I've noticed that quite a few posts show many of us are either building new shops, are moving into new quarters or have just gone through this stage.
While we're all in different stages, I thought it may be helpful to hear your best tip or tips while you made this transition.
My only tip so far... don't rely on all the trades to just do what they're suppose to. Babysit the project. Snoop snoop snoop from a safe distance, and ever so politely let them know your preferences if something isn't done to your spec.
The building is going really well on my shop, however countless little things have needed changing. For example, the drywallers covered a very important outlet by mistake... FOR MY COFFEE MAKER! Had it not been my coffee maker outlet, I probably would have missed it! LOL.
I changed the window sizes 3x on the shop. I told the contractor from day one I wanted those darn windows 29" off the ground so they meet my desk height. Reason being, we have a desk in our house with a window in front of it, and if I wish to look out the window, I have to stand up. PET PEEVE. I'm sitting and wana look out. Contractor says the standard are only a couple inches higher than the desk height. Fine. Windows are ordered. During the night, I lay fully awake, wondering what he meant by a couple inches. I go to measure the window from hell I hate now, and call my contractor up the next day. Lo and behold, Hell Window would have many nice homes in my new office. I change my order, agreeing to the next nearest number my contractor rambled off. Next night I lay awake again. Those windows sounded REALLY low. I get up and measure. Good grief, my desktops and mess and desk legs will show from the outside! Eck! Phone call next morning. Well looky here, I can have my windows 29" off the floor after all if I just change the size of the windows abit. I got my dream windows with a few sleepless nights. I hope my contractor still likes me.
Contractor boxes in the stairway really nice underneath for extra storage. Very nice. No junk showing. I'm thinking, this room may be needed for walking space. All the men, "Nah.. this is the right thing to do." Okey dokey. One evening, I say in passing to hubby, "Sure looks tight in here. How big of a vehicle can we pull in here anyway?" He starts to measure. I go in the house. A few minutes later I hear the hammer and saw busy at work. I go out and he's removed that beautiful man loving wall. Seems hubby's truck will just fit in the garage that way however no walking room around the vehicle due to that man loving wall. Hehehe...
I do have one more small tip. I'm glad we hired a contractor. Two of his subtrades quoted too low, so we don't have to pay for these mistakes out of our own pockets. Also, you talk to only the contractor. We had our own electrician and gas fitter, and our personal time diminished when dealing with these steps daily. Once they were done, we had our lives back again. All we hear now is bang bang bang and it isn't on our back door.
i can't say i have moved in to a new shop. i am still in the same location that i have been in for the last 8 years.
but one cool thing happened. my landlord built a cover on the backside of my shop and now for the first time, i can park a van under a cover to letter it.
posted
I got tired of working in the basement and lugging wood and HDU to the barn and pushing the horse and goat out of the way. Bought a Quonset hut in August and filed for a minor variance with my township. One thing led to another and after posting signs twice and finaly getting to my meeting and waiting, my building arrived in early December and the snow started half way through the unloading. To make a long story short, I now have a $16,229.08 metal lawn sculpture poking through two feet of snow. Spring can't come soon enough. Glad you like your contractor Donna, I called five around here including two that I made signs for and most of them didn't return the call. Guess they didn't want to bother with a one week job with no material mark-up.
posted
Donna, when we did it we drew several sets of plans scaled down to 8 1/2 x 11 pages. We drew in the areas and started trying to function on them. Where is the plywood gonna stand? What's the path for it to get there? What's in the way? How does it get to the saw? Where will the painting happen? The lettering? Trucks? How can we do it so boards can be cut while paint is drying while a truck is being lettered and what obsticles are between the toilet and every work area? We used colored pens to draw in the foot paths that will most be travelled and this identified the congestion areas. We tried to follow the path from materials coming into the shop raw through leaving as finished to make sure there was no backtracking, so many jobs could be happening at any time without interfering with one another.
We used another chart to try to draw air flow. Where would the heat come from and how will it be moved. What is the prevailing wind direction and how can we use that to our advantage? What about when it switches to the other direction? How will we evacuate paint fumes and not loose all our heat?
We did another overlay for electricity. Where will the 220 be? the 110? We set 220 outlets in the floor for some of the bigger tools like table saw and shaper so we can move around without tripping on power cords on the floor.
What about sound systems? Phone and modem lines? Get them into the walls? Find out what kinda phone wire will not cause cross talk with multiple phone lines. This is a mistake that I made by using the regular stuff supplied. Ask the questions to get set up for future requirements.
Lighting is also important. Figure out where you want it and where there will be shadows. Where to put white walls to reflect light into shadows. Also what spectrum of light.
Donna, I could share more details if I touched on anything you might want to talk about.
------------------ The SignShop Mendocino, California "Where the Redwoods meet the Surf"
Oh, for the faith of a spider! He begins his web without any thread.
Posts: 6805 | From: Mendocino, CA. USA | Registered: Nov 1998
| IP: Logged |
posted
Well, I haven't built a building from scratch, just remodeled an existing one. But some of the things I would mention are:
1) Make sure you have ample ceiling height. Think about how tou intend to use the space of each room before you just settle on an 8' or 10' ceiling. If building a bay for vehicle lettering, figure on installing at least a 10' insulated door. A regular 7' door is only sufficient for passenger cars.
2) Give careful thought to heating and A/C, and do your homework on the various systems available and their advantages/disadvantages for your application before choosing the right one.
3) For windows, call contractors and replacement window companies in your area and check on the availability of mis-sized or odd sized windows that they might have in storage. Sometimes you can get some very nice matching windows that are in essence brand new windows that someone ordered or manufactured in the wrong size. I bought three matching insulated maintenance-free windows for my shop two years ago, and the price for the windows with professional installation was $275 total.
4) Decide on the layout of your shop before you finalize door and window placement. Those things are expensive to change after the fact. Make sure you have lots of receptacles. They are inexpensive to install when the building is in progress, but fairly difficult to add afterwards. You can't have too many receptacles, especially for coffee machines! My shop has a receptacle every 6-8 feet.
5) Storage! We all need it, and thinking this out in advance is better than trying to find a place for stuff afterwards. Oftentimes we end up using valuable work space for storage because this was not thought out to begin with. If you are building on a steep grade (as I am getting ready to do), don't neglect finishing the basement of the room or addition. The cost of pouring a floor and adding adequate ceiling height to the basement is not comparable to the benefit of the space that you will definitely be using! Want light but privacy? Use glass blocks instead of windows in the basement.
6) If you don't know anything about construction, have the work checked in different stages of the building by an expert who can verify that the work is being done properly. If you are inside the corporate limits of a city, the building code people will do this as it is part of their job. Of course, it's best to use a contractor with whom you have prior experience and a record of their work. Make sure the contractor is licensed and insured to the extent that is required in your state/province/city. Carefully check references of a contractor if you haven't used them before, and never pay them the balance on the job until you are sure they have finished everything to your satisfaction and don't owe any suppliers or subcontractors for the materials/labor. In many places you can be held liable for any debt incurred by the contractor if he disappears or is unable to pay the debt!
posted
Congratulations... Glad to see the project is well under way.
I did manage to get my garage built last summer, It's set next to my shop but is sort of joined at a corner so I have access through the shop. After having been stuck in a weird little building with 7' ceilings I was craving some real height. Built 16' high with a 14' door, people kept asking me what I was going to do with the second floor, couldn't understand why I grinned when I said 'nothing' . Measures 25' x 60' long. There's nothing I can't get in there nor build in there, I love it!
Couple of ideas ...
Don't compromise, If you want it .. do it now .. It's a lot cheaper to get what you want if you do it the way you want the first time, rather than compromise and then have to renovate or make changes later.
It's your shop, you are the one who'll have to live/work in it, don't let the builders get away with too much. You're absolutely right on insisting how you want the windows.
Insulation is cheap. Impossible to have too much.. (it's important here anyway) I ended up with r42 in roof and r27 walls.
Consider how work flows through the shop, how does material get stored/used? What's the path?. Minimize walking in circles to get a job done.
Don't get too fixed on your first setup, do it, live with it for a while, work with it for a while and leave the finishing touches 'till after you're sure that the layout/working arangement works well. Allow for future devices/employees.
Run networking cableing now! (whether you need it or not!) Run sound cableing now! Telephone cableing Too!
posted
Build it alot bigger then you think you need. We had a new shop built 2 years ago 30x60 16' ceilings 2 years ago it was great now this summer we're gonna ad 30x30 at least. Big Tables, Tons of outlets. and don't forget to ad a couple 220v outlets I only put one in the main production area now I can't move my laminator around Later Gary Wiant
------------------ Gary Wiant Vinyl Graphics Unlimited Shippenville, PA
Posts: 66 | From: Shippenville, PA U.S.A. | Registered: Mar 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
Having recently moved, heres my secret... 1. Dump everything in the garage
2. Wait for the sign fairies to come and sort the good junk from the real junk.
3. Once junk has stood for a sufficient period of time, let small children at it to distribute it evenly across the floor.
4. (Optional) wait for record rainfall to inundate the floor and wet everything
5. Get first job and re-redistribute some of the stuff to one particular part of the building. (Ensure even coverage of exposed floor with vinyl backing paper, aaplication tape and multi coloured paint splatters.
6. Have (insert preferred tradesman here) come back and rip large sections of floor, wall and/or ceiling out and leave again.
7. Install your own sign at front of premises and presto, you're in business.
The order of procedures listed above are suggested only, you can rearrange them to suit your specific requirements. Think I'm kidding? Drop around some time. Enjoy, David
Chaos is the natural state of the universe, trying to change that is tampering with mother nature and I'm not about to try that
------------------ D.A. & P.M. Fisher Signwriting Brisbane Australia da_pmf@yahoo.com
Posts: 1450 | From: Brisbane Queensland Australia | Registered: Nov 1998
| IP: Logged |
posted
I am in the finishing stages of a 36 X 51 wood frame building myself.
You asked for tips so here they come.
I installed a hot water heating grid in the concrete before the floor was poured. I researched it alot and talked to several contractors but they were all way too high priced.
I found a supplier who would sell me the special tubeing and engineered it myself. The kids and I rolled out just over 2500 feet of tubing one weekend and tyed it to the reinforceing wire with hundreds of plastic tye straps.
I am currently using a 50 gal. gas water heater to heat the entire building with,it also supplies my domestic hot water needs in the shop.
Fired it up in January 2000 and I am very please with the results. However on the very cold days of December 2000 the water heater ran almost non stop. Building was a toasty 68 degrees though and gas bill was les than my home which is only slightly larger.
Secondly I placed electric recptacles every 4 feet and ran Cat5, 3 pair of telephone wires, and a cable TV coax every 8 feet all from a central location. You never know what the future will bring!
Third I ran 1/2" schedule 80 PVC air line in the walls with outlets about every 10- 12 feet.
The entire building is 6" insulated walls with 10" insulation in the ceiling and covered with 1/2" finished and painted sheet rock.
I am hanging double tube 110 watt High Output flourescent lights now.
As soon as I get some cabinets built I"ll be ready to move in.
I can't (rapid rubbing of hands together) hardley wait!!!
Many other little cool things I might share later.
I have dreamed of this shop since I was 12.
------------------ Glenn Hall Hall of Graphics Toledo, Il
Posts: 28 | From: Toledo,Illinois, usa | Registered: Dec 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
Donna, another thing we did was to position large frosted skylights on the east slope of the roof with shafts to bring in natural light. It's important to position windows and skylights so as to admit light without glare. The direct light makes it difficult to work.
------------------ The SignShop Mendocino, California "Where the Redwoods meet the Surf"
Oh, for the faith of a spider! He begins his web without any thread.
Posts: 6805 | From: Mendocino, CA. USA | Registered: Nov 1998
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic