Hot Rods Your 2 car garage....

My garages. The short story.
These measurements may not be exact. But as close as I remember, mostly going by the size of each drive in door.
Home number one, for six years, was no larger than a two car garage. This is where I’m really guessing. The cement block garage is a 1 ½ car with swing out wood barn doors I made. This makes the garage roughly 14X18. At most 15X20.
My first car was a 1949 Dodge and it was only garaged from Oct 57 when we married and moved in till spring 1958 when I bought my first old car project, a 1931 Model A coupe. The coupe went in the garage for six years. I mostly worked on it outside in the 10’ X 75’ driveway.
This is also where I worked on a 49 Olds, a 50 Buick, 54 Ford, 39 Ford 4-dr, and others. My biggest project there was swapping the 4-cyl Austin Healy Sprite engine/tranny for a 327 Chevy/powerglide. Yes outside partially under a shade tree.
When doing any painting the Model A sat in the front yard so I could paint in the garage. At least three of those cars were painted there using a small Sears compressor.

House #2 for 30+ years had a 24X28 garage with 16’ door with 4 old cars in it most of the time. Yes four! Sometimes another 4 or 5 sat outside. Again most work except painting was done on the drive way. This drive was roughly 10’ at the street and widened to 4-cars wide at the garage, about 50’ long. I later added a rear stall 8’ wide on one end and 14’ on the other by 24’ long.
A white rock pad for the motor home or other RV was roughly 45’ by 12 next to the garage and side 8’ door of the addition. That rear addition had a 6’ overhang to work with the car partially outside.
We lived on the end of a cul-de-sac on a pie shaped lot. I added an 8’X28 side addition on the left side. Half that for yard tools, the other half for work bench and welder/compressor, etc. The main garage had a high ceiling for storing crap.
My 39 Ford was stored and forgotten in the rear addition.

House #3 in Florida, 21 years, after moving most crap and most cars into garage roughly 24’28’ with two 9‘ doors. Here we have a 18’X36’ shed filled with three cars and enough crap to build more plus a 12x 14’ workshop with a car port on each end. The 10’X 12’ pump house became my garden tool shed. Ended up adding two 10X20 vinyl shelters on the slab in front of the garage. This is my main work area. All of the garages I’ve owned but I still work outside where my DD and RV sits.

Old age. Five acres and this larger place is getting to be too much for us. We decided we’d move back to Illinois. Lucked out and found a small home on ½ acre at the edge of our home town. Difficult to find a small place in the city with a garage or even a drive way. Again we lucked out. I now will have a 20X20 garage and a 100’ long grass driveway. Hope to put in a 20X20 cement slab at the garage with a 10’ drive. Way out back there is a 10'X12' metal shed for my mower and other lawn care stuff. That'll help.
We bought this place off the internet so with the help of our grown kids and pictures bought it sort of site unseen. I do plan on getting rid of all but the two old cars in my avatar. Gave son my 39 Ford and son-in-law my 48 Chevy panel truck. Still got cars and crap to sell.

This makes me very interested in this 2-car garage thread. Will two cars, parts, and tools fit in a 20X20 very low raftered garage? Too old and lazy to add on the rear which is what I’d love to do. Lot is 105X210 with small home in middle. Nothing but a farm behind so plenty of room.

Coincidentally we’ve only had four homes. All four on dead end streets. Each got shorter. This one is only 1/8 mile long.
Don't have any really good photos of my garages but here's a few partial views. Hopefull in order. Garage #2 #3 where we are. Garage #3 Garage #4 Garage #1

That’s my two car garage story and I’m stuck with it.

 

House I bought 27 years ago (and still live in) had a typical 1940's single car garage. My t-bucket was wedged in there forever. I finally built a 2-1/2 bay directly in front/attached to the original, thus giving me one bay double-deep and the new section 24' wide. The back bay is set-up as a tool room with provisions for welding and such. There is a full gantry crane in the front bay. I now have both a T and an A side by side. This past summer I put up ANOTHER single-bay out back for seasonal crap and yard stuff just to clear it out of the garage and make some extra space. No sooner did I get finished with it and my son brings his vintage motorcycle project into my garage and eats some some space for the winter. Moral of the story is, you can NEVER have enough room.

 

I remember years ago my buddy back in my home town put up a metal 44'X66' building in his back yard. Odd figures because he wanted it as large as legal on his lot. That building has a loft for lots of extra storage. We both figured he'd have plenty of room. In no time he filled it with old Fords and flathead parts. For years he's had a tiny bay to work in and the rest is packed.
My other buddy had a metal buildings put up. Then another. Both of those, his one car attached garage and a shed are full of cars and parts.
Son in law built a large metal building with his apartment in the front third. Then added another mid sized building in back. Then a larger metal building tall enough for semis. Added a large loft, a lean too on one side. He married our daughter and moved to a large house with three car garage with loft. His dad lives in the thing they now call "The shop." Now they are closing in the lean too and adding a tornado shelter below. Every foot is filled with something! There's enough cement outside for a landing strip.
As seen from some of the celebrity garages, and HAMB celebrity garages it's impossible to have enough room.

 

Moved to the farm with my '29 AA project in 1975. Didn't have a garage, but had two horses and needed to build a barn. Project stayed out in the elements. Fast forward to 1990, new wife and I remodeled the farmhouse and added a two-car garage. Project stayed out in the elements, but cab and rest of sheetmetal went into the rafters of the garage. Next we built a new home with a 3-1/2 car garage. Project came inside and had its own stall, but now I want more room! I'm now retired, and seem to have even less time to play with the project. That's gonna change.

 

My 24X30 garage that I built 2 years ago is my man cave, before that I had a leanto to work in, it leans to the East and North and the floor might as well be dirt, the old concrete in it is so broken up a creeper was almost worthless. I most certainly appreciate what I have now and hope this will allow me to get my project completed while I can still enjoy it. The picture is of my Christmas presents from my grandson and his fiancee, who painted my man cave sign which is now proudly displayed in my garage/man cave.

 

Here's my 1 1/2 car garage. 19 wide by 25 deep. As you can see I can only get one car in there with all the other stuff in there but its plenty of room to work.

 

Is that a 63 galaxie on the right. If it is do you have any more pictures of It? I like the color and look with the flames

 

The car's advertized for sale here on the HaMB
there are a lot of photos in the ad
glad you like it
check it out

thanks alan

 

I guess mine is a four car by size but only two car doors

 

Move the compressor outside, pour a pad, bolt it down and build a small lean-to roof over it, it will be SO much quieter than running it inside of a garage. you can build all that for about $25, 2 bags of quick create a 10 ft. 2x4 for the frame, then after the concrete has cured, reuse the 2x4 to make the roof framework and get a piece of tin to cover it.
That's how mine ran for years with a 2 car garage, I did the same thing when I built my shop, I just didn't want to hear it run.
Godspeed
MrC.

 

Cramped. And the 49 is in the driveway. Anyone in Austin TX looking for more space...

 

I love this thread and need to see more

 

My two car garage. JW

 

One side

 

The other side.

 

I put a new compressor outside once ,The first day that it was -21 degrees it didn't last but about 20 seconds after I turned it on.It's hard to drain the water out when its that cold.
I have built myself 5 garages over the years ,2011 I had to get rid of everything but my wife and the dog. after three years of living in a camper I'm starting all over. This time I have one stall 12 x 24, no heat and only one 25 amp circuit. I am building a 57 gasser, Can it be done without all the fancy stuff, who knows but were not dead yet.

 

I started with a 20x30 me and Dad built, then we built a 24x36, 10 ft ceilings. Later I had the Omish build a 24x36 onto my other 1 going the opposite direction with 13 1/2 ft ceilings. I put a 2 post lift in it. I do a lot of work for other people in the last 1, and use the 1st 24x36 as a hot rod shop and store my chevelle. What would be nice is a 40x60 with a shed on it for all the crap that is constantly in the way. Air comp, eng stand and crane, etc, etc, etc.

 

I don't have electricity. And can't open the doors all the way but. I'm determined to get her running this summer

 

Wish I had a two car garage.........doing it in a one and a half.

 

24x30 steel sided wood frame building. Sheeted the inside with OSB, got all the leftovers from moving to this place out of it, built a bench across the end, hung some troffers left over from remodel at work, and now.......nothing. Sold all the projects prior to the move, can't seem to find anything that tickles my fancy within a reasonable distance or price range. Years of not having a place to work in and now have place, no project.

Patience is a virtue, they tell me.

 

Here we were this weekend working outside because there is another project in the garage
Trans swap before Bowling Green Hot Rod Reunion

 

Man that is a shitload of models

 

I mentioned a few pages back, my two-car garage with three cars in it. Well, it's not as messy as it has been, so I snapped a few pics of my cave...







And 'Klub Kahiki' the garage lounge...





I can do pretty much anything I need to, except stretch out or get more stuff.

...who am I kidding. There's always room for more.

 

If you need storage space for cars and/or parts you might consider used shipping containers. They are relatively cheap (at least here on the west coast), water tight and very secure. I have two 20 footers outside my shop, one I keep a car and parts in and the other I have some equipment I rarely use, brake lathe, bead blaster and distributor machine. It's wired for power and lights. You could easily fit two cars in a 40 footer and they are cheaper due to less demand. I have even seen a shop made up of two 40's secured together with the common wall cut out.

 

Great pics of some great garages!

 

Sure are a lot of garages posted here that are a heck of a lot bigger than two cars worth. Extra out buildings, up stairs living/storage.

Mine is as big as the city would allow, 18x28. Its always over flowing with crap. I believe if I had a larger space it too would be over flowing with crap =) Only room for one vehicle at a time, and after a cleaning there is plenty of room all around the vehicle to work. I had a 56 Cadillac in there for awhile and didn't feel cramped.

 

This is what I'm working with.

 

20x20 backyard shop, works fine for me.

 

18'x20' here. Its really tight with a bigger car rather than the model a in there. Working to get washer and dryer out of there also. And working on more storage cabinets in there with tons more organization. Its all about organization in a small work space. everything has a place.