The ChasR Manshed

It's good to see it's got a bit of conversation going!


Apologies for being away. I've been quite a busy chap! I'm still putting stuff away, and the garage has changed a little too. Well, slightly.




Damn, I may have already broken that one, albeit, it cane be moved elsewhere . With a shutdown week coming up, I plan on doing that.

Cheers.



Do you have a link to the kind of USB you used?

I was going to leave the walls as they were, bar maybe mount some memorabilia on with HD adhesives, and hang frames off the roof studs, thus, avoid drilling the interior.

The ventilation I was going to leave, as the chap clearly built the garage with ventilation in mind, so as to keep the cars he had there in good shape .

The mice I may well have to consider. It doesn't look like they have been here before but time will tell. Interesting to see all of the suggestions around how to deal with them, in addition to issues arising from it.



Nah, I'll be living in this!

But in all honesty, there is indeed a house on this. I've deliberately left the shots out of the house for semi-obvious reasons. While I'm sure folks on this forum are fine, it's the folks outside of this place whom concern me.



The last guy and the neighbour put in a decent amount of effort.

The last owner knocked down the previous garage and put this workshop in its place. I'm quite surprised he kept the construction similar to what was there before, and even the pebbling outside.

I'm told that outside of the garage, it was just a mudpit. At the same time the garage was done, the last owner and the current neigbour dug out the back and put in the stones and hardcore, which should help in the future .

As said, I never planned on moving into a place with a garage, or even this area! But when I saw the place, I knew I'd have to try putting in an offer, and rustling together some monies.

So, what have I been doing?

Firstly, I have actually started doing more work inside it. However, with no lights, I was going to struggle!

As a result, I got myself a single LED Batten. I know I know. In my defence, I am trying to keep some cash aside for sorting out of the floor, for the reasons Bstardchild alluded too. It will be very hard to sort out once I have alot of stuff in there. I am considering either self-levelling compound or polishing the floor. The Breathable tiles look like a good idea and get amazing reviews. However, I do worry about losing small things down them, hence my reluctance to go with them. We'll see what I decide on, which will be soon.

At least I could see what I was doing at nighttime, which allowed me to do some work for one of the cars. I'll update this soon in the relevant thread.

Furthermore, I have my first car inside it! It's not the one I expected but life sometimes works out that way. At least nothing is in place permanently yet.

As you can see, I have the one batten in place. I'm planning on placing that up top, but am looking into options of moutning them on the ceiling without drilling into the beams. This would involve somehow securing them to the beam fixings which are midway down the beams.

Yeah leaving photos off is cool and I’d hoped that was the case I was just impressed for a first house you’ve found one with such a massive garage space!

Nice space you have there.

The last two places we had had garages, but too small to work in, so the car had to come out onto the street. Then you couldn't do any job that would immobilise the car, or more to the point you daren't do anything that may immobilise the car because of any issue you come across. Kind of limits you a bit.

Now I've got loads of room and a list of stuff I can do at leisure and without worry. Luxury!

Enjoy yourself in there. 

Cheers folks!

I'll bear in in mind mk2cossie. I was thinking of self levelling compound but I think I'm steering more towards 3 avenues

-Just painting what's there. Being riibbled, it probably will chip at some point with jacks etc. going over
-Polishing the concrete as blackpopracing stated and then chuck paint on ;. The old man who would be helping is not keen on this, as he reckons it will take forever, and will create alot of dust.
-Epoxy flooring as you have said. I'll have to reach out for quotes ; A friend of mine did it himself, so I'll have to see what is involved in that.
-Tiles ; Breathable ones, but it would be good to have a smooth floor, which I can use for social functions (i.e if it's raining outside, and folks can chill inside etc.

However, I've fallen foul of bstardchild's theme. It's now got stuff in, albeit, not beyond emptying. Stripping my friend's ST220 has not helped there, as has trying to get rid of the 'other' ST220 parts (i.e fitting them onto mine). But at least my ST220 is making quick progress now, in part down to having a garage on quite literally my doorstep, and my drive to basically remove stuff I don't need from the garage, and that includes parts currently on the car.

On the above, I'll have to commit to making a decision by some point. The cars moving elsehwhere is not a problem, as I have space both here, and at other places .

Well, it's about time this thread was revived.

Truth be told, the garage has seen a few changes!

However, the floor has not been covered. So that will be tackled next.

The plan is to get the floor covered in a known epoxy paint, which a friend recommended.

However, I'm decided whether I smooth the floor off or not. I'm currently thinking I don't for now.

The stuff I'm buying is the Floorsaver Epoxy paint, which a friend has recommended. This comprises of the following

-An etcher, which physically fizzes onto the concrete, thus bonding itself onto it.
-The 2 part epoxy paint, which eventually goes off.

I've seen a mate use it, where he has a similar setup to me, regarding the type of floor. His floor has been very good with the stuff.

Yup, the trolley jack can move about fine as it is. A few are telling me just to treat the floor as it is, to not make the job more of a mammoth job.

For me, it's more about stopping the dust, and having something which won't always flake off.

So, things begun. First or all however, I needed to plan on what paint to use. One thing was for sure. I wouldn't be using Trade Paint.

So the free stuff I got would be gifted on. I'd end up using something else instead.




Also courtesy of Mighty Car Mods, I'd be inspired to try out a Banh Mi before even getting to work. I can recommend these!




Eventually, I'd clear out the garage however, where the fun would begin:

Cheers fella! That's not a bad idea about the bollards to be fair.

Regarding the garage floor, I could not put it off any longer. I'd need to get stuck in. Regarding paint, I decided that I'd go for Epoxy Resin, hoping for a hard wearing surface. It was a friend's recommendation. I debated surface grinding the concrete or, self levelling it, but it would have added in alot of time for possible not much practical gain.

First thing to do was to get some tools to paint the floor with:




One of the things called for was a plastic rose ended watering can, which I could use later for watering plants anyway. I thought about the teachings of Walter White when I got this



But before I could do anything more, I'd need to sweep the floor down. But Jesus, it was very dusty!




Eventually, I would start on the first step of the dance. Etch the floor. I was using floor etcher, which in essence, is effectively diluted Hydrochloric acid. The concrete took alot of it! Enough for me to run out! I would end up getting brick acid, and spreading this out. I would then jetwash off the remains after the concrete had reacted with the acid.

In essence, you put down the acid due to the concrete's surface being Alkali. The acid neutralises the surface, removing the latience (top surface) at the same time. In theory, it neutralises the surface, so that the paint can stick to the concrete, and not the dust/dirt on top of the concrete. We all know how dusty new concrete can be.


After this was done, I'd jetwash off the surface until I could see no more dirt leave the surface. This took quite some time.




Once this had dried off enough, I began to paint. The floor can still be painted in a damp state, since the epoxy resin paint I bought is water based.



It's fair to say the first coat was being taken in quite a bit. Being a 2 pack paint, it had a limited working time.








Eventually, I'd paint it all:




After which, everything I took out would begin to go back in. But doesn't it look much better with the floor done?

Looks great! The floorsaver Epoxy is good - used the same in mine and it's held up pretty well.

Agreed on the walls if you have the time - makes a huuuuge difference in brightening the workspace