This is part one of my dumping ground for progress pictures during the shop build. In this installment, we measure for the shop, do prep work, and start digging with a skid steer!
My steps are obviously specific to me, but I hope to give you an idea of what needs to be considered and completed when building a shop. It is A LOT of work no matter how you slice it.
First, we measure and put some stakes out. I am going to do a separate writeup on how to lay out a shop and square it up.For giggles I got out my laser and checked to estimate how out how much fill I would need. This will also be in the writeup.Next, I needed to knock down part of my existing shed to make room to park my flatbed trailer. It was rotten and about to fall over on its own anyway.Should make a nice little spot since the trailer is getting evicted from its current spot by the house.Needed a magnet to pick up roofing nails out of the grass. Didn’t want to go to the store cuz…covid. So I made one instead from stuff I had laying around.Worked well I’d say.Staked out (the green T-posts don’t stand out very well)Parked the van with the trailer hooked on inside the future shop to make sure it would fit like I was thinking.The neighbor put in a storm shelter and had some extra dirt so they brought it over to my yard. Thanks for the dirt and free entertainment Dan! The kids loved it.Next obstacle was removing this paver wall. Not fun, but it must be done. Like the shed, this wall was working towards falling over also.Progress… (It was humid and 90+ degrees out) Luckily I had the mower with a lawn trailer to move the bricks. I stopped counting once I got over 150 bricks…Almost done. There was another row under the dirt line that I saved for another day. My boy got to run the winch on PJ using the wireless remote control to pull out a bush. He was stoked.When there is a dirt pile in your yard… It begs to be driven on and over. One of these days I will finish the bumpers on PJ, maybe in my new shop?Shitters full Clark! Seriously though, I had to locate my septic because my building has to be at least 10ft away per code.My dad gave me this military scissor jack a good 5 or more years ago. It is super heavy duty but I didn’t have the handle for it so I had to improvise.So, I grabbed a random bolt that fit from my bolt bin and welded it on.Viola! We have support for my storm drain so the dump trucks don’t crush it when they deliver dirt.Here you can see the drain I am supporting. There isn’t much dirt over it for having to support a giant dump truck.Utilities marked. All clear! (says: ATT/D CLR) ALWAYS call before you dig. I submitted mine online and they were out in less than 2 business days.Getting started. Having the grass scraped off before getting the dirt to avoid any future settling issues.
Scraping the grass before building the pad was a subject with mixed opinions. It was about 50/50 depending on who I talked to on if they thought I should. I ended up having it done just to be on the safe side. No point in risking my $$$$ concrete settling or cracking because I wanted to save a couple hundred bucks in dirt and labor.
I don’t know how we would get anything done without Gertrude and her frisbee.The hole gets bigger…All done for the day. Took less than 2 hours for the operator to get this part done. We just piled the dirt to the side in hopes we can use it around the building later.Go Cat!
That is all I had for this update. I took the day off and have 40 yards of dirt getting delivered tomorrow. We should have a level pad by the end of the day if all goes well!
Its look good, I am following…