Shop Build (help appreciated!)

[seal killer]

All--

The house is finished! Next on the list are immediate--as opposed to long term--landscaping and the shop build.

A refresher on the shop location . . .

The shop will be in the 40' x 50' garage immediately adjacent to the house. The north, exterior wall of the house is the south wall of the shop. That wall--from the shop towards the interior of the house--is 3.5" of hard Styrofoam, 6" of rebar and helix reinforced concrete and two more inches of hard Styrofoam.

My South African friend (Johann) and I are building the shop. (He's the drone video operator; he also helped me put together the deck and is helping me build a retaining wall at the southwest corner of the house, an interesting project.) Currently, the shop consists of one wall, the north one which is adjacent to the drive-through bay of the garage.

That wall delineates the shop/full bath/laundry room/hallway from the garage. Imagine (or look at the pictures below) the area set off inside the garage as a rectangle measuring 40' x 19'. Coming into the garage through one of the vehicle doors and turning right, one will see the entire length of the new wall punctuated by two doors; an 8'w x 10'h garage door roughly in the middle of the length of the wall and a man door that opens into a 19' long hallway leading to the door between the garage and kitchen. Once inside that hallway and progressing towards the just-described kitchen door, you will pass a full bath and then a laundry room. Those two rooms are 7'w x 19' long, combined length.

The north wall is 10' high and framed up with 2" x 6". The wall between the shop and the back of the laundry room and bath will be framed up using 2" x 4", as will the wall between those two rooms and the 4' wide hallway. If you've been doing the math, that leaves me an area measuring about 28' 8" x 19' for the shop. That is far larger than the space I had in my two car garage, since I could not "spread out" due to the fact that my inconsiderate wife insisted on parking her car in that garage. (Well, I also put my prized Crossfire and Sportster in there, as well, but they were considered features adding to the ambiance.)

Now, on to business. The ceiling is next. I want to span the entire space without internal supports other than that provided by the 2" x 4" walls of the laundry/bath. (The ceiling joists and those wall are parallel, so the walls will not provide support, anyway.) My current plan is to use 2" x 10" pine, which I've read is good for a little over 21' when placed on 16" centers. Originally, I had planned for storage on top of the shop ceiling. Not now. However, I believe I can engineer the hallway ceiling to give me a 4' x 19' storage area.

The north end of the ceiling joists will be supported by the north shop wall. The south end will be supported by the exposed roof of the house. Leaving out insulation and from the inside out, that roof is built on engineered scissor trusses on 2' centers with 3/4" AdvanTech tongue and grove decking and sits on the concrete wall of the house.

Even though I've read that 2" x 10" pine will span the distance, I'm (slightly) concerned. Should I double up a few of those 2" x 10"s?

Please feel free to add your advice, comments and observations. Thanks!

--Bill

View from "hallway" . . . https://youtu.be/9cdkYPuws2M

[BadDog]

There is only one rule you need to follow. MUCH bigger, and higher ceilings. Based on that, I suggest a free standing steel open span building of at lease 40' x 60' with min 12' ceiling. Now, apply rule 1... And again...

But in reality, I would either make or buy a "glue-lam" (or how ever that's spelled) for the span. Overkill would be good, particularly since it might allow for a lift point. Better yet, structural I beam and add a trolley. And, and....

[pete]

Exactly what Russ said Bill. Build not for today but for the future needs. Because of a Sciatica problem there's not a hope I want to lift my 85 lb 6" mill vises anymore. Or about anything else over maybe 40 lbs in my shop. Without my medical issue were all still going to age to the point where that lifting is going to become a problem if we live long enough. If it were me I think I'd be adding structure in the ceiling and seriously think of adding something like 2-3 heavy barn door tracks on each side and middle running the length of the shop and a couple more across those tracks so you end up with sort of a light duty legless gantry type system lag bolted to the ceiling that can move in X and Y to almost any point in the shop. Large machinery moving into or out of the shop can always be done in numerous ways without a heavy duty gantry. Having one would be nice, but there expensive and take up room for the multiple vertical legs and vertical height for the gantry itself. My guess is for most of us something fairly light but engineered to take up to maybe 500 lbs would be more than good enough to cover 99% of what we'd ever need one for. It will never be cheaper or easier to do something like this than right now. Yeah probably one of the folding engine hoists in a shop with that much room would work fine. My bet is your going to easily fill that area to where you'll wish you had an overhead gantry at some point.

[fenichel]

I don't know about the relative costs of one solution versus another, but I here note what I did for my 500-square-foot basement shop, with good result. My heavy machines are all along two perpendicular walls, and the dumbwaiter through which heavy objects enter the shop is at the end of one of those walls. I have I-beams running just off the ceiling about 3 feet in front of each of those walls, and chain hoists that can slide along either beam or be moved from one to the other. This setup has allowed me to move a minilathe (~400 lbs) and a small CNC mill (~800 lbs) into my shop singlehandedly, and also to move some worktables around. For months at a time, the chain hoists are idle, and the only function of the I-beams is to provide some shelf space on their lower flanges. But now and then, I am VERY happy they are there.

[liveaboard]

I agree with above; I have no doubt your plans have gelled in your head and all, but hold off a moment; you can still tweak your design.
I suppose you'll be able to drive in there with some sort of machine with a hydraulic loader, and that's great. But a gantry crane is MUCH more handy. you can stand next to the load, watch it, hold it, position it.
I have a 1 ton in my garage, and when I needed to split my 80HP 4 ton ag tractor, I never had to strain any of my delicate old human parts.
200lb water filled tires are no worry with a gantry crane.
I use it to lift my cars, too [had to make some rigging]. Hoist 'em up and put stands under, no jacking for me.
I even use it for unloading heavy furniture. There's no end to uses, or how many injuries can be avoided.
But mine is a single point swinging type, with about 8' radius. I would strongly recommend one that can span the whole shop. Then you can drop heavy items in the corners [machines, parts, tractor implements, plows...] Storage racks that are assessable to the overhead hook can be made later.
A ton isn't difficult; steel beams think nothing of a ton.
I'm building a little one right now, that fits inside my container metal shop. Making a bigger one would be the same work; less actually, since my space is so tight and I had to make it fit inside an old metal box.
It would be easy to integrate the steel gantry beams into your structure, so they hold up the roof, and /or make a storage floor above. Build the machine later, but now is your chance to put in the structure and plan the space.

The most dangerous things are the smaller ones, just a little too heavy to lift by hand; because then you try, because getting the machine into position is too tedious and we're all real men and arggg! back injury.
So build or buy a setup that's quick and easy to use.
Power traverse would fun, but isn't necessary unless you go for higher capacity.

[liveaboard]

[liveaboard]

Other dream shop ideas;
If we could have aircraft hangers, we would. But we can't.
So, a combined parking area / shop space has good and bad points.
You have space to maneuver in with a forklift or loader. room to work on large things like your vehicles, but usually it would be parking out of the weather.
negative is big though; damage from sparks, grit, dust, and heating costs.
Solution; movable or folding dividing wall.
Yes, that would be difficult. Still, it's worth a few minutes of pondering.
I made such a thing in a domestic space, so the sizes of adjoining rooms can be altered. It wasn't vary hard or expensive.

Other things; if you have woodworking machines, integrated dust ducting. Underfloor may be considered. In floor electrical outlet for a free standing machine[s].
Welding fume exhaust
Separate space for cutting and grinding [grinding grit is not nice] with bench and vise.

All these things would add considerable time to the build, and some expense too; but after the amazing effort you put into the house, why not go for the best workshop you can to match?
And much can be completed later [after you install your tools and are fully functional] if the framework is installed now.

[K. Browers]

Hello Bill,
Congratulations on getting to the good part.
You asked what to do for the ceiling. May I suggest a suspended ceiling like the ones used in offices. The difference is that you put it just under your roof trusses not at 8 feet. It will give you a high ceiling that will be cooler in summer and if you want, throw some extra insulation on top for the colder months. You can probably find used light fixtures that will fit the suspended grid that you could rewire for LED lighting. If someday you need to access the trusses to maintain or tie something to them it is a simple matter to take down a few tiles. Everyone's ideas have been good suggestions and can be implemented under your high ceiling. I think though that if you go cutting trenches in the floor this soon it might raise some eyebrows with the commander. Do not forget to insulate your dividing walls for sound deadening,
Cheers
Karel

[SteveM]

Consider Solatubes for lighting.


The light comes down the tube and terminates in a fixture that looks like a light fixture.

My brother's office has 2x4 fluorescent lights and what look to be 2x2 lights in the hung ceiling; the 2x2's are the terminations of the Solatubes (my brother's company is actually an authorized Solatube dealer).

During the day, they never turn the lights on.

They even have shutters you can use as dimmers.

Steve

[SteveM]

As to the ceiling, if you have enough space above it to stand (even if hunched), build with the intention of using it for storage. You will always need more storage.

If you don't, then to quote Humphrey Bogart as Rick Blaine: "...you'll regret it. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon and for the rest of your life".

Insulate, insulate, insulate. It's going to be either too hot or too cold, and anything you spend on insulation will pay off in the long term, and now is the time to do it.

I agree with all the comments on lifting. Set up storage so that you don't have to lift stuff, just slide it off the shelf onto a cart and onto the machine. Have your vises and rotabs on a shelf the same height as the mill table and get / make / modify a cart to be that same height.

Investing now in material moving equipment and processes will cost less than the cost of a series of chiropractor visits, or heaven forbid, an emergency room visit. Dropping my Bridgeport head on my foot cost me almost as much as the head did.

Steve

[SteveM]

Consider Solatubes for lighting.


The light comes down the tube and terminates in a fixture that looks like a light fixture.

My brother's office has 2x4 fluorescent lights and what look to be 2x2 lights in the hung ceiling; the 2x2's are the terminations of the Solatubes (my brother's company is actually an authorized Solatube dealer).

During the day, they never turn the lights on. The light is 100% pure sunlight, not the harsh color of florescent lighting.

They even have shutters you can use as dimmers.

Steve

[SteveHGraham]

I like that gantry.

I have started thinking about adding another shop here, since my tractors suck up the existing one. I was hoping to drywall the walls and ceilings, with a relatively modest ceiling height. Then I could have AC in the summer. Now I'm wondering if that makes sense.

Maybe I'm better off getting a shed for the tractors and cart, plus a huge fan for the existing shop.

Wondering what the best shape for a shop is. My guess is that a square is better than a rectangle.