I never thought I'd do this -- compressor

Sheetrock.....

Barry Irby

One house I built had tall narrow windows. I made the sheetrocker use the cutouts as ends in the closets. They fit perfectly. The sheetrocker was furious. Said "I don't get paid for hanging this sh*t twice!"

Re: I was gona stay out of this but...

C John Hebert

....I can't count the number of houses I framed and built and worked both, stick framed roofs and trusses and both have their respected advantages. For my own houses and additions....I chose to frame it myself. Trusses in a lot of places allow for 2' on center as opposed to 16" on center placement...saving one or 2. As for labor saving costs...sorry. It takes at least 3 guy's to stand up trusses, after they are carried over, unless there is a cherry picker available but that is extra cost. The webb bracing prevents the attic space just about useless. Sure you can order the center open, but that has extra cost involved AND...your still limited as to the load, and...it may open up the center, but you still are at a loss over what may be used as storage.

My place now, I stick framed alone. Time wasn't an issue, and neither was labor because it was mine. I can store anything I want above, and have tons of sq. ft space, which is the way it should be...after all, you paid for it! I have a 10 pitch here in Maine and certainly don't have a snow load to worry about. To keep this short, we decided to live above the shop and scrap the 3 bedroom originally planned home because retirement was near and we really didn't need all that, as well as loving the view from above the second (attack) level. I ended up putting in 2 full "A" roof window dormers, pushing out two walls to the end of the deck area. The size of the dormers were 8'/ One was in the living room, and the other in the bathroom. I framed a shed roof for the back half, keeping the front side a 10 pitch. This allowed me to frame the back wall straight up and have the ceiling joists (now floor joist) sitting on top of the lower wall then continuing to receive the rafters. I had to put a center beam down stairs with support posts, but I ended up wrapping some stationary equipment around the posts, so work area wasn't all that at a loss. I ended up with a 1 bedroom apartment, large bath with a whirlpool. Kitchen with an island divider and dining room, and a comfortable living room that ended up being pretty damned comfortable for a retired couple. For the front side...my rafters were a tad over 22' if I remember right. My staircase is on the outside and have a dumb waiter powered with an electric winch to bring up groceries and firewood as I heat with wood alone and no back up for this log cabin.

Having a prior shop with a gambrel design, I had wood dry out nicely that I stored up there through a gable end door, and from the heat loss of the shop. As for the shop floor...I live in Maine, so we have to deal with frost 3' and 4' deep. Ready for this??? LOL I poured a 6" slab, with standard wire. Rebar is an overkill! The key is to pour the slab over a sand base or..."Clean" gravel with no large stones. I scrape about a foot of top soil out, then fill with sand or gravel, then the slab. Sand doesn't freeze, cause heaves or cracking and that's what the wire mesh prevents...cracking, and now with this fibre cement...it's even better.

Basically...stick frame gives you so many advantages on usage, where trusses your limited. Trusses gives you an open floor plan, where stick frame you might end up with a center beam and 2 support posts depending on the size of the building. The cost difference between the two I think is a wash...it just depends on the use and abilities are. As for the rebar...I built my log cabin from my own cedar trees. Milled them, and started stacking right on top of the slab. Been here 15yrs, and haven't had a crack yet.

Re: floor

Don Evans

My recommendation would be never purchase a broom, instead purchase a good shop vacuum. Much less air born dust with that method.

You can get a good vac at Lowes for $100 to $150.

Justify cost as "it's just part of building a shop".

Don

agree, decision is about space

Bill Tindall, E.Tn.

If you need, or can use, the space created conventional roof framing should be considered. The cost difference might not be significant.

As an aside....friend was building a shop. I convinced him to do a rafter roof. When it was framed I joked that it's length provided an opportunity to use it as an indoor range. The next year he took up air rifle shooting and .....well you can guess the rest of the story.

I'm eating up your comments.

Gary Smyth

I won't push this thread much longer but I thought a "before" image might help. The existing unheated unfinished garage was designed to over winter a boat is 33' x 27' x 14' at the roof peak. Wall studs are on 16" centers. The rear of the garage is nested into the earth bank and the interior is 9' high front to back to the bottom of the trusses. Trusses are 2x4 and 30" apart. They span the full width of the garage (27'). The floor is #2 gravel. After the new concrete pad is in place to the left of the existing building, the pad has to support a 6000lb vehicle. I plan on coming off perpendicular to the existing roof with a gable supported (so far) by 8x8 posts and the long end facing the driveway same as the existing doors. Height will remain a 9' ceiling height.

Additional comments welcome

Interior of existing bay one.

;

Re: ditch the trusses ~ Disagree

Larry Clinton At Frankfort, (Central) Indiana

I built my 30' X 30' shop using engineered trusses. They were designed to provide an upstairs storage room 30' long X 10' wide with adequate strength to allow the storage of all the wood the space would allow! The truss builder was less than 20 mile from my build site and they delivered and stacked beside the site.

It is currently full with a narrow walkway through the center, access is provided via a pull down heavy duty ladder. After storing for a year or two, I measured the ceiling to floor to see if there was any "sag". There was none. The entire truss system and roof decking was done in one day with about 5 people.

The trusses are also built so that I can cut an opening in either end to install an exterior entrance if I want to add one.

I have built a home before so do know how to cut rafters etc., but this installation was both less expensive and quicker to install.

To each his own!

Re: I never thought I'd do this -- compressor

DEAN Q JOHNSON

Here's a series of pictures of my garage/shop build from several years ago. We finished with ten-foot sidewalls, in-floor heat, used trusses etc. A couple of things we did was to run dust collection under the slab to allow central location of table saw and we used industrial linoleum tile for flooring. Sixteen years later it still cleans up well. Keeping the dust collection and compressor on the 'garage' side of the building can help with the noise factor.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/zVTYZwlRqlIiUda42

We were very lucky that our friends and neighbors are craftsmen by trade. Which reduced cost significantly.

Re: Sheetrock.....

Brian Holcombe

Sounds about right, I have plenty of friends and family who do beautiful work in the trades. However, I’ve had a few situations which caused me to do pretty much everything myself.

It helps one feel good when you can always rely upon yourself.