Saturday, November 23, 2013

home stretch on the new metal shop ...


 when last we visited this project back in september, the carpenters had just finished getting the slate on the roof ... after that it was on to the siding and window trim outside, and the insulation, second floor radiant heat,and sheetrock inside.  click the photos to enlarge them ..
it was kind of a thrill when the lights went on and siding was mostly finished ...
we still had to have the concrete professionals back to pour the slab for the 
steel/blower/compressor shed .. 
 and we had to build the rather elaborate 20' long rack to store all the small in size, but 20' to 24' long raw materials ... fortunately, the carpenters were called away on another job for a day, which gave us time to figure out the rack before the roof went on .. mucho easier that way ..
the shed is fitted here with a bronze color standing seam roof by donnie dorr's metal shop ..
 and inside, we did some painting, and reconfigured the chop saw tables into a mockup work table so we could figure out where to hang up the welding fume extractor.  we ran the pipes to the blower thursday ..
 boilers these days are amazing ... this little guy puts out 80,000 btus, enough to heat both floors, (+/- 1500 square feet in a vemont winter), and provide domestic hot water for the sink and bathroom.  exhaust out in pvc pipe.  no chimney ...
 ahhh, the doors .. nobody made a cheap standard unit three doors wide, so we had to cobble these together with parts from a company whose name escapes me now .. we made up some quicky transoms from 8/4 pine and ordered up some custom thermopane to fill them.
 there were a couple reasons for that configuration .. #1, you can open the doors totally in the summer like below, and should we move on at some point, the openings are framed to accept regular 9' x 7' commercial overhead doors .. presto, a heated, two car garage with a mother in law apartment above  ... the plumbing and radiant for the second floor was roughed in before the sheetrock went up ..
 
 a few notes below on the quicky transoms ...
 9' 3" x 16" plus the frames
 essentially, the frames are butt jointed, timberlock construction, with applied moldings to accept the glass .. framed in the shop and screwed in over the door units .. cheap, easy, and fast ... you don't get that combo often enough ...
all for now ... sam is moving in this week
the steel's there waiting for him