Megaplex Construction

[schmoo]

Sooo jealous! Here is my garage (the open one) an driveway:


Even without the snow, I have no room.

[Ian]

Your picture of snow has just ruined my day

[rmicroys]

Sooo jealous! Here is my garage (the open one) an driveway:
<snip out photo>
Even without the snow, I have no room.

Ha! That was me in 2005. I know the feeling. Try that driveway, garage, and all with 3 cars, a truck, racecar and a 24' enclosed trailer. When the whole fleet was on my street I was a favorite with all my neighbors - you know it!

[schmoo]

Sorry Ian. Think SnowX and skiing?! Better now?

[JGraves]

Sooo jealous! Here is my garage (the open one) an driveway:
<snip out photo>
Even without the snow, I have no room.

Ha! That was me in 2005. I know the feeling. Try that driveway, garage, and all with 3 cars, a truck, racecar and a 24' enclosed trailer. When the whole fleet was on my street I was a favorite with all my neighbors - you know it!

Same here in 2005. A car at a friend's, motorcycle in the basement, sled in the back yard, truck, trailer and 4 cars in the driveway and street.

[PMcD]

Hah. Thats me now. Trailer barely fits in the driveway. I have bumpers on the back patio and fenders in the basement. Still have a 200 litre drum of fuel, 8 tires and wheels, a transmission, and an engine to come.

[Ian]

I moved because I got tired of juggling four cars in the driveway everytime I wanted to do something. Now everything is tucked away nicely in the garage.

We should all get together and start a support group or something ... "Hi, I'm Ian and I have a problem". I guess in a way, that's what MCO is

[wing]

Same here, bought a house with a big driveway haha

[andregt6]

Oh don't get me started.

Single lane tow house...

I need help.

[John Powell]

... Single lane tow house...

You have a motorhome with a laneway?

[andregt6]

hehe

I wish.

Town House.

I wish I had a 24' trailer and a motorhome.

A.

[cjpye]

I was just visiting a friend in Nova Scotia and was quite jealous of his new, 2 storey, 2 car garage on his 7 acre lot. Lots of room for two cars and a nice space above.

On the other hand, for someone who lives in downtown Ottawa, my single car attached garage, double driveway with parking for 4 cars (1 inside a fenced-in area) is pretty good.

It's all relative.

Chris

[rmicroys]

I took this week off work. After gathering supplies last weekend, getting scaffolding, etc, we worked for 5 days straight to 'pre-wire' the garage for inspection. This place has more wire than most people's homes - and it's only got 1 room! Wow. What a job, also the brutal job of fixing the stupid panel that first electrician left us. In a fairly cramped spot on the wall, the guy mounted the panel sideways of all directions possible... It would have made it nearly impossible to route 1/2 the wires around the panel to the far side. Class act I tell you.

At least I had a good friend from Toronto come up who is an electrician and help me out for the last two days. Turned out great I think. He wasn't 100% happy with his work - knowing that he could have made it look better, but given the circumstances, I think it's pretty snappy. Had to get a splitter panel, 2m of 3/3 wire to relocate the panel properly, and a lot of cursing today trying to bend 3ga wire around the tight confines in the boxes in the cold today. Now that it's almost all done, I think we did pretty good. I have one more 120V outlet to put in once we figure out where the projector for the TV goes, then we'll do the last of the low voltage stuff and then all the wiring it pretty much done. Get the pre-wire inspection done early next week. Maybe even start picking away at some of the insulation this weekend... now if the garage doors were only on, then at least we could make it comfortable inside. They should finally get put up next week - there was a little bit of a bumble when they managed to ship the wrong style of door. Oh well, the builder made good on it, and it's getting done. I think by the end of next weekend, I may have the insulation mostly complete... then I can at least get the plumber back in to commission the boiler and then we can make the place comfortable and finish the last of the work that we're going to do on the garage this year... then I'll pickup with drywalling the place in the spring. As the cars are going in to storage shortly, I think I'm going to run out of time to get the place drywalled. Oh well. Wait until spring and move out all the cars, and then get the drywall completed.

[morrow]

Rob, if ever a place deserved a move-in party, it is your Megaplex!

Jeannie

[rmicroys]

Rob, if ever a place deserved a move-in party, it is your Megaplex!

Jeannie

Yes, yes it will.

[rmicroys]

So, after the rest of the weekend, we got as much of the insulation complete as we could given the fact that we could not cover the wiring for the pre wire inspection. Got all the low voltage stuff in as well. It's looking pretty snappy. Inspection is on Tuesday, so work begins again after that to complete the insulation.

We used Roxul for the walls, not bad stuff actually. Very nice to work with as long as you don't have to 'cram' it in to tight spaces. I think I'll need a bale of R22 pink for some of the tight corners and such. If one over handles the roxul, it starts to break apart badly and probably leaves air gaps and such. All and all, I'm super happy with the progress I made in the 9 days available to me. Certainly there were a few days where it was pretty cool in the garage - and on Friday AM when we rewired the panel which is right by the open bay doors for the garage (because they're not installed yet) my friend rewiring the panel nearly froze because he was standing there as the breeze swirled in to the garage around him. We had to staple up some sacrificial plastic sheeting to keep the wind down for him. But other than that, the temperatures were quite bearable.

I think by next week this time I may have the whole place insulated - that's the dream, we'll see how far we can get. I may have to bail on some extracurricular activities at night in order to get it all done but with the cool temps coming, I'd love to be able to commission the heater and be able to dress normally, rather than have 5 layers of clothing on...

[rmicroys]

Whoohoo! I have garage doors! Now one man door needs to be fixed as the concrete guys poured the slab a little too high at one door and it doesn't swing open. Well... almost there to having a closed in garage with locking doors and stuff!

[rmicroys]

Latest photos...

Electrical panel... boy there's a lot of wires there for a one room building... much better looking now that it has been relocated from the original sideways position the original electrician left it in.



Okay... did the builder pick that garage door opener on purpose?



The rest of the shots...





Racecar stored already for the season, gives nice perspective and scale.

[andregt6]

Right I have to unsubscribe to this thread.

Its not good for my morale

A.

[shwafia]

Wow ... great garage! Exactly what I hope to build at the next house.

[GoesFilled]

I gotta get me one of those..

[rmicroys]

... And the lord said, let there be light!

[jkcashin]

I gotta get me one of those..

Fortunately, you have support on this endeavour.

Jamie

[rmicroys]

Spent last night with my father and Mike White for 3 hours, I spent about a hour wrapping up the details on the central vac tubing/wiring, and they started insulating the ceiling. I then went about foaming all the holes we drilled in to the top plate for all the wiring and vacuum tubes, etc. Then I put on my 'get covered in itch' gear and started picking away at the insulation myself. I was amazed we got it about 1/2 done. What a difference already! The construction heater even turned itself off by the time we wrapped up for the night - that was a first. So even 1/2 completed it was making a huge difference to the heat loss. We should have the insulation complete by the end of the w/e, maybe even have all the vapour barrier up. Then I can get Scott to come back and commission the boiler, and finish the rest of the plumbing... Then we have warmth to finish off the rest of the details, and we can then store the cars. It's getting right to that time too. Perfect.

[rmicroys]

No updated photos or anything... but I've got all the insulation done. The vapor barrier is all hung on the ceiling, most of the walls are completed. I'm off to buy a pile of tape today and have fun taping all the seams, boxes, outlets, etc tonight. I may even be able to start drywalling the ceiling tomorrow.

The plumber and gas fitter stopped in this morning and are hooking up the boiler. Looks like I can turn off the electrical heater and go radiant! Whoot! It will be nice with the warm floor, and have a programmable thermostat.