Dan F's One-Room Garage Studio

Air-Mass-Air is straight mass law, and it takes a lot of mass to get any decent isolation. Maybe you can lobby for John to give you a custom title (ala my "mere mortal" status) that reads, "Backing Rod Proselytizer." ;-)

ooooo, speaking of titles, i just noticed i'm now a "senior member." :D you're right, the isolation with just mass law won't be that great, but i'm just tempted to see anyway. :lol: you are right though about closing up the room making things more difficult. i probably shouldn't.

Welcome to Senior Memberness! That happened when you hit 300 posts. :) You deserve it. You're quality and quantity, dude. 8) You also broke 7,00 views on your thread! I'm ready for a new avatar from you now. :lol:

good suggestion ... here's a nice pic that shows me holding my new kid, with the background showing a piano, a baby swing and two guitars (upper left) ... guess which of these items gets the most use :? i'll add the pic below for future reference ... for the biographers, you know. :lol: dan

can't believe it has been 2 weeks since i posted to this thread. i have continued working on the north wall of the garage, first layer of 5/8. i've been cheating a bit. because it is such a hassle to go and get the wallboard, basically i have to take all the seats out of the minivan and it's tough with one person to go and get wallboard even if you have a truck, the wallboard has become precious to me, and i frequently agonize about how to cut it to fit these spaces most efficiently. then again, time is precious as well so i'm often stuck thinking about how much time i should waste worrying about efficient use of drywall. i have taken to using scraps on this first layer of 5/8, probably a no-no but i can't help myself. yes that is extra seams, extra caulking etc. but somehow that doesn't seem to bother me. what i hate most is cutting the pieces of wallboard, and also wasting pieces of wallboard. a few extra feet of seams isn't a big deal to me. anyway it is just the first layer. i think the important thing is the mass, not the continuity of the layer. after all i have giant seams all around the perimeter of these boards, what is a few more feet of seams which is small in proportion. by the way from here on out i will be using only 1/2 inch gypsum, i only had the 5/8 because on the south wall, the 1 1/2 inch screws would have protruded a little too far if i used 1/2 inch gypsum. by the way i had bought a couple of boxes of 1 inch screws, thinking these would work for 1/2 inch gypsum. but mostly they are not long enough to get any grip on the wood you are screwing to. another funny thing about the beef up on this north wall is that i am screwing the gypsum into the wood siding on the garage. that is, the siding is nailed to the studs, and the gypsum is nailed to the siding. this is a little worrying since the nails holding the siding were not probably designed to hold this much weight. but hopefully it will be ok, especially since the caulk should help transfer some of the weight of the gypsum back onto the studs. by the way that pipe at the bottom of the pix is the water pipe for the whole house. it's a copper pipe. working around this is a disaster waiting to happen isn't it? i should probably screw a 2x4 over it for protection.

Looking good, Dan-The-Man! 8) You may recall that I had my drywall delivered. That worked out really well for me. There was a $75 delivery charge, but when I divided that amount by the number of boards that were delivered (26 for the beef-up phase), it didn't seem like that big of a deal. Plus, I had help stacking the boards exactly where I wanted them on my garage floor. That's something to consider next time you need drywall -- maybe you could calculate how much you'll need for the rest of the project and get it all delivered at one time. It may seem like a high price to pay for the luxury, but when you consider what your time is worth, it's really not that bad. You might be get your Roxul (or Thermafiber) delivered at the same time and without incurring an additional charge if you buy them from the same place (AMS in San Leandro?) :) I just reviewed some early pages of this thread, and I (re)discovered that the long wall of your studio is parallel with your garage door. For some reason I thought your design was rotated 90 degrees... I think what confused me is that it appears your electrical service enters your house on the south side of the garage, yet your interior breaker panel is on your north wall -- right? And I take it your north wall does not suffer "wavy stucco syndrome" like your south wall -- instead, you have siding on that side -- correct? There have been so many photos taken of the inside of your garage, but few taken from the outside and no illustrations that show the basic floorplan of your house (at least the area closest to the garage) that it's kind of confusing... ;-) Anyway, you'll feel a lot less anxious about the drywall staying up if you plan to "cleat" them into place. Also, some beads of liquid nails on the back side along the edges (but not in the field) will help too. If you really want to be cool, you'll do some Green Glue sandwiching. :twisted: But you're probably too frugal for that, huh? ;-) Anyway, glad to see you're making progress -- more than I am these days!! :lol: Hopefully I'll be in more of a "go" mode after I see the termite expert on Monday... :roll: --Keith :mrgreen: Keep up the great work! :-D

Hi Keith, Yeah I will probably break down and have a big shipment delivered once i start putting up full sheets at a time, then i'll really need a lot. But first, i need to clear some space ... all that Roxul in the garage is really a PITA, even though i did get a good deal on it. My original design was a smaller room and oriented like you remembered. but then i realized that doing it that way just wasted a lot of space, so why not just have a giant studio instead. The north wall has wood siding, so i have a smooth surface to apply beef to. The siding is nailed to the studs from the outside. I have been viewing Green Glue as being similar to Mass Loaded Vinyl -- effective, yes, probably saving time and effort, yes, but very expensive. The same arguments against MLV seem to me to apply to GG. Although GG may be better than MLV, I don't know. I'll admit though, if i knew GG to be equivalent to X mm of gypsum, i would be tempted to use it, considering how much less work it must be -- particularly when working in 14 inch wide sections doing beef-up. I may have to look into this more. Here are some exterior shots of the garage ... you are not confused about the breaker box, you have it right. The meter and main breaker are on the south wall, and the subpanel is on the north wall. The south wall is closer to the utility pole ... the subpanel location on the north wall is closer to the center of the house, and actually backs up against the kitchen. On the first picture showing the north wall, where the corner is (to the left of the tree) is right where the studio ends. Conveniently the slab has a seam there as well, so the leaves across the middle of the garage will straddle that seam. On the second picture showing the south wall, the studio goes back to where the roofline changes. So even though the studio is attached to the house, it's not as attached as it could be. It's kind of its own little outcropping from the rest of the house. And the bedrooms are as far away from the garage as they could be. Dan

Thanks for posting the pictures -- that clears things up a lot! :-) Your combination of siding and stucco reminds me ofour old house. Have you considered putting up some exterior lighting on each side of your garage door? It's one of those "if not now, when?" things. The previous homeowner of our old house added lights on the sides of the garage door -- I later changed the fixtures. I think it makes a huge difference. 8) I'm glad I wasn't losing my mind about your original plan. The Green Glue test results are legitimate -- unlike MLV. I have yet to see any reputable documentation for MLV. Maybe it's out there, but I haven't seen it. All I've seen are snake-oilish claims.

you read my mind about the lights. i'm going to put them in right after i finish beefing up that area. then i will drill a small hole for the romex to come through into a junction box that i will mount on solid wood on the inside. after i caulk up the small hole there shouldn't be any impact on the isolation. and this should be ok code wise i believe. i already have my existing porch light wired through a sensor that turns on when it gets dark ... i will of course wire my two new lights so they also are turned on by the same switch. the light sensitive switch (the name escapes me right now) was well worth the effort, i love that thing! no more coming home to a dark house. my old house had lights on a timer, but having to continually change the times throughout the year was a pain.

by the way, i finished the whole first layer on the north wall last night. i'm getting bored with this beefing up stuff though. i think i need a break and i'm getting very tempted again to work on other parts of the project, even if it is for practical purposes out of proper sequence. i've been bugged about how hard it will be to reinforce that ceiling of mine, which is really barely adequate to hold up the 1/2 inch gypsum that was there before i destroyed it. i'm going to be running new 2x10s above the existing joists which will involve cutting an access hole in the front of my garage between the door and the roof. i'd like to get that done just so i can stop worrying about how to get it done. also, i really want to seal off that rolltop garage door and start beefing it up too. stupid i know, makes it much harder to get materials in. but then again, i can make a lot more noise at night with power tools if i complete the outer leaf. i could really blast the radio too. also, hardhat notwithstanding (that thing has saved my skull more times than i can count) i'm really getting tired of those garage door rails being in my way, when i know i'm going to be demo-ing them soon anyway. i'm feeling a strong need to see more visible progress sooner. :P ... sometimes the practical benefit of a morale boost is worth more than the practical disadvantage of screwing yourself in another way. :twisted:

Good move. Make sure that you don't overload your daylight sensor with too many watts. You may need have a pancake box on the outside...

I had the coolest setup at my old house... I went to a specialty lighting store and special ordered a product (I wish I remembered the manufacturer...) that allowed me to add motion sensor switch to any light fixture -- it mounted behind the fixture and then the "eye" hung down below it -- fully adjustable, of course. What was especially cool about it is that it also sensed dawn and dusk, so it would turn the lights on at 20% power when it got dark, but the lights would go on at 100% power if motion was sensed. So I got the best of all worlds -- energy savings, attractiveness day or night, security by keeping the house somewhat lit at night, and extra security by extra brightness when a person approached the house. 8) If you look closely at the photograph I linked, you can see the "eye" hanging down, right above the house number. :)

Dan, If you've still got a lot of dry wall cutting to go, you might think about doing what I (and my helper) did after both of our arms got too tired to even cut through the first layer of paper. I bought a long straight edge (I think Kieth has one of these for cutting OSB). It's about 9 or 10' long and has clamps on each end that are slideable. We used a Dremel tool with a dry wall bit (normally used for cutting out vent and door openings (no comments, Kieth!!! :-) ). The round "ring" around the base of the tool is exactly 1" from the bit edge so we marked our pieces and "extra" inch wide, clamped the straight edge done, then slid the Dremel down the entire length of a sheet of DW in about 15 seconds. No more strained muscles (or cut thighs, fingers, etc [it was the "etc" that hurt the most! I now wear a cup when drywalling]). The bits last a long time if you don't try and pull/push too hard on them (I think we used two bits over the course of 170 sheets of drywall (and the second one is still in pretty good shape). Just a little something I thought I'd pass on. len

Cool, that's an interesting tip Len! I think the fact that you can cut the drywall with a knife is deceptive, it makes you think it should be easy, when really it is a pain ... i'm just starting to realize how much i hate cutting the drywall. I'll check into that dremel thing. I do have a lot of drywall cutting ahead ... :cry: :cry: Plus, my cutting with the knife could be a little straighter :wink: Dan

Having gone through beefing up 19 stud bays with 4 layers of drywall, I can honestly say that I feel your pain! (Although I never cut myself!) :roll:

Dan Fitzpatrick wrote:

you read my mind about the lights. i'm going to put them in right after i finish beefing up that area. then i will drill a small hole for the romex to come through into a junction box that i will mount on solid wood on the inside. after i caulk up the small hole there shouldn't be any impact on the isolation. and this should be ok code wise i believe.

Yep, It's to code. I'm an electrician :P If you plan on mounting the light fixture to siding you can get a riser plate that matches the siding that looks like one of these pictures. One will have to be cut in to the siding and the other rests on top of the siding. Also there are 3 1/4" and 4" pancakes available. Be sure there is enough depth inside the fixture to hold the pancake and wiring so it will sit flush if you decide to mount the light directly to the siding.

thank you Tom!

so, my dad who recently retired has offered to come down from sactown this saturday and help me hang up my ceiling joists. BIG PRESSURE!! i have to have everything ready to go and planned out to maximize the hours he is working with me. i did some research on joist hangers today, because i kind of suspected that i don't know a darn thing about them. and i was right! first of all, i am planning to use the hangers on the bottom chord of a truss. i found out you have to be very careful if you do this, because the opposing forces on this chord can rip the board apart if you do it wrong. GOOD TO KNOW! here is a pdf link to this info for those interested: http://www.strongtie.com/ftp/bulletins/ ... PIDF04.pdf also i have come to understand that the regular hammers i have around the house are pretty wimpy ... i guess it's time to buy a framing hammer? by the way, even though i am using the joist hangar on the bottom chord of the truss, i'm going to be building a wall under this truss so i'm not worried about whether the truss can hold the extra load. on the other side of the garage, the joists will be attached over the existing rolltop garage door. there are 2x12 studs running from the roofline to the garage door header on 16" centers. i'm going to nail the end of the 2x6 to these studs. again, i'm not worried about whehter the header can take the extra weight because i'm building at least something like a wall under here as well. one question, is it a good idea to support the 2x6 joist with a 2x6 stud nailed vertically alongside the existing 2x12 stud for the joist to sit on, or is this a waste of energy. it seems like a good safety thing, like the way you put studs UNDER headers, you don't just nail studs to the header from the side. i know, i should do a diagram but i'm feeling lazy right now. ok, ok hang on ... ok, now the orange pieces in the diagram are 2x6 running vertically, to act theoretically as supports for the 2x6 joists i guess in case the nails don't hold good enough. does this make sense to do or is this a waste of time?

I can't see how anything like that would be a waste of time, whether it's necessary (to hold the weight) or not. I vote to do it. But then, I don't have to do it myself. :-) len

Len, I've always found if you want an honest opinion on whether something needs extra work, ask a person who doesn't have to do the extra work :D well i only have to do this 11 or so times. i was just wondering if it did any good at all. by the way, at the end of the ceiling that has the truss, after getting home and looking at it, the bottom chord doesn't line up with where i need the joists to end up. so it looks like to do it correctly i have to get an 18 foot 2x8 and nail it to the truss to serve as a place to attach the joist hangers. incidentally, this is similar to what is done on the other side of the truss. the roof structure indirectly rests on the truss, bearing on a 2x8 that is nailed to it. as i mentioned before, i'm building a wall below here so i don't think i have to worry about overloading the truss, the truss etc. will be supported by the new wall. not sure how i'll get an 18 foot 2x8 to my garage by saturday morning :? man, i hate procuring materials. that has to be the worst part of this project.

Dan Fitzpatrick wrote:

man, i hate procuring materials. that has to be the worst part of this project.

It's only the worst part of the project SO FAR. I can speak from experience that each step of the process is my personal "worst part" as I reach it. :-) Right now, priming the drywall and painting is the worst part. Before that is was texturing. Before that, hanging the drywall. I think you get the picture. Set your mind at ease by knowing that THIS worst part will pale in comparision to what is to come. On the other hand, maybe that's NOT so encouraging. :-) Never mind. len

Dan, in framing you should NEVER rely on just nails to support anything - you definitely want solid blocking UNDER your joists. You might be able to use hangers, but I've never liked the fact that you have to use those special, fat short nails with them. They tend to split the wood if it's very dry in my experience. Simple test for framing - theoretically remove the nails - would it fall down even if there's no wind, and nothing bumps it? If so, use blocking... Steve

Thanks Steve, that's kind of what i suspected ... appreciate you checking in on my project!!

You're welcome, sorry I've not had MORE time - think I'm gonna have to catch up before you're finished and I've no idea what you've built... :? You've completely lost me with your descriptions; what kind of "2x12 STUDS" are we talking about here - do you mean rafters of some sort? And, if you'll be building a wall under your new joists, why hang them from existing trusses (and take the chance you'll wrongly stress the truss?) Why not just build the wall frame FIRST, and rest the joists on them? Or maybe I need to just get off my ass and read ALL your thread :? If it's all explained in technicolor already, just tell me and I'll RTFM, so to speak... Steve

no need to apologize, Steve. i've greatly appreciated all your help so far. and also, the complexities of this build are so confusing that even i can't even figure it out when i'm actually staring at the thing right in front of me, it's no wonder you can't follow it :D the 2x12 studs are actually vertical members that transfer load from the front edge of the roof down to the header over the rolltop door opening. i'm beat right now otherwise i'd post a picture :oops: the reason they are 2x12 i guess may be cosmetic, i'm not sure why it is that way ... maybe just because the rafters don't quite match up vertically with the header. again a pic would make this more clear, i'll get one up shortly. why can't the joists rest on the new wall i'm building? unfortunately i'm having to work around some existing "joists" which are not strong enough to hold up a ceiling but are i guess tying the walls together so the garage doesn't collapse. my guess is that they are fine to hold the walls together but not much else. so i'm adding a second set of joists perpendicular and above the existing joists, so basically a direct connection between the new joists and the new wall isn't possible, the old joists are in the way. i thought about how to get rid of these old joists, maybe doing collar ties or something, but i was too freaked out by doing such a major engineering retrofit ... but it's not too late to consider something like that, i still have about 36 hours, hehe :lol:

ok i got some pictures of the 2x12 studs (actually 2x10 :oops: ) and the truss on the other end. i think i have it figured out. there is a 2x10 nailed to the backside of the truss, on which rests a bunch of the roof. my house has a pretty weird construction. it looks like it was built as a simple rectangle, and then protrusions like the garage were added on later. so there is actually a vestigial roof inside the attic space. you can see this through the hole in the truss. anyway the plan is for me to partially fill the holes in the truss with 2x material, nailing it to the 2x10 behind, then the joist hangers will be nailed to this uniform surface ... the joists can't go directly to the 2x10 because it doesn't quite line up right. anyway i'm on track to get a bunch of this done tomorrow with my dad's help :D by the way, i finally figured out to buy a framing hammer, which is quite a bit bigger than the hammers i have lying around. it kicks ass! i just got the 19oz because i'm wimpy. once you use a framing hammer, you'll never go back, baby ... the garage floor is made from 4 slab sections ... by building the wall directly under the truss/2x10 structure, the outer leaf will rest on one pair of slab sections (closer to the house), and the inner leaf will be on the other pair (closer to the street). this should help isolate the sound from the house a little bit better. the issue with stressing the bottom chord won't apply, it is ok as long as the stress is put on the whole chord and not just the lower half, and in my case the hangers won't even be on the chord itself, the force will be transferred to the 2x10 behind and the top of the bottom chord. so i think i'm ok. i'm going to fill the gap between the 2x10 and the bottom chord, which is about 6 or 7 inches, with a ripped 2x8, so that it's even, and then a regular wall with a double top plate will support that structure.