Yet another home garage shop thread... (aka 'buddha's temple)

[darkbuddha]

First, I gotta say I'm very excited to finally have a reason to be a part of this board! After living in a condo (no garage!) for 10 years in Seattle, we moved to Sarasota and bought our first home last year (July '09). So now I finally have a garage to call my own and make it what I will. It's kinda an odd floor plan, but here are the basics:

At first glance it seemed fairly large... right up until I put stuff in it of course, and it promptly shrunk significantly. Now I'm in the process of bringing it up to snuff and getting it organized before it becomes a huge, unrecoverable mess. The good news is that I won't have much (if any) yard tools, mower, etc. in the garage... I simply don't do lawn/yard work. For me, it's super important that this be a working garage for my automotive hobby/repair/resto/modification endeavors. But I also want it to be an inviting space to generally enjoy since it's also my primary hangout and the family's primary ingress/egress point for the house.

Now, I've scored some freebie kitchen cabinets I'll be using, and I've got a couple tool chests/boxes (yes, some are HF... sorry MITUSA guys ). I started another thread about my plans for the space, but here it is again with a couple updates:

the key: http://img30.imageshack.us/img30/9834/keyk.jpg

As I said, it needs to be a working space with adequate storage for spare parts and supplies, but I guess the immediate issue I'm having now is that my plan has packed the space with storage and workspaces, with absolutely no space for display posters, art, cool stuff, etc. Have I overdone the storage aspect? Or perhaps I'm doing the storage all wrong?

BTW, here are some pics of the actual garage from before a couple of the updates that appear in the floor plan map posted above:






Whatch'all think?

 

[GHOSTDANCER]

Looks like a good plan

 

[Jack Olsen]

To my eye, you're trying to fit one too many cars in there. But it might work. I'm spoiled by the fact that my wife thinks our driveway is too narrow for her to drive through.

21' wide with cabinets on both sides seems a little tight. Maybe fold-down benches on the minivan side?

Still, my garage is significantly smaller than yours. So I might be imagining the situation as worse than it actually is.

 

[darkbuddha]

First, thanks for the feedback. Jack, you're very astute in your observation about one too many cars. The photoshop'd plan above is to scale and space would be as tight as it looks (2'-3' on the sides, 1'-2' on the ends). The goal for that 3rd car position would be storage or small projects. The plan is to have the car on wheel dollies to move around as needed, so if it needed major/involved work, it could be rolled to occupy a more central spot in the garage (temporarily). Ideally I wouldn't be doing this, but my wife (and kids) seems to think being able to park in the garage to avoid getting soaked by Florida's summer afternoon monsoon-like rains is an inalienable right. Whatever...

I love the fold down bench idea a ton actually for both of the side walls. The red "tool box" shown to the left of the minivan side (north of the door to the house) was planned to be a "laptop center" from Ikea: http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/70137919 . But a fold down bench would provide a larger and more multi-purpose use of that spot. I think a fold-down welding bench on the right side wall would be excellent, with a bench grinder and anvil setup along side. That way I could remove the 24" floor cabinet and free up that floor space if needed.

Hmmm... I wonder where I might get an idea of how to do a fold down welding bench?

 

[Stick Figure]

Sounds like you need to replace the "minivan" in that diagram with a fully stocked umbrella bucket. Should keep everyone happy! Sorry i don't have any good advice to give, i can only fit two cars (one of which is my current project) in my 3 car garage. My 4runner and the g/f's honda sleep outside.

 

[Curt_pnw]

Nice Merkur! I think I saw your car at one of the vw gtg's a few years ago at Alki.

 

[darkbuddha]

Sounds like you need to replace the "minivan" in that diagram with a fully stocked umbrella bucket. Should keep everyone happy!

Nice Merkur! I think I saw your car at one of the vw gtg's a few years ago at Alki.

Yep... that would've been me before I moved to Sarasota last year. I gotta tell you I really miss the VW scene up there. I'm gonna miss getting out to Alki and doing the Leavenworth euro drive.