Home Garage Ideas

[Tarticmonkey]

Hey All,

Looking to get some ideas of what people have done with their garages to centre around working on cars- I have a few ideas but want to see what others have done so I can budget accordingly.

Main questions are regarding the following:

- flooring- are the £20 black rubber floor matts as poor quality and short lasting as I expect? What have others used as alternatives?
- Work bench- currently thinking of using old kitchen cabinets to kill two birds with one stone- have others done this? Or is it better to get something purpose built?
-Tool storage- plan is to get a chest tool draw as I have dreamt of owning one since I was a kid- sad I know.
-Wheel storage- how safe is wall mounting?

Looked at the usual Pinterest etc but they all seem to be mega money builds.

 

[EthanMenace]

Jake's RB Clio 197 Track Car

I am no expert but I have read in a few places that the synchros don’t like a modifier.

clio197.net

@jwillo did a few garage bits on his thread

 

[Tarticmonkey]

Thanks @EthanMenace. I thought I had seen something on here like that!

 

[Beany]

Depends on the size of the garage..

But @R20BTG has a lovely set up

 

[Tarticmonkey]

Foot print is 7.7 meter by 3.5 meters . Height I'm not sure of.

However there is an inspection pit running down half of the length.

 

[matt9566]

I think it's easy to get carried away with things like this (as you've seen on Pinterest)

Albeit mine was only in internal garage for storing my old R26 over the winter but some reasonably low cost things I did which made a huge difference were:

Painted the floor in Screwfix No Nonsense Grey paint - I was tempted by the tiles but couldn't justify the cost, for proper rubber ones it's a fortune I think. The paint was about £25 and did a few coats, easy to wipe, looks good, cost effective

Lighting - You didn't mention this but I upgraded my old tube lights to led square panel lights and the difference was night and day, allowed me to clearly work on the car at any time of the day

Storage - I used some old wardrobes that I got for free that had plenty go shelves, worked perfect for me but if you can save money elsewhere on flooring etc you could then buy something like the Draper units Jake got on his thread

You seem to have a fairly big space, for wheels I've always liked the idea of the wheel storage trolleys, not that expensive and can just move them about when needed.

I think less is more sometimes, figure out what you will and won't use then spend the money on the things that will make your life easier

 

[Tarticmonkey]

Excellent points @matt9566 .

Thank you for the heads up on the paint I will take a look at it. The other idea I had for flooring was used office carpet tiles as they're fairly cheap and would insulate a bit I guess?

Lighting is a fair comment something I had thought about the garage does have light tubes in I think but agreed was already planning to upgrade to LED's.

The wheel storage trolleys are something that I've looked at but not too keen on them taking up floor space. Good shout on the wardrobes though.

 

[S24nrc]

Office floor tiles will hold onto oil and generally be horrid after one or two big jobs. I'd be putting down an epoxy paint on the floor that seals it all in and stops liquid penetrating. Our unit has an unsealed concrete floor and it does my head in, its constantly dusty, breaking up, oil is impossible to clean off it. If we can hold onto it for another year I'll be looking at a way of sorting it.

 

[Tarticmonkey]

Painted floor it is then I think!

 

[Seriosha]

There are Tire Storage Shelves, it can be less than optimal, depending on how your Tire-Sizes divide up in those, but i learned to love them =)

Like these: https://image.jimcdn.com/app/cms/im...cc6b921ef311661e/version/1519905691/image.jpg
You can build those easily by yourself and with scrap material too. Put them high on the wall to gain space below, or combine those shelves with storage bottoms, depending on what you need.

Pressured Air: This is something you will use a lot and you don't want to miss once you have it. don't go too small, the constant running engine will annoy the shit out of you and you have to make brakes all the time because pressure drops too fast. cheaper units can be put into noise dampening cabinets, but beware of overheating when there is no proper ventilation!

Then, as already said: LIGHT! this is so underestimated in my opinion. If you think you have enough, get some more. you won't regret it

Floor: for simple jobs and in the coild of winter some cheap carpet like flooring is okay, but if you can get some sealed floor that's easy to wipe off, go for it. Tiles, paint, you name it.

If you don't have the money and/or height for a regular lift, a scissor lift is a good thing to have.

Work Bench: Get something durable, can be old kitchen worktables etc, doesnt matter. And get a Vise

I could write all day long about this, but i am getting carried away with tools instead of basics already

 

[Helpimonfire]

I ended up panelling the far end of my garage so I could screw shit to it. The workbench is "floating" with a support under the vice, only used some cheap 75x50mm timber from B&Q and a sheet of 18mm ply to make it. My garage isn't actually wide enough for the car to go in and comfortably work around it but there we go. Concrete pad out the front with a roof I think next!

 

[R20BTG]

Aha, my thread has arrived

Mine is probably more of a 'posh man cave' rather than a working garage, but I can do some tasks in there. I'm lucky that my garage has a floorboarded attic that I can access using a proper staircase. That means I can put all the stuff up there to avoid cluttering downstairs (suitcases, Christmas decorations, camping gear, tins of paint, roof boxes etc etc). Without that I'd lose a lot of space.

I spent AGES whitewashing the walls, it took days, but I'd recommend it. It does wonders for light and avoids dust from the blockwork walls. I tried a paint sprayer but it didn't like the white emulsion so I ended up just doing it with a large brush. It's messy, painful and boring, but I'd still do it again.

My flooring is Swisstrax Ribtrax modular tiles https://www.swisstrax.com/ £5.99/tile, and ends up about £900 to cover a double garage. UK distributor not far from us both https://www.galatent.co.uk/slate-grey-swisstrax-UK-ribtrax-tile - I did loads of research before committing to these. Epoxy flooring, garage floor paint, rubber tiles, office carpet tiles, vinyl flooring, everything. I'd make the same decision again, the Swisstrax has been brilliant. It's strong, doesn't stain, fuel resistance, chemical resistant, oil resistant and you can jack a car up on it no problem. If you do manage to break a tile by dropping something heavy on it, you can just unclip it and replace it with a spare. In my old house I had garage floor paint and it was shit, lasted a matter of days before it started peeling up. This is compounded if you roll your car in with warm rubber, it'll just pull the paint up. Seriously, don't do it unless you're willing to spend money on full epoxy floor. I was getting quotes for £2000-£2500 for a proper epoxy paint job back in 2018.

My grey cabinets are New Age Pro and I got them in a Costco sale a few years ago https://newageproducts.com/garage-storage-cabinets-pro-3-0-series/ and they're still as good as new over 5 years later.

Lighting - I have 12 x 600mm square LED panels, wired into 2 x 6 panel circuits, so I can have half the lights on, or all of them on. They're brilliant. Don't underestimate good lighting. I have loads of double sockets dotted around the place, some with USB. If you're putting in power, put in more sockets than you think you'll need.

I got the two red Halfords Pro toolboxes on eBay, managed to get both 3 x stacks for £500 which I think was an absolute bargain.



My workbench was an old length of oak worktop left over when we did our kitchen, built up on a 2x4 frame at a height that I can store wheels underneath. Beer fridge left over from our old house. I bolted a vice to the workbench.



Shelving is just scaffold board stained with a dark wood stain with eBay steel brackets.





I wish I had a bit more headroom so that I could install some kind of lift, I'm looking a scissor lifts to get the car at least waist height.

 

[Tarticmonkey]

@Seriosha thank you for the good points. The work bench is an extremely good point as vice is definitely going to be required I believe for some of the jobs I would like to do in the garage. Compressed air is a good point as well. My ideal would be to get a compressor in there- only a small one but something to allow the facility of compressed air if it is needed.

@Helpimonfire mate, I love how you have used the space available to you. The idea of using board to line the walls may be something I nick from you. The floating bench is a good idea as well- how much weight do you reckon that would be able to support?

Do you think you could strip a gear box on it?

@R20BTG Love this. I think they layout is excellent. Didn't think of using the space under a work bench as storage for wheels/ tyres.

I will keep an eye om ebay for tool chests but would agree it appears as though you got a bit of bargain there for 2 for £500. Out of interest have you managed to fill both of those fully? Also How do you break down what you are taking trackdays tool wise?

Socket wise, I believe the garage has a fair few but will check once I am fully moved in. I have a feeling though that the ere wont be too many further down the garage though.

Whitewashing the walls sounds like something worth while and something I can rope the boys into helping with the bribe of beer and pizza ahaha. Silly question did you have to clean your walls at first or anything for this?

I will say the swiss tracks do look good but I will be honest I don't think I could stomach £450 to do half of the garage that I would leave uncovered. The full epoxy paint job may be a none starter as well at the price too. Unless I can get some that has fallen off of back of a truck.

 

[Tarticmonkey]

Whilst I'm budgeting for things. Any recommendations for garage doors?

 

[Beany]

Whilst I'm budgeting for things. Any recommendations for garage doors?

JB doors

 

[Helpimonfire]

@Helpimonfire mate, I love how you have used the space available to you. The idea of using board to line the walls may be something I nick from you. The floating bench is a good idea as well- how much weight do you reckon that would be able to support?

Do you think you could strip a gear box on it?

The beauty of lining the walls with boarding is you can use any old stuff. I used OSB chipboard as it was cheap and cheerful. It's all tied into the garage walls so it won't go anywhere.

The workbench can take a lot of weight. Me and the missus were sat on it (combined weigh of probably 160kg at the time) and it only flexed a little. I've also given the vice some hell with lots of levering and hammering, didn't move. So it'll take a gearbox with no dramas.

 

[Tarticmonkey]

Excellent. Sounds like a winner.

 

[Tarticmonkey]

Thought I would do a quick follow up regarding this as it's been nearly a year since I have been in the house and only just got around to starting this project last weekend and I've hit the first hurdle on this to overcome that wasn't expected. But before that I will give an update for what the garage is what bits I have got / done / plans.

Goal for the project is to have a space for me and friends to work on our cars and be able to do so in a relatively clean work space. There are are certain jobs we have put off attempting until this has been done - such as fitting my LSD purchased past year. This has now added that I am looking to have facility to add an ev charger onto front of the garage as it looks like the next company car could be an EV but that is a story for another time; and also add something that can act a bit of a chill area for BBQ's in summer etc.

The garage itself is rather large being 8m x 3.8m wide or 24ft x 12ft to give some indication. Meaning that pretty much any car I own for fun would be able to fit and be useable as workshop - whether that be upgrading the clio to a meg, swapping it for a mk7 fiesta or whatever would come. As well as allowing for a good sized work bench, tool box and everything else that would be needed.

So far what have I done? Added a fancy garage door that is a roller shutter that goes up and down with press of a button and bought supplies for said garage.

- wall paint
- floor paint
- quick set concrete to repair dinnts in the floor
- what mounted wheel storage hooks from Sealey. - lucky enough to have a cellar as well to store these in but in summer and doing trackday's some what reguarly it becomes a ballache to kart these out every time. Well and truly the definition of a first world problem.

In addition to that I have also ripped down all of the plasterboards up in the rafters of the garage to replace them with new and to create a wiring diagram in order to replace the light circuit and florescent bulbs with LED's. This is where the first problems have been found . The roof is fubar.


The OSB has failed many many years ago and been lent against the plasterboard until has been found. Not very cash money. The saving grace is that the rubber on the roof lining is still water tight and the boards are dry as a bone - so no further immediate failures are currently expected and the roof beams are solid too.

Obviously this cannot be left and I have a fear of heights so me changing the roof myself is out of the question. Current plan is to get some quotes for this sorted and go from there.


The clio is back and safely aware from any danger areas.




Despite the above it is great to finally get started on this project despite it being shitty and not been known / disclosed during the sale of the house by the previous owner but then again he doesn't know his arse from his elbow so probably doesn't know what an OSB board os.

Thought I'd just follow up and post an update as i've mentioned it on my main thread a few times.

 

[Helpimonfire]

Get some storage up higher if you don't want to lose floorspace, I borrowed my mates garage to do a few bits on mine yesterday and having the cabinets up high helps a lot. I think he's going to be putting lighting underneath too.