In a recent MR, they talked about building a room under the garage Has anyone on the forum either done this or have a home with this feature? I’m thinking about a 26x26 garage and clear spans (no center columns) are desireable. How do you insulate this? Spray foam or nail cleats to the underside of the car deck for lay-in fiberglass. Are there issues of drainage from the car (this is in the Northeast where we do get snow and rain)
Any thoughts or experience are very welcome.
Thanks
Ken
The Southampton, Sag Harbor and Montauk Line
“The Route To The End”
The floor of the garage can be sealed to make it water proof. This should prevent any water from getting into your train room. Should this fail, spraying “Great Stuff” between that floor and the ceiling of your train room should creat a second waterproof barrier.
Drainage from the car should not be that much of a factor. Assuming you drive your car long enough to completely warm up the engine before you put it in the garage, the engine heat should evaporate most of the moisture that falls onto the floor, especially if your train room is heated. The insulation simply slows down the heat transfer between the rooms. it does not stop it altogether. Cold air cannot hold a lot of moisture. Warmer air can. Consequently, heating up the outside air (once you close the garage door) will permit it to absorb the extra moisture that evaporates from the floor.
Ken, I don’t have first hand experience, but have a friend that contructed a garage with a room below. I do believe that he had columns in the room below. Anyway, it goes without saying that the garage floor has to be contructed to hold very heavy loads. In his case, he used a preformed concrete casting that was made especially for this application. There were some strict building codes that had to be adhered to along with the appropriate inspections. This of course will vary from place to place. I would start by calling your local city building inspectors office and finding out what the local codes are.
Not exactly what he meant, he was referring to when it rains or snows, and parking the wet car in the garage.
Don’t think I’d use fiberglass where there is any possibility of it getting wet, I’d use extruded foam instead.
Any particular reason not to put the train room OVER the garage? It’s what I’m thinking of doing. I’m assuming you’re having to dig down a few feet to pour footings below the frost line.
It IS possible to do this without supporting columns, but the floor structure would have to be fairly substantial. I’m assuming you’re going to have a contractor (at the very least) do the concrete work, I would discuss this with an expert who knows a lot more about this than I do and can look at or make some blueprints or designs.
Brad
I have not tried this though I help a friend hand dig the area under his garage for a family room. He needed posts and my take is that it was not worth the effort. I would think that a travel trailer parked someplace on the property with heat and air would work better and be WAY less expensive. Some old motorhomes are on the market for under a thou and would make a great train room.
In our area they sale storm shelters that they bury in the back yard in variuos sizes that are fair priced and water proof. That way your trains would be safe from a tornado, maybe enough room for the kids too. I heard digging out under a garage is expensive as all get out. John Allen did it though, but that was a crawl space I think. Fred
That might be a good idea, but the Dog would suggest that you check with your local zoning board.
Have fun
Looking at the coverage in Model Railroader, I notice that part of Bruce Chubb’s new layout is under his garage. I believe that he lives in the (sometimes) frozen north, and that the house was designed with layout construction in mind. No mention is made of exactly how the garage floor is supported.
If the adjacent under-house basement isn’t going to be part of the layout space, going up over the garage might be the better option. Jacking up the roof and building a residential-load floor and a standard set of walls would be a lot less expensive than excavating, lining and roofing over a bunker.
No matter what you do, fly it past the zoning board and building inspectors FIRST.
Chuck (who ended up IN the garage)
There was a small sub article that talked about the room under the garage in that MR article…
I think [tomikawaTT] is right about going above the garage being cheaper and would add more resale value to the home.
I can’t imagine putting a room under a garage already constructed. My friend was building a new house had the garage excavated at the same time the basement hole was being dug.
This would be a new addition added onto the existing house. This way I get a new master suite upstairs with a bathroom and a new 2 car garage (I’ve only got 1 now), a first floor bedroom and under that would be the trainroom or (horrors!) a home theatre.
Thanks for all your suggestions, esp. the fiberglass vs solid foam. In my town, you MUST deal with the building inspector and have a set of approved (architect and engineer) plans.