Converting part of garage into a storage room.

Belenus

Hi, I'd be interested in your advice, thoughts and suggestions.

We live in a 2004 built 4 bedroom detached house in West Sussex.

Our garage has an up and over door and is therefore cold in winter. It is a bit too narrow for our car so it is used for a fridge freezer, wine racks, bicycles and other stuff.

We are thinking of converting the rear two thirds into a dry storage room by building a partition wall. There is an existing door into the house at the rear and we would put a door in the partition wall to allow access to the front of the garage without going outside. The consumer unit would be in that front section.

The room would have no windows which doesn't bother us but would that break planning, building or other regulations? I presume light and ventilation are important considerations. We could easily fit a fan similar to the fan in our windowless downstairs toilet.

If it does, the only place for a window is on the side wall of the garage. That side faces the side of our neighbour's house which is identical to ours. There is a 2 meter gap between our houses, with a dividing fence giving us about 1 meter each. On our side there are no windows or doors but on their side is their side door at ground level (as in our utility) and a bathroom window on the first floor.

Does anyone have any idea of the likely cost of building a partition wall about 2.59 meters wide by 2.50 meters high with a door.

What would be the approximate cost of fitting a window if required?

Then there is the cost of plastering the walls a total of about 11 meters by 2.5 meters in total. We might not do that as we would be quite happy with the existing blocks as it would only be a storage room.

We would also need to install an additional light for the front section as the existing ceiling light would be in the rear section.

The floor is concrete so we would probably cover that with underlay and reuse our lounge carpet which will soon be replaced. Alternatively we could lay vinyl floor covering.

There is a radiator on the wall between the sitting room and garage which would presumably make installing a radiator straightforward. Alternatively we could use an electric heater.

An alternative and far cheaper approach might be to fit an insulated door to the garage. My wife does not like the look of roller garage doors and wants something similar to what we have.

Is it possible to have an up and over garage door or something similar to our Georgian style door that is fully weather proof?

The garage is 5,41 x 2.59 meters or 17'9 x 8'6 in feet and inches.

I attach a couple of pictures.

Thanks

https://i.postimg.cc/JhDjTRwf/floorplan.jpg

https://i.postimg.cc/s2k7qbsv/house-front-view.jpg

-taff

What are you planning on storing?

Nearlyold

Up and Over doors are never weather proof or well insulated and roller doors aren't much better because in order to get any worthwhile insulation from them the rolled up size would have to be huge like a massive barrel!
Have a look at Hormann sectional doors - specifically the LPU 67 Thermo. which has 67 mm of insulation built in to the panels, I'd guess the cost with a motor would be just over £2,000 you can have windows of varying sizes built in but that's not a cheap option - I dont think the LPU67 has a panelled option so no Georgian look available.

At the other end of the cost scale you could just buy two rigid foam foil covered insulation boards, cut them to size with any old saw and just wedge them into the reveal behind the existing garage door, tape and seal the board. Then build a simple stud & plasterboard drywall against the insulation board.   This is on the assumption you are not looking to create a habitable room

Have you got some specific purpose in mind in fitting a stud wall 2/3rds along the garage for creating what would then be front and rear storage rooms?

Belenus

-taff said:

What are you planning on storing?

The front section would be for bicycles, recycling bin, rubbish bin, pressure washer etc.

The rear weather protected section would be for my large CD collection, suitcases, guitars, amplifiers, and other items that I wouldn't like to expose to the cold and damp in the winter.

I would also keep the existing fridge freezer and wine racks in there.

I would probably have a small electric heater in there set to switch on when the temperature gets below maybe 8 degrees or so.

Belenus

Nearlyold said:....At the other end of the cost scale you could just buy two rigid foam foil covered insulation boards, cut them to size with any old saw and just wedge them into the reveal behind the existing garage door, tape and seal the board. Then build a simple stud & plasterboard drywall against the insulation board.   This is on the assumption you are not looking to create a habitable room....

Since I first posted that is what we have been considering. We have decided that we don't need a door between the two parts of the garage as there would be very little reason to use it. When we want to put the bins out or go for a bike ride we would open the garage door just as we do now.

We think a stud and plaster board wall as you suggest, with plenty of insulation, would make the rear section easy to keep reasonably warm and dry. It would also be easy to remove should we ever want to return the garage to its original.

The rear section would only have one outside wall. We could consider lining that with insulation. 

Those Hormann doors are interesting but my wife doesn't want anything but the Georgian style garage door so they are non starters.

The room would be for storage only and not habitable.

Nearlyold

You'll need to put a stud wall both sides of the insulation board as the board has poor fire resistance on its own. You can get the Georgian look in the Hormann insulated door range if you go for the LPU 42 door which has 42mm of insulation. You can easily build the stud wall yourself - no particular skill is required just basic bodge carpentry.

Belenus

Thanks Nearlyold, that Hormann door looks interesting but it wouldn't fit in our rather peculiar garage door set up as there isn't a wide enough vertical wall inside to accommodate it. Hopefully the below pictures will show why not. There are recesses in front of and behind the door.

https://i.postimg.cc/j2nQWktw/garage-door-close-up-2.jpg

https://i.postimg.cc/NGKW7s0T/garage-door-close-up-3.jpg

https://i.postimg.cc/G90PvJmM/garage-door-close-up-9.jpg

We might investigate side hinged outward opening garage doors but we think the best and simplest solution is to keep the existing garage door and build a partition wall to create a dry and warm storage area.

Yes, I could DIY it as I have plenty of DIY experience but I'm 68 years old now, comfortably retired and I prefer to pay professionals for all but the simplest jobs around the house these days.

Perhaps I'll find a skilled local handyman or retired builder and pay him/her to do the job with me helping.

Thanks again for taking the time to post.

lesalanos

Is the floor of the garage lower than that of the house? 

It may be worth raising the floor in your new storage room.  This should also help keeping it warmer too

Mutton_Geoff

I converted the rear half of my garage to an office/gym. I needed planning permission and building control. BC wanted a spring closure on the door between existing garage and office and a fire door with intumescent strip.

Unless you insulate the floor/walls/ceiling of the new store room, you'll be wasting shed loads of money trying to heat it.

As for keeping a fridge/freezer in a garage, they do not like having an outside temperature lower than the inside which will happen through most of the winter. This will cause premature failure of the compressor. Your pressure washer warranty is invalid if you store it in an unheated garage/shed over winter as water trapped inside the pump freezes and breaks the thing (ask me how I know). Finally, even cheap wine likes being stored at a constant temperature, the ups and downs of storing it in a garage with soon ruin even a half decent plonk. Garages are pretty useless places for putting stuff like fridges, pressure washers and wine!

Slinky

Mutton_Geoff said:

As for keeping a fridge/freezer in a garage, they do not like having an outside temperature lower than the inside which will happen through most of the winter. This will cause premature failure of the compressor. Your pressure washer warranty is invalid if you store it in an unheated garage/shed over winter as water trapped inside the pump freezes and breaks the thing (ask me how I know). Finally, even cheap wine likes being stored at a constant temperature, the ups and downs of storing it in a garage with soon ruin even a half decent plonk. Garages are pretty useless places for putting stuff like fridges, pressure washers and wine!

Thanks for pointing this out! We store our wine in the garage at the moment, having done this in our previous home. There the garage was internal, the door faced north and it was well insulated.  Now we have one where the sun bakes down on the roof all day.  Wine will be moved inside.

We also have a fridge/freezer out there but we turn it off in the winter and just use it as a cupboard.  We're trying to keep heat down at the moment by having the main door open a bit, and the back door wide open to encourage ventilation to help the fridge.

Belenus

lesalanos said:

Is the floor of the garage lower than that of the house? 

It may be worth raising the floor in your new storage room.  This should also help keeping it warmer too

Interesting point that we hadn't considered.

Yes, the garage floor is about 6 inches lower than the rest of the ground floor.

I don't think we will raise it as that would make it harder to convert back into a full garage in the future but thanks for the suggestion.

We may lay some floor insulation and then cover that with the underlay and carpet from our lounge.