I've been talking and thinking about doing this for 3-4 years now. Two days ago we finally took the first "ground breaking" step toward making it a reality.
The garage on my house started out as a flat-roof, open-sided carport when the the house was built 40 years ago. Some previous owner put sides on it, but no garage doors. When I bought the place 15 years ago, the flat roof was leaking badly, and the front wall where the two openings are was rotted badly enough that I had to rebuild it before having garage doors installed.
While the house foundation is sound, the garage foundation has had numerous problems from cracking and movement. I've always planned to one day tear it down to the ground and start over. My original plan was to just rebuild a two-bay garage of the same size, but with a peaked roof. Eventually, I realized that by making use of the slope, a tall RV bay could be added without ending up with a roof-line taller than the rest of the house.
Discussing the project with the DW resulted in further "scope creep", such that we'll also be adding a fair amount of square footage to the living area of the house as well. My garage/RV bay/man-cave has ballooned considerably since I first started dreaming, but this is what we've settled on. The old garage is about 28' deep, and 24' wide. The new garage will be 30' deep and 60' wide. The RV bay will have one wide door, rather than the two narrow doors shown. I was planning to allow 14' of vertical clearance, but I'm not sure I really need to go that high. Twelve feet would be plenty for my camper, the garage depth and driveway approach will never accommodate an RV much longer than mine.
About 10 years ago I had an asphalt driveway paved down behind the house, and then had a Jamar RV shed constructed over it where I'm currently parking my truck and camper. It's sitting right where my new garage RV bay will be, so it'll have to be moved. That's what we've started, which doesn't sound too difficult. Except.........
My property is on the side of a hill. There's no naturally level ground anywhere, so a pad will have to be constructed. Also, about a year ago (anticipating the loss of my garage and the storage space inside it) I constructed a 12'x20' storage building right next to the house to hold all of my man-stuff while the garage is being built. Once the garage is built, the storage building will be taken apart and moved farther away from the house. So that's two level pads to construct.
I also have a ton of trees on my property, mostly white oak, some of them pretty big, and pretty close to the house. Of course, there are trees in the way of everything I want to do.
So, Wednesday morning, bright and early, the tree cutting pro's got started. The weather was gray and gloomy that day. This is where my metal RV shed will be moved. I'm going to reduce it's height a little and use it to park other equipment under.
Getting the boom truck setup for another tree.
They were having fun maneuvering that 2WD boom truck around on my slope.
This tree was hanging over my RV shed.
My storage building. They dropped a big limb on it's roof, but it doesn't appear to have suffered any damage.
My truck and camper out of harms way in the front yard.
Wish I had one of those trucks to play with.
Pulling one down close to the power lines.
I'm saving these for another project.
I'll add more as we make progress.
:):)
The garage on my house started out as a flat-roof, open-sided carport when the the house was built 40 years ago. Some previous owner put sides on it, but no garage doors. When I bought the place 15 years ago, the flat roof was leaking badly, and the front wall where the two openings are was rotted badly enough that I had to rebuild it before having garage doors installed.
While the house foundation is sound, the garage foundation has had numerous problems from cracking and movement. I've always planned to one day tear it down to the ground and start over. My original plan was to just rebuild a two-bay garage of the same size, but with a peaked roof. Eventually, I realized that by making use of the slope, a tall RV bay could be added without ending up with a roof-line taller than the rest of the house.
Discussing the project with the DW resulted in further "scope creep", such that we'll also be adding a fair amount of square footage to the living area of the house as well. My garage/RV bay/man-cave has ballooned considerably since I first started dreaming, but this is what we've settled on. The old garage is about 28' deep, and 24' wide. The new garage will be 30' deep and 60' wide. The RV bay will have one wide door, rather than the two narrow doors shown. I was planning to allow 14' of vertical clearance, but I'm not sure I really need to go that high. Twelve feet would be plenty for my camper, the garage depth and driveway approach will never accommodate an RV much longer than mine.
About 10 years ago I had an asphalt driveway paved down behind the house, and then had a Jamar RV shed constructed over it where I'm currently parking my truck and camper. It's sitting right where my new garage RV bay will be, so it'll have to be moved. That's what we've started, which doesn't sound too difficult. Except.........
My property is on the side of a hill. There's no naturally level ground anywhere, so a pad will have to be constructed. Also, about a year ago (anticipating the loss of my garage and the storage space inside it) I constructed a 12'x20' storage building right next to the house to hold all of my man-stuff while the garage is being built. Once the garage is built, the storage building will be taken apart and moved farther away from the house. So that's two level pads to construct.
I also have a ton of trees on my property, mostly white oak, some of them pretty big, and pretty close to the house. Of course, there are trees in the way of everything I want to do.
So, Wednesday morning, bright and early, the tree cutting pro's got started. The weather was gray and gloomy that day. This is where my metal RV shed will be moved. I'm going to reduce it's height a little and use it to park other equipment under.
Getting the boom truck setup for another tree.
They were having fun maneuvering that 2WD boom truck around on my slope.
This tree was hanging over my RV shed.
My storage building. They dropped a big limb on it's roof, but it doesn't appear to have suffered any damage.
My truck and camper out of harms way in the front yard.
Wish I had one of those trucks to play with.
Pulling one down close to the power lines.
I'm saving these for another project.
I'll add more as we make progress.
:):)
Got the new septic tank installed last week, and now I have a backyard of dirt and rock to clean up again. I was glad to get it done though, as the tank was the only part of the original system that hadn't been replaced. It wasn't really big enough for the house by code, so there were several good reasons to replace it.
Here are some pic's of the install. I had the utilities marked beforehand. White paint is marking the work area, red is the power to the house, orange is the phone-line. The line to the old tank is between the red and orange lines.
In addition to installing the new tank, I had the installers put in a drain line for the two downspouts in the first image over to a gully next to the house. You can see a white dashed line running toward the top of the image. The water from the downspouts was draining on top of the area we are about to dig up, and was causing an erosion problem. I also had them make a connection to the sewer line I had run under the garage upper bay when it was built to give me an RV dump station in front of the garage.
Looking the other direction. The little wooden stake close to the foundation is marking the end of the sewer line under the upper bay.
The old tank of course got pumped out, then about 75% of the top was sawed off, leaving just enough to support the retaining wall that was sitting on top of it. The sewer line between the house and the tank was replaced several years ago, and the hope is that they will be able to avoid digging behind the retaining wall. I remember that a portion of the wall was taken down so the plumbers could get the hatch on that end of the tank off. We're assuming that was so they could run the new pipe inside the tank, and install a new "T" on that end. If that's true, there should be enough pipe inside the tank to connect on to. All I can say is: "I'm happy to pay a plumber to do this kind of work for me!"
The guy on the track-hoe was amazing to watch. He has been using them since he was a kid, and it shows. He wasn't just OPERATING the machine, he was WEARING it like an article of clothing. He crawled it all around the edge of the hole, at times even scaring the two guys working with him. The machine would start to tip into the hole, and he would just calmly use the bucket arm to push it back into place. His coworkers both said "I can't even watch him when he's doing that".
The new tank arrives.
I think this is the longest truck that has ever driven into my back yard. He's going to have to back all the way out, too. There's not enough room for him to turn around.
That stump needed to be trimmed down so the truck could drive over it.
Backed up to the hole.
Lifting the tank. This arm is amazing. It can extend out 30' with 10K lbs hanging on the end of it. My little tank is only about 1000 lbs.
The outlet side is connected, and they are starting to bury it.
Inlet side plumbing. The line heading under the track-hoe is from the RV dump station.
Putting it all back. After filling in the old tank, and the void created by removing one of the big stumps that used to be in this area, there really wasn't a lot of excess material left over.
All the rocks are raked up. I'll cover the area with straw until the next phase of destruction starts.
:):)
Here are some pic's of the install. I had the utilities marked beforehand. White paint is marking the work area, red is the power to the house, orange is the phone-line. The line to the old tank is between the red and orange lines.
In addition to installing the new tank, I had the installers put in a drain line for the two downspouts in the first image over to a gully next to the house. You can see a white dashed line running toward the top of the image. The water from the downspouts was draining on top of the area we are about to dig up, and was causing an erosion problem. I also had them make a connection to the sewer line I had run under the garage upper bay when it was built to give me an RV dump station in front of the garage.
Looking the other direction. The little wooden stake close to the foundation is marking the end of the sewer line under the upper bay.
The old tank of course got pumped out, then about 75% of the top was sawed off, leaving just enough to support the retaining wall that was sitting on top of it. The sewer line between the house and the tank was replaced several years ago, and the hope is that they will be able to avoid digging behind the retaining wall. I remember that a portion of the wall was taken down so the plumbers could get the hatch on that end of the tank off. We're assuming that was so they could run the new pipe inside the tank, and install a new "T" on that end. If that's true, there should be enough pipe inside the tank to connect on to. All I can say is: "I'm happy to pay a plumber to do this kind of work for me!"
The guy on the track-hoe was amazing to watch. He has been using them since he was a kid, and it shows. He wasn't just OPERATING the machine, he was WEARING it like an article of clothing. He crawled it all around the edge of the hole, at times even scaring the two guys working with him. The machine would start to tip into the hole, and he would just calmly use the bucket arm to push it back into place. His coworkers both said "I can't even watch him when he's doing that".
The new tank arrives.
I think this is the longest truck that has ever driven into my back yard. He's going to have to back all the way out, too. There's not enough room for him to turn around.
That stump needed to be trimmed down so the truck could drive over it.
Backed up to the hole.
Lifting the tank. This arm is amazing. It can extend out 30' with 10K lbs hanging on the end of it. My little tank is only about 1000 lbs.
The outlet side is connected, and they are starting to bury it.
Inlet side plumbing. The line heading under the track-hoe is from the RV dump station.
Putting it all back. After filling in the old tank, and the void created by removing one of the big stumps that used to be in this area, there really wasn't a lot of excess material left over.
All the rocks are raked up. I'll cover the area with straw until the next phase of destruction starts.
:):)
My, how time flies!
It's been nearly a year since I've updated this thread, and I need to do that or it's going to auto-lock soon.
As you may remember from my previous posts, I had shoulder surgery in January last year. About 3 years ago I learned that I have irreparable rotator-cuff tears (complete separation) in both shoulders. Sometime in late 2015, I managed to tear the deltoid in my right shoulder, and damaged the long head of the biceps tendon (also in the right arm) enough that it had to be cut loose (Biceps Tenotomy). It wasn't something that happened all at once, it happened over a long period of time. All I knew was my shoulders hurt. I thought it was just normal โgetting oldโ stuff. I only knew it was bad when I woke up one day with a huge bruise on my right shoulder.
Anyway, my hope was that I'd be recovered enough to do some work in 3-4 months. That didn't happen. I was on short-term disability for 15 weeks. When I went back to work, I wasn't sure I would even be able to work to the end of 2016. It's only been in the last month or so that I've started having some relatively pain-free days. Before that, it was just a daily struggle. I'm happy that I can back off the pain med's now. I've got nearly full range-of-motion, but I've lost a lot of strength in my shoulders and upper arms. I have to avoid working above shoulder height now. I've had to change the way I do a lot of things, and avoid doing some things entirely. We did get a few projects done though, and I'll get the thread up to date now.
After getting the mini-split HVAC unit installed in the new room over the garage (then having the inside unit moved into the spot it should have been in to begin with) I had the interior walls insulated and sheetrocked. They haven't been mudded and taped yet. The mini-split is doing a great job of keeping the room heated and cooled. It's VERY quiet, both inside and outside the house. I also had the two small sections of wall on each side of the windows covered with the same T&G pine that we used on the ceiling. It was a good way to use up some of the scrap. These windows face East, and the morning sun was a little too bright for us, so we had some solar film installed on them. Fortunately, the type of windows we bought were OK to put film on. Some types of windows will overheat, and will void the warranty.
The ships figure-head is still doing a fine job of holding up the ridge beam.
When the walls in the new room got insulated, I also had some insulation blown in the attic space above the garage RV bay. I then installed some lights in the attic so we can see what's in there.
I then trimmed in the attic fan. I decided to not install a shutter on the garage ceiling to eliminate that source of noise, and just used some 1/4โ hardware cloth to make a screen for it. I also put a 2โ PVC pipe over in one corner so I can drop an air hose down to my compressor in the garage. Keeps me from having to lug the compressor upstairs when I'm working in the new room.
Sometime after the garage ceilings were sheetrocked, the boss and I had a conversation that went something like this:
โWhat about the floor receptacles in the new room?โ
โWhat floor receptacles?โ
โThe ones we talked about.โ
โI don't remember that.โ
โWell we did, and I'm counting on them being there.โ
"Aaauuuggghhhhhh!!!"
I think the conversation went on longer than that, possibly for days, but for some reason I've blotted it out of my mind now. I eventually came up with a plan that involved only removing one full piece of sheetrock from the ceiling in the garage, and a few narrow strips next to the beam to get a circuit over to the corner of this piece where the โXโ is. Then two receptacles were cut into the floor at opposite corners of the area exposed by removing the full sheet.
The boss is happy now, and she was able to use one of them for the Christmas tree this year.
That's about where we are now. There are some decks outside the new room that need to be rebuilt, and some landscaping work below the decks. Unfortunately, there is also a septic tank under the area we are wanting to build over, so I'm in the process of having a new tank installed now. The old concrete tank is sitting under this retaining wall about where the red box is, with the wall sitting on top of one of the covers. About 20% of the tank is covered by the wall. A new concrete tank is going to be installed about 20' downhill from the wall.
Stay tuned, it's probably going to be a busy spring and summer!
:):)
It's been nearly a year since I've updated this thread, and I need to do that or it's going to auto-lock soon.
As you may remember from my previous posts, I had shoulder surgery in January last year. About 3 years ago I learned that I have irreparable rotator-cuff tears (complete separation) in both shoulders. Sometime in late 2015, I managed to tear the deltoid in my right shoulder, and damaged the long head of the biceps tendon (also in the right arm) enough that it had to be cut loose (Biceps Tenotomy). It wasn't something that happened all at once, it happened over a long period of time. All I knew was my shoulders hurt. I thought it was just normal โgetting oldโ stuff. I only knew it was bad when I woke up one day with a huge bruise on my right shoulder.
Anyway, my hope was that I'd be recovered enough to do some work in 3-4 months. That didn't happen. I was on short-term disability for 15 weeks. When I went back to work, I wasn't sure I would even be able to work to the end of 2016. It's only been in the last month or so that I've started having some relatively pain-free days. Before that, it was just a daily struggle. I'm happy that I can back off the pain med's now. I've got nearly full range-of-motion, but I've lost a lot of strength in my shoulders and upper arms. I have to avoid working above shoulder height now. I've had to change the way I do a lot of things, and avoid doing some things entirely. We did get a few projects done though, and I'll get the thread up to date now.
After getting the mini-split HVAC unit installed in the new room over the garage (then having the inside unit moved into the spot it should have been in to begin with) I had the interior walls insulated and sheetrocked. They haven't been mudded and taped yet. The mini-split is doing a great job of keeping the room heated and cooled. It's VERY quiet, both inside and outside the house. I also had the two small sections of wall on each side of the windows covered with the same T&G pine that we used on the ceiling. It was a good way to use up some of the scrap. These windows face East, and the morning sun was a little too bright for us, so we had some solar film installed on them. Fortunately, the type of windows we bought were OK to put film on. Some types of windows will overheat, and will void the warranty.
The ships figure-head is still doing a fine job of holding up the ridge beam.
When the walls in the new room got insulated, I also had some insulation blown in the attic space above the garage RV bay. I then installed some lights in the attic so we can see what's in there.
I then trimmed in the attic fan. I decided to not install a shutter on the garage ceiling to eliminate that source of noise, and just used some 1/4โ hardware cloth to make a screen for it. I also put a 2โ PVC pipe over in one corner so I can drop an air hose down to my compressor in the garage. Keeps me from having to lug the compressor upstairs when I'm working in the new room.
Sometime after the garage ceilings were sheetrocked, the boss and I had a conversation that went something like this:
โWhat about the floor receptacles in the new room?โ
โWhat floor receptacles?โ
โThe ones we talked about.โ
โI don't remember that.โ
โWell we did, and I'm counting on them being there.โ
"Aaauuuggghhhhhh!!!"
I think the conversation went on longer than that, possibly for days, but for some reason I've blotted it out of my mind now. I eventually came up with a plan that involved only removing one full piece of sheetrock from the ceiling in the garage, and a few narrow strips next to the beam to get a circuit over to the corner of this piece where the โXโ is. Then two receptacles were cut into the floor at opposite corners of the area exposed by removing the full sheet.
The boss is happy now, and she was able to use one of them for the Christmas tree this year.
That's about where we are now. There are some decks outside the new room that need to be rebuilt, and some landscaping work below the decks. Unfortunately, there is also a septic tank under the area we are wanting to build over, so I'm in the process of having a new tank installed now. The old concrete tank is sitting under this retaining wall about where the red box is, with the wall sitting on top of one of the covers. About 20% of the tank is covered by the wall. A new concrete tank is going to be installed about 20' downhill from the wall.
Stay tuned, it's probably going to be a busy spring and summer!
:):)
The T&G and sheetrock on this wall is completed. I also had some final electrical work done; a few more wall receptacles in the garage, and a couple of floor receptacles in the new room. I'm glad we could leave the walls open while we lived with the new construction and figured out what we want. Now, I'm ready to insulate the other walls in the new room and have them sheetrocked.
The new garage receptacles. One on the support post using conduit, and another over the beam that will be used for a fan I intend to mount directly below it. The fan should help move the heat that collects in the upper bay back down where it's needed in the lower bay.
I'm still waiting for my shoulder to heal up enough that I can do some real work here. Right now I can only work on things that don't require raising my right arm much, or lifting much weight. In the meantime, there are a few details I can work on. The hole in the siding from the mini-split's first location needed to be patched, so I removed part of the sheetrock on the inside to expose the backside of the siding. I saved scraps of the siding materials, and was able to make a patch to fill the hole. The outside surface is mostly covered by the mini-split line set cover, so most likely nobody but me will ever know the hole was there.
Inside view after the patch is installed.
We were originally planning on having a closet in this corner, but the boss has decided she likes the windows. That's actually easier for me, because removing the windows was going to require some wall refinishing on the other side. I needed to get the plumbing and wires tucked into the corner a little tighter, though. The pipe is a gas line for the garage heater, and the wires are all Cat-6 Ethernet. The new window and corner trim can cover all that now that it's pulled back tight. I'm going to find a piece of sheet metal angle to protect them from nails before putting the trim up.
It took me all day to do those two things!
:):)
The new garage receptacles. One on the support post using conduit, and another over the beam that will be used for a fan I intend to mount directly below it. The fan should help move the heat that collects in the upper bay back down where it's needed in the lower bay.
I'm still waiting for my shoulder to heal up enough that I can do some real work here. Right now I can only work on things that don't require raising my right arm much, or lifting much weight. In the meantime, there are a few details I can work on. The hole in the siding from the mini-split's first location needed to be patched, so I removed part of the sheetrock on the inside to expose the backside of the siding. I saved scraps of the siding materials, and was able to make a patch to fill the hole. The outside surface is mostly covered by the mini-split line set cover, so most likely nobody but me will ever know the hole was there.
Inside view after the patch is installed.
We were originally planning on having a closet in this corner, but the boss has decided she likes the windows. That's actually easier for me, because removing the windows was going to require some wall refinishing on the other side. I needed to get the plumbing and wires tucked into the corner a little tighter, though. The pipe is a gas line for the garage heater, and the wires are all Cat-6 Ethernet. The new window and corner trim can cover all that now that it's pulled back tight. I'm going to find a piece of sheet metal angle to protect them from nails before putting the trim up.
It took me all day to do those two things!
:):)
