The Airplane Workshop: 26x32 pole garage in Paris, KY

I finally came to the realization that I do not have the time to build my own garage. I need it badly, with tools scattered all over 3 different towns and never available for quick use. For a guy who thrives on having 3 projects of various calibers going on at any moment, this won't work. I'm a field support engineer in my day job, designing and writing repairs to aircraft. I also am an A&P IA and a pilot. My family owns somewhere between 3-5 airplanes at any time and I'm the mechanic keeping them flying, or tearing them apart! I am always doing something with airplanes, either restoring an old one, building a new one, rewiring some avionics, so I needed a place to do the work.

Late December 2014:
First things first, there is a tree right in the corner of where my new garage will go. It hung out over the neighbors fence and too close to their shed for me to cut the 50' tree down, so I hired a professional to eliminate the tree and leave the stump to me.

New Years Eave:
Enter rental #1: Mini excavator. This machine is so fun to use, I thought stupidly of buying one for a month afterward. Having no experience with equipment like this, I was a bit slow... but by the end of 5hrs machine time, I had it down.

Getting a 1 day rental for the mini excavator late on Tuesday Dec 30th is the smartest thing I could have done. The local rental place was closed Dec 31 and Jan 1st for New Years. Without 3 days to "learn" I probably wouldn't have had so much fun.

Fast forward through a couple months of snow and freezing temps, and I was ready to cut out the site for the new garage.

Re: 26x32 Pole Garage in Paris, KY

Next up is all the site leveling. My garage is being shoved right into the corner of my property after accounting for all local setbacks. The natural slope drops approximately 24" over the 32' width of the garage, and I couldn't go any higher than 15' per local code. The last thing I wanted was an 8' ceiling, nor did I want that much fill elevating my garage to the height of my house which sits about 75' away and another 10' lower. So I decided to cut the site level.

This was about 12 loads in the 6x10 dump trailer. Thank the Lord for good neighbors, because I was such an awful skid steer operator it would have taken me a week on my own to do this. My neighbor was no professional skid steer operator, but had driven them off an on for years doing odd jobs. Experience counts when you're paying by the day for equipment. Not to mention hauling off all the dirt takes time too. We got it done in a day, right before a long day of heavy rain, thus all the water in the pictures.

Re: 26x32 Pole Garage in Paris, KY

more site pictures

Re: 26x32 Pole Garage in Paris, KY

Looks like a great start. DIY sure satisfies.

Re: 26x32 Pole Garage in Paris, KY

I contracted Tri-County Pole Barns out of Cynthiana, KY to build me a dried-in shell, complete with concrete slab and an 8x18 garage door. Here are the specs:

26x32x10 pole barn
8' OC 6x6 treated post
2x8 treated grade board
2x10 double truss carriers
4/12 pitch 26' trusses
2x6 wall girts
2x4 roof purlins


They dropped off the building kit on Thursday, got all the holes drilled, posts set, truss carriers and girts up on Friday.

Re: 26x32 Pole Garage in Paris, KY

You are moving right along. By cutting in you remove the soft topsoil and build on undisturbed material. Great base for your concrete floor. The only downside is that it complicates drainage and may require retaining walls of some sort to stabilize the cuts and prevent soil from washing out and filling in your drainage swales.

Re: 26x32 Pole Garage in Paris, KY

Pictures of graveled site from Thursday and from Friday after Day 1 of construction.

Re: 26x32 Pole Garage in Paris, KY

Bib Overalls said:

You are moving right along. By cutting in you remove the soft topsoil and build on undisturbed material. Great base for your concrete floor. The only downside is that it complicates drainage and may require retaining walls of some sort to stabilize the cuts and prevent soil from washing out and filling in your drainage swales.

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Correct. You'll see in many of the site pictures that every time it rained, it filled my site because we dug down to the clay. The drainage swales on the backside are between 3-5' wide. I am currently thinking of rip rap back behind the building, but if I find some cheap retaining wall blocks, may do that instead.

Re: 26x32 Pole Garage in Paris, KY

On Monday I had a roof, some soffit, trim, windows installed and even some building wrap!

Re: 26x32 Pole Garage in Paris, KY

It really ***** having to work and not see these guys build! I came home Tuesday to a basically finished garage. Only a few pieces of metal were missing.

Re: 26x32 Pole Garage in Paris, KY

Looks fantastic, I am down the road a little in Richmond. Any chance you could post the cost of this endeavor as I am thinking of doing something pretty similar and with you being so close it would be a great help!

Re: 26x32 Pole Garage in Paris, KY

Pattonky said:

Looks fantastic, I am down the road a little in Richmond. Any chance you could post the cost of this endeavor as I am thinking of doing something pretty similar and with you being so close it would be a great help!

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Sure, when I'm done... I'm still waiting to be told I've got enough gravel... I keep bringing in more and more! Not to mention the electrician to get power to the building, and any other incidentals I'm still encountering.

The crew finished the building on Wednesday. I waited till the weekend to get some lumber and frame out the inside of the pole barn for electric and insulation. I got a deal on R19 craft faced insulation that was 24" OC, so it was a last second decision to stud the interior out instead of just adding interior wall girts and blowing cellulose in the walls.

The batts are 8' tall, so I decided to only insulate the upper 8' to reduce the amount of cutting that had to be done. The bottom two feet will have XPS insulation so that when I wash out the inside, water doesn't wick into the insulation. Here are some pictures.

Monday is the day to pour the slab!

They called me at 6:45AM after I got to work to make sure I was ready for them. Of course I'm ready!

Final grading of gravel, lay down the 2" of foam, rebar 2' OC, and concrete poured and screeded all happened before I got there at noon! Here are some pictures.

Re: 26x32 Pole Garage in Paris, KY

Pattonky said:

Looks fantastic, I am down the road a little in Richmond. Any chance you could post the cost of this endeavor as I am thinking of doing something pretty similar and with you being so close it would be a great help!

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I'm up to $19,400 for my functioning garage, but I have another $1500 or so I will need to invest over the winter to install the metal ceiling, OSB walls and all the florescent light bulbs.

$550 in mini-excavator, bobcat, and dump trailer rentals
$900 in DGA gravel (about 6 single axle dump truck loads)
$14,920 for the dried in garage, including all doors, windows, concrete, foam under slab, gutters, etc.
$450 for T8 light fixtures
$200 for exterior lighting
$300 Liftmaster 8500 garage door opener
$400 R19 insulation for the walls
$1,650 for 200A panel install and overhead service drop