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30x45 build "The Donut Shop"

Wolfe_Man

Don't Label Me!
Joined
May 19, 2020
Member Number
242
Messages
183
Loc
Apple Valley CA.
I've been on Pirate since 05 and moved over here but have never posted much, just enjoyed reading and learning. With what happened I moved over here and figured this may be interesting to some plus give the new site some content.

My hobby has been building hotrods, classic cars, 4x4, welding, fab etc, basically anything with an engine or working with metal for the last 25+ years or so.
I have/had been building cars with my buddy Ron for the last 19 of those years but he retired and moved to Washington a year ago.
We had been working out of a 30x45 (10 foot walls) shop we had built in his backyard. We called ourselves RnG Customs (Ron and Gabe) over the years the things we've built have been in 14+ magazines and many SEMA shows (www.facebook.com/rngccf if you're interested in past stuff). I dont think we did too bad for some backyard/shadetree hacks.

When Ron told me he was moving I decided to duplicate the shop in my own backyard with some small changes and code update requirements. The changes I decided were 12x9 garage doors vs the 14x8 used before (was a pain to get lifted vehicles or the 4 post lift in during winter) and new code required brace walls since the long wall is over 40' long. Since I had to have a brace wall I decided to use it and build a compressor room and a corner for my little CnC Plasma table. The biggest was half of the shop I did scissor trusses to make more room for a 2 pot lift since I was limited to a 10 foot tall wall/16 foot peak height. This gave me +-3 feet more clearance in the middle (where the cab would be).

This also meant I needed a new name and partner as well. I found a partner in my youngest sibling/brother Ben with a 16 year age difference (I'm oldest of 6). He's young but has the "old school" hotrod gene and work ethic in full force. Plus, he plays a mean guitar ( for amusement you can see him here https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?v=1139875286143721 ) . The name came one beer fueled night (after working our asses off building the shop) as my family owned 5 bakery's/donut shops growing up in SoCal. My brother had a vision of an old 5 slot mag burning rubber and drew it up.
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Where I live since I am on just under a half acre I cannot do a metal building or pole barn style, It has to be stick built/stucco and match the house and be no larger than 80% of house plus 16' peak height as well. We/I started about 18 months ago and yes it's a slow build but its my youngest brother and I building on the weekends after our day jobs with the help of some friends. The only parts that were farmed out was the concrete/foundation and stucco. Everything else was done by us and one hell of a learning experience.
We grew up pretty poor so roofing a house (every house we grew up in) or adding a wall (with 6 kids sometimes you have to add a wall to make a bedroom) was no big deal but I had never framed an entire building and make sure it would pass inspection too.

The foundation took 4.5 truckloads of concrete and is a min of 4" thick in middle. The guys did a great job and even when it rained on it I only had 2 small depressions/water puddles.
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After the foundation was poured I got busy at work then it took a bit to figure out a lumber package so it sat for 6 months or so.
When I finally ordered the lumber we got busy and had all the walls built in 2 weekends. It could have went faster but it was mid summer in the high desert and we had no shade in 110+ degree heat so we did most of the work morning then again in evening.

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Since we were using scissor trusses on half the building we only built 3 walls, the 4th wall went up after placing all the trusses (by hand, that was fun)


Continued next post....
 
Next post....

My brother and I arent exactly rolling in the $$ and we do a lot of bartering and "horse trading". This is a big part of why I was able to afford to build this.

We are not carpenters by any means, I lucked out and had a customer of mine that was a retired construction/carpenter that I traded work on his bitchen 53 dodge coupe for help drawing up the plans (prescriptive plans not engineered plans) and "stuporvising" that quickly turned to the Old dude kicking my ass and making me/us look bad by working circles around us.

Once the 3 walls were up we began sheeting them in preparation for placing the trusses. (below you can see the required brace wall)

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As we finished that the trusses were delivered and with the help of some friends we got those swung into place. (below is my son trying to be Karate kid at the end of the day)

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Below you can see where it transferred from a standard truss to a scissor truss.

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Once all trusses were in place we built the "balloon" wall. It ended up being doubled 2x4 since it was over 10' tall but not shown in this photo.

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To be continued ..
 
Getting closer...

I mentioned about horse trading.. Well my neighbor happened to be a retired stucco/lathing guy and I traded work on his c5 corvette and he did my lath work (paper and wire). We both provided materials for our respective jobs and on my side I was out $200 in parts and a weekend in labor. I feel I got the better part of the deal but he argues with me to this day he did.

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After the lath work was done we (my brother, a friend and I) did the roofing. My buddy recreating my Sons karate kid pose after we finished roofing.

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Once that was done my retired neighbor hooked me up with his friend who stucco'd the shop for cheap.

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More to come...
 
And more yet again...

Once the base coat and scratch coat was applied we took the chance to paint the eves so we didnt have to worry about overspray

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They then came back out and put the color coat on (a gray blue my wife picked) the color dries much lighter BTW.

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External is done for the moment.

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More again...
 
And this brings us to now...

We insulated and dry walled in prep for garage doors (to be installed this weekend). we only did it on the front wall and where the door tracks will run. Later after I save up some more $$ we will finish insulating and dry walling it.

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This brings us to now.. What is left after garage doors installed this weekend to be "done"/usable is upgrading my main house panel from 100amp to 200 amp and trench for the feed to my sub panel (125 amp sub/feed).

Once power is there I have a backlog of 15+ customers/projects that have been waiting. If there is interest I can do threads on those projects as well. (in the photo backgrounds you can see a few of the projects both personal and customer, 78 3/4 chevy 4x4, 65 mustang, 54 ford custom-line, 55 chevy 3600 truck, 95 4 runner 4x4, 2000 explorer 4x4, 66 impala wagon)


Will post more after doors installed...
 
Great job man, thanks for sharing! I love the DIY plus horse trading, that's how I roll too.
 
Any chance that drywall jack is from HF? If so how do you like it?

Yup, HF drywall jack. For $200 it works well. Only complaint is it only goes up a little over 11 feet so after the 2nd row on the scissor truss side we had to stick it in the bed of my brothers truck to get the 3rd row on ceiling. Wasnt a big deal but the next 2 rows to the peak are going to be an adventure. Everywhere else in the building it worked great though and stupid easy to use.
 
And now I have a lockable, secure building. Time to start moving tools/welders/lots of crap in and putting it in its place.

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Ill post up after I figure out where I need to put everything. I have Ideas but way too much crap as well.
 
Yup, HF drywall jack. For $200 it works well. Only complaint is it only goes up a little over 11 feet so after the 2nd row on the scissor truss side we had to stick it in the bed of my brothers truck to get the 3rd row on ceiling. Wasnt a big deal but the next 2 rows to the peak are going to be an adventure. Everywhere else in the building it worked great though and stupid easy to use.

Awesome! My ceilings are only 9', so that should be perfect.

Building is coming along nicely. Are you painting all the walls and ceilings first?
 
Awesome! My ceilings are only 9', so that should be perfect.

Building is coming along nicely. Are you painting all the walls and ceilings first?

No, I need to get working as I have a massive backlog of projects (15+) so the finish insulation, drywall and painting will come later. Plus I need to restock some $$ so I don't put it on CC.
 
Nice shop - awesome pose on the roof too. I quite like the stucco finish, thats not really all that common for sheds or workshops over here in NZ... they all tend to be steel buildings with 7-rib cladding. How durable is that finish - like does it survive a bumper tap ok?
 
Nice shop - awesome pose on the roof too. I quite like the stucco finish, thats not really all that common for sheds or workshops over here in NZ... they all tend to be steel buildings with 7-rib cladding. How durable is that finish - like does it survive a bumper tap ok?

You know I've never bumper tapped a stucco building before. But its pretty tough especially since it was fully sheathed then done. As for durable, its very durable. Its basically a textured concrete.
 
Digging the build. I'm hoping one day to build myself a shop, likely smaller than yours, but you inspired me.

Looks great.
 
You're gonna regret not finishing before starting work in it.

I fully understand the backlog of clients + the need for cash, but it's gonna be a giant pain in the ass to move everything around to finish the interior.

I dig the build though. :smokin:
 
You're gonna regret not finishing before starting work in it.

I fully understand the backlog of clients + the need for cash, but it's gonna be a giant pain in the ass to move everything around to finish the interior.

I dig the build though. :smokin:

I 100% agree but I had it in mind as well from the beginning as plan B in case $$ ran short (it always does). In prep, everything except some shelving units are on casters so I can drag them out of the way do some insulation/panels and put it back as I go.
 
Some small updates, upgraded house panel from 100amp to 200 amp, then trenched in for the electrical run, got it signed off and started to lay pipe and bury it. Ground was so hard it tossed sparks a few times and my brother ended up using his key ring to hold the throttle open and we just sat and let it drive itself.

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Also setup my little CnC plasma area with its PC etc. Plus mounted the important stuff like a large TV for reading wiring diagrams (yeah right) and finished wiring the shop 125 amp sub panel.

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I like what you're doing.

I think I would've sprung for more service, since there's gonna be a couple of you working in there. But, it looks like it's coming together, so get it! :smokin:
 
I like what you're doing.

I think I would've sprung for more service, since there's gonna be a couple of you working in there. But, it looks like it's coming together, so get it! :smokin:

I agree but since I am in a "neighborhood" They gave me enough hassle over the 100 to 200 amp house upgrade. No 400 amp service available. Inspector/planner wasnt calling me back until I left a VM asking if I needed to give him a back alley handy, pass him $100 or what to get it approved and signed off haha.
I am pretty sure the 125 will be ok. I figured air compressor 15amp (5HP), CnC Plasma 40 amp (only if maxed out, its a CnC ready Everlast 60s) and possibly a welder (40amp max MM175 mig or AHP 201xd tig) running at same time would be max high amp draw.

I'll have to pay attention if I am running my ESAB PCM-875 plasma as its a monster that can draw over 50 amps (specifically put in a 60amp 220 circuit for this thing).
All lighting is LED and the corded hand tools are not a huge worry.
 
I agree but since I am in a "neighborhood" They gave me enough hassle over the 100 to 200 amp house upgrade. No 400 amp service available. Inspector/planner wasnt calling me back until I left a VM asking if I needed to give him a back alley handy, pass him $100 or what to get it approved and signed off haha.
I am pretty sure the 125 will be ok. I figured air compressor 15amp (5HP), CnC Plasma 40 amp (only if maxed out, its a CnC ready Everlast 60s) and possibly a welder (40amp max MM175 mig or AHP 201xd tig) running at same time would be max high amp draw.

I'll have to pay attention if I am running my ESAB PCM-875 plasma as its a monster that can draw over 50 amps (specifically put in a 60amp 220 circuit for this thing).
All lighting is LED and the corded hand tools are not a huge worry.



Right on.

At least you did the math :laughing: I'd suspect your compressor might draw more than 15A unless it's 220, but it sounds like you've thought it out.


Any estimate on total cost yet :eek:
 
Right on.

At least you did the math :laughing: I'd suspect your compressor might draw more than 15A unless it's 220, but it sounds like you've thought it out.


Any estimate on total cost yet :eek:

Compressor is 220 5HP on a 30 amp circuit.

I have all receipts but havent actually added them up.... buuuut I think I am right about 28k. Concrete 8.2k, lumber 8k, roofing 2.5k, stucco 3k, electrical (with main run) 2k, doors 1.8k, beer 1k
 
Fun evening. Moving crap around and trying to figure out where to put everything (still have crap in my house garage). Moved the welders/plasmas in, moved some tool boxes around and I think closer to having it usable. I need to get my hands on pallet racking.

We have our first shop injury too, Wife was dragging down the shelf to the left of welding table and hit her ankle with it (she is accident prone, few months ago she yanked an extension cord and it flew and the prongs stabbed her in the face like a snake bite on the bridge of her nose...) and cut an artery... was squirting all over the place. Now her foot is a bit swollen but think it'll be ok. I should know better than say sure when she asks me if I want help moving crap...

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Moved the toolboxes by the plasma table around. I think its a little more usable plus I have a 15watt 3x3 cnc laser (fun toy) than I can set/store in th3 gap sideways when not in use to protect it (You can see it barely above on the banquet table)

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Subscribed. Loving the shop. I've got a Crossfire Pro as well.

Thanks, my crossfire isnt the pro, I got in on their 2nd or 3rd batch of 1st gen systems. Looking forward to abusing it soon as I have only used it for goofing off and as a big plotter with a pen stuck in it to draw some brackets etc.
 
Nice! Thought i saw two rails. Once you start using it, it'll be hard to stop, lol.
 
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