Building my own workshop

[Limburger]

Hi!

I've bin watching this site for quite a while now and thought arrhh meaby I just make a thread to share the build of my own garage. I live accros the big river (Netherlands) from you guys, so the style of building is probarly a bit diffrent. Also my english will not be flawless, I appoligise for that.
I just finished school a couple of years ago were I learned to be a Agriculture mechanic (mostly tractors). So building things like a garage/workshop is new for me, I got a lot of help and input from my dad.

Now almost precise 2 years ago I bougth the house, there was a 1,5 car garage with it wich was in bad shape, so it had to go and make room for a some what bigger place. I have a Ford F100 1953 pickup that I am restoring, in the years that I have the truck i've rented 3 diffrent places to work on it but every single one of them had some massive downsides like, to small, no electricity or just to far from home.
I saved money over the few years and when I bought the house I started drawing a garage so I could get some ideas what I wanted. Now 31th of may 2021 most of the garage is done and the finishing is going on (mainly on the inside). I will post regurarly some pictures allong the way. I allways love pictures when scrolling thrue a thread.

The jungle and the old garage.

This is the ''plan''.

After two days of chainsaw madnes and a day of demolishing the old garage with friends I called a good mate wich has acces to a excavator and he digged down the garage.

Marked out the foundation and made the actual foundation.

Dumped some concrete in there there will be a steel structure so I made the ancor points of threaded bar already in the foundation. Kind of a pain to put them accectly in the correct spot, side note I f'ed one ancor point up

 

[Adam W.]

Hello.

You're right, that was a jungle. I couldn't get my head around the pictures in the beginning.

 

[Doug B]

Looks like that’s going to be a really useful space, nice work so far

 

[danst96]

Welcome to the forum! Love the Netherlands, used to come over at least once every 2 weeks for work.

 

[murphy]

Nice job so far, what size is it, keep the pictures coming

 

[Limburger]

Hello.
You're right, that was a jungle. I couldn't get my head around the pictures in the beginning.

Yeah when all the green was down and away, I could totally see the garage standing there.

Looks like that’s going to be a really useful space, nice work so far

Im doing the inside now and AWW how nice it is to have a nice shop of your own.

Welcome to the forum! Love the Netherlands, used to come over at least once every 2 weeks for work.

Really?! what kind of work if I may ask?

Nice job so far, what size is it, keep the pictures coming

Thx,
Its 5.1meters wide and 11 meters long. I loved to go till the end of de proparty but it just would be unpractical in the future. So I had to settle with the 11 meters. Still very happy with the dimensions so far. I guess in the near future its to small again

 

[danst96]

Really?! what kind of work if I may ask?

I work for a company supplying labels and packaging to fashion brands, I have a lot of customers across Europe and Amsterdam is quite a centre for many head quarters.

 

[Record 1984]

I just finished my shed/garage, best thing I've ever done. I would advise you to do as much of it yourself as you can, then you'll know every block, pipe and wire. You'll save a fortune and the self satisfaction is priceless. Good luck.

 

[Ollie78]

This looks great.

Ollie

 

[Hsmith192]

This is really cool, look forward to the updates!

 

[Limburger]

Thx guys, another picture dump below

I work for a company supplying labels and packaging to fashion brands, I have a lot of customers across Europe and Amsterdam is quite a centre for many head quarters.

Interresting! Thx

I just finished my shed/garage, best thing I've ever done. I would advise you to do as much of it yourself as you can, then you'll know every block, pipe and wire. You'll save a fortune and the self satisfaction is priceless. Good luck.

Yeah, only the mason (guess its called that?) work I didnt do, the inside walls we did by our selfs. Oh and the floor is finished by a pro, those things just need to be tip top.

We let the foundation dry a bit, then we removed the boards and started marking out the garage and the walls. Never did this but we took our time and god her done. Was kind of the old fashion way with a hose filled with water to make for a make shift level. (works great )

The mason made an outline to get to level with the brick work. Then started on the neighbour side. This was a bit of a pain because I couldn't build the wall from the neighbour side so we had to do it backwards from the outside to the inside. But it just had to be done this way. It was kind of strange to do it this way but I rolled with it, i'm a mechanic i'm just trusting older people with years and years of experience. Since the mason was doing his job, I already designed the steel structur and ordered it.

Gladly my boss is awesome and has absolutly no problem with me fixen these thins on afterhours and weekends. So we fitted the long beams in the saw and made them shorter It was very tricky to get the angle ride but we managed.

Made some anchor plates and welded them to the beems. Also made the plates in the roof pieces for the wooden beams (don't know the correct english pronounciation).

Having a collegue with a loader and a extention helps alot!

The day after we put the beams up we made it a bit stronger by putting the wooden beams in, here you see me with cast on my right hand Did something you guys should read twice I think Feel kind of stupid, im no dodgy person or what so ever when it comes to tools and sharp thins, but this one struck my fast. I was measering some things by my self to check my drawings. I had my tape measer all the way out because I was measering a long distance, I was pulling it a bit so it would not sack so much, when suddenly the lip thing came of and the tape came in like a jet fighter and sliced clean in my pinky finger.
After some stitches I went further, and a couple of days later my tendon snaped I just cut the tendon half way thrue and later in the week it snapped.
Realy bad luck, now I had 2 surgeries and a lot of fysio but the right pinky just works half now, we call it a reminder for building my garage.

Later this week more pictures!

 

[Spectric]

I gather this workshop is for your 53 Ford pickup, is that the one with the sidevalve engine, or in American terms a flathead?

Have you thought of having a pit in the workshop, makes a lot of jobs easier unless you have enough height for a two or four post lift.

 

[Limburger]

I gather this workshop is for your 53 Ford pickup, is that the one with the sidevalve engine, or in American terms a flathead?

Have you thought of having a pit in the workshop, makes a lot of jobs easier unless you have enough height for a two or four post lift.

Yeah that's correct, although I would love to have the original engine in there. When I bought it some one put a 4,6v8 injection engine in it. And i'm okay with it, better fuel mileage and more hp. The driveability goes up a long way with this engine and trans combi.

Good question.
I thought about a pit but I hate the mess that collects in there, i'm a real nitpicker when it comes to a dirte workplace. So wen I poured the floor I left 2 patches clear of in floor heat and made the concrete about 30cm thick so I could mount a two post there when I want it. But for now I do without.

 

[Spectric]

I have worked in several places with pits, for commercial and they were all tiled with lights built in and concrete steps both ends to get in/out. In early days with cars we used pits or ramps but what a god send were the four posters. A lot of these pits had sectional lids so that kept them clean, big downside was gas welding in a pit, access great but Acetylene being heavier than air you can guess where that collected.

 

[Limburger]

I have worked in several places with pits, for commercial and they were all tiled with lights built in and concrete steps both ends to get in/out. In early days with cars we used pits or ramps but what a god send were the four posters. A lot of these pits had sectional lids so that kept them clean, big downside was gas welding in a pit, access great but Acetylene being heavier than air you can guess where that collected.

Yeah correct at work we use a fourpost and for the heavier tractor a moveable two post.

 

[Spectric]

Those moveable jacks are really great, easy to just put out the way when not required , and thinking back you could for a car easily make a rotator so long as you fixed the jacks down first so welding the underside would be really simple.

 

[clogs]

Limburger, nice w/shop......if you are like me, I'm in mine more than indoors at home....
what you going to do for heating....? I would have been tempted to use under floor heating...so cosy when it's snowing outside.....

not seen a tractor lift like that before....all my tractor work is on the smaller antique side of thing plus the odd Kubota and the smaller Massey's....but I just use a normal 2 post car lift (2.5ton)....have two lifts at the moment, just might get another as it doubles the parking availability....made some adjustable feet/legs to get up to the high points under the tractors.....
all we need now is a few photo's of the Ford truck you lucky boy.....

these are mine....
1934 Commer bread van with my 6m caravan...in a truck stop, Northern Italy during the trip down here.......
the boss drove the Kombi ( ex Dutch) and overloaded trailer....plus 3 dogs n 2 cats.....took 10 days to drive to Crete, Greece......
just a bit crazy.....hahaha.....

plus my 1928 C4 Citroen pick up.....yep need to loose some weight.....

me and a pal loading it onto the artic truck for the transport here......loads'a fun.....just gotta rebuild the front axle and the body....
my 2 collectable tractors allready loaded.....

 

[Spectric]

plus my 1928 C4 Citroen pick up

I have never seen one, must be rare and without the Citreon badge I would never have guessed it was a french vehicle.

 

[clogs]

actually there are loads out there...mine came from the Med coast so no rust......last owner 40 odd years....
it started life as a 4 door sedan.....
then during WW2 when fuel was rashioned they just cut the back doors off and made pick-ups....
mine has two gearboxes (farm work)( the second reverse gear is now blanked off) and is RHD....
up till 1935 you could buy either L or RHD.......think the idea was when they were &issed they could see the curb......LOL....
also all RHD vehicles at that time had to have a Green light on the back for night time running ( as well as the norm red) to denote RHD.....have that green lamp and undamaged......
it also has wind up windows, very Citroen'esk.....no heater and just one wiper.....cable brakes and wibbly wobbly steering....hahaha....
actually it drives all right......the chassis, along with the friction shocks and running gear are all rebuilt....new roller bearings throughout......
it'll go back as 12v......there's a huge 3 brush dynamo...so it will be gutted and a much modified Kubota alternater made to fit inside.....apart from the pulley size u'd never know......

yep I just love old vehicles.....and completely nuts....

I took a late 40's Morris J to Los Angeles when I went to live there.....drove it across the US via Texas on the way home....great laugh.....
lastly when my 40's Indian is rebuilt it will be ridden up thru Europe (taking in the Indian International rally) flown to the states for Daytona speed week and on upto the Sturgis rally.....
finally ridden the last part to LA to see if any of my mates are still alive......and if she (her indoors) lets me do a tour of both islands of Japan on the way home......
Bee's in your hair and oil on ya shoes.....hahaha...why buy NEW.......lol.....

 

[Limburger]

Love the C4! Dude that thing is cool. Pictures of my 53? Coming up!
I bet im more in my shop that my house. Now im fixing the inside just like I want to have it, it's starting to grow on me to start my resto in my own good layed out place!

Freshly powder coated frame. I did rebuild the transmission by my self. What u see is almost all new or rebuild. Apart from the engine that was in good condition.

I did refresh the look of the engine, cleaned the injectors and replated all the hardware.

Current state.

New shop update this evening.