Shop Build. Finally Broke Ground.

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Don't let the wife get ducks!!! I speak from experience!
Yeah, the one boss at the Shop, his wife has ducks. I think everything he owns smells of them... :yuck:
 
It's been a long 3 month wait, but progress again. The building kit was supposed to be delivered at the end of April, but was delayed until today. Kind of a bummer since I rushed everyone to have the slab ready to go by spring, but at least it should be fully cured by now.

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4 semi loads so far. Lots of steel. Final semi is inbound tomorrow with all of the metal panels.

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Beams and columns scattered throughout the property. Good thing we cleared the pasture space as it is currently providing storage for steel and wood.

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Those are some pretty hefty beams. The footprint provides a bit of scale.

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I'll post an update weekly but we should have it fully framed by July, then wood framing for the living quarters a few weeks later. Plan is still to have it move in ready by the end of the year.
 
Day 1 of erection on Monday.

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Day 4 of erection today. Pretty good for a 4 man crew over 4 days. I wish I could have taken some time off of work to watch them. I did not fully comprehend the scale of this thing until the first beams when up. Bigger than I had imagined.

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FJ40 checking out its new home. It will be nice to have all of the cruisers inside and under the same roof!

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I was in awe when I started on page 1. Three pages more and I am still in awe…. Great building, great views, plenty of power..spectacular. We don’t see this much in NJ
 
I was in awe when I started on page 1. Three pages more and I am still in awe…. Great building, great views, plenty of power..spectacular. We don’t see this much in NJ

Thanks! There was a lot of work that went into the planning, over a fairly extended period of time. Just like any project, there were plenty of delays, setbacks, and price increases, but we were determined to push through and get this from a plan set to an actual building. I definitely was inspired by other projects in this subforum, and appreciate all of the feedback and great ideas that I have received along the way. Some of the best advise has been to oversize what you think you "need" by at least 20%, same with power.

This is probably the most exciting stage of the build. All of the hard decisions have already been made, now I get to sit back and watch it take shape. I'm letting my wife handle all of the interior finish choices in the living area from here on.
 
Well your plan has come together…. My pole barn was completed about 20 months ago and I waited 35+ years to do it… in a discussion of new costs, it would take nearly 65% more money than it did in February 2022 … as for size, I live in a rural spot, plenty of land ( not like yours. In NJ, they’d drop 100 house in there) …no neighbors close by, and NO ONE can see my building and it is my road…..Yet the town dictates 150’ off the property lines, 1200 sq ft max and a few other small invasive details. Anything over 5 acres in NJ can apply for farm assessment… I can do that which then means property taxes for the land are less, not the house and…. You can put up any size building…. anywhere you want as a farm or woodland management.

If I were not at the tail end of things …I would have gone farm… but it’s an 18 month process, I’m 71 and enjoying the s#!t I still try to do so why put it off another 1 1/2 years. Your oversize thinking is 101% accurate. I am easily 1500 sqft short
 
Purlins, girts, and x braces going in, along with some framed window openings. The erector crew wants to start skinning and insulating the center section next week, then do the lean to's after.

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Full length back porch is going to be nice. 10' under the low point and 10' deep. Almost ready for concrete. So far we are at 190 yds of concrete. Crazy how expensive that stuff is. Next week will be interesting to see the sheet metal go on. Hopefully we chose wisely on our colors.

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More progress. We were hoping to start wood framing in July, but that is looking like August now. Lumber prices seem to be holding just above their YTD lows so that is good. Wood boiler has been ordered, along with a 500 gallon thermal storage tank. Ordering garage doors as soon as the lean to drive door openings are framed. I have been back and forth on full liner panels vs drywall on the first 6-8' above floor, then liner panels the rest of the way, and am still leaning towards full liner panels. Only other pending critical decision for now is selecting exterior stone for the front wainscoat, which is going to be like 6' tall.

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Both from the asthetics and installation side I'd choose full liner panels. Transitioning from metal to something else is tricky. Metal has been way cheaper than finished sheet rock in my shop. Electrical is the one aspect that gets complicated with liner panels. In a 36x50 wood framed portion of my shop I ran panels horizontal and put outlets in the wall. Worked out perfectly to code between 2 ribs. In the main machine area steel building with 20' ceilings and a crane I ran metal insulated panels vertical and all electrical runs in busway and conduit.

So if you run ribs vertical you'll probably be running conduit. It's not so bad though. I like doing it and trying to make it look nice.
 
Both from the asthetics and installation side I'd choose full liner panels. Transitioning from metal to something else is tricky. Metal has been way cheaper than finished sheet rock in my shop. Electrical is the one aspect that gets complicated with liner panels. In a 36x50 wood framed portion of my shop I ran panels horizontal and put outlets in the wall. Worked out perfectly to code between 2 ribs. In the main machine area steel building with 20' ceilings and a crane I ran metal insulated panels vertical and all electrical runs in busway and conduit.

So if you run ribs vertical you'll probably be running conduit. It's not so bad though. I like doing it and trying to make it look nice.

Yes, the labor for tape/texture/paint of drywall quickly makes it a lot more expensive than liner panels. I'm definitely ok with conduit. As you mentioned, if you plan the runs well, they look ok. I think the electrician is going to run some wire for lower outlets under the liner panel in flex MC.
 
I like that you can pull the metal off to run stuff behind it. If it gets damaged you can pull some screws out, pry it out and pop the dents out. Oh, and a big one for me (as I have a 2 acre field right next to my shop) is mice and critters cannot chew through steel. They chew right through sheetrock and make homes in your walls. Tight fitting steel stops them.

And I always heard metal inside makes shops loud. My shop's pretty big with lots of machines running everyday. I don't know if I did something different from others (don't think so?), but it's pretty mellow inside. A couple 400W JBL EON15 G2's inside and the music even sounds good lol.
 
A couple 400W JBL EON15 G2's inside and the music even sounds good lol.

Now I know who to consult with when it's time for a shop sound system.
 
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It doesn't look a whole lot different, but the roof is on, along with most of the center section trim. There is a lot going on with the trim, which is taking some time. I dropped by on Friday (they usually work 4 10s) and they were still there, trying to finish the center section trim before the framers start next week. The roof is dark bronze, and the siding is slate grey. The lighting in this photo doesn't show it well, but there is a decent amount of contrast between the two.

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The framers wanted to get in before the lean too's were erected for easy access, and to avoid two different crews working in a confined space. The area above the mezzanine will be where we live for the next 2-3 years. It's 1600 Sf, with 3 bedrooms and 2 full baths. It will be somewhat tight, but still comfortable for our family of 4.

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5000g water tank. This thing is the size of two Landcruisers. That is going to be a big hole in the ground.

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Coming along nicely. So you have to truck water in? I assume a well would be prohibitively deep in that location?

We did drill a well, down to 600'. It produces about 12-13 gpm, which is fine for domestic use, but we also want to irrigate a 1 acre pasture. Best way to do that is with big impact sprinklers, but they use over 100 gpm each.

The well pump will fill the large tank, which will have 2 outlets. One outlet to a small variable speed pump to supply the workshop and future house, and the other feeding a large pump for irrigation.

Added bonus is that this system could be used for fire suppression. Wildfires are definitely a concern in our area.
 
Loving every view of this building that you’ve posted… my interior walls are spray foamed and I had to use T1-11 to protect the foam on the lower end. Wiring was all buried in the foam and I thought I had figure out all of it…but, I failed in 3 places to run my 220v compressor line, welder and a/c. 4 times the amount of work backtracking…but it was all finally hidden.

I have found that the thermal mass of the floor (about 8”) and the foam insulation keeps the place nicely cool until the end of of June here in the fabulous garden state….98* last 2 weeks
 
I have found that the thermal mass of the floor (about 8”) and the foam insulation keeps the place nicely cool until the end of of June here in the fabulous garden state….98* last 2 weeks

Thats good to know! We had two swamp coolers for the shop floor in the plans, but I may wait and see how summer temps are before ordering them. I think we have R15 batt in the walls, and R30 in the ceiling. A few commercial overhead fans will help too.

98* with NJ humidity does not sound like fun. We have been hovering around 98*, but with like 15% humidity. We also get some nice breezes off the mountains at night and usually cool down to the low 60s.

I wonder if we could plumb the radiant system in a way that would allow cold water from the well to be circulated through the system during the summer. I may have to chat with the plumber about that.
 
I wonder if we could plumb the radiant system in a way that would allow cold water from the well to be circulated through the system during the summer. I may have to chat with the plumber about that.

Geothermal !
My wife and I were looking at a house 25 years ago that had the same thing you are describing… all he used for A/C was a dehumidifier as the ground water constant was 58*..,in winter, a bump up with auxiliary heat to 70..and done.
 

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