Going to get a garage built.

seconded

 

Soakaway, laying cables in ground, tarting up the driveway etc.

Okay, so the next job to be done was to dig and construct the soakaway, and lay the water pipe, conduit and power cable into the ground. I didn't do any of this myself either; I paid a guy to come along and do it. I think it took him a day and a half and it came to about 750ish including materials and digger hire. This work included doing temporary repairs to the driveway with a layer of scalpings on the top. It's not pretty and it's a bit of a PITA to drive over, but a new, proper driveway is something that will have to happen much further into the future.







Yes, that is an old pipe he's hit right in the middle of the soakaway itself! Fortunately it had been put out of service long ago; you can see where one end of it so happens to have been capped in this very spot.






10mm SWA cable at correct depth above it, electricity warning tape, water pipe and conduit.








Water pipe and power cable now inside ready to be connected to something useful...




Power

As I perhaps previously mentioned, the first electrician I called on for a quote was clearly trying to create as much work for himself as possible, and was quite possibly telling me absolute bullsh*t. Basically, he came over and said that even before the garage itself could be connected to the house supply, the house itself would first require a new consumer unit (CU) and rewire of all house lighting, due to the fact that the house lighting does not have a protective earth conductor. His quote for fitting the new 17th Edition CU and rewiring the house lighting was approximately 1100. And - here's the funny bit - that quote was with ME moving all of the furniture and carpets out of the way, and ME pulling the floorboards up, and ME drilling the holes in the beams for him. And this was NOT including anything to do with connecting the garage. And, he insisted that due to regulations he would have to install all garage electrics for me -- he couldn't just install the CU into the garage.

I got a quote from a second electrician who came well recommended from a mate of mine, and he popped over and said that the 17th Edition / Part P regulations / whatever simply do not require him to touch the house at all, even though the house isn't up to current standards. All he needed to do was to install a brand new two-way CU and 30mA RCD right alonside the present house CU to provide the supply for the garage, and provide certification for it, and tell building regs. people that he'd done it. I think also he needed to place a sticker somewhere stating that the house wiring didn't have an earth conductor in the lighting wiring. That's it.

So for - I think it was 280? - I had the SWA cable routed through the house for me (it goes to the house CU through the house's integral single garage), RCD and CU fitted into the house; then an 8-way CU fitted in the garage, and left there for me to wire all my gubbins into.



I spent another 200 or so a reel of 1.5mm2 T&E and some much-cheapness strip lights for my lighting as you can see there, and also a reel of 2.5mm2 T&E to install my plug sockets ring. I also have some 16A sockets ready to install should I need them for a TIG welder, etc. which can be run off a separate MCB.

I positioned the strip lights where they are because I need to keep the maximum headroom clear for when (if) the lift goes in.

 

Sectional Door

Lots of man-love to PAB for his great advice over this. If you want a garage door, get in touch with him first.

I fitted it on my own over a weekend and I only think I had to bother PAB on the phone once for ten minutes, so I think I did alright.









Start putting the frame together:



Wang some noggins (nogs? noggins?) into the RSJ:





Getting the alignment absolutely right and square is critical. I am fortunate in that the concrete is reasonably level. PAB advised me to sink the vertical pillar into the concrete by 5mm on one side to help compensate for about 10mm difference I had across the entire width.

Alignment and securing of the door tracks:







One thing I generally don't enjoy doing is tensioning springs like these:
























Doors / Windows

Then I fitted the remaining doors and windows.











Next jobs:

1. Paint the floor and walls.

2. Go and visit the 'rents in Tywn in North Wales with a hire van and collect a load of heavy duty racking that the old man has offered me.

 

Nice Trev, its bigger and nicer than my house!

 

whe you get a garage built you dont mess about i want one look at the space wow what kinda head room do you have?

 

Headroom towards the back is exactly three metres. The roof trusses could have been far cheaper and sourced locally, but they came from a company in Welshpool because the chap there was very helpful in calculating a truss design for me that would give the extra headroom.

I just found the website where my dad originally got the racking from.

EDIT: I previously showed the wrong racking system. Here's the right one:

http://www.rapidracking.com/Products.aspx?Grp1Code=8&Grp2Code=98&Grp3Code=990&Grp1Desc=Racking&Grp2Desc=Wide%20Span%20Bays%20%20Frames%20and%20Levels&Grp3Desc=Wide%20Span%20Shelving%20%202%20Complete%20Bays



Really excellent robust racking. Hoping to blag two or three sections of it! He has got lots of this collecting dust after their shop had a bit of a refit.

 

that stuff is quality, used to stack bouncy castles on it weighing over 200kg and id be knocking into it with the forklift constantly, never damaged it badly.

 

very nice

 

Nice work Trev...that's a proper garage!
Coming along nicely..

 

Sweet!

 

Wow, awesome. I need a garage, what size did yours turn out as?

 

Whens the garage warming party?

Looks amazing, very jelous

 

Thanks guys. Externally it's 10m long by 4.55m wide.

Gareth - I'm thinking it's a good excuse for a barbeque later in the summer, so let us know when you're free :-)

 

I'm still trying to think about what to use to seal the floor and walls, and whether to paint the walls internally.

Well, I'm reasonably happy about what I'm going to do with the floor. I'll properly sweep and Hoover it out, and then I have some cans of concrete floor sealer that apparently reacts with the top surface and hardens it. Then I'll use some good quality garage floor paint, perhaps from Wickes. I've heard of many people having problems with paint coming off the floor onto tyres easily but apparently the key is to paint it as thinly as possible.

I'm not sure about the walls though. My builder mate told me to use some exterior masonry paint on the inside to seal the walls (stop dust, mainly) but I'm not 100% sure if I like the look of white painted brick. On the other hand I might end up boarding out the inside anyway for thermal reasons and to hopefully reduce noise.

 

I was at rockingham about a month or so back and the state of the pit garage floors was awefull whatever paint they used was utter sh*te!

 

You can get that water repellent stuff (ronseal?) that you brush onto/into the bricks (looks clear like water when applying) with a thick brush.

If you paint the inside white you should get a lot more light bouncing around (something i wish i did at the time).

 

Like this stuff, Mike? I think this is Wikes' copy of the Thomson's Waterseal. For the exterior, yes?

If I want to preserve but 'seal' the bricks inside, after lots of reading around it seems like using an oil-based varnish could be the way to go.

Yes I have a big tub of exterior white masonry paint for inside (can't remember the brand, but it's a good one I think) but having second thoughts about it for some reason. I know it would make the place brighter and more open feeling.

I might just dust seal the floor and water seal the exterior of the walls for now and see how it goes.

 

Aye that's the stuff for the walls.

 

Looks awesome!

I've just read this thread after not having read it since last year! In that time we've basically been doing exactly the same all ourselves.

We used some polyurethane concrete floor paint from toolstation and it's absolutely crap! keeps chipping

 

years ago when i was decorating my dad and uncle did the boiler room floor at york races with 2 pack floor paint and they said it was good stuff but you didnt have much time to get it down before it started going off
as long as the floor is clean and you get as much dust up as possible you shouldnt have much trouble
or an alternative is to have the terracotta tiles that a lot of workshops have