. He couldn't get it through his head that the building was actually in the air above the roots.

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[sbosecker]

Phred,

I admire your determination. I think I know where you are located and you're about 35 years too late. Ha!

Back when I first moved to the Atlanta metro area, the area just south of your assumed position appeared to this untrained eye to be starting the transition from "somewhat rough" to "beautiful people". I suspect the process of improving your property would have been much easier then. Ha!

I also remember quite a few years ago there was quite a stink in Atlanta when a property owner couldn't get permission to remove some large trees. I think the neighbors were causing the biggest fuss. Anyway, in the end, a "vandal" girdled the trees one night.

May I ask the history/source of your project's name (The Flying Shop)?

Best regards,

Scott

 

[GLTHFJ60]

That's a heck of a story, damn. Can't wait to see some more pictures of the property and can't wait for construction to get started!

 

[phred]

May I ask the history/source of your project's name (The Flying Shop)?

Best regards,

Scott[/QUOTE]

The name is really because on the front edge of the shop actually touches the ground. Although I am a pilot I don't tinker on aircraft in there and unfortunately I don't get a chance to fly anymore due to work and other things that eat up my time and money. I used to live in Oregon and flew a lot out there. Much less crowded airspace and beautiful scenery.

When we first move into the neighborhood about 20 years ago it had just transitioned and now its crazy. Im about a mile from the intersection of Virginia and Highland.

 

[phred]

So on Jan 15 2015 the contractor breaks ground only to find debris. It turns out in 1926 they just buried all the construction scraps on site. How things never change. I hire a soils engineer to come over and probe the site and redo the footing design based on the **** we have found. The soils are spongy and poorly compacted. The GC removed all the debris and the footings nearly double in size and depth. What was a 5x5x2 footing is now and 8x8x2.5 with 3 feet of compacted gravel. You gotta love it when the overages start on the first day!
You can see the line of trash in the footings. Looks like they burned everything they could and buried the rest.

 

[phred]

here are the new oversized footings and this is just the beginning of the fun. I really wanted this shop and I was so far into the money pit at this point there was no turning back..

 

[sbosecker]

When we first move into the neighborhood about 20 years ago it had just transitioned and now its crazy. Im about a mile from the intersection of Virginia and Highland.

phred,

Thanks for the explanation regarding the name.

My assumption about your location was correct then. Although I have never lived inside the perimeter, I used to (occasionally) visit Highland Hardware in Virginia/Highland. When I first started visiting them some 30+ years ago they were across the street from their present location. Looking at the Urban Pioneering that was going on as I made my way to that store, even I could see that if it kept going it was going to be nice.

Unfortunately there is often a tradeoff in liberties for "nice".

Ha!

I look forward to more information on this project.

Best regards,

Scott

 

[phred]

more footing shots, lots of reinforcing. Ready to pour and then....the rains started. Tarpped the entire site to keep the giant footings from filling with water.

 

[phred]

Well after a week of rain we get back after it and finish up the column footing and poor them

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[phred]

Now its time for another surprise, but unreality we should have know we would find more trash. The front retaining/bearing wall the the entire shop is anchored to was supposed to be 8" thick 3' tall an have a 4x1x28 long footing. Well it ended up being a 10 wall loaded with #4 bars 6' tall at one end and just over 10' at the other plus, you guessed it the footing got much bigger and heavier. Look at the debris line in the excavation and the surprise double wythe brick retaining wall that we discovered. I assume it was a foundation wall for an old single car garage. If I had know that it was here I may have been able to convince the city that I was repairing the existing garage.

 

[matt_i]

Wow, steelwork galore and pour on metal decking! Very cool, that's an ambitious undertaking

So the large J-bolts "hang" from the wooden cross-form supports via nuts until the pour is completed...then a number of threads are in free air to receive the baseplate.

I am hopeful the same contractor doing the layout of footings is the same one erecting the steelwork...that way they know location is hyper criticial!

 

[phred]

The steel fabricator is a whole special story by himself that I will get to shortly. The center of the footings were pinned by the surveyor and dbl checked before the pour. It all worked out pretty well. The footings ended up pretty deep. I talked with the engineer about the depth and the additional concrete required to get base plates up to the specified elevation. He ran some numbers and said just hold the footings down and make the columns longer. As long as the columns were back filled with compacted dirt it would be fine. We saved about 10 yards of concrete that way. At 125/yard thats $1200 I got back on the other adds.

 

[Farmall450]

I like the looks of this, plenty of covered storage below

 

[AZ Pete]

Subscribed


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[phred]

The underside will eventually have a nice deck and entertaining area. I included power and switching for lights and outdoor fans.


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[phred]

Time for more concrete. The little wall footing gobbled up 10 yards of 3500. One bobcat bucket at a time. The column footings were pumped but at least we could use the bobcat for this one and save the pump charge.

 

[phred]

Time to form the retaining/foundation wall. There was a forming crew setting up a house foundation at the end of the street so Rusty, the superintendent, wandered down and talked to them and they came over on Saturday morning and set up the forms and tied the reinforcing. That saved time and money because we didn't have to mobilize a crew and truck full of forms for about 250sf of wall. Heres the forms in place and a shot of the steel embeds for the beams to be welded too.

 

[phred]

Here the wall poured and ready for the steel. Buuuuttttt.... the steel wasn't ready!!! Ive been in the construction industry for almost 30 years and understand lead times, small shop requirements etc. I started pricing the steel package soon as we submitted the drawings for permit. I had three shops price the package. All of them came out and looked at the site to determine what equipment they would need to set the steel. All of the prices came back higher than I thought was reasonable. Prices ranged from 35 to 50,000 for this job. Now that works out to about 9500/ton. Steel in quantity in Atlanta runs between 3000 and 3500/ton. This is a small job about 4.5 tons. I knew I was going to get high prices but these numbers were out of line. I made a few calls and found a guy that specializes in small projects. He came out and we talked. He looked over the drawings and figured he could do it for a little over 7000/ton including the composite decking. We worked out a deal and he said he'd be ready when we where. Well he wasn't. One thing after another. Couldn't get the steel, wife was sick, hurt his back, had to do emergency repair on another project, its raining or too windy. Holy **** this went on for a month. So on the mean time there were some repairs that need to be done to the house so the crew started hand excavating part of the basement to find a leak in the 90 year old foundation wall. First we had to cut through the existing foundation wall to access the crawl space. The dirt behind this wall had never been disturbed below 2 feet and was like concrete the guys spent 2 weeks with picks and shovels excavating this area.

 

[matt_i]

That pocket in the wall looks very thin to me...both on the bearing area for the beam and the back side. Not criticizing, and maybe my sense of perspective is off.

Also, I'm interested in pouring the wall next to a slab, seems like it would be a major pain to now fill the thin and deep void and get it compacted adequately.

I looked at the basement excavation next to the brick walls and it looks like the foundation is undercut...maybe I'm having a bad day or can't see so good

Anyway, these would be things that would drive me nuts trying to figure out, or fill me with great worry, you obviously have found good solutions for them! I'm still very impressed with this build.

 

[phred]

The beam pocket is thicker than it appears and is actually a bit more stout that the engineer called for. We back filled both sides with washed 57 stone after we coated both sides with mop on waterproofing. As it turns out in 1926 in at Atlanta a foundation was not considered critical. The house is on brick piers with 1x1x8" mortar pads and the brick walls are single wythe on a bed of mortar. We did under cut the wall on purpose. I've got some pics to so why. The only real foundation wall under the entire house was the one we had to cut through to access this areas. It was added sometime in the 90's when he garage was added


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[Cairo94507]

Wow - That is a serious project you have going there. Looking forward to seeing more. Nice work.

 

[phred]

So here are some more shots of the basement excavation. A little back story first. Atlanta is not flat as you can see by my back yard. It is rolling hills. The house has a daylight basement that leaks when it rains. Imagine that? Who would ever think a thing like that would happen without a foundation wall?[emoji849]. The attached garage seemed to get the worst of it so I decided I could kill 2 birds with a couple shovels. Fix the water issue in the garage and pick up some extra storage.

As you can see it's wet in there now. It had been raining for a couple days and that allowed us to find the issue. An old tree long gone had sent a root under the house. It rotted away but the root turned into a 1" pipe. Water literally ran out of that hole when it rained. We plugged the hole with grout and put in a French drain, drainage mat and a reinforced block foundation wall filled with 5000 psi concrete. Let's see water get through that.


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[Brian R]

I had a brick house back in PA that was built in (near as we can tell) between 1910 and 1920. It also had a daylight basement and was built into a hill. The basement had a dirt floor and the height fluctuated from 6.5 feet to 3.5 feet. We dug it out to create a kids playroom and workshop and found that the footers and foundation were overbuilt. I'm sure back in the early days of the 20th century the workmanship was driven by who was doing the building and from what you posted it appears that the foundation was ok for what it did to support the house but they were done in by the tree roots.

The design for your garage is really fantastic and although you've had to jump through hoops and unexpected costs I'm sure it will be worth the effort. Good luck.

 

[phred]

more excavation and concrete.
Plus we stubbed up conduits for data/cable, water and the drain line for the french drain

 

[phred]

Walls complete and a dry room for large tool storage and parts shelves. The basement has been dry ever since the room was completed. Yeah, we spent about 8 grand in labor just to get this excavated and waterproofed but to no long have to vacuum water out of the basement and garage it was worth every penny..
The last shot is the old crawl space access door from the outside. You can see how much dirt is now above the new storage room floor We infilled that opening with brick and a small widow. The superintendent makes custom windows for high end houses company and as a gift made a custom window that matches the other 9 over 9 true divided lite windows in the house. I'll find a picture of this and post it

 

[phred]

Well the day finally arrived where the stars aligned and the steel fabricator could actually show up and start. Now this is not to say that he was fast, but he did a great job. He field fabbed every stick. You couldn't fit a small crane or boom truck down my drive. We tried to get lull with a 40' boom but it was too tight and there was no where to lay down anything on the parking pad with the lull there. There is only 10 feet between the houses in the old neighborhood. So all the steel came on a trailer that would fit down the drive. All 20' lengths and each was cut, drilled and weld in place. I've been in this industry for a long time and have never seen a project like this done one piece at a time. First he set all the base plates and shot all the elevations. Each footing was a different elevation due to the terrain and the extra deep footings. With this info he cut the columns with a 4" side grinder. Holy ****. The cuts were laser straight and fast. He used a metabo grinder with a 1/16" thick disc. He cut the i-beams in about 2 mins each. Amazing how fast he could cut each piece.

 

[GLTHFJ60]

Impressive!!

 

[wasfast]

Looks like the major troubles are behind you. Thankfully the fabricator came through and is doing work to your standards. Shouldn't be more underground surprises now!

 

[Boosted1]

Wow! You are certainly committed.
Looking forward to updates.

 

[phred]

Wow! You are certainly committed.
Looking forward to updates.

My wife thinks I need to be committed! Here's a few more steel pics

I noticed while the steel was going up that the beams and columns were slightly larger than designed. I asked the fabricator about. He said the steel yard didn't have the sizes he needed so he called the engineer and they reworked the design to fit what the yard had in stock. No extra charge for the larger steel. (Yippee). The lateral beams all have 1.5" of camber. The framers are gonna like that!


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[phred]

Bolted connections, composite metal decking, lots of headed studs and a 12" x12" grid of #4 bars all topped with 5000psi concrete. I had the finishers "burn" the surface slick

 

[felixgogo]

Wow! - Very impressive!

 

[phred]

more of the frame plus the infill brick work at the old basement door.

 

[phred]

finally the day arrive for the concrete. The slab was specified for 4000 but the concrete plant messed up on an early order that cost the crew a day when pouring the retaining wall. The superintendent told them they need to make it up to me for costing a day of labor. So they sent out the slab mix at 5000 which is what I wanted anyway.
The pump driver didn't clean out his lines very well the last time he pumped so we spend about 30 min unclogging them

All slicked up and covered with burleen for 4 days. The framing package and trusses are covered in black plastic in fore ground waiting on the concrete to cure. I finally have an elevated slab!!!!

Note the light line on the right side about 2/3 of the way back. That the block out for the in slab hydraulic lines for the lift. Yep a lift on a elevated slab. Pretty cool!!!

 

[Boosted1]

Looks good.

 

[GLTHFJ60]

Beautiful!!