A slow build of my workshop. (Grosh type build)

So I have been perusing the forum for a few weeks now learning and reading. Thought I'd share the slow build I have. A little about me, 1. Ratel (ra-tel) is Afrikaans for Honey Badger. 2. I'm a Piping Engineer by trade. (Clemson Graduate) 3. I grew up working on my father's 911 and then eventually my own 944S. The 944 is still gone but never forgotten. (1983 911sc with 993 supersport webber cams, 964 oil pump etc, corbeau seats, full turbo suspension upgrades, tuned length headers etc...) Currently the only "sporty" car we have is my Wife's dream car. 2012 Kona Blue Mustang gt.

I just finished building my deck and now it's time to work on the next large project on our house.

So our house is a ranch with walkout basement we stole from the bank (builder foreclosure). only half of the basement was completed and the second half is 9+ ft ceilings with only a mandoor and piers supporting my bedroom. (to the right of the last deck picture). The room inside is ~22ft x 22ft and will be eventually a single bay garage space with workshop area to the side. 8ftx7ft door and a door into the finished basement. I started the project this past weekend by wiring up a subpanel in the workshop area and added three more lights to the single bulb the builder saw fit to furnish the room with. This lead to some excitement because when I turned on the 220v breaker I got HUGE sparks in the main panel. I turned eveyrthing off, rechecked wiring etc and turned it back on. Turns out. when you use a knockout protector you can tighten it too much. so much that it cuts the insulation and grounds the panel to the active 60 amp wire. I could have died if I had been touching that panel when I flipped the breaker instead of the wall next to it. Pics in the following post of work so far. I need to save up, I have had a mason give me a quote to cut the brick and place a header panel to support the outside lintel of the upper floor.

Last picture shows the columns to be removed. The beams above are 2x 2x10's. To span the 12ft that they will span once the column is gone they will need to be increased to 4x 2x10's at a minimum. I'm inclined to overkill where I sleep above it so those beams will probably end up being 5x.

It will be cool to watch you tackle completely different problems to try and achieve a similar end. Check into engineered wood beams instead of 2x10's. You probably have to meet code and other silliness and usually an engineered beam will be stronger for a given volume. It should leave you with more head/car room. I'm also interested to see what ideas you have for preventing the garage smell from mingling with the house smell.

My shop is a converted unfinished basement. Very similar.

Smell is a bitch to work around. Goes right into our bedroom. My next attempt will be to completely airtight seal the.floor/ceiling. Think plastic and foam

Also, our basement shops are naturally very moist. When I can get back down there im permently mount and plumbing a dehumidifier.

Lastly, coat the floor as soon as possible. Before moving any tools in

Also look into whitewashing the walls. Cheap amd super effective.

Mazdeuce. I've looked into the engineered beams but I really do not want to create a whole new support structure then remove the existing. Although, a "friend" of the familiy supplies designed steel to factories for construction... But i'd be looking at substantially higher cost then. (wife is a structural engineer)

Although, using the beams would potentially mean I could span the entire area and have a double car garage... but then where would my workshop area be? :( Decisions Decisions.

I really wanted to name the thread "Undergrosh". Since this area is below and next to the main garage.

Dusterbd13 wrote: My shop is a converted unfinished basement. Very similar. Smell is a bitch to work around. Goes right into our bedroom. My next attempt will be to completely airtight seal the.floor/ceiling. Think plastic and foam Also, our basement shops are naturally very moist. When I can get back down there im permently mount and plumbing a dehumidifier. Lastly, coat the floor as soon as possible. Before moving any tools in Also look into whitewashing the walls. Cheap amd super effective.

Right now the finished basement that is attached has a strong "basement" odor to it. I need to see if a dehumidifier will help with that.

Small update. Overtime has been few and far between and Overtime is what will fund any work.

The wife and I were driving to Charlotte to pick up our little dude from his Grandparents when she turns to me and says "instead of messing with the crawlspace, why don't you just slowly build up the outside garage that you want... ".

well, maybe. Not sure my HOA would be ok with Grosh length build. First step would be foundation and backfill. The spot where it needs to go has a decent slope so I'd need to back fill in that area nearly 5'deep x area it ends up.... max of 24' wide unless I feel like tearing out a wood stair I put in just a year ago... but if I moved the stairs up to 30' wide. Depth? I can make it 100' deep if I wanted, but I'll probably settle for 24x30? not sure. I know 24x24 wont cut it. Possible that the upstairs could be a storage area...

the driveway has a concave slope to it so I'd have to deal with that as well.

a second(third if you count the crawlspace option) is to build it along the one property l ine further back. Then it could be as wide as possible and no backfill. Some septic overflow movement would have to occur though... and I know it'd piss off my one neighbor. He's already complained that a tree was shading his vegetable garden. This building would be 10 ft higher than the tree and where the tree is... so yeah..

Old image of the back of the house from before we bought it.

behind me in this picture is the area of the third option. However, there is still slope in this area. so there'd still be at least some minimal filling in... (I'm standing where the deck is now...)

The lower edge of teh third option is seen here. to the left of the picture.

The view from this option would be outstanding...

Glad to see the update! Your wife is insane. A neighbor finished a 'garage-mahal' a while back, three bays, for boats, with a pitched enough roof for storage. He ended up in it for $30K or so.

Two neighbors recently had someone build theirs for them. We have to match the house so the first guy did all brick. his just barely 2car garage cost him north of 35k...

Second guy must be 50k in. he contacted the first guy's builder and the builder said no way, he lost money on the first one. Second guy did brick with the accent siding from his house on the sides... it's got an attic for working out, a smaller bay for his lawnmower and a full bay. but he's got fancy led lighting, stained concrete etc... (you'd love his c10 he did it's freaking amazing looking.)

I'd build the pad first, then do the walls etc. Hire someone for the brick work or take a stab myself. but over months...

Yay for updates.

Spent today starting to add shelving so i can free up space in the main garage. I made a purchase a few months back and it's getting annoying trying to park with my 4ft x 8ft work desk at the end of the bay. Unfortunately that means moving all the stuff in the workdesk into the undergrosh. (yes I seriously think I'm going to steal that and use it. pending Mazdeuce approval.)

Here is what I'm starting with right now. piles of junk in the way. Need to get it organized and out of the way for work to continue.

So today's task is a set of shelves to put paint cans and storage bins on.

I luckily have tons of left overs from building the deck last year.

Those'll work.

Hand thing brick plugs. a few holes later and voila.

ready for the 2x4 and screws right?

nopers.

hmmm.

oh I know all you need is a bigger drill right?

I recessed the screws enough to get them to engage the brick anchor.

I got three of the four 2x4's mounted when this happened on the third.

while tightening the last screw it pulled the others out...

stopped for the night. Tomorrow I'll open all the vents under the house so it breathes a bit down there and attack with new vigor to get the shelves up.

Reason why I stopped: bike seat mounting and sizing. Need to adjust the cheapo seat as the brackets are not made for any real bike apparently...

also, helmet needed adjustement.

I approve of Undergrosh. Sounds like a lair of some sort. I expect all sorts of wacky inventions for fighting crime to come out of there.
In the mean time, you need to spend some quality time in the concrete anchor section, get something more robust.

Glue screw and clamp treated lumber to the blocks¿

I think with the shelving (decking boards again left over.) I'll be fine. the board itself goes to the floor so the screws are just in shear against the shelf unit being pulled out away from the brick.

Get some tapcons...

Are you building a freestanding garage? I like the property line option if a few additional steps mean a bigger building.

Cool thread!

OHSCrifle wrote: Get some tapcons... Are you building a freestanding garage? I like the property line option if a few additional steps mean a bigger building.

the freestanding will probably be ten plus years from now. I hope to get this area done to the point where I either cave in and put a garage door into it (got quoted 2100 bucks to do it last year.) Or leave it as is but make it a nice woodworking shop. For now I just need to get E36 M3 up off the floor so i can work in it.

Does that basement space have dirt floors?

I have had 8' wide garage doors before. Found it to be snug. Wife found it to be enticing to hit with the minivan...

If you'll eventually use this as a garage for a vehicle, go at least 9' wide if you can do it.

jimbob_racing wrote: Does that basement space have dirt floors?

It is the "Crawl space" most homes here are built with pier construction and usually you have to belly crawl to get under there. For our house, Half of the space is poured concrete and finished with a bedroom. This area is dirt for now. I need to get everything out of the way in order to start leveling the floor.

ugh. Spent thirty min posting.. apparently closed it instead of posting. I'll do it again tomorrow.

EDIT: woot nm, chrome saved the page when I opened it in my recent tabs..!

Yay photos finally uploaded.

so here is where we were yesterday.

Did I mention my drill collection?

Every year lowes has the dewalt drill for 99 bucks. every other year i've bought one. Last year I finally bought the lithium one... totally worht it. (and also 99 bucks you just have to look harder...)

Some clamps fixed the wayward 2x4 so I could start putting shelves in.

2x4 for bracing under the shelf.

I got the first shelf in completely.

then I got smart, "what would Mazdeuce do?"

template

and multiple pieces. (but apparently i suck at counting w/o an excel spreadsheet and had to make three more later...)

A tip my father in law showed me is to hit the screw with a hammer to set it. Makes working single handed much easier when trying to hold the piece where you need it while screwing it and keeping it level...

put the first screw in but leave it loose.

put a level on it and hit the second screw. voila level shelf. then do the rest.

the main shelves are 16" appart to fit plastic bins. the second from top shelf is 9" so fullsize paint cans will fit on it.

bam, wheels up and out of the way. floor space cleared. I have to empty the upstairs desk now and repack the shelf. but man does this shelf make a HUGE difference.

oh I also put out another 30 bags of 50lb concrete...around 120 so far, need 30 more... white line in the bellow pic.

Hey Madratl, I'm a piping Project designer and my kid starts Clemson this fall!!!!!!

Did I miss what the bags of concrete are for?
Nice shelves. Pretty much exactly how I do it when I'm fed up with stuff and need storage right meow.

I'll post a pic this weekend. That entire lower area was 2ft lower and filled with trees when we moved in. the drainage for the neighborhood flows back there and it was just a 50 ft wide plain of mud. I had 10 double axle loads brought in and raised it up but the edge just kind of "tapered" off into the ditch. The bags make up a retaining wall approx 100' long that I'll be back filling this weekend as I've come across a source for pretty cheap fill dirt.

So when we moved in the back yard looked like this:

this is 2 months after moving in

(this past christmas)

This is the current day. (this past weekend.)