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I have to agree with the idea of the living quarters on the main floor. As you get older, it is definitely a chore getting things like groceries up the stairs.
Scott's last garage was very similar to this one in layout. Their house was out front and helped hide the garage from the street. Their last house was a bungalow and this one is a side split level style.

His last library which housed his documentation, memorabilia, and trophies was at the side of the garage, separated by glass doors. It had a fireplace and a bar. It was great in that it separates car and hobby functions from private living. He could hold a guys car get together without bugging his wife.

His last garage housed 5 cars and a 2 post lift accessed from two doors in the front.

It really did get the creative juices flowing, but there is no way on earth that I could afford anything like this.
 
Thankfully, I live in a hilly area so that I can have the garage portion as a drive-in basement and still keep the living space on grade level above. The last residential elevator I installed was only $20k though, so that'd would certainly be cheaper than expanding the footprint to accommodate everything on one level. I do like the man cave idea in the garage, but I don't know that I need it separated from the garage itself. Then again, I'd blow myself up with a nice fireplace in the garage if I don't remember to extinguish the pilot light before spraying chemicals the way I do.
 
But my current House is just over 1400 square feet and my garage is 1200 - i only wish the roof in the garage was taller or vaulted, its 11 feet but more clearance would have been nice.
That's about where I'm at too square footage-wise. I would have gone taller on the shop building but architecturally, it would have looked disproportionate if the roof of the shop were significantly taller than the roof of the house. Its OK tho. Since I'm short, I don't have to lift a car very high to stand under it. ;) Sports cars I can work under just fine. Its only when I put my pickup truck on the lift that I wish I had a taller ceiling. But I know people who have lifts in a standard attached garage with an 8 foot ceiling. Its still great for working on the brakes and suspension since its like putting the whole car on top of your workbench, and for working underneath, they just use a small stool with casters similar to the way you'd use a creeper with jackstands.
 
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Interesting timing of this converation...
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I solved the door issue you guys are talking about. Although its actually stalling my permit process as there an issue with the sizing of the beam over the door. Putting a double door on the side wall puts a lot of load on the beam over it.

Anyways, looking at the pic with the garage door, the lift will be on the far left, and room for a car next to it, and a bodyshop room on the far right, but rotated 90deg so you have to make a sharp corner coming to enter it, and another bay next to that as well. Fits 4 cars comfortably and only the one in the middle has to come out to access any of the other 3 bays. Could squeeze 7 cars in though if I was just ramming them all in. Trying to get my fleet down to 4.

Similar ratio as above posts too. 1200sqft shop, 1220sqft house, but I hope to punch it up to 1400 at some point. Of course the shop has 16 foot walls so twice the interior volume. No interest in living quaters in it though. I do too much welding, metal work and bodywork. It would be way too noisy to live in that space. Not that I could do it with my zoning here anyways. I could have rezoned and done a carriage house, but again, no one is going to want to live above my shop lol.

This thread has been very inspirational... also going to cost me a lot of money lol.
 
Somewhere, I have a fat magazine (American from the mid 80's) with ONLY garages, I'll try to see if I can find it, surely to my wife's frustration.. :p
 
That sounds like trouble!

I spent a year just playing with the floor plan and figuring out where everything is going to go before going to the architects.
you shouldn't be allowed to post in this thread until you break ground. think of it as gentle encouragement for forward progress.
 
HEY!
He is bouncing these ideas off of this board!
This not a tease. It is still in the planning stages.
The double door will require a HUGE steel beam. Granted.
 
MOAR OPEL GT PLZ!

--billyM
It only took 5 years, but I am here to deliver. I talked my buddy out of this old 72 Opel GT, sold my rx7 project and datsun pickup to make space to work in there. Still have a mk2 parts car out front I need to strip and clear out though... You can juuuust make out the now clean corner where it used to live. Oh we got a lift in there now too, love that thing. Added quite a few more 4' LED lights and the place is downright enjoyable to work in now. Still trying to figure out the best fan method to make it bearable for more of the day, all summer it's just miserable between about 11am and 8pm. Picked up a 4' belt driven barrel fan today actually, not sure if it'll be best to suck air out, blow air in, or what, but i'll be happy to have moving air for sure.

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Little bit of rust behind the wheels, but overall a very clean car. Plan at the moment is to replace every rubber bit needed to get it safe, enjoy it as is for a bit, and decide if it's fun enough to drive to justify throwing a beams or something at it. Love the look of these old 13" wheels, but tire selection is laughable. 15/16x7 +20 offset 4x100mm wheels seem to be what most places offer for these, very easy to find these specs. There is actually a set of rpf1's in 14x7 +28 with 205/55 r888's that is SUPER tempting locally, but I'm hoping for something a little more classic styling. Just under 23" diameter tires are much easier to find as well which is nice.
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The opel was in full storage mode in this pic below, you can't even see it in the corner. This supra and the rx7 are sold, and the ole heirloom white one lives at home. Getting big heavy duty shelves is a game changer, not sure what took us so long honestly. You can see all the random crap all over the floors because there was no way to get bulky heavy things stored up on the loft safely.
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Got a multiprocess welder to play with, no idea what I'm doing but I'm having fun figuring it out. Made a little cart as a first project that is great for long distance travel, but I need to build a stand for that with 4 casters for shuffling around the shop with it. My buddy is a certified pro and shows me the ropes and answers questions I can't find on google, very very handy to have skilled friends.
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Home garage is rockin these days as well with the Supra and a couple motorcycles at any given time. The 06 VFR 800 i just ride and haul things/bicycles on, 86 VFR700 family heirloom in pic is actually all done and at a friends house to make space while I'm restoring a grey market 86 VFR400R. Bicycles get to live inside because honestly I use those more than anything else I own.
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Quarantine has really helped me appreciate having multiple projects going. Friends that didn't have hobbies before are scrambling for things to do, and I feel like a hoarderline king. When i hit a stopping point on one project, there is almost always something else I can find to do on another one.

That's about where I'm at too square footage-wise. I would have gone taller on the shop building but architecturally, it would have looked disproportionate if the roof of the shop were significantly taller than the roof of the house. Its OK tho. Since I'm short, I don't have to lift a car very high to stand under it. ;) Sports cars I can work under just fine. Its only when I put my pickup truck on the lift that I wish I had a taller ceiling. But I know people who have lifts in a standard attached garage with an 8 foot ceiling. Its still great for working on the brakes and suspension since its like putting the whole car on top of your workbench, and for working underneath, they just use a small stool with casters similar to the way you'd use a creeper with jackstands.
That is the exact problem I have when I put my van up on the lift. It is still better than crawling around under the thing, but not nearly as nice as lifting sports cars way up high. Funny enough this van is actually about the same length as a MK2, but such a weird/fun thing to drive in its own way. I usually bicycle/motorcycle/supra in that order when I need to get somewhere, and the girlfriend gets the van. The van also doesn't get to live inside, but only 1 vehicle living outside out of all the garbage I own aint bad.
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I always liked the Opal GT and considered restoring one many years ago. At the time, they were very similar situation to the Supra, built in similar quantities over about the same number of years, but ten years earlier. Little aftermarket support. About 20 years ago I went and visited a guy who who had a private Opal GT junkyard near Leonard, TX to learn more about them. He had probably about 30 of them sitting outside irrecoverable, just for parts, and another 15 inside a barn that maybe had some chance of being resurrected, but still mostly too far gone to be worth it at that point in time. I never did follow through with buying and restoring an Opel GT, rather went for its American big brother instead. Still on the wish list tho.
 
Damn nice sir! I always liked the way the Opal GT's looked.
This thread is making me want a lift more and more - Im targeting the spring - but i want a 4 post lift, its more for storage than working, but will see plenty of work time too.
I Have a 1974 Karmann Ghia Convertible that sat for 30 years that will sit up on the lift for a bit.

Maybe i should just build a whole new massive garage - you guys are a bad influence.
Thanks!
 
HEY!
He is bouncing these ideas off of this board!
This not a tease. It is still in the planning stages.
The double door will require a HUGE steel beam. Granted.
It will be a Parallam actually. Its a wood frame building so putting a single steel beam in is a pain. That was the last hang up with the permit to resolve, just got that dealt with yesterday. Knock on wood, the permit goes thru now. Well past the planning stage, this is what we call pre-production in the video game biz lol
Got a 100+ foot tree to take down first, that should happen in the next couple weeks.

Sweet Opel Gamble! I've always liked the looks of them. I have an itch for something like that one day too, a 2000gt would be nice... lol

2 post is where its at for working on cars that's for sure, but 4s have their place. I actually had to buy my lift already, there was a big trade show (well trade show pricing at least this year, via Lordco) about a month ago and the pricing was as good as it was going to get for the next year or so I jumped on it, and with no place to put it either. Luckily their heavy equipment division said they'd just keep it and they'll bring in another for me anytime I'm ready for it. Its a Rotary so they stock about 5 of that model at any given time so it was no big deal for them.
 
Finished my welding table awhile ago. top is 60inx30in 3/4in thick plate. Whole thing weighs about 700lbs. I set it next to my tool box. My 14in Dewalt chop saw fits on the bottom. The 2in receivers hold the mounts for my vices, bench grinder etc... so I can pull them off and put them on the bottom shelf when not in use. Top shelf has the long power strip and holds all of my grinders. I have one for each type of disc. Cut off wheel, wire wheel, flap disc, grinding disc, cup brush, Multi tool, tungsten grinder for my tig, etc... Also have 2 pieces of 2in box 3ft long that I put can slide into the receivers to hold some 3x5 1/4in angle to set things on, such as Lawn mower engines, 4 wheeler engine, differentials etc... when working on them. Table is occupied by the engine for my 4 wheeler at the moment. I mounted a 10,000 lumen shop light right above it. Makes it a nice place to work. I have 6 4ft 5000 lumen Shop lights for the garage itself. Mounted 2 of them already, need to ge the other 4 put up and the rest of the garage cleaned up so I can put my 84 in there.
 

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Little aftermarket support. About 20 years ago I went and visited a guy who who had a private Opel GT junkyard near Leonard, TX to learn more about them. He had probably about 30 of them sitting outside irrecoverable, just for parts, and another 15 inside a barn that maybe had some chance of being resurrected, but still mostly too far gone to be worth it at that point in time. I never did follow through with buying and restoring an Opel GT, rather went for its American big brother instead. Still on the wish list tho.
I keep hearing stories about this private Opel junk yard... need to find how to contact and see if he has any rear quarters or an AC system I can snag. Parts are really tough to find for these, better off skipping past the stock baby brakes that fit under 13's and upgrading to retrofit stuff where people still make rotors and such, i'd have to special order stock rotors for this thing... I did find a forum for these cars, seems decent, just having to learn an entirely new chassis to get the basics going.


William that is a slick welding table. We've got a workbench on one side, and a couple welding tables that we can move around as needed. They seem to end up being project work surfaces here and there, but that's fine because they don't weigh 700lbs, but on the flip side while welding on them I have to be careful not to warp the tops because they don't weigh 700lbs. I've been trying not to use the chop saw since i got a portaband, less cutoff, less cleanup, and less dust to be hacking up later on. I still end up grinding to clean edges of course, but every little bit of dust knocked down is a win in my book.
 
Light it UP!
My main workshop is as bright as a tanning booth.
Not as big as Williamb82's.
All 5,000 daylight spectrum. Not yellow.
 
Your welding table looks like you bought it in a store, and I don't mean HF. :) Very well thought out design. As to lighting, I just last month replaced all my old 8 foot florescent bulbs with

Single Pin 65W T8 V Shaped 8FT LED Tube Light 270 Angle, Single Pin FA8 Base 7800LM 6000K Cold White, 8 Foot Double Side

Just simply bypassed the ballast inside, essentially straight positive at one end and negative at the other. The difference is almost night and day and I am very pleased. I forget what spec the old bulbs were, but I do remember they were "daylight" color temperature. They were probably seven or eight years old, but they were never anywhere near as bright as the LEDs to begin with.

The key tho to lighting is figuring out where to put them. Mine are all essentially directly over the center of each bay which is great for working on the engine. But while its now enough light for the building, I can't see well enough to work in the wheel wells that are facing the walls. If the wheel well is facing the adjacent bay, its just fine, but not enough light reflects off of all of the "stuff" that lines the perimeter walls. So I plan to add another row of singles directly above the "aisle" on the outside of the bays.

8FT LED Shop Light Fixture, 72w 7200 Lumens 6000K Cool White,High Output Tube Light, Double Sided V Shape T8 Integrated 8 Foot Led Bulbs

Another thing I "wish" I had would be some "up" lighting underneath the lift. It would be great to have some recessed lighting in the floor under the lift, but I don't know if it would be allowed by code or not. Part of me would worry about spilling some oil or gas or even just coolant and getting into the light fixture. But it sure would be nice.
 
Where I'm putting all my lights is something I need to decide very soon as the electrical permit will be next for permits. I'm definitly doing lower recessed lights in the walls this time for the bodyshop room. My old one has the lights on the walls, and yeah same problem, never enough light in the wheel wells.

Nice bench Will!
I think I'm sticking with my old wood one, its worked well for me, but also I have a huge 6x4 laminated work table I inherited that I'm going to cut in half and make 2 workstations out of for the clean areas. I'm making a fully enclosed metal working room plus a bodyshop room so the main area will be very clean this time.
 
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