Garage project!

Malt_Vinegar said:
Cheers, i didnt know how accurately it was measured. Its been taking my weight ok (11 stone) and seems to be ok with what is up there now. Is there anything that can be done? Can i add some form of steel crossmember to breezeblock walls to prop it up and make it weight-bearing?
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Aside from actually increasing the size of the joints or double skinning them there isnt that much you can do easily. You can't exactly put a support in the middle to prop them as you need to park a car in there!

Just be careful and load anything heavy as close to the walls as you can to reduce the imposed load, nothing heavy on the centre of the cross-beams.
 
Jonnycoupe, thats an interesting point! Not thought about that. I also noticed your location, do you work for said company? I used to a few years ago, in the head office :p

chippie said:
Not sure about the shiny epoxy floor stuff, but I used International Concrete Floor Sealer International Concrete Floor Sealer

and International Floor Paint on the floor.

The breezeblock walls I put on some stabiliser, then just normal plain enulsion once that had dried.
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Missed this post! I shall take a peek :) Thanks!
 
Jonnycoupe said:
I would have thought the safety factors for a roof framework are massive?

Especially considering things like heavy snowfall?
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Ye there is a decent amount of foreplanning for a roof, although I suspect much less for a simple garage roof - anyhow imagine he puts all the weight up there and then the heavy snowfall comes.....?
 
Monster said:
Ye there is a decent amount of foreplanning for a roof, although I suspect much less for a simple garage roof - anyhow imagine he puts all the weight up there and then the heavy snowfall comes.....?
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I dont know if you looked at the picture of the garage above, its side-wall is actually part of the house across from mine, and it attached to another garage with a full height breezeblock wall. Is there no way, i can brace the existing structure to these walls.

Perhaps i can put in a heavy duty steel joist with steel supports bolted to the concrete or walls?


*EDIT*

I have just been reading up on this, and it seems that i can just add more lengths inbetween the originals, and add a substantial load tolerance. Also, the flooring will help if i do this, as it will help spread the weight evenly over the whole roof and new lengths!
 
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The thing that concerns me is the length of the spans, as they are along the full length of the garage, and not across the width. Alongside this you only have one faily long lintel above the garage door supporting a load of the weight. That lintel is probably only rated for a certain load, and could do your weak point as its also a long span lintel. I guess you could try and support the roof across the width with supports but then your going to have to tamper with the block wall to make it useful.

I'd say just leave it as is, you should be able to put a decent amount up there, just don't overload the centre area and try and place stuff sensibly.

Get on with the tidying, I want more pics!
 
Infact if you were bothered you could probably stick some wooden joists across the length, held with wall straps bolted to the concrete, but it seems a bit pointless.
 
I dunno what would fail first, but when i see these new build garages with the spiked plates that join joists end on end Im sure they could be reinforced easily with small amounts of steel and screws.
 
Monster said:
Infact if you were bothered you could probably stick some wooden joists across the length, held with wall straps bolted to the concrete, but it seems a bit pointless.
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Well, if it helps me get it stronger, and able to take more of my "junk" it will help!!

I had a work dinner last night, and training tonight, so I wont be able to get on with the tidying till tommorrow after work, but there is another load of junk out of there. No pics yet!

Also, now it seems adding power is a lot simpler than i first thought, so i might be doing that on Sunday if i can get the bits together cheap enough. Otherwise it will be a "next month" job when i get some more moolah :)
 
Monster said:
The thing that concerns me is the length of the spans, as they are along the full length of the garage, and not across the width. Alongside this you only have one faily long lintel above the garage door supporting a load of the weight. That lintel is probably only rated for a certain load, and could do your weak point as its also a long span lintel.
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I totaly agree, the beams look completely inadequate for supporting any real weight. In their intended role of supporting the roof they are not subject to large bending forces and the distance between the beams is too large to properly support flooring anyway, which is why the original plywood sagged so much. Timber floor joists should be a maximum of 450mm apart IIRC, or less for the smaller joists.

One possible and fairly simple solution would be to fit appropriately sized joists running underneath the original beams at 90 degrees, i.e. accross the width of the garage. Adding extra longitudinal joists at the same time would also be a good idea to properly support the floor.
 
Yeah some brackets in the brickwork to run some timber across would help distribute the floor loads. The long member are pretty much acting as tie bars mainly loaded in tension. Completly the opposite to what happens with someone up there. The diagonal members do mean its not totally unsupported against that load, there are probably some guidelines on the distance to place them appart.

Saying that Ive seen pictures of loft conversions where people have just cut out the central upright supports with nothing coming down so there is a decent margin of safety in them :eek:
 
Malt_Vinegar said:
Well, its good to know that there are options to sort it out. I will see what i can work out on that front!

http://www.wickes.co.uk/Joist-Hangers/Maxi-Speedy/invt/156726?WT.srch=1&WT.mc_id=GOOGLEBASE

How about 4 of these, with 2 large wooden joists at 90 degress with the first 1/3 of the way along from the length, and the second 2/3 of the way along?
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They look about right, to be honest try and get a nice chunky set of joists and put 3 of them along that span as its a fair distance.

It seems we have a few people who work in construction on the motors forum, or DIY happy people? Keep in mind that the structure is still only as strong as its weakest point, which I still think is that lintel.
 
The weekend rolled around, and more work has been completed!! Most of today was spent sorting through all the crud that was being pulled from the garage. My irrational habit of hoarding my mail because i didnt want it lobbed into general bins and open for fraudsters meant i had about 3 years of mail to sort. Along with some more sorting, and dump runs!

I purchased a cross shredder and my GF and I got to work. During breaks in other stuff throughout the day we were sorting, and shredding, there is still a massive pile in the lounge ready to go through the shredder. I think we are up to 4 bin liners of shredded paper now. 2-3 more till its all gone!!

So, the garage as it was in the morning (messier than the last photo, as we had removed more stuff from the house, to be sorted this weekend)

Garage1.jpg


So, i had to pull out a lot of stuff, reduce it down, make a pile for dumping, and try to consolidate all the random odd boxes down to a few decent sized ones.

Garage2.jpg


Gah, i hated this point, it looked like i had gone right back to the beginning again. Still, after much faffing and box consolidation i ended up with a slghtly more respectable looking garage again.

Garage3.jpg


I was in the groove now, and tidying and crud-removal was going well. The loft space was being utilised for lighter stuff (untill i get the bracing installed)

Suddenly there was room to walk, put stuff, and it really did look like putting a car in again just might be possible!

Garage4.jpg


Thats most of the tidying done now. Couple more hours next weekend, or if i can grab some time in the week, i might be able to get cracking on some of the more interesting stuff. Also, aim to get to that landmark of parking my car in there!!!
 
Flooring?!

I like the look of these, and i think this might be a simpler way forward for the flooring. Modular, touch, non-absorbant, and easy to replace :D
Stick in some skirting, and some plaster board on the walls, and it will look like a proper room!!
 
OK, I have purchased 45 of the flooring tiles. Like this...

tiles.jpg


Also, i am waiting on a quote for postage on 6 of these to enable me to load up that new losftspace...

hangers.jpg


Masonry truss hangers, 100x225mm. Then its off to the timber yard! Now, Should I be using single 100/100mm in there, two 100/100mm or, single 100/200mm timber lengths?

I also spotted these for sale within 5 miles of my house, so am bidding on them too. Cleaned up and sprayed up with matt black acrylic should tidy them up a bit for allowing me some room to work under my car when it is in the garage.

ramps.jpg
 
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Ok, took a pic this morning, took up some of the crappy mouldy carpet that was in there, along with one side of the chequred black and white vinyl. (all the stuff at the front is rubbish, either waiting for a dump run, or for my Bins to be emptied (should be today for the bins!)
floor1.jpg


So, now we have some floor, i am feeling nice and motivated, cant wait to get the flooring stuff! It should be ready to go down at the weekend :D

car.jpg


The car looking eagre to get in there!! It really does not look like it will fit, but i had a 5 series in there before, so it must!!
 
Ok!!

Update time! I decided to try and get the floor as clean as possible for the laying of the flooring which did arrive, however through some mathematical specialties on my behalf, i ordered far too little to cover the whole floor!!

Half of the floor swept..
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The matting! oooo, spangly!!
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Some of it going down :D
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Thats where i left, it, need a few more panels to finish it off, and cut some edging bits to make the finishing touches!
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I also have decided to make a folding (to roof) ladder out of the remaining peices of decking from my summer decking project, should be good enough wood to take my weight and stain pretty nicely.

One more dump run completed, i think it might have even been the last one i need to do!

more soon!!


However, it looks very nice!
 
oh nice..althought a word of warning...I have that flooring as well and to be honest it's nice to work/ walk on, (and it keeps the heat in as well) but doent like having weight on it....it falls to bits and moves around.... and I only have my motor bike on it, not a car so it will be worse..

bullit
 
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