Shop Areas Coming Along

We started working on the shop areas during the Christmas holiday period. Over the past 6 weeks or so we have roughed in all the electrical outlets, all the lighting circuits and insulated all the interior and exterior walls in preparation for the Amish crew to come back. With the amount of work they get done for the price, it was a no brainer to have them back. In just over a week, they hung OSB in the Deer Processing Area (23x15 w/15' ceilings) and in the Automotive Area (23x37 w/15' ceilings) and they also hung the drywall in the Man Cave (23x22 w/15' ceilings). Then once that was completed, they installed metal ceiling in all areas, Deer Processing, Automotive, Man Cave and the 29x48 Storage Area. The final activity was to blow in insulation in the entire 66x48 shop area. It took 275 bags of insulation to get a solid R38 or higher but I can tell you, it is already paying off. They also framed up some closets for me in the Deer Processing Area for all our hunting clothes and supples. All of that in just over a week!

During all that we installed light fixtures in all areas. In the Automotive Area we installed 8 flourescent fixtures which are 4' T5 High Output, 4 bulbs per fixture. With the 8 fixtures we have about 200 lumens per square foot, nice and bright! We also installed two of those same fixtures in the Deer Processing Area and then in the Man Cave we hung 4 pendant lights that are dropped 3 feet down from the ceiling so they hang at about 12 feet or so.

Finally, we turned on the heat! The shop areas are all heated by the boiler and each is its own zone with its own thermostat. Lorrie no longer has to dress in 6 layers to come out to help, she complains now about being hot. Nothing better than being able to work in a T-shirt in the winter time.

The painting in the Deer Processing Area is done and the painting in Automotive is 90% done, just need to paint the bottom 40 inches dark gray, thought that would be a good idea for some contrast from the "all white" walls and to help cover up the dirt, dings and dents that are likely to occur in an automotive work area.

Our drywaller guy is coming in the evenings this week to finish the drywall in the Man Cave and we are in the process of thinking about the paint scheme/ colors. Thinking about doing multiple colors to give it some character, we will see.

Hanging lights in the Man Cave. You can see the drywall has been hung but not finished yet and how nice the ceiling is.

This is the Automotive Area, all nice and bright. With the white walls, white ceiling and high output lights, it is very well lit and will make a nice work area. Just need to paint the gray at the bottom and this room will be ready to start setting up.

This is the Deer Processing Area, looking at the walk-in cooler and one of the new closets, still need to get closet doors and will need to trim everything out with wood trim.

Another angle of the Deer Processing Area, the paint is all now dry so we will begin to set it up for "grinding day" which is in a couple of weeks.
 



A picture of the hoist in the Deer Processing Area. We braced up above the ceiling to ensure strength and then flush mounted the hoist on the bottom of the finished metal ceiling, also ran power so it will be clean and neat.