Building new Shop. Any Suggestions?

[OldPaint]

I AM with gino on the depth of the building with 12 ft overhead door. the outside dimension of my commercial metal building was 24 ft X 30. the 10 ft X 12 ft overhead door opens on the 24 ft dimension. and i can tell you i didnt think about INSIDE measurement. with a metal building, i lost a foot just in the frame for the overhead door. the back side of the building took another 8-10" for the back doors. so now i have ruffly 22 ft inside. i have and can put an F-350 DULLY quad cab in there and close the door.....AS LONG AS THE TRAILER BALL IS REMOVED FROM THE HITCH)))) the truck takes up all of it and you cant walk around front or back!!!!!! so if you want a 24 ft inside space clearance you need to 26-28 ft for sure.

 

[Skye]

Second floor

Do you plan on growing in the next five years?We just finished building a 20'x30' garage with a second floor above. Main floor is 11' ceilings with a 10'x16' garage door. We did barn style roof with 4 dormers. Lots of room upstairs to expand and very little extra money to build this. I did 2"x4" wall and had it sprayed foamed . Well worth it. I am under 40kJust my two cents.

 

[Speedsterbeast]

Wow. Tons of great info.
I should have specified a little more info. The saw will only be used inside when using the roller cutter and knife cutter. I'm buying a sawtrax, so it will be easy to roll right out the door and do the cutting outside- even in winter- hence the placement right at the overhead door. My shop will be as dust free as possible, hence the in-floor heating. Also, I'm not sure that placing any flooring over the concrete will reduce the efficiency by any measurable amount. I'd have to look into that one. Also, if my shop is built that size it will just fit an extended cab long-box truck inside, but how many of those am I going to do? I'm not a "car wrap" guy and 75% of my work is signage and decals, where another 10% is on-site heavy equipment graphics, so that leaves very little time with a vehicle in my shop.
Oh and I'm upgrading my printer to an HP Latex, so it will go right against the wall, as they are front loading.
I did think about building a loft, but I'm still stuck on that one. I'll have a ten foot ceiling for overhead storage on the walls. May even get one of my kayaks on the wall over the panel saw. As for taller vehicles, I also will still have access to a large shop I've been using for vehicle graphics just a couple kliks down the road. One case of beer per vehicle is the deal.
I know it will be tight, but I think my next move would be to hire employees and move to a legitimate sore front location somewhere, so I will continue to use my bathroom in the house which is just a few yards away.
The advice to wait until I can affoird to do it all totally fully realized is good advice too. I did think about one more year.
Thanks to all for their input. I'll keep everyone posted on the progress, or if I make changes to the plan.
Cheers.

 

[Gino]

Do you realize those saws are meant to be set up and remain in a permanent space for accuracy's sake ?? There are all kinds of leveling screws and if you start moving it around, you'll never get a true cut.
Also, if you don't think about the future, you'll never get beyond an extended cab.
Perhaps you should talk to someone about a business plan and see how this building really fits into your overall scheme of things.


Sometimes putting a kayak on a wall or moving equipment around is more of an emotional decision, than a business decision. You want to be as smooth about these things as possible. Dropping 40k into a building that might not be as efficient as you think, could end up becoming just an over-sized garage in your backyard with some sign equipment in it.

Oh, around here, if you advertise a business and have an established location, you must provide restroom facilities along with ample designated parking spaces.... no matter how far out in the boonies you are.

 

[Speedsterbeast]

Good advice Gino. I never thought of the saw being out of square after rolling it outside.
As for the washrooms, good point, but I only advertise as a mobile, and delivery service only.
I am concerned about if I need to hire an employee prior to expanding to a commercial location.
And that is something I may never want to do.
I quite enjoy my lifestyle now and make a decent living. More money has never been a motivator for me.
Although having a shop at home that allows me to expand may be the thing that allows me to keept this lifestyle.
I've got some serious thinking to do. I may put it off for one more year, or just bite the bullet and go big this year.
I have already decided to put off the printer for one more year and suib out the big jobs, but I could always
squeeze a laminator and substrate cutter into what I have now.
Hmmm. Just when I though I had it figured out.

Thanks for the input

 

[nashvillesigns]

nice digs

nice plans. can't see keeping a nice shiny car next to the saw. you need one mother of an exhaust on that cutter...
put all your tables up on wheels. best idea ever. as for your computer area, i would glass that in, in a corner....
eventually, i will be where you are at. for now, its keep the signs crankin out!!!!
good luck!!!

-mosher

 

[OldPaint]

i like the 28' X 34' but 34 seems like an odd dimension. 32-36 is usually more dividable by 2 ft or 3 ft increments. metal buildings are 3 foot panels...most wood framing is 2 foot increments. IF you do the layout as you have it i would leave the office/printer/etc open. this way you got 33-34 foot with a 10' X 12' entrance. which means you can pull bigger truck totally INSIDE AND CLOSE THE DOOR. i would just hold off on the office/printer etc area for now and build that as an ADD ON to that shop area at a later date. you can get by with a 10- 12 ft X 20-24ft 8 ft tall either on the back or the side of the 28-34.

 

[GAC05]

I'm with the "go higher young man" group.
Go as high as you can afford even if you don't need the space immediately.
When the space is needed you could slap in a DIY metal mezzanine into the back half of the building.
The stuff is easy to break down & reconfigure to fit into almost any space.
With today's economy you should be able to get it used at a very good price.
The galvanized interior stuff lasts forever.
We did this more than 20 years ago and the mezzanine has moved with us twice since then.

wayne k
guam usa

 

[OldPaint]

i agree with gaoc5. wasnt enthralled with doing a 16 foot tall building on residential property but after going 2 stories instead of 1, iam glad now i did that. i got a 10 ft wide 12 ft tall sectional garage door, 200 more sq ft loft above 1/3 of the garage, and tall enough to put a 3 bladed commercial ceiling fan up far enough i will never worry about hitting the blade. also my heat source(you can see it in the pic) is hanging from the purlins at about 10 ft, so when its running and the ceiling fan is on low, the floor area is nice and warm. also as i was saying about adding you office space later if you make this building say 16 at endwall(dont know what the pitch is for snow loading in your area, but i built metal buildings in maine with a 3 in 12 pitch with 90 pound roof loading and never had a cave in) to get a 12 ft tall door you will have to have a 14 ft tall wall height. so if you center pitch it, you will have a 16-18 ft center. i did mine with a single slope from 16 to 14 as you can see in the pic. for you office area, you reall dont need anymore then 8 foot ceilings. it will be easier to insulate, less costly to heat and cool and will give a really great garage space to work around vehicles. so i would cancle the office space within your layout............and just build the garage for now.

 

[ProWraps]

14' door or your gonna hate yourself.

 

[OldPaint]

14 FT DOOR??? now tell me............1st off he is in CANADA!!! its very cold. the higher a building the harder and more expensive to heat.
2ndly..........i been at this a long long time, worked on many tow truck, tree service bucket and boom trucks....and none of them are taller then 11 foot tall(this is because of road and bridges clearance standards))))) so unless you doing MONSTER TRUCKS, 14 ft is overkill.

 

[ProWraps]

um.. yes he is in canada where its cold. so chances are he is going to want to bring in as many vehicles as he can rather than work outside. unless you dont want to work on any rvs, box trucks or anything of the sort, a 14' door is a must.

i have just a smidge of experience with this.

 

[Gino]

I don't think the OP is really interested at this time in having a 14' door, so it's probably a moot argument/discussion.

Our first sizable shop back in the 80's had a 12' door and I can't tell you how many vehicles we had to either do outside, on site or just plain turn away. Our last shop had 2 14' doors and it was like opening a can of worms. We had 13,000 s.f. and we could house I think 9 trucks at any given time. We simply advertised being able to do any size vehicle and we had 6 to 10 trucks a week going through those same doors. This was before wraps were being performed by anyone. In fact digital printers weren't even on the market yet. In 2001, we purchased our present location and immediately put a 14' door at one end and a 12' door at the other end. We have a bay 110' long and we can basically fit four full vans inside at once with plenty of room for getting around them. We just did three utility and pick-ups this morning with two more pick ups coming this afternoon.

To me/us, truck lettering is the most lucrative part of the business there is. Nothing invested except some paint and/or vinyl and man-hours. No substrates, no cutting, no d!cking around with anything. Just plain old good money making stuff. Don't get me wrong, while the truck lettering is going on, both printers and other stuff is all getting done.

Multi-tasking is good in the workplace, but if everything is tightly squeezed into it's own little compartment or nook & cranny, you still can't do one thing without interrupting something else, thus the statement about tripping over each other. You can trip over yourself, if you're a busy shop.

 

[Speedsterbeast]

I'm planning on a 10' high ceiling, so I can flip sheets of material around.
During the summer months when I'm at my busiest the outside temp ranges from 20-30 Celcius (70-90 F.) so I can work on larger stuff outside.
And last time I checked 34 was divisable by 2. Sorry, not trying to be an ***, but since joints are staggared in any sheeting, the waste from a 32,34, or 36' shop would be basically the same as far as I can see. The wider door does make sense, but when the temperature drops the smaller door would be more efficient and lose less hea when the door has to be opened.
And again, If I'm a one-man shop, I can only work on one vehicle at a time.
And agian, I have a shop that I rent for a few hours here and there that can house a transport trailer.
In my OP I asked that the size not be the main advice here. I know that everyone thinks I should go bigger. I'm looking for the things that maye be a surprise, other than needing more space. If that's the biggest surprise, then I guess I got what I came here for. Thanks again for all of the input.

 

[Gino]

I'm planning on a 10' high ceiling, so I can flip sheets of material around.
During the summer months when I'm at my busiest the outside temp ranges from 20-30 Celcius (70-90 F.) so I can work on larger stuff outside.
And last time I checked 34 was divisable by 2. Sorry, not trying to be an ***, but since joints are staggared in any sheeting, the waste from a 32,34, or 36' shop would be basically the same as far as I can see. The wider door does make sense, but when the temperature drops the smaller door would be more efficient and lose less hea when the door has to be opened.
And again, If I'm a one-man shop, I can only work on one vehicle at a time.
And agian, I have a shop that I rent for a few hours here and there that can house a transport trailer.
In my OP I asked that the size not be the main advice here. I know that everyone thinks I should go bigger. I'm looking for the things that maye be a surprise, other than needing more space. If that's the biggest surprise, then I guess I got what I came here for. Thanks again for all of the input.

I realize you're a one-man shop, but think about this scenario.......

You're doing two 4 x 8's and you need to roller coat them. Now, they're drying and up on horses and suddenly a guy shows up with his truck to be lettered that you forgot you scheduled for today. [it happens] Also, while the paint was drying you can't cut the pvc or other substrates that for still yet another job, cause the wood is still drying. Remember, it's raining and you can't do anything outside. By having such tight quarters you've painted yourself into a corner and are at the mercy of waiting for paint to dry.

Now, perhaps you never paint in your shop, so let's say you are just putting together some 4 x 8's fr a real estate guy and laying down large sheets of vinyl and you need your room fairly clean. The truck scheduled for today is there in the bay and you need the room to do 6 4 x 8's.

All I'm getting at is that you really need to be tight with scheduling and making sure nothing goes wrong, cause something minor goes wrong and it backs up several jobs and makes for unhappy customers. I'm not saying you have to go bigger.... I'm just saying you can't multi-task and take on more than maybe two jobs at a time.

Even when I was a one-man show.... I still had many jobs going on at once..... and today, although we only have a few people working here, we have countless jobs constantly going on. It's so much easier on your cash flow, if you have many jobs a week going out instead of just three or four.

I'm not trying to be harsh or beat a dead horse. We all do things ultimately our own way, but just explaining growing pains. If you do it just because you can, it doesn't necessarily equate to being a sound business decision.

 

[OldPaint]

sorry i ment divisible by 4 foot. not 2. at 34....4 ft increments.....= 8.5. so yes it is divisible by 2 but most sheeting is 4 foot so you would have to cut 2 foot from a sheet......throw it away. so increasing the size to 36........HAS NO WASTE OF MATERIAL and does not increase or lessen YOUR COST OF MATERIALS, that you had to buy to make it 34 feet. and in a metal building, all the exterior panels are 36" or 3 feet increments and at 34 foot, you would have to cut a 3 foot panel and USE ONLY A 1 FOOT section, and discard A 2 FOOT PIECE...YOU PAID FOR, so why not make the building 36, which uses the whole panel YOU PAID FOR without cutting it.
simple logic. when i built my metal building i was thinking 28 feet........but since the material i had to buy was for 30 foot, why not make the building 2 feet longer and then i wouldnt have any waste or time in cutting a panel.

 

[Speedsterbeast]

Old Paint. Still not sure I agree that I'd waste more with a 34' shop then 36' as I can use a 2' width on the start of the next section, then have a four foot at the end of the second one. Anyway, as Gino described in very good detail, I AM rethinking my plans. Although if I do go bigger it may be only up to 30 X 36, but I'm also going to look at box trusses to give me overhead cold storage as well. I will keep you all posted on how it goes.
I still have to finish clearing out my old 14' x 22' shed, jacking it up, shoring it with cross bracing and dragging out to the back of my property for storage before I get too far into the new shop. And we just got 10cm of snow today. Worst spring ever!

 

[rjssigns]

Another option to heat your shop is what I have in mine. http://www.spaceray.com/ Funny name, but they work a treat. Sealed combustion(explosion proof) Quiet and zero maintenance. If something were to go wrong the business end is the size of a bread box. Can remove it in a couple minutes and carry it to the furnace shop.

 

[Speedsterbeast]

In-Floor Heating is one thing that no one could convince me not to go with. I've worked many hours in shops with it and you do not feel like you are standing on concrete. I like the ease and dust-free advantage of overhead radiant, but a warm floor is so much more comfortable.

 

[OldPaint]

i am a draftsman by trade and training and worked at building metal building in caribou maine. i do know a little bout building in cold climates. most of the buildings we built had to have a footer at 7 foot and concrete walls to ground level because of the frost depth in that part of the country. also insulation was a big part of any building there because of the cold and length of winter. here in florida, all i had to do was a a perimeter footer 10-12" and poured the floor and footer as one unit. here its not foundation depth or roof loading under 5-7 feet of wet snow...we have to build to wind load of 140 MPH!!!!!!!!
this is where i got mine, but you can find same type of company closer.
http://www.steelbuilding.com/