Took the first step towards building my shop

[Frank S]

I'm no soil engineer, or geologist; or decent gardener, lol.
Looks same as 'our' red dirt, comparing stockpile angle of repose. Identical to that around my building, elevation 849' [about 75' higher than Missouri River] and completely different than house at 997' [our famous black dirt]. Dense, dry, fine and packs like roadway. You can mold it cleanly enough to use as concrete forms. Astounding somehow, considereing our locales are 650 miles apart.
And to offshore forum members, that's a 9-1/2 hour flatland drive.

Yes it is a red Corse sandy clay with the correct moisture content while packing it will pack down so hard that it takes a pick to break it up by hand and once fully compacted it remains stable

[Frank S]

This morning my wife thought I had finally stripped the cogs off of the last remaining brain cell in my head when I told her I was going to arrange a few things which would eventually lead to adding another bay on the shop should ZI ever require it.
She said Frank you have already gone from building a 4000 sq ft shop to one that will be 6000 sq ft and you are no closer to completing it than you were before you decided to make it bigger.
Why do you think you want to make it larger now instead of latter if you need it.
So this brings me to how I came up with the idea I have some storage van trailers that are parked just inside my fence out next to the highway in front of the shop. I will need to relocate them eventually any way, so why not pre plan on how to make best use of their storage capabilities. Right now they are full of stuff that most of it will be place in the shop once it is closer to completion. but where the trailers are located it is most difficult to transport materials or equipment from them.
So I decided to spend some time now and save even more time latter by relocating the trailers or at least prepare an area where I will be relocating them. To not do this might mean I would not be able to place them where I want them due to the amount of fill I still need to add, plus once I park and ground the tool room trailer it may be completely impossible to place one of them anyway.
So I began the day moving a load of bar joists which will be used for the rood between the shop and the machine shop trailer. then I moved my forklift that has been parked at the end of the container on the North side of the shop ever since the container had been placed there.
Then I moved my steel rack and a lot of other materials which was in my way
then pushed off about a foot of the soft dirt and refilled with the rejected fill material I have been mining for the shop floor. Since the area will not be brought up to grade any time soon the reject fill would serve to harden up the soil enough to place the first trailer there Plus by leaving the area about 2 feet below the finished floor level once I remove the wheels and tires entry to the trailers will only be about a foot above the eventual slab Also I plan to put the trailers with about a 25 ft bay between them which may eventually be roofed over
And that is how the insane mind of the Frank functions

while pushing the sand out of the way I unearthed this little guy. I gave it to the cats to play with pretty sure it eventually escaped since I didn't see them try to kill it

[Toolmaker51]

Stripped cogs or not, they beat unobtainable crystal balls any day of the week.
My immensity of space is far more conservative, only ~ 1/2 acre or so. So trailers and floor work space are a little more valuable than the property they sit on.
Found out long ago, whatever is conceived is best left flexible. Never know when extra roof trusses, equipment or other such treasures fall into our lap.

[Frank S]

Stripped cogs or not, they beat unobtainable crystal balls any day of the week.
My immensity of space is far more conservative, only ~ 1/2 acre or so. So trailers and floor work space are a little more valuable than the property they sit on.
Found out long ago, whatever is conceived is best left flexible. Never know when extra roof trusses, equipment or other such treasures fall into our lap.

I used to have a crystal ball well not crystal but black plastic, but I dropped it and the glycerin the orb floated in ran out. From then on any question posed to the ball came out as answer not available.
relocating the second trailer can come much later as access to where it will be relocated will not be restricted by anything other than a door. Another reason it may be a while before I move the 2nd trailer is in order to do so I will have to use my Freightliner to move it which means I will have to make a 200 yard long road leading way from where the trailer will be dropped .

[Frank S]

For those of you who may be wondering why I seem to be constantly increasing the projected size of my shop before even considering putting the walls on it I direct you to a thread on another web side the first post of the thread has a link to a video of what ultimately I hope to be building
Another venture and KBS Coatings

[Toolmaker51]

That will sell like hotcakes; riders and material haulers alike.

[Frank S]

That will sell like hotcakes; riders and material haulers alike.

Through my reworking the design I bent a couple of the applied for patents and one of the current patents so bad that me and the patent owner sat down and together had to write up several new points for him to submit to his attorney. But I didn't tell him about one main item I have designed to replace some componentry I'm writing that one up myself as a standalone which will not be use restricted so if this thing goes south between us I will have it and he wont be able to incorporate the system if he decides to take it elsewhere.
One thing in the new configuration that I made sure to incorporate is the platform can reach dock height something his can not do I feel that dock high capability will expand the market potential. Think about a pallet of machine parts needing to go to shipping warehouse or vice versa cutting fluids and what ever. or the landscaper who picks up a pallet of sod then delivers it to the jobsite.
Variations and options for the machine will add versatility which I have preliminary designs on but not set in stone as of yet

[Toolmaker51]

Oh my, I should say so. Can tell of dock height issues all afternoon.

[Frank S]

A 20 ft container arrived Monday morning One good thing was Bob's day contract had been called due to mud so he got here about 9:30 then the driver showed up around 10 Am. We took him to town to take advantage of the wide flat area un chained the little tractor on the back of his trailer and backed it away from the container then undid the locks holding the container down I used my toe jack to lift the container and place our slide shoes under each corner then Bobe backed his trailer up tot eh side and T boned the drivers trailer with a block of wood between them we winched the container side ways as Bob moved his traler a few inches away from the drivers trailer then I had the driver slowly back up while Bob winched as soon as the container was off of the drivers trailer bob pulled away we moved the little tractor to the front of the trailer chained it down signed paper work and we were ready to take the container to put it on the ground we letf the driver there to finish out his 30 minute break. The driver said he has had containers loaded and unloaded 1000s of times with cranes and large forklifts but never had he seen it done the way we did it and almost never as fast as we unloaded him said once he delivered to a job site and had to wait 3 days for a crane to unload him and there was a rig similar to Bob's sitting there had he known it was that easy he would have hired that driver to unload him.
I told him it only looked easy because we had those slide shoes and the toe jack to put them under the container otherwise we might have damaged his aluminum trailer. He said he hadn't thought about that.
By 10:45 the container was on the ground located in its final resting place





Now that that is done and I have made the end trusses for the lean-to it is time to get some work done

[Frank S]

Yesterday Jane and I managed to get the last of the poles in the ground even with all of the safety inspectors and the building inspectors all having to put their 2 cents worth in
First off it was the job site superintendent sending the building inspector into one of the holes as it was being backfilled

then the civil engineer showed up to make sure the fill was properly compacted

Then the safety officer had a conference with everyone before we were allowed to go back to work How can anyone be expected to ever get anything done with all that supervision?

I figured that today I might get 2 of the end trusses up but was going to have to move the bus scaffold and lower its height some how.
But then this morning I had barely finished breakfast and my 4th cup of coffee dreading the prospect of what was ahead for the day, About this time some guy who is not chopped liver.

By the end of the day in near 100° heat this is what we had done. When there is a second pair of hands around to help hold things and move things quite a bit can get done even with taking more breaks than working. Crawling out to the middle of a bar joist that is only chained off on one end and resting on top of the pole on the other to release the lifting strap several times is so much fun I recommend it to everyone Just don't tell Jane what I did.


Sometimes all you need to do is just hang around much better than trying to back walk crawl across now 2 loose structural members one if them held in place by a single pair of vice grip pliers on one end