From a garage to a shop.

**Expat** · 18th November 2009, 01:52 PM

We've been in the house for just over 2 years now since I sold my place in Holland Park that I grew up in. I like not living right in Toronto but still being close enough that you get all the mod cons without the downside of being boxed in. I got a backyard and front flower bed for me to play gardener in and for our girls to run wild. In Winter the South side is steep enough they can go sliding after the snow comes.

The drawback to the place was that it is only a one car garage. Admittedly it's a little wider than some we looked at but still it's limiting. Okay I worked out of a one car garage back home but in that garage was a mid-60's cabinet saw and a 100 year old wood working bench from the old Palings piano factory that was on Victoria Street in Brissie before they tore all that up and made it into the Myer centre.

This is what I have been dealing with up till about 2 weeks ago. A right bloody mess at the best of times. The scrap sheet stock is leaning against the dining room table my Great-Grandfather gave to my Paternal Grandmother as a wedding gift. It and the bed frame and dressing table that are still wrapped in their shipping blankets have to be restored and moved into the house at some point but even now I have to work around them.

Over the last year I started accumulating equipment and tools for what I needed to do and what I wanted to do and it's never really been set out as I would like it to be. That's resulted in more of a mess than anything but at least I was able to work around most of it.

The things I couldn't work around were the lack of space - can't really do much about that except to get organised in the space I have - and the lack of electrical outlets/lights. I currently have 2 x 110v/15a duplex outlets and 1 x 65a cfl ceiling fixture. Not much huh? Well like I say that was until 2 weeks ago.

I finally pulled the trigger and started to upgrade everything in the garage to turn it into my shop!

First a 16'Lx8'Wx8'H storage container was dropped on the driveway and then I proceeded to fill it up with the contents of the garage. I also proceeded to fill a lot of big garbage bags and the back of the car with crap for the recycling station. The old steel shelving in the very first photo of this thread was put out on the curb and lasted all of about 4 hours!

So what now? Well observe the right front of the container in the photo above...... The large roll of Delta-FL and two rolls of Reflectofoil. That and a bunch of 5/8" T&G OSB will be my new shop floor. But that's not all. I needed a plan for all of this to work properly and here it is:

Now there are elements to the upgrade not shown here of course but this is about 90% of what I hope to have finished in another 2 weeks. The walls and ceiling are being painted gloss white to vastly improve the lighting but the biggest improvement there will be from this lot:

Those are three of the double 4' T8 fixtures I've installed. Because they came with tails and plugs rather than hard wire them in I went with a 4-way outlet on the roof switched from......

......box mounted beside the entry door mounted alongside a 15a/110v duplex outlet that both run from the new 60a/24 pony panel tapped off the main panel in the basement! The panel was a 100a/24 but I only needed 60a. The funny thing is, a bare 60a/8 panel actually would have cost more than this 100a/24 with all of the breakers I needed and the 60a main breaker...... plus taxes!!! Economies of scale... Oh and you can see one of the reasons we couldn't run the new wiring through the walls. Where it's not drywalled it was easy but elsewhere it was a nightmare so we just used conduit. That's my friend Mike giving me a hand.

Since this was taken another two uprights have been added to the rack from Lee Valley and the wall has been primed ready for gloss. The peg board boxes are very handy with their Talon hooks also from LV. The small parts bins/rack to the right has been taken down and will probably wind up in the corner beside the new storage shelves being built in.

Over on the other side my large peg board box is up and currently has some of my power tools hanging in it as well as a lot of the small items needed for the upgrade. That's a 6' level standing there and the box is 43"x44" to give you an idea of the scale of things. You can see 2 x 15a/110v and 1 x 20a/220v outlets here. All up I'm adding 4 x 110v circuits and 3 x 220v circuits. The table saw and dust collector will run off the 220v and once I get around to it so will the jointer I want to pick up from Grizzly in the US.

So that's the start of it all. Friday this week the OSB is delivered here and the ply for the shelving and new mitre saw station is delivered to The Carpenter's Square. I'd cut all the sheet ply here but the mobile work centre is headed to the storage container on Friday so I can lay the floor and besides which Rob has a pair of Excalibur sliding tables mounted to his General cabinet saws that make cutting down sheets simple as! Final sizing I will do once my floor is done and the saw is back inside to stay.

**Waldo** · 18th November 2009, 02:56 PM

Gonna be interesting to see this as you make the most of the available space.

(How you finding acclimatising to the weather? I've been in Melb' now 9 years after originally coming from Brisbane and can't yet get used to the cold

but the heat easy)

**munruben** · 18th November 2009, 04:58 PM

Looks great.

**Expat** · 19th November 2009, 12:31 AM

Originally Posted by Waldo

Gonna be interesting to see this as you make the most of the available space.
(How you finding acclimatising to the weather? I've been in Melb' now 9 years after originally coming from Brisbane and can't yet get used to the cold

but the heat easy)

I'd have more photos done of the transition but I'm only getting an hour a day to work on it at most right now because of all the appointments the girls have this week. Coupled with the after effects of the flu I've got it's slowed me down. Friday on that'll change as the ply and osb arrives. Lots to do then and very little time to do it in as the storage container goes away a week from Thursday.... unless I want to pay for another month!

I've been here for 11 years now and I still hate the cold. The snow is okay until you have to shovel it away but -25c is not something you want to wake up to on a regular basis. Not sure what sort of Winter we're going to have considering we hardly had a Summer. So far Fall has been mild as well. Got a light sprinkle of snow 2 weeks ago but since then nothing. I only spent a week in Melbourne during Winter many years ago and that was enough to last me a lifetime - sorry Melbourneites. Depressing doesn't begin to describe the feeling. There are days here in Winter when you just don't want to get out of bed in the cold and dark but I think the bright white snow does tend to make it seem a little more pleasant. Again that would be unless you have to shovel the stuff out of the way to move!

**Christos** · 19th November 2009, 10:01 AM

Looking very nice.

**artme** · 19th November 2009, 10:26 PM

Looking good expat. The finished product will show just how successful your plans are.

**yasinthomas001** · 20th November 2009, 05:43 AM

That really sounds interesting....hard work gives good result one day which is seen here....good work done..keep it up

**Expat** · 21st November 2009, 02:44 AM

That's one! Thank goodness the rain stopped and it was actually sunny when the OSB was delivered this morning. These are my first pieces of the Delta-FL, Reflectix and OSB laid on the floor.

The Delta gets overlapped on the smooth area on the left side and tuck taped then the Reflectix is laid over that and also tuck taped together and then the OSB is dropped on top of that and everything is secured to the floor using Tapcon screws every 2'. I'm also applying expanding foam sealant around the perimeter as recommended by the Delta folks.

I'm going to seal the ends of the OSB at the garage door end by simply painting the sheets and we'll see how that works out. I'm looking around for a metal plate/sill to attach to the end of the new floor as a transition from the concrete up to the OSB so the ends of the wood are not being pounded to sawdust every time I roll something in or out of the garage.... sorry.... my shop!

I hope to finish the floor this evening and I'll get more photos up then. I'm liking this more and more now.

**Scally** · 21st November 2009, 07:18 AM

I can't imagine living in a place that is -25 degrees.
It was 42 here yesterday.

The flooring should stop your feet freezing.

I like the lights and the white walls. You will have great woodworking light.

As soon as I moved into this place I went from 1 to 4 flours and put a 10amp and 15 amp circuit into the garage.

Looking good.

**masoth** · 21st November 2009, 07:36 AM

Mate, you are doing a good job, and your report is most enlightening (no pun)

. You are sure to be satisfied with the organized workshop when finished although I suspect it will still be a little crowded - like mine!

soth

**Expat** · 21st November 2009, 03:22 PM

Well I didn't get finished tonight. Close though. I ran into some problems with the tongue and groove and had to clean out most of the grooves and some of the tongues. I also don't have a large enough "persuader" to drive the sheets together so I'll have to borrow my neighbour's once I get back from cutting the ply tomorrow (Saturday). I have to pick up a couple of extra concrete bits too because I've gone through two already and I only have 2 of the sheets secured!! Not a good sign.

As I surmised there isn't a square wall in this joint! The concrete sills are close but the walls themselves are all over the place which slowed me down as well. The back wall with it's ins and outs was a pain to cut the Delta, Reflectix and especially the OSB to fit into all those spots. Anyway I'm noticing a difference out there already at least in terms of comfort to work/walk on. Much easier on my worn out bones than the bare concrete or the rubber mats were.

So one more run of the Delta-FL to do and it has to be cut the entire length of the run to match up to the left wall and then at the back wall you can see it's going to have to negotiate a couple of angles none of which will be square or close to any known stop on a mitre saw or a set square! What fun.

**Christos** · 23rd November 2009, 06:07 AM

Originally Posted by Expat

you can see it's going to have to negotiate a couple of angles none of which will be square or close to any known stop on a mitre saw or a set square!

Mitre Saw.

What!

Mitre Saw????

Do it by hand.

**Expat** · 23rd November 2009, 11:07 AM

Originally Posted by Christos

Mitre Saw.
What!
Mitre Saw????
Do it by hand.

Framing square! Woo hoo! Anyway.........

Now why would I turn the Delta-FL upside down? Maybe because I don't trust that it will be the same width all the way down and I want to make my marks for cutting it with the ends in their proper orientation rather than just use a tape. After this I took the whole thing outside and laid it over a sheet of OSB up on saw horses and sliced it using a utility knife and my 6' level.

And it fits just right! Tucked under the piece to the right and tuck taped together that's it for the Delta with about 10' to spare. Now for the Reflectix and OSB.

With all the Reflectix cut and taped in place the last two full sheets of OSB have to go in. I cut off the tongue on both sheets because they are of no use in this position. The question than is how do you lock the groove of these sheets to the tongues of the middle sheets if there's no room to swing a "persuader"? I could have used a couple of Bessey K-Body clamps but the Irwin's work just fine. Looking back I should have done this for all the sheets from the get-go. 20-20 hindsight is a wonderful thing!

This is the "notch" in the back wall and you can see how there isn't a square corner here. The sheet of OSB against the right wall is square but once you get past that it's all guesswork!

This is the part of the back wall the storage shelf will be mounted to and you can see how it's out of square along it's length compared to the right and left walls by the gap the OSB sheets have left. They're all square to each other but those walls.............

This is pretty much all that's left to do with the floor other than a bunch more Tapcon screws to drive in the sheets I've laid already. Bought myself a hammer drill at last. I've been meaning to for a while and I got a good deal on a DeWalt so now the drilling will go a little quicker.

I'm undecided about what to do in the small areas to each side of the garage door. I have more than enough Delta-FL, Reflectix and OSB to cover those areas up but should I bother? I'll ponder on that as I finish painting the walls and build the storage shelf and mitre saw cabinet over the coming week.

Once I shut the garage door the difference inside was almost immediate. It was around 6c outside and my hands were a little bit frosty but within a few minutes of the door being pulled down I took my jacket off and it was quite pleasant in there. This is in spite of my not having fixed the concrete sill under the door so there's still a 3' wide by 1/4" high gap for the elements to make their way inside. Give me one day this week with some sun and the girls taking a nap and I'll get it done.

**Christos** · 24th November 2009, 08:12 PM

Very good progress.

**Scally** · 25th November 2009, 12:00 AM

You would think that it would be easier to build something square than everything out of square.

Nice progress.

It is good to see those timber flakes being put to good use.

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