Adventures in boat ownership - continues!

[dansshin]

@Englewoodcowboy I know what you mean and understood.

 

[dansshin]

Here are the rest of the pictures from today. It looks like it may be raining so not sure what impact it will have to the foundation. Contractor will be back tomorrow to do the poured walls. Talked to neighbor and they seem to be fine with the dirt being on their lawn for little bit and repairing any lawn damage afterwards.

 

[dansshin]

@Bruce BIG Thank You for the information you provided. I'm glad I was able to adjust the plan to increase the length a bit based on your input before foundation went in. When my architect said 24' I thought I was getting 24' of space. I had no idea that was outside dimension. THANK YOU!!!

 

[Bruce]

Your footers are poured. Rain will not cause any harm beyond a need to clean off the footers before forming the walls and more dirt washing into your neighbors yard.

I am glad that you have increased the length. I built out house in 2011. That required a lot of good advice from friends in the business.

 

[Rideitout]

Deja vu. This thread is taking the same route as your original post about buying your boat. You have a laid back attitude while others think you may be doing some things wrong and may not end up where you want to be. I can't say who is right but, judging from your boat buying experience, I think you'll get what you want and somehow make it work out just fine. I have to agree with making it deeper. My garage is 26' front to back outside dimensions and the 210 fits in it with about 10" to spare without the tongue folded. I'm a residential contractor and I think the quote for the foundation/flatwork is inline. Just don't have any set-in-stone expectations of a completion date and be sure to accept any cost overruns with a smile.

 

[Murf'n'surf]

Great advice from @Bruce and @Englewoodcowboy

Your project is moving along nicely. I look forward to many more pics!!

 

[Speedling]

Wow, sorry I missed all this!
Yeah, my current garage is 24' x 24' and it stinks. Can't get around the boat at all. Any extra length would be awesome there!
I know that with current costs $100 a square foot is the norm around here. If you are trying to reuse some of your old brick, I would say it's not really worth it if you can swing the extra bit of money. If you are having a hard time finding a bricklayer, just start asking around. Or find where some guys are laying brick on something and find them at lunchtime and see if any of them want to do a side job. Bricklayers, even union ones, are great for side jobs. Where I live, if you can get under $1 a brick, you're golden. If it's a flat basic wall, I think you should be under $1 a brick for sure. That's just to lay it. You still need to buy the brick, which varies a good bit.
As far as saving the money, I would have said find someone that does concrete and make friends It's a huge cost and can easily be done yourself once you learn some of the basics. I would NOT however do any finishing work yourself, just the foundation etc. but that's with inspector's approval and someone guiding you along. Since you already hired this out, just go for it!
The garage door you can probably do yourself nowadays as well, just watch some basic tutorials on youtube. Another way you can save money is roofing. It's not terribly hard, just time consuming if you haven't done it before. Around me, everyone is blue collar. Like all of Northwest Indiana. Everyone knows someone that does something and you can get it all done for beer and a handshake. Problem is they are blue collar, and us hard working folks are gonna drink our beer, ok? Not me, I grew up in Illinois. I drink wine and mixed drinks (Long Islands all day PLEASE). In any case, SOMEONE has to have done roofing before and knows how to tie it all in with your existing. I don't recall your original drawings as I'm writing this, but it is easiest when there is a seperation between garage and house with some sort of elevation change so that the roofing is broken up. Finding shingles is sometimes the trickiest part though.

Oh, and as far as finding and pricing out brick, the brick yards do NOT always have a better price and the masons do NOT always get a better price. In fact, around here, everyone is the same price no matter what. We do several millions and some years billions of masonry and don't get a discount unless we can get two companies bidding each other out on a multi-million dollar job. Masonry companies don't typically get a markup on the material either. In fact, we have started using menards for a lot of our stuff because it's cheaper!
Masonry is all about the labor. If you can cut the amount of labor, you will save the money.

 

[dansshin]

@Speedling Well perhaps my brick contractor is charging more because he is reusing alot of the bricks so more labor for him. Maybe I should ask how much if he is installing all new.

I been using Craigslist to see if I could get someone to bid on my brick work but even after telling them I have approved permit and project will be starting soon no one showed up other than the guy I hired. It sounds like construction work has picked up and everyone around here is very busy.

 

[Speedling]

No one likes to re-use the brick. It's sloppy and messy and doesn't bond nice if there is mortar in the holes. If you clean the brick yourself and stack in rows of 11 then he may come down on price. It's all labor costs!
also, give him a really good hole to clean out the mixer. Under the driveway or something. They will make a mess either way but if you are prepared for it they may be happier and work harder.

 

[dansshin]

@Speedling I asked him if price would be cheaper if he uses all new bricks without him having to remove and clean to reuse existing bricks and he simply replied "No". I estimate my total area to brick would be about ~165 Sq. Ft. so what would you think reasonable estimate for this job may be? How much more if you had to add for demo of existing brick.

Based on the information from the builder my brick is called "Hebron Castlewood Scotty".

 

[Speedling]

$5 a square foot isn't unreasonable. I just wish you were able to get multiple quotes. I know around here it's a really cutthroat business right now and there are a million masons.
https://www.google.com/maps/search/masons/@44.9874754,-93.2195447,12.13z/data=!4m8!2m7!3m6!1smasons!2sBrooklyn+Park,+MN!3s0x52b33a04ab97f237:0xe4b26b2ae4641588!4m2!1d-93.3563405!2d45.0941315
I'm not saying it's gonna save you thousands on something like that, but hundreds maybe.

 

[dansshin]

@Speedling I might need to fly you out to my house to do it for $5 sq. ft because I just exchanged another email with local masonry contractor and he said $30/sq. ft. and that includes materials. This would put it inline with $5000 I'm paying but my current guy is demoing the existing brick and reusing some of the brick and including matching keystone in the center of new garage.

My concern now is your comment about using existing brick being "It's sloppy and messy and doesn't bond nice". It sounds like if brick is fairly cheap it would be better to just use new.

 

[Speedling]

I would use new if you can match it, yes.
If you leave mortar in the holes, the bond isn't nearly as strong and you will have cracking after a couple years on a new addition like that. You still may with new, but not nearly as much.
$5 a square foot is a side job for us and would not be materials included. Realistically we are more like $7 on a typical job but like I said, it's cutthroat around here lately.
Just a ballpark of $5000 really isn't that out of the question for what you are doing either way. All depends on the rates in your area. For us, an 8 hour day should net the worker $200-250 a day. Some guys can lay 800 brick a day no sweat. Some can't. Depends on if they have someone tending them as well.
I am just glad you have options and quotes. That should tell u what it will cost in your area for sure.

 

[dansshin]

Few more pictures of the progress.

 

[dansshin]

Things are already not going very smoothly. I'm having some concerns/issues with way the foundation guy added brick ledge and I decided to let my brick guy go and having challenges getting my down payment back as he will not return my calls or respond to my inquiries about when he would be returning my down payment.

It seems my foundation guy couldn't add the brick ledge as part of his poured wall to the front part of the garage where brick front will be. He did add it to the corner but there is 6' section on the front where he couldn't. Even though I asked him to pour the 4" form to build up the brick ledge from the footing prior to him backfilling he stated using steel lintel would be good enough and would not rust since it's very thick steel. I was concerned about this so I called my city code guy today and he told me lintel is generally used for above ground over windows and doors and have not heard of using it below grade. Even for above ground it needs to have corrosion inhibitor. Also did some web search to find consensus about using lintel below grade is generally bad practice. I'm asking him to redo the brick ledge on the front but not sure if he will as he has already backfilled the dirt.

Today was supposed to be the day that my brick guy was to tear off the rest of the brick on my existing 3rd stall so that we can prepare to frame the new garage. Even though my description of work for this phase was "remove brick so new garage can be framed" but it seems he was under the impression that he only needed to remove brick from about a foot or two above the existing garage door for framing which I would have been ok with. But my dad who will be helping me frame said all the brick from existing 3rd stall should be removed for framing which meant 4 or 5 rows more than he planned so he said he needed another $1500. Based on input from @Bruce in this thread, I ready felt like I was over paying for the brick work @$5000 and additional $1500 to remove 4 or 5 rows of brick seemed unreasonable so I decided to request my $1250 deposit back. I have not gotten any response from him all day about when I would get my deposit back. What recourse do I have on this to get my deposit back? Only work he has done so far is remove 1 foot of brick (1 hour of work that I observed him do) from my existing garage corner so that foundation guy can tie in the new foundation to existing. I've indicated to him I would pay him $100 for that 1 hour of work performed.

 

[bobbie]

@Englewoodcowboy Wow....i've got a honey-do list around our house. maybe you can hop a plane and give morgan and i some help. @jcyamaharider and @sx210owner will vouch for our hospitatility!

 

[Speedling]

I have never heard of a concrete guy that couldn't pour a brick ledge. He just forgot it.
angle will work but will rust. Don't like that idea one bit. Seen it before, and without some sort of ledge it just ain't gonna happen long term.
if you do pour another ledge, be sure to rebar or pin into existing concrete several times.
Your next option is to do cultural stone. If you go that route be sure they do mesh, a parge coat, then do the stone. I recommend a stacked stone.

 

[Speedling]

Something like this:
http://m.homedepot.com/p/Veneerstone-Stacked-Stone-Villa-Flats-150-sq-ft-Bulk-Pallet-Manufactured-Stone-97357/202189904/

 

[Bruce]

Your concrete guy needs to drill rebar for the brick ledge into the concrete wall at an angle where it will push down into the poured wall then form up and pour the brick ledge.

 

[Bruce]

I could not find any pictures of the rebar or forming but my brick ledge was added after the walls were poured. 1/2" or 5/8" Rebar was drilled in at approximately a 45 degree angle every 2'. Then forms were put in place and a 1' wide brick ledge was poured. The area under the brick ledge had been excavated for the walls then was filled with city pit gravel. The gravel had been compacted by rain and equipment driving over it before we poured the brick ledge. We poured the brick ledge tall enough to reach the city pit. Four years later I only have one crack in my brick work and I believe that came from a decision to break a concrete block loose from a wall when pouring our driveway.

Here are some pictures of brick on the ledge.