Garage design

[buickanddeere]

I am moving eventually. Looks like I am going to have to build a new garage/shop. The ceiling needs to be high because I have a auto lift. The garage I have now has only 10ft ceilings, but I make do with a scooter and don't raise the lift all the way up. A 12ft ceiling would give me full capability in height. I am thinking of making a cathedral type ceiling and putting the lift in the middle so the building doesn't end up so tall. I also have garage doors, I think I am going to a barn/slide door on rails, the garage door rails are always in the way.

Have any of you looked at a building made from the company in this link? https://www.facebook.com/BuildABarnLLC/ If you don't have facebook, here is their website; Build A Barn LLC The big deal I see is look how few posts you have to put in the ground, and there are no large 2x's going along the top of the posts. I got a local company to design the garage I have now, and they "created" a kit and they dumped it in the yard off the truck and I built it myself. It's 30 ft widex24ft deep, and on the front I have 3 10 ft openings(really ended up being about 9ft finished) and to span this distance he gave me 2x12's, enough to double them up on each side of the 6x6's to go across the door openings. He designed more posts on the back wall, so it has double 2x10's.

On the top of these doubled up 2x front and rear I installed trusses on 2ft centers, then plywood, and then shingles.

My questions are; What are the different designs for the roof support systems and the types of roofs? In the build a barn example, he is spanning a whole 10ft between the metal trusses. But he is using 2x6's on edge to support the metal roof. He has no beams across the posts, each post has it's own truss.

If I use a conventional wooden truss, what is the max amount I can separate them? I would probably be using 2x4's laid flat. Or could I buy some metal brackets and set the 2x4's or 2x6's on edge? Could I actually build a building like the build a barn, but use wooden trusses instead of the metal ones? Go to lowes and buy the metal brackets to hold the 2x6's on edge, and copy that design? Would I have to tell the truss people what I am doing and they would build a heavier truss or would a "normal" truss work? I would probably see if I could buy a cathedral type truss to give me more ceiling height.

Any truss spacing less than 10ft means I would have to install the 2x12 beams along the top of the posts, and then space the trusses along the top of the beams. Or install more posts in the ground for each truss. I would have to factor that into the cost comparison, comparing that to the cost and less labor to do the build-a barn building. Do any other companies use this type of method? He is close by, I could go pick it up the components myself.

Another question; I am assuming my designer put the trusses I have on my garage now on 2ft center because my garage had a more conventional plywood and shingle roof. Is that correct?

As always my priority is cost and ease of building/erecting the garage. If the cost is drastically cheaper to just add more posts, then I would consider that. One change I am going to make, my doors are below the gutters right now. I want to put one large door on the end of the "A" of the building, and utilize the cathedral part of the ceiling for the lift, so extra posts on the "sides" is not going to cramp my style for a large door.

All is good except you need to build it twice as large . It also needs a small kitchen , three peice washroom and laundry .

 

[CNC Dan]

My shop is a 24x42 ft steel building of pretty conventional design with two 10x10 ft rollup doors and 12 ft wall height.

With 6" concrete floor (4000 psi concrete), cost was $23K in June 2005 when it was built.

That looks like what I want. Have to build a house first though.
Does the $23k include any plumbing/electrical/heating/partitions/etc.

 

[aeblank]

The wall are 10' door is 9' rafters where the lift is, standard 28' truss on the rest. Stick framed on monolithic slab. Can put suburban on almost lift it all the way. Regular car no problem. 24" over hang all the way around. Did it this way, because you can see it from the house and didn't want monstrosity. Also have to heat it.
View attachment 449247

This is the same as the setup I was talking about / have. My lift fits in with about 6" to spare. No complaints. Makes the garage much shorter and less imposing. From the front, it's a 2-stall garage. Its actually 5 stalls with a full height lift. Be careful not to hit the garage door though!! I've come within an inch or two once. NOT cool.

 

[flusher]

That looks like what I want. Have to build a house first though.
Does the $23k include any plumbing/electrical/heating/partitions/etc.

Nope. I did the electrical wiring myself. No plumbing, heating, partitions.

 

[ovrszd]

Nope. I did the electrical wiring myself. No plumbing, heating, partitions.

Yep, I did too. I think I was right at $30K for my 42x50 all steel, 4" insulation wrapped, including concrete. $10K later I had it finished with electrical, plumbed air, bath room, liner paneled with additional insulation.

 

[buckeyefarmer]

Like I said, I am cheap. You can go to lowes or most anywhere and get a 7 or 8ft door, they keep them in stock. Taller than that and you enter into the "commercial" door sizes. The price almost doubles. My doors I have now are 9ft x 9ft and I paid dearly for them and they are un-insulated. A 12ft tall door is going to be expensive. I have looked at door applications where the tracks for the door are angled upwards, the ones with the torsion bar counterweight system use a special cable drum that is not the same diameter all the way across. Looks special order and expensive to me.

Stores only stock small doors, usually 7 x 8.
I have ordered all my doors. You can special order any size ( in 3" increments) clopay door from Home Depot online and have it delivered to you. They also install or you can install. I have 10x10 residential doors on my barn, now wish I would have gone taller. Just ordered some 8 x 10 doors for a project. Not expensive and easy.

 

[Creamer]

here's mine on the way up.

 

[ovrszd]

here's mine on the way up.

Cool. Start a thread with pics all the way thru. Similar to mine but smaller. I really like mine. The vaulted roof allows me to have a hoist in a 10' eave building.

 

[countrybumpkin]

Here is mine that I'm fixing to install 3 12x12 doors in myself.

 

[ovrszd]

Here is mine that I'm fixing to install 3 12x12 doors in myself.

Nice!!!! What are you gonna use it for?? That's a large building. Sometimes hard to tell in pictures though.

 

[countrybumpkin]

40 x 80

The first 30 foot is the shop area (30 x 40) the remaining 40 x 50 is cold storage parking. I will mainly use it to work on my cars and fab what ever I think I just gotta have from tractors to race cars.

 

[jim_wilson]

Seriously - I don't know why people insist on using trusses for everything. They're a serious waste of usable space within the building envelope.

When I look at the pictures of the barns built with trusses my head starts going thru a calculation of how many square feet of potentially usable space was wasted by using a truss system.

This barn is 28ft x 42ft. The front half (with the garage doors) - has 9ft ceilings - and then a whole 2nd floor room over those two bays with 8ft ceilings. Above that room is ATTIC SPACE - with about a 4 1/2 feet of headroom.

On the back half - there is a garage bay widthwise - with a 15ft ceiling. There is also walk around attic space across the back half - with a 6 1/2 ft ceiling. The rear garage bay is under where you see the skylight - in the very rear there is a mezzanine type structure that is 7ft wide for storage.

Pretty much every square foot of the internal building envelope is usable space. Building roof protected space is expensive. You might as well get as much of it as you can for your money.

The structure is 2x6 walls - with 2x12 roof rafters - they're tied together with 2x12's going cross ways - acting as the attic floor. It's basically a truss design - but it allows for the space to be used - unlike these truss designs using smaller sized lumber.

 

[Jim Timber]

I agree about the trusses. At least do a gambrel or something that gives you some added storage.

I really like the timber frame, myself. It might cost more for the raw materials, but it uses less wood in the end and you don't need to have a crane to put them up.

 

[ovrszd]

Jim,

That's a beautiful building for sure!!!! If I had that, I'd never go in the house!!!!

In regards to the use of trusses. Understand that 95% of the posters on here are building a shop without the potential of living quarters or storage quarters above. So for them, it's economical to use trusses and flatten out the roof. I'm sure there's a design criteria to determine which method is most economical, and I'm sure that's way above my ability to sort out.

So, assuming all I want/need is a shop. And assuming I want a 28x42 such as yours. What's the economical feasible way to design it and build it??

How many dollars per square foot, using the 28x42 floorplan, did your building cost??

As a comparison, I have a 42x50 single story building that cost me $19.50 per square foot, completely finished and well insulated, heated, lighted with concrete floor.

Not picking on you. Just understand that there is a huge variety of needs and uses involved in shop buildings.

 

[Jim Timber]

Richard, I don't think you can compare prices from MA to MO and come out with meaningful conclusions. Concrete costs have a lot to do with how far from the plant you are, so what might be $75/yd in one area could be $120 in another. Building materials are also location dependent as shipping them regionally adds cost as does the area of the country for taxes and cost of living.

Lastly, the labor portion is another big variable here. What one guy hires out or does themselves is going to be different from project to project.

 

[ovrszd]

Richard, I don't think you can compare prices from MA to MO and come out with meaningful conclusions. Concrete costs have a lot to do with how far from the plant you are, so what might be $75/yd in one area could be $120 in another. Building materials are also location dependent as shipping them regionally adds cost as does the area of the country for taxes and cost of living.

Lastly, the labor portion is another big variable here. What one guy hires out or does themselves is going to be different from project to project.

Oh yeah, I totally agree and understand those variables. But most readers could take that into consideration when looking at the numbers.

As for concrete, it was 20% of the cost of my building. Even $50 per yard difference in cost would be pretty small when compared to the entire building cost.

Building material variations might be significant if you live in a rural area. But then, you'll get a lot of that cost back because your hired labor costs will be cheaper. In regards to Jim Wilson's building, most readers of this thread do not have the technical ability to build it themselves. So that design would add considerable cost in material and labor. It's an awesome building. But I would never call it a garage or shop or barn. It's much more than that.

I think in the end, unless you live in an extreme area, the costs will be similar p/sq ft for a similar building.

Very interesting to see/hear other's thoughts and designs.

 

[jim_wilson]

Jim,

That's a beautiful building for sure!!!! If I had that, I'd never go in the house!!!!

In regards to the use of trusses. Understand that 95% of the posters on here are building a shop without the potential of living quarters or storage quarters above. So for them, it's economical to use trusses and flatten out the roof. I'm sure there's a design criteria to determine which method is most economical, and I'm sure that's way above my ability to sort out.

So, assuming all I want/need is a shop. And assuming I want a 28x42 such as yours. What's the economical feasible way to design it and build it??

How many dollars per square foot, using the 28x42 floorplan, did your building cost??

As a comparison, I have a 42x50 single story building that cost me $19.50 per square foot, completely finished and well insulated, heated, lighted with concrete floor.

Not picking on you. Just understand that there is a huge variety of needs and uses involved in shop buildings.

I'd really have to sit down and figure out what the building cost me to build - because to be honest, I didn't really track the costs all that carefully.

One of the design parameters was also to basically keep the wife happy. That's a good part of the reason why it looks the way it does. The architectural design keeps both my wife happy - and also the neighbor's wives. If I had just thrown up a metal building I'm pretty sure people would be bitching about it endlessly. So instead of getting " that building is ugly" responses from people - I get " I love that barn" type responses from people.

But a similar sized structure could be put up that looks a lot less "fancy" than mine - without the use of prefabbed trusses - using stick framing - and you'd get the benefit of all the usable space inside the building.

 

[ovrszd]

I'd really have to sit down and figure out what the building cost me to build - because to be honest, I didn't really track the costs all that carefully.

One of the design parameters was also to basically keep the wife happy. That's a good part of the reason why it looks the way it does. The architectural design keeps both my wife happy - and also the neighbor's wives. If I had just thrown up a metal building I'm pretty sure people would be bitching about it endlessly. So instead of getting " that building is ugly" responses from people - I get " I love that barn" type responses from people.

But a similar sized structure could be put up that looks a lot less "fancy" than mine - without the use of prefabbed trusses - using stick framing - and you'd get the benefit of all the usable space inside the building.

Not even gonna make a guess??

I'll go with $95K.

No response required. No offense intended.

 

[murphy1244]

Jim, That is one gorgeous building. Can't wait till I see the finished insides.

 

[jim_wilson]

Not even gonna make a guess??

I'll go with $95K.

No response required. No offense intended.

Basically I only have cost of materials into it. The only labor I paid for was getting the foundation put in and having the concrete floor poured. Other than that I pretty much did all of the work myself.

I don't think I'm at $95k - but it could be $60-$75k.

I'll try to take a few pictures of the inside to demonstrate what I mean by "usable space" - and why I don't like trusses.