well as many of you may know we are buying a new home, and I need a ideas for the Garage. It is a 2 car 27x27, As of now it has 2 110 lines of juice, phone,2 Big doors with openers and two medium size windows . I plan on doing a rewire and Insulation, then doing the walls and the ceiling. I am not shure what Wall board I am going to use as of yet. When it is done it is going to be verry nice! I have been collecting nice posters for a while and some nice banners. It will be painted white with red trim.I will also installing a hanging heater in one corner and a window AC, Is there anything that you all maybe can think of that I need to do now while it is in the Bare wall stage? anthing that would help down the road?? I **MAY*** get a lift in a few years, but that is on the back burner.. This garage will be like my polishing habit but worse! It will be like a room for me that is just not attached to the house and has cars in it
Posted by Jim Mac (Member # 113) on :
What about installing a wet bar along with a big screen TV?
Seriously, I'd look at either getting a liner for the garage floor, or (I don't know if this actually exists) painting the garage floor with oil/grease resistant paint. Another thing would be to designate a particular area as your "work bench" area and amply wire it with outlets and electrical boxes for lights and other applications. You may also want to consider how many amps you'll be running to the garage, as a heater can really put a big dent in your power supply. The last thing you want to do is to be constantly blowing circuits. You may need to upgrade the breakers in your electrical box. Another thing would be to have multiple light sources on the ceiling so that excessive shadowing can be eliminated. And consider installing several reel lights so that no matter where you're working in the garage, you can pull one or two over to provide extra light.
Instead of installing a window AC in one of the windows, why don't you see if they can permanently install a window unit somewhere close to the ceiling? And have them wire a wall switch to activate it.
Hope this helps. I'll post anything else I think of.
Posted by HTWLSS (Member # 117) on :
Well, since we're right in the middle of garage construction......here's what we're doing.
The floor has been painted with a water based, two part epoxy paint called NitoFlor WB130 (formerly NitoFlor FC130). It's similar to the stuff you see on the floor of aircraft hangars.
We will be using textured, vinyl/plastic panels that come in 4x8' sheets (like you see in rest rooms, commercial kitchens, restaurants, meat rooms in grocery stores, etc.) on the lower half of the garage walls to protect the sheetrock and make for easy clean up if they get marred.
In addition to the ceiling lighting, we'll mount a few lights vertically to the walls.
We'll also be wiring it with surround sound so we can have friends over for NASCAR parties, movies, etc. Some kind of large TV or big screen is in the future.
As far as the decor, the curtains will look like Racing Flags (or be in other auto related themed fabrics that I find.)
Also, a few years ago we purchased a set of billboard panels of a Camaro Convertible......that'll go somewhere.
The rest of the walls will have framed Camaro posters and advertisements that we've collected over the years.
[ 01 October 2001: Message edited by: HTWLSS ]
Posted by DaddySS (Member # 848) on :
While the walls are bare, add outlets every 6 feet around the walls, you can never have too many oulets in a garage. Install the wiring for flourescent lite fixtures on the walls about 6 to 8 feet up, especially on the front wall, if you plan to do your own work they are invaluable. Also, if you plan to get a compressor, you may want to build a hut for it ouside the garage and bring the line in through the wall, install the electrical for that now. If it doesn't have it already, install a drain, this way if you put water proof material on the lower half like HTWLSS suggests, you could wash it inside. If you don't have water and a slop sink, run those pipes now, and add a hose outlet near the door.
When you're done with those things, c'mon back and we'll think up more!
[ 01 October 2001: Message edited by: DaddySS ]
Posted by Deanne (Member # 1057) on :
Wow....what a bunch of great ideas! I just made it back into a house after being in an apartment for a year. Trying to get the 2 car garage set up for the Camaro and Grand Prix. I want to do some restoration work on the Camaro and then I'm always waxing/polishing the Grand Prix. I added a few flourescent lights and the floor already had that aircraft hanger type coating...I need more lights and outlets though. The concern I have about this garage is the hot water heater is in the far back corner...right in the same spot that the garage recesses some and a work bench would fit perfectly. Not sure how to handle that. Teri...I love the curtain ideas!! The wall board sounds great too. Thanks for posting all these suggestions!
Posted by poSSum (Member # 119) on :
In additition to lots of electrical power we had 2 - 25 twisted pair cables run to the garage as well. They'll be used for phone, computer network (gotta be able to get the message board and install university into the garage) alarm, perhaps intercom and whatever other new electronics will come our way.
We also had a spare 1" conduit run at the same time to be able to run whatever idea comes up next.
Posted by XLR8NSS (Member # 1065) on :
Dont forget a small refrigerator to keep the Budwiesers cold!
