Experts on garage construction

CatmanV2

CatmanV2

Member
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48,839
Was chatting to Mrs Catman this morning about our 'other' cars which we would both love to have available for playing.

To me, this means within no distance of the house, with power for battery conditioners, warmish adn dry.

Basically our garage :)

It's double length, but mostly full of other stuff. So I can have another thing built on the end, to store the stuff, and get the cars in, but in many respects, I'd rather have a lift to allow me to jack one up (as well as work on cars as and when) and park the other underneath.

The snag I see is that the joists of our garage are 2.3m off the ground. I don't have the heights for the Sprint or the 116, but assuming they are like the 147, we're about 0.7 = 0.75m short.

I *could* simply chop out the joists and hope that the remote wall doesn't peel away, but I reckon that may not be the best idea :)

So who knows about how I could reinforce the garage to treat us to one of these?

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/271004289547
(cars not included, sadly) ;)

C
 
M

Mr.Cambio

Member
Messages
7,096
if you send me more info and pics, i can make some suggestion. Pity i'm on the other side, i could have a look.
 
CatmanV2

CatmanV2

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48,839
That would be most kind of you, Martin, but don't make a special journey. It's a bit nebulous ATM, something for (hopefully) next year. But if you're in the area at some point, I'd be happy to feed you beverages in exchange for expertise.

I assume you do have some expertise, and aren't just thinking of checking my garage full of TQT out? ;)

C
 
Marti

Marti

Member
Messages
358
Haha I think I do :rolleyes::rolleyes: it's no problem, I got to go to the other side of Ware one day next week so could be just as easy to carry on to sunny Harlow!!?
 
CatmanV2

CatmanV2

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48,839
If that meets my work, then that would be *super*.

I think I can be around Monday, Tuesday, Thursday or Friday, with suitable notice. From about 1800 onwards.

If that fits, it would be wonderful, if not, it's still super, but delayed :)

C
 
2b1ask1

2b1ask1

Special case
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20,283
They look like factory made trusses to me C-man anything removed would need to be substituted IMHO it should be doable.
 
CatmanV2

CatmanV2

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48,839
Cheers Newton. Marti is kindly planning to drop over on Thursday to give a professional opinion. :)

C
 
dunnah01

dunnah01

Member
Messages
648
Not easy to replace those. You'd need to use part of the truss as rafters and then install new purlins. These would need to be suppported off new corbels or buttresses at the ends of your garage. Anything is dooable at a price but spanning the length of your garage would require some pretty hefty purlins which would eat in to your headroom anyway. An alternative would be to use steel frames with moment connections at the ridge but once agian very pricey.
 
CatmanV2

CatmanV2

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48,839
I'm impressed. I have a pretty reasonable vocabulary, but you managed to three words I have *no* idea what they mean. Or at least in this context. Thanks, I shall google :)


C
 
Emtee

Emtee

New Member
Messages
8,446
Hi Catman, from the information I picked up along the way when re-designing / re-roofing my house, you could do this, but it wouldn't be the easiest of conversions. It comes up often with cottages (as mine) where bedrooms are partially in the roof space.

Your 'ceiling joists' - the bits getting in the way (bottom chords) look like they're tied to the wall plates. Your 'roof rafters' (top chords) look like they're tied to these with fastening plates, but from what I can see not directly to the wall plates, which wouldn't be unusual, as they overhang and the bottom chord is there to act as the brace anyway.

You have central king posts holding the top chords in place and tying them at the apex. Your photographs don't show whether you have a ridge beam (I assume you do), and how this area is tied together?

So the shape of your structure under load is an unturned 'T' and your points of load are at the bottom of the king post where it sits on the bottom chord, which is spread across the span to the wall plates (the main vertical load) and at the wall plates to stop the roof falling flat (the secondary lateral load).

So at the moment you have a triangle split in the vertical with the king post, but you could make this into an 'A'.

You would need to tie the top chords to the wall plates with fastening plates. This is necessary to stop bowing in the top chords (trying to slide off the wall plates or bow the garage walls by taking the wall plates with them) when the bottom chord (currently acting as the brace) is removed.

Most importantly you would need to add new higher bottom chords (collars) tied to the side of the king posts with bolts and also the top chords with bolts. The placement of these new higher collars would need structural advice to calculate the loads based on the span and weight. Once all the new collars are in place the old bottom chords could be cut out besides the inner wall plates, and the un-needed lengths of king post below the new collars.

You might be able to dispense with the king posts altogether, but I don't know how these are tied at the apex, so can't say with any certainty, and it's only more work anyway.

After all this you still have horizontal collars in place, albeit a bit higher up, which might not give you the head room you need anyway.

Please treat this as nothing more than well meaning observation, but I hope it helps.
 
CatmanV2

CatmanV2

Member
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48,839
Thanks, Miles. All these new words :)

I need about 50cm head room, but of course that may not give me enough width.

Maybe I should dig down...

C
 
2b1ask1

2b1ask1

Special case
Messages
20,283
It may be easier to jack the whole roof structure by 8 courses of bricks (may need to be dismantled to achieve) but this may require a planning application as there is probably a 4 meter limit to out buildings.
 
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