The AM Forum

He are are some photos of work in progress of my ham shack/shop 30'WX 48'L. The concrete contractor should be pouring the floor Monday or Tuesday of this week
Joe

A few more photos

Wow that wood is pretty close to the ground. I hope you don't have termites out there. I'd paint all that wood near the ground with a couple coats of drain oil.

That's nice and big too! Congtatulations!

That's the way they build pole sheds around here, wood almost the whole way to the ground.

Joe

Congrats on the new shack!  Keep those photos coming in.

Al

Very nice!   I have shack envy and it's only framed...

Joe,
Great size for the new workshop and shack.  How do you plan to insulate and heat it? 
Joe, W3GMS

How about a picture update!

I noticed two conduits. is one for signals and the other for power? Will you put in plumbing as well? It's worth it to have a small water closet. Will you also put in HVAC?

Thanks for all the comments. I will post some updated photos of the building. I did install some PVC pipe before the cement floor was poured. Three inch 90 degree sweeps, one for electrical service the other two for feed lines etc. A two inch line for water and four inch for a drain. I'm thinking of using propane for heat that would be tied into my tank, AC don't know. I will use fiberglass insulation. As far a termites that is not a issue here this is pretty much standard construction for a AG building. 
Joe 

More photos:

Post pics a year from now so we can see where all that empty space went.  It will mysteriously vanish.

Joe

Thanks for the photo updates.  I am really glad I HVACed my shack.  It's really paying off right now.

Now about those sched's.  When can we expect to hear your strappessence on 75?  Actually, what with the T storms this summer probably this fall, right?

Al

Looks great Joe! 

Like was said before the space will vanish.  Good on the insulation and the heating and possible AC. 

We have about 1500 sq ft of finished drywall and insulated garage space and its all full.  My wife now has 5 vehicles some of which are her classic ones.  I just sold my 74 Ford F-100 and my 88 Fiero GT will go up for sale soon.  I will be down to my Toyota truck and that's it.   We do have a 2 post lift and now one car is on the bottom and above it is her 73 Mach 1. 

Enjoy you new space and hopefully we will get to work you on the air this winter.

73,
Joe, GMS

Very nice Joe, now you just need to add the strap

Just hope they used treated lumber.  That should make it OK if the wood is not in DIRECT contact with the ground.  They do make a special grade of treated lumber that is rated for direct contact or burial.  The detached garage here was built by a crew of jack-leg carpenters (before we moved here) who laid the concrete slab, then bolted untreated pine framing directly to the concrete.  Naturally, the whole thing has been termite food ever since.  They also brushed the soft concrete slab side-to-side, perpendicular to the front-to-back direction, so that the grooves retain the dust when you sweep the floor.  I guess "that's the way they did it round here" when they built the POS. 

I paid to have the house and shack foundations treated for termites, but did not consider the crappy garage worth the expense the exterminator was asking for the job.  I regularly dump used crankcase oil on the sill round the perimeter, which seems to hold them in check.  But now, the crankcase oil comes only from the lawnmowers and garden tools since I let the oil-change guys with a lift or pit play contortionist to get at the remotely located oil filters and drain plugs in the vehicles we own now. The only motor-vehicles the garage holds are the riding lawn mower and a garden tiller.  The rest of the space is piled high with mostly non-radio "junk" I don't want to discard, along with the brown-recluse spiders that have taken up residence there.

I put some treated lumber on or near the ground at the house, shack and antenna dog-house, and have never seen any sign of rot or termite damage. I had planned to use it for the poles carrying the feed and control lines from shack to tower, but opted instead for galvanised tee-posts, since I could manually pound them into wetted ground using a tripod, hose-pipe and post-driver, rather than dodging ground radials while digging post-holes in dry clay to accommodate wooden 4X4s or round landscaping timbers.

The whole subject of wood and insects has gotten so complicated that I need a refresher course just to keep up.

The phone company uses Creosote, but they have a special EPA exemption to do it, so that's not an option AFAIK. I used to use Cuprinol for wood that would be in or near the ground, and it always did a good job, but that's not sold anymore either.

We can get "pressure treated" wood in New England, which comes with scary warnings about wearing gloves while you work on it and never, ever, ever, burning it: the kind of sky-is-falling verbiage I'd expect from a snake-oil salesman, so I'm not sure if it does the job or is worth the expense.

I've seen a "green" alternative that's supposedly almost-just-as-good as preasure treatment, but it involves using Parafin and making up a mixture to soak the wood, so I'm not anxious to use it if there are easier choices around.


If I used crankcase oil here, in the home of political-correctness, the Thought Police would arrive within minutes and send me to the Ministry of Love.

Some years ago, I asked for an estimate from a pest-control company, which turned out to be for several hundred dollars that I didn't choose to spend. However, due to a legal requirement, the company's proposal included a copy of the label for the insecticide that they intended to apply. I found out that I could buy a gallon of the stuff for about $30.00, and pay for a face mask with appropriate filters, all for less than 1/3 of the estimated cost for having a professional do it. I still have the mask, and I just respray the area involved every year.


I had my back deck rebuilt a while back, and the contractor put in "Sonotube" concrete forms, which are round cardboard casings that can be dropped into holes and used to form concrete into piers. I'm curious if others have used them, and where the break-even point is between pouring a concrete slab or using Sonotubes; i.e., at what point it's less expensive to drop Sonotubes or similar forms into holes, and use the piers and metal brackets to mount lumber carrying sils, instead of just pouring a concrete slab under everything.

Thanks for your help.

73,

Bill, W1AC

I just visited a new house and the wood around the garage doors was being attacked by ants. I had to laugh since he got his design training from an idiot yuppie aunt.
Who the heck puts a garage on the south side of the house so there are no windows facing the winter sun. cold and dark.  Yuppies...
OH well he can buy lots of oil and the sun will keep the driveway warm.

Evidently, lots of people. In our area, whether the garage is on the South, North, East, or West side of the house most have no windows in the garage. Most don't consider the garage as a living area so who cares.

Yea, really, it's a friggin garage not a greenhouse.

I've got 3 garages and a pool house here that can verify this. And I left well over 1000 lbs of electronics behind for scrapping when I moved!


It's a regional thing. Folks down this way aren't too concerned with such things.

By the way guys, if you have ants or other insect problems, the fix is simple: remove the moisture. They won't hang around without it. It can be as simple as clearing out excess trees to allow sunlight in, removing sod a foot or two from the foundation and adding crushed rock, or as involved as a complex drainage system. But it works just fine.

Joe, you made fast work of that garage. I know folks who spend more time talking about it than you did building it. I still need to finish wiring and insulating my garage station, and I've been here since late '08.

So when are you & Margie coming to NEAR-Fest again?  ;D

Yep, Joe made it outa Dodge intact.   Good for him.  If it wasn't so much work, I'd have done the same by now.



"Who the heck puts a garage on the south side of the house so there are no windows facing the winter sun."

Maybe Frank means the garage is blocking the house's southern windows?   ;)

T

Yes Tom. How dumb is that here in the N.E. They all looked at me like I was nuts when they were sitting around the table drawing pictures. I explained the house was backwards and being a flat lot it didn't matter which side the driveway was on. Dumb yuppie aunt never designed anything but an expert on all things. A garage on the north side would also block the cold north wind making the house warmer.

Unless you have a solar warming based system, getting sun on your windows is mostly useless. Similarly the loss of sun should be unnoticeable. If you have crappy windows, it's all different. But, if you live in the northeast and have crappy windows, you really are stupid, no matter where your garage is located!

I disagree HUZ and invite you to visit my beach QTH on a winter day to stand in front of the windows facing south. Or ask Dean KNX about my solar set up.
He stopped by on a cold winter day to enjoy 85 degrees next to my south facing windows.

Yes, you have a solar set up. You are using the sun on purpose. Of course that 85 kinda sucks in the summer, so I wonder if there is any net gain. In cases where one is not, windows should not allow cold air in. They should not allow sun in either (unless you like high AC bills).

Carefully designed overhang above windows keeps the sun out this time of the year.
The cat loves the nice cool stone floor. Barely gets past the window sill now. Winter it will come in 15 feet when the sun is low.

Hmm. You must have magic grass and dirt to stop the reflection.

Actually many newer windows are designed to allow in radiant sunlight at a particular lower angle and block it at others, basically letting you benefit from it in winter while blocking it in summer. Something like polarizing or such, I forget. If you just use stock glass, all bets are off. We pay hell here in summer due to a lack of tall shade trees close in to the house. But nothing has fallen on the roof in the hurricanes, tornadoes, or windstorms either.

But hey - Joe's garage has no windows. Moot point, yuppies or otherwise.  ;)

Garden is directly outside the windows. There isn't much reflection.
When there is show on the ground it really reflects energy at the windows.
You can't stand near the window for very long on a sunny day during the winter if there is snow on the ground.

I have a similar setup on the back or south side of the house as Frank. Lots of glass. It approaches 80 during the dead of winter. Zone 1 rarely comes on during the day under full sun.  Got trees that are in full bloom during the summer to provide some shade. Cooling not a problem.

Interesting techniques -   using glass that favors lower angles for winter and trees that are transparent in winter, but grow shade in summer.

I remember being in Frank's sun room in the winter. It was actually too hot for comfort, but that was the idea - to store up heat for the night.


Maybe the ultimate Yuppie option would be a moveable astro-dome over the whole house, caw mawn.


My best effort for winter was putting in a FB coal stove and real chimney a few years back. One 200 gallon oil tank from Sept - April is 1/2 used. The coal stove is extra work but the glow and heat is fun.

For summer, being at 805' elv and breezy generally keeps us about 10 degrees cooler than at sea level.

T

..nice, and this should push me along...mine looks almost the same..it is 30x46, big 15foot sliding door, and smaller regular door... it was a grow-op before i owned the place...slowly getting it organized...only taken 5 yrs to get to painting the inside walls...

tim..

..sk..