Building my Dream

Rick Prosser

Member
Messages
377
Location
Midlands of South Carolina
This thread will chronicle the land clearing and building of my first dedicated woodworking shop. I hope to get the picture links working and convey some of the interesting challenges that have, and will continue to occur. Gotta enjoy the journey as much as the destination...:thumb:

This is the only structure on the 50+ acre wooded lot. It is a little to small and out-of-plumb to use as a shop :D

picture.php


I will continue the thread as soon as I can figure out how to make attachments to the photos I uploaded to my familywoodworking album ??
 
Don, he's talking about linking to pics he's already uploaded to his photo album, not attaching them in the usual way.

Let's see if this works...

picture.php


Yup...it works. :D Apparently more than the guy in the photo. :rofl:

Rick, here's how I did it:

  1. Open one of the pics in your album
  2. Highlight the URL in the Address bar of your browser, then right-click on the highlighted address and select Copy
  3. In the post when you want the picture to appear, click the Insert Image icon (looks like a little picture of a mountain in the toolbar of the text entry box)
  4. In the pop-up window displayed, right-click and select Paste
  5. Click OK and you should be good to go. ;)
Let me know if you need any other help. If I don't have the answers, I'll make something up that sounds pretty good. :p
 
I'll see what I can figure out for that. You may need to upload the pics twice. Once for your album, and another time for the forum posts. (If that's the case, the tutorial Don linked to explains the process.) But before you resort to that, I'll see if I can find a way to do what you're trying to do.
 
Since the lot is heavily wooded, we needed to create some roads

MakingAroad.jpg

Then cut some trees

RickchainsawWeb.jpg

Here is how it looks coming in the driveway to the shop area

ShopSiteWeb.jpg

and with just the stumps left

shoplotWeb.jpg

The shop is a 40x70 with a 12 ft overhang on the long side. I had to clear a 10 ft area around the building, so the total cleared site is 72 x 90. That's a lot of trees to cut and haul away !

Next, will have to dig up the stumps and start leveling the site. There is a good slope here - will have about a 5 ft drop.

Will post more later.
 
That work will keep you in shape!

Great start, and I hear you on clearing trees, back in my youth, I helped a buddy finish up a contract he took from the government to clear cut trees for a new highway, I think is was about 200 yards wide 80 KM long (50 miles) but not all of that had trees on it. Everything between the surveyor's tape we cut down. I only did the job for a couple of weeks, as he was getting close to the deadline and needed help, but it was hard work!
 
Good luck with the build Rick.:thumb:

Somehow when reading this post i just knew i would find Jonathan at the bottom saying he would recycle that building.:D Only you Jonathan. I am with Stu on that one....have a big bonfire.:rofl:
 
The original plan for the "leaner" building was for wood storage. It does not leak (from the roof anyway), and it has a floor in the upper level. The frame is still in good shape, but the exterior boards obviously need some help. If we decide to keep it (more for historical/nostalgic purposes), I will build a scaffolding thru it and raise it up off the rotted timbers, put down some concrete block or pour, then square it up and set it back down. Then replace the exterior boards as needed and add the "wings" to each side. I have some weathered boards from another location that will match.

... or a bonfire ;)

Either way, it will have to wait for a while. Too much other stuff to do for now.

Larry - I did not realize how much of a slope there was when we started. At the time, it seemed that concrete slab was the way to go, but now with the added cost of the retaining wall - it could have worked out with a wood floor and crawl space. The house will definitely have crawl space.
 
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Some more progress

After the stumps were removed, dirt (sand) smoothing was next

DustyTraactor.jpg dusty!

In the mean time, got the well and septic installed

well.jpgSeptic.jpg Well is above the shop, septic is below the shop.

You can see in the pic, I built a little 10x10 shed to hold tools, drinks, and such so we did not have to cart them back and forth every day. Also needed a place to get in out of the sun and rest a bit

shade.jpg

Got the site level enough for pulling lines and prepping for concrete retaining wall

LevelCorner.jpg trench.jpg

You can see the impact of the slope by the height of the framing/batter boards.

We are now caught up to current day.
Wow, it sure took a lot longer to get the work done than to post the progress. Things will probably move a bit slower now, so I may throw in some "items of interest" to the thread from time to time. We expect to start the actual building construction in 3-4 weeks.


More to follow...
 
from the looks it can still be a wood floor setup rick..not sure where you are headed in this shop ,,but one thing yu can gain is to get a loading dock out of the fall of your building grade as well as the crawl space..which allows yu to do many more things..just wood floor alone is worth what you have started here.
 
Adding a real basic layout of "the compound" to show show placement of buildings.

Compound1.JPG

Larry, with contracts signed and deposits made - we are going to go with concrete. I still have option of putting wood over concrete later, but no crawl space. Also, the lower side is not going to be available for loading area with the layout we have.
 
Wow, Rick, that ground looks really sandy. Hopefully you'll not have any issues with groundwater!

That photo of the septic... that looks like a really huge pipe in the sand there. Or is that just the photo?
 
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