Jump to content

Workshop Ideas


Spearos

Recommended Posts

So... last year I moved into a house with a decent sized garden with the intention of building a large workshop.

Basically I'm trying to put together some sort of plan of what to go for. I would really appreciate people's thoughts/experience.

I think having it built with blocks and with a proper tiled roof is the way to go - I plan to stay in this house for a long time so I want something that will last. Attached is a crude plan... so far.

I have swotted up on permitted development etc and have come to the conclusion that I certainly do not want to get involved in satisfying building regs, therefore I plan not to exceed the 30m². With this in mind I'm thinking 6mx5m - I understand building control are interested in the internal floor area rather than the actual 'footprint' of the entire building?

Height. Because the building will be within 2m of the boundary I will need planning permission to go higher than 2.5m, which I think is inevitable - I understand flat roofs are nothing but trouble!
Ideally I do not want a building that is too obtrusive (it'll be at the back of my garden), so I'm unsure how high to go. With this in mind I'm thinking a ridge height of ~3.5m and an eaves height of ~2.5m which will give me a pitch of about 20 degrees - how does that sound?

I plan to have 1 x personnel door, 1 x window and 1 x vehicle door. Which leads me onto my next question - what type of door to have for the vehicle access and how big?

All comments/suggestions welcome!

post-4669-0-60732100-1457125479_thumb.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

if its within 2m of the boundary you cant go more than 2.5m total height including roof so flat will be all you can do. building regs are not hard to satisfy, the building controller will tell you what you need to do and the extra size is well worth it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I understand building regulations to apply to 'everything', whether inside or outside the scope of permitted development.

PD allows you to bypass planning permission, not building regulations. PD imposes it's own limitation envelope, but at least, if you keep within that envelope, it saves having to bow and scrape to some haughty jobsworth.

Keeping in with neighbours, if at all possible, is key to a quiet life here. Worth spending a bit of money on, and I don't mean a box of chocolates either.

Suss out if there is anything they want doing while you have contractors on site, tree pruning, lowering an overgrown hedge, replacing a rotten fence, either with new of with a brick wall, helping lay a concrete drive, that sort of thing.

Regards.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

not quite accurate, under a certain size you are exempt building regs too. but youd be silly to not involve building control anyway, for starters it means you can go bigger, second it means it isnt going to fall dow because you havent done it to the correct standard.

http://www.planningportal.gov.uk/permission/commonprojects/outbuildings/

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As big a door as possible. I have swing doors on mine, but the most 'practical' in terms of use and space-efficiency is probably a roller shutter door. Expensive though. Making it wide enough that you could have the vehicle parked half in the building and still work round it would be advantageous I feel - for things where you want to run the engine.

I went for a timber frame for ease, speed and cost. But there is no doubt that a block-built building is going to be far more substantial. 6 x 5 will be a good size. Of course they're never big enough once in use, but that's just the way it is!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Side hung timber doors, always. You can screw hooks to them and hang all your welding cables on them, extension leads, angle grinders...... Like to see you do that with a roller shutter or up and over!

Seriously think about a timber building. I paid about £3k for my workshop, sort of built to order, it'll be much warmer. Plus it was erected by them, inside 8 hours, and if I was doing it again the day after I'd have spray foam insulators in to blast it as soon as they'd gone. Really really wish I'd had my workshop done.

I'm due a new garage at some point in the future, I will not be making the same mistake twice.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If you havnt got much height I'd put a pit in. Make room for a toilet and basin, a fall on the floor towards the centre and large door so any fluids or rainwater don't go everywhere, a study beam for block and tackle roughly over the engine bay is always handy.

Steel doors with insulation and timber exterior would be my preference I think, timber doors have too much flex in my experience. Perhaps provision for a wood burner chimney and don't forget a decent water and electric supply.

Soundproofed compresser shed, segregated welding/grinding area, extractor fan, alarm,shelving and some Lin bins behind a door/cupboard to stop them getting muck in them are all handy things.

Fiberglass flat roofs are pretty popular round me albeit with a slight pitch on them.

Will.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Side hinged doors are fine if you don't need the space in front of the garage. If you need to park up close to it they'll be a PITA, because you'll have to move the vehicle(s) every time you want to open them. Nasty to handle if you're in a windy location, too. For the sort the size of garage you're planning I guess you'd have to do two sets of doors, too, rather than a single large one, whereas roller will allow either two single or one double door (arguments for both - I prefer one full width, because although you have to open the whole garage up to the elements you've got maximum flexibility for positioning vehicles. My last garage had side hinged wooden doors, the one I've just had built has an insulated roller door - the wooden doors were fine, but that was a single garage and I couldn't park outside it anyway. The roller door is much more draft proof and convenient. Go for roller not up-and-over or sectional though, they don't take up lots of space inside.

Seriously consider a wooden garage - it will be a great deal cheaper. The garage I've just built is more or less what you're proposing (it's 30m2, brick/block cavity walls and a tiled roof, with insulated roller door. It cost about £22k to build.

If you've got to deal with planning anyway, building control will not involve a great deal more hassle for garage - provided you don't have concerns about things like how solid the ground is under it. If they aren't happy they could make you put in much deeper foundations or even a flotation platform, which can get rather ridiculous for a relatively small building (mine has foundations to standard modern spec, and even those are at least double what the gable end of the neighbours house next to it is on - that's about 35ft high and has been standing there without any movement for a hundred years. They will also make you stick to the rules regarding neighbours boundaries, shared walls, etc. - but in the long run your neighbours will probably thank you for that. Our build was considerably complicated by, and going for the full bricks-and-mortar necessitated - by the fact that the previous owners of the adjacent house built their garage in a way that wouldn't have been allowed if both it and our old garage (that they rebuilt alongside theirs after buying land from the owner of our house) had been inspected (roof overhanging the boundary and draining onto our roof and eventually into our soakaway was the biggest issue). So their corner cutting ultimately ended up costing us a lot money.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Some interesting comments - thanks guys.

I do plan do put in a planning permission request regarding the height - 2.5m just wont do! As for the neighbours they appear a reasonable bunch and besides the garage will be at the back of my garden, well away from any houses. There's quite a few large garden buildings in my street too so it's not like mine will stand out.

I was very keen on a wooden building, something along these lines http://www.ukworkshop.co.uk/forums/build-a-shed-mike-s-way-t39389.html The problem with wooden buildings of course is they rot however build one this way and it should last a long, long time. Also as mentioned they are warmer, less condensation and contain the tool of choice for Land Rover owners very well :glare:

Problem with a wooden building is that (unless I'm mistaken) a building constructed by mainly combustable materials, between 15m² and 30m² means building regulations come into it if, it is within 1m of the boundary which mine will be.

Initially I was keen on a steel roller door but then I'd need to think about space above the the door opening for it to 'coil up'. Space that could be used for a bigger door. The planned position will mean there is space for side hung doors to open, I just wasnt that keen on the problems big heavy timber doors have. However as suggested a steel framed, timber clad door could be the answer.

i know rather too much about building control, but then i have good reason. this is 5mx8m, the max size allowed under approved development regs

You're my new best friend! :rofl:

The issue I have with going over 30m² and having to satisfy building regs is that the soil here is heavy clay and there are trees close by. With this in mind I have heard stories of building control wanting foundations over 2m deep!!

Since you're going over 30m² could you tell me what other regs (if any) you have to satisfy? Also, you mention 'approved development regs' what are they? :unsure:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Side hinged doors are fine if you don't need the space in front of the garage. If you need to park up close to it they'll be a PITA, because you'll have to move the vehicle(s) every time you want to open them. Nasty to handle if you're in a windy location, too. For the sort the size of garage you're planning I guess you'd have to do two sets of doors, too, rather than a single large one, whereas roller will allow either two single or one double door (arguments for both - I prefer one full width, because although you have to open the whole garage up to the elements you've got maximum flexibility for positioning vehicles. My last garage had side hinged wooden doors, the one I've just had built has an insulated roller door - the wooden doors were fine, but that was a single garage and I couldn't park outside it anyway. The roller door is much more draft proof and convenient. Go for roller not up-and-over or sectional though, they don't take up lots of space inside.

Seriously consider a wooden garage - it will be a great deal cheaper. The garage I've just built is more or less what you're proposing (it's 30m2, brick/block cavity walls and a tiled roof, with insulated roller door. It cost about £22k to build.

If you've got to deal with planning anyway, building control will not involve a great deal more hassle for garage - provided you don't have concerns about things like how solid the ground is under it. If they aren't happy they could make you put in much deeper foundations or even a flotation platform, which can get rather ridiculous for a relatively small building (mine has foundations to standard modern spec, and even those are at least double what the gable end of the neighbours house next to it is on - that's about 35ft high and has been standing there without any movement for a hundred years. They will also make you stick to the rules regarding neighbours boundaries, shared walls, etc. - but in the long run your neighbours will probably thank you for that. Our build was considerably complicated by, and going for the full bricks-and-mortar necessitated - by the fact that the previous owners of the adjacent house built their garage in a way that wouldn't have been allowed if both it and our old garage (that they rebuilt alongside theirs after buying land from the owner of our house) had been inspected (roof overhanging the boundary and draining onto our roof and eventually into our soakaway was the biggest issue). So their corner cutting ultimately ended up costing us a lot money.

Very informative post - thanks.

There will only be one door - the access to the back of the garden is only ~4m, there is a small council owned garage 'blocking' one side of the back of my garden. Hence the door being offset in my drawing. Hope that makes sense!

Can I ask what was included in your 22k? Was that start to finish, all in, everything?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's was roughly £22k for the actual build - there will have been some costs for the draughtsman, planning and building control on top of that, but they were shared with house extension we were building at the same time so it's hard to put a figure on them - wouldn't have thought they came to more than another £1k, though.

I was shocked how expensive it is to build a brick and tile garage - I'd done a bit of research beforehand and was expecting it to come out around £10k - think that was mostly based on quite out of date information! We had three quotes for the work, two of which were roughly the same (one was £20k for the garage, but offset by more for the house extensions - overall they were virtually identical) and one was significantly more.

It's worth noting that there were things in that which added to the cost - the old garage, which was a single, brick build with single sloped asbestos roof had to be demolished, and the shared party wall and existing roof drainage issue meant that we had to put a large valley gutter between the roofs.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The problem with up and over doors and roller doors are that it makes the garage very tall if you want to get a land rover under one. The advantage of side hinged doors is you can do a narrow one to walk through and a wide one for when you want to get the car in and out which means you don't lose all your heat every time you want to walk in and out and your not wasting wall space on an separate personal door

I thought the 2.5m height limit on permitted developments was to the eves rather than the ridge, I thought the ridge could be 3.5m? Maybe my memory is not as good as I thought? Either way if the road is lower than your property maybe you can steal height with a lower floor?

You have to ensure it is to building control standard whatever you do. You can download it for free and most of it wont apply to you anyway. If you don't your insurance may be invalid or you may have to get covenant insurance when you want to sell.

Get lots of light in if you can, insulate it and run a good sized conduit or two to your house for electric, water, alarm, Internet, phone or whatever else you decide you need in the future.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was shocked how expensive it is to build a brick and tile garage - I'd done a bit of research beforehand and was expecting it to come out around £10k - think that was mostly based on quite out of date information! We had three quotes for the work, two of which were roughly the same (one was £20k for the garage, but offset by more for the house extensions - overall they were virtually identical) and one was significantly more.

I'm starting the process of getting a garage/workshop built. Timber was out because I want to build close to the boundary. My neighbour suggested steel as it is fireproof and cheap. It's also light so the foundations are cheap too. Unfortunately, the council had other ideas and have insisted on stone. Because of the proximity to trees, 3 metre foundations were also required to take the weight of the masonry. Three metre foundations would undermine the footings of the main house so, without resorting to extensive underpinning, a raft foundation was suggested.

I'm currently resubmitting the plans, but I been warned that it's not going to be a cheap build.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Some interesting comments - thanks guys.

I do plan do put in a planning permission request regarding the height - 2.5m just wont do! As for the neighbours they appear a reasonable bunch and besides the garage will be at the back of my garden, well away from any houses. There's quite a few large garden buildings in my street too so it's not like mine will stand out.

I was very keen on a wooden building, something along these lines http://www.ukworkshop.co.uk/forums/build-a-shed-mike-s-way-t39389.html The problem with wooden buildings of course is they rot however build one this way and it should last a long, long time. Also as mentioned they are warmer, less condensation and contain the tool of choice for Land Rover owners very well :glare:

Problem with a wooden building is that (unless I'm mistaken) a building constructed by mainly combustable materials, between 15m² and 30m² means building regulations come into it if, it is within 1m of the boundary which mine will be.

Initially I was keen on a steel roller door but then I'd need to think about space above the the door opening for it to 'coil up'. Space that could be used for a bigger door. The planned position will mean there is space for side hung doors to open, I just wasnt that keen on the problems big heavy timber doors have. However as suggested a steel framed, timber clad door could be the answer.

You're my new best friend! :rofl:

The issue I have with going over 30m² and having to satisfy building regs is that the soil here is heavy clay and there are trees close by. With this in mind I have heard stories of building control wanting foundations over 2m deep!!

Since you're going over 30m² could you tell me what other regs (if any) you have to satisfy? Also, you mention 'approved development regs' what are they? :unsure:

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2015/596/article/3/made

basically permitted developments is a development where your council has given planning permission automatically. this loosely ties into building control.

on this page

http://www.planningportal.gov.uk/permission/commonprojects/outbuildings/

particular points to take note of are:

  • No outbuilding on land forward of a wall forming the principal elevation.

basically it has to be to the side or behind your house, not in the front.\

  • Outbuildings and garages to be single storey with maximum eaves height of 2.5 metres and maximum overall height of four metres with a dual pitched roof or three metres for any other roof.

so your walls can go to 2.5m and the top of your roof to 4 meters UNLESS!

  • Maximum height of 2.5 metres in the case of a building, enclosure or container within two metres of a boundary of the curtilage of the dwellinghouse.

unless you havent got a 2 meter space round the entire outside of the building plot. in which case your max height including roof is 2.5 meters. (this personally is causing me some rather pressing issues. )

anther part to take partticular note of is

If you want to put up small detached buildings such as a garden shed or summerhouse in your garden, building regulations will not normally apply if the floor area of the building is less than 15 square metres and contains NO sleeping accommodation.
so you can put up a 15sqm garage (total footprint) without building regs (not 30sqm)

If the floor area of the building is between 15 square metres and 30 square metres, you will not normally be required to apply for building regulations approval providing that the building contains NO sleeping accommodation and is either at least one metre from any boundary or it is constructed of substantially non-combustible materials.

or up to 30sqm as long as the building has a 1m space all around it and is built of block with a fireproof roof. (in other words not hot tar, but fiberglass etc)
or a max of 40sqm if you do involve building control before you need planning permission as long as it isnt covering more than 50% of the land inside your property boarders (ie front and back gardens)
dont be afraid of building control. they're not there to make your life difficult, just to make sure the buildings safe. the great thing is you pay a set fee and then call them out as often as you like to check what you've done and to grill them on any details your not sure on. ie foundation depth etc. i live in china clay country, possibly the worst to build on. i had to dig down 2.5-3ft to put the foundations in. no biggie, that's what a mini digger is for :-)
ive got the building to eves height for less than 4k.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

My post from last night didn't seem to post. But here it is.

I built a double garage in block, covered with timber feather edge. It had a centre wall as it was going to be split between my house and my brothers new house next door. I'm not sure on the price overall, but I did most of the block laying myself and had tiles free from a house my parents demolished. The design was done under planning permission due to being put in at the same time as the planning for the new house.

However due to multiple 30m+ oak trees within 2 m of the garage we tried the strip foundations but in the end, had abbey pynford do their piled raft foundation. The reason for this is my brother's house had to have the same foundations due to the trees and the heavy clay soil. If I had my time again I would probably look at a reinforced concrete raft with dropped egdes under the walls. The only issue with doing these sort of foundations is that they are a bit beyond the average capabilities of a DIYer.

I will get some photos up when back at home.

i see you are right about the height as you mention being within 2m of the boundary.

'Outbuildings and garages to be single storey with maximum eaves height of 2.5 metres and maximum overall height of four metres with a dual pitched roof or three metres for any other roof.

Maximum height of 2.5 metres in the case of a building, enclosure or container within two metres of a boundary of the curtilage of the dwelling house' copied from planning portal.

If you need extra height for an opening, putting the opening into the gable end of the building will provide the space to install a roller door without cutting into the limited height at the eaves. Using a roof truss designed to keep any cross ties higher than the eaves would also be good for clearance.

Hope that makes sense.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm starting the process of getting a garage/workshop built. Timber was out because I want to build close to the boundary. My neighbour suggested steel as it is fireproof and cheap. It's also light so the foundations are cheap too.

I'd be very careful with that assumption, if you're close to the boundaries the steel will need fireproofing.

When I rang one of those steel building companies that advertise on Ebay, they advised that if you were going to build a garage/workshop at the bottom of the garden of a typical row of semis or terraced houses, it would actually be about the same price to build out of stone. I picked my jaw up off the floor and rang my local builder instead.

Oh to have land...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'd be very careful with that assumption, if you're close to the boundaries the steel will need fireproofing.

When I rang one of those steel building companies that advertise on Ebay, they advised that if you were going to build a garage/workshop at the bottom of the garden of a typical row of semis or terraced houses, it would actually be about the same price to build out of stone. I picked my jaw up off the floor and rang my local builder instead.

Oh to have land...

You may be correct but it wasn't an assumption. My neighbour is a chartered surveyor. In my specific circumstances I had confirmation that a steel building would fully meet building regs... if not planning requirements. I had a site inspection and a quote from a company that specialises in custom made steel buildings (the footprint isn't square) and cost was going to be around £12k plus £5.5k for the slab. I have only had informal estimates for stone on a raft but it is looking like looking like it's going to cost over £30k.

As you say... Oh to have land!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Interesting the 12 quotes I got for my shed.... steel on average was about 30% (in one case 300%, they weren't interested in explaining why lol) more expensive than a corresponding wooden pole shed.... the end result for me was a wooden pole shed with two steel spans so I can have "clear span" inside the clear spans cost me another 12%

Yay I have land.... now I need money lol

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's was roughly £22k for the actual build - there will have been some costs for the draughtsman, planning and building control on top of that, but they were shared with house extension we were building at the same time so it's hard to put a figure on them - wouldn't have thought they came to more than another £1k, though.

I was shocked how expensive it is to build a brick and tile garage - I'd done a bit of research beforehand and was expecting it to come out around £10k - think that was mostly based on quite out of date information! We had three quotes for the work, two of which were roughly the same (one was £20k for the garage, but offset by more for the house extensions - overall they were virtually identical) and one was significantly more.

It's worth noting that there were things in that which added to the cost - the old garage, which was a single, brick build with single sloped asbestos roof had to be demolished, and the shared party wall and existing roof drainage issue meant that we had to put a large valley gutter between the roofs.

I too find that surprisingly high (but then WTF do I know!). so basically you didn't lay a finger on your garage build?

I'm hoping my build wont be quite that much - my initial thoughts are to get someone to do the footings, slab, blockwork and roof. I can then 'finish' it off. I'm inclined to just go for a single skinned wall which will mean less materials and labour.

The problem with up and over doors and roller doors are that it makes the garage very tall if you want to get a land rover under one. The advantage of side hinged doors is you can do a narrow one to walk through and a wide one for when you want to get the car in and out which means you don't lose all your heat every time you want to walk in and out and your not wasting wall space on an separate personal door

I thought the 2.5m height limit on permitted developments was to the eves rather than the ridge, I thought the ridge could be 3.5m? Maybe my memory is not as good as I thought? Either way if the road is lower than your property maybe you can steal height with a lower floor?

You have to ensure it is to building control standard whatever you do. You can download it for free and most of it wont apply to you anyway. If you don't your insurance may be invalid or you may have to get covenant insurance when you want to sell.

Get lots of light in if you can, insulate it and run a good sized conduit or two to your house for electric, water, alarm, Internet, phone or whatever else you decide you need in the future.

First sentence is exactly my concern! Although as crclifford has mentioned you could design the roof truss to have the bottom chord set slightly up on the top chords (higher than the eaves) to give you more 'headroom' for the coiled up roller door.

That's a great idea - side hung doors with one larger than the other. I like that :D

Yes permitted development allows you to have an eaves height of 2.5 m max however if the building is within 2m of the boundary the height cannot exceed 2.5m.

I've never heard about insurance being invalid if you haven't got building control involved? Yes, of course I can understand that if you built something and didn't get building control involved even though you should have, then that could cause issues. But as in this case for example, an outbuilding of less than 30m² does not require building regs so how can insurance companies/conveyancers make it a problem?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If you want to put up small detached buildings such as a garden shed or summerhouse in your garden, building regulations will not normally apply if the floor area of the building is less than 15 square metres and contains NO sleeping accommodation.
so you can put up a 15sqm garage (total footprint) without building regs (not 30sqm)

If the floor area of the building is between 15 square metres and 30 square metres, you will not normally be required to apply for building regulations approval providing that the building contains NO sleeping accommodation and is either at least one metre from any boundary or it is constructed of substantially non-combustible materials.

or up to 30sqm as long as the building has a 1m space all around it and is built of block with a fireproof roof. (in other words not hot tar, but fiberglass etc)
or a max of 40sqm if you do involve building control before you need planning permission as long as it isnt covering more than 50% of the land inside your property boarders (ie front and back gardens)
dont be afraid of building control. they're not there to make your life difficult, just to make sure the buildings safe. the great thing is you pay a set fee and then call them out as often as you like to check what you've done and to grill them on any details your not sure on. ie foundation depth etc. i live in china clay country, possibly the worst to build on. i had to dig down 2.5-3ft to put the foundations in. no biggie, that's what a mini digger is for :-)
ive got the building to eves height for less than 4k.

Thank you qwakers.

Although I interpret the part I've underlined slightly differently. The key word is either. Surely it means that you can have a building between 15m² and 30m² within 1m of the boundary if it's made mainly from non combustable materials or if the building is made from combustable materials and is between 15m² and 30m² it needs to be more than 1m away from any boundary?

Totally agree with the 2.5m total height within 2m of boundary being a major ball ache! Not exactly Land Rover friendly is it?!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

We use cookies to ensure you get the best experience. By using our website you agree to our Cookie Policy