Here's Your Cheap Shop - NC

[J T]

All I know about 'em is, they're listed in one of the local bargain papers. Good way to get an inexpensive shop.

Used Mobile Home - good condition, price is correct, no misprint. $1500.00 [phone] Williamston

12x60 Mobile home, Free, must be moved. $0.00 [phone] Grifton

12x60 Mobile Home - exc shape, move in cond., has tires & axles, ready to be moved, in Greenville area, $1200.00 [phone] Raleigh

Free, older mobile home, good for storage, fishing, fixer upper, $0.00 [phone] Greenville

2 Singlewide mobile homes, good for storage, FREE, $0.00 [phone] Greenville

JOAT Have a nice day! Someplace else.

[Ba r r y]

Planned properly, a 12x60 could be a GREAT shop! Knock a few walls down and ripping, jointing and planing long stock would be easier than dealing with my basement's lolly columns...

Barry

[Mark & Juanita]

Not a bad idea. However, there are many areas where even those of us with enough land are precluded by zoning regulations from placing mobile homes on our places.

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[J T]

Fri, Feb 3, 2006, 6:32pm (EST-2) [e-mail] (Mark=A0&=A0Juanita) doth mumble: Not a bad idea. However, there are many areas where even those of us with enough land are precluded by zoning regulations from placing mobile homes on our places.

You don't say it's a mobile home, you say it's a shop. Use you imagination.

JOAT Have a nice day! Someplace else.

[Wilson]

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[Oleg Lego]

The Mark & Juanita entity posted thusly:

What a shame. Can't you call it a shop or agricultural building? I would think that the reason for the bylaw would be to prevent folks from living in it.

[Mark & Juanita]

I think the reason is really to actually avoid having the trailers on-site because they often become run-down and eye-sores with either peeling paint, or the siding become delapidated and run-down. ie, I think it's more esthetic than anything else. Now, if I put a motor in it and it became an RV, then I could park it :-) RV's, Arizona's state vehicle.

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[Wood Butcher]

If you pull the axle & wheels and do not hook up the water and sewer - would that be enough to prove it wasn't a "home"? You would probably want to go even further and gut it for free space. ie. no kitchen, no bath, nada. Just a shell. Hard to call that a home.

Security would be a big issue for me. Way too much glass and walls you go thru with a box cutter.

Art

[Brooks Moses]

What about floors that you go through with a table saw base?

- Brooks

[Ba r r y]

Wheels off, block foundation, small stick built addition, and you've got a modular shop, not a mobile home.

Mobile homes are NG where I live, too Some recent construction has involved 4, 5, and even 8 section homes that came in on trailers, got attached to a stick-built garage, and sold for almost 3/4 of a million.

Barry

[Ba r r y]

That's another thought, storage trailer!

[Ba r r y]

What about the cost of building a 12x60 building in most locales?

Tavern grade oak flooring can be had for $1 a square foot. Install it over some 3/4" plywood in the machine area, and you're good to go.

Glass, and the natural light that goes with it, is GREAT for handwork and sharpening. Also, those windows can open and make for a very nice environment during good weather. As a woodworker, couldn't some sort of storm / security shutters be fashioned? I work in a basement, it'd kill for some natural light and some decent fresh air flow on a nice day.

There's someone out there who wants to build desert homes from decommissioned Boeing 727's, surely a mobile home could be an interesting shop for someone? Not everyone, maybe not a lot of folks, but where there's a will...

Barry

[Swingman]

What's interesting about this thread is not the mobile home shop, but the optimist/pessimist tendencies displayed by the posters.

I like your attitude. SWMBO is of your and JOAT's "why not?" mindset ... nothing to her is impossible, and what I may initially think of as a setback is to her the door opening on a new opportunity.

[J T]

Sat, Feb 4, 2006, 5:59am (EST-1) [e-mail] (Swingman) doth sayeth: I like your attitude. SWMBO is of your and JOAT's "why not?" mindset ... nothing to her is impossible, and what I may initially think of as a setback is to her the door opening on a new opportunity.

She got a single sister? I've found out that when someone tells me, "You can't do that.", what they usually mean is, "they" can't do it

- or think they can't, which amounts to about the same thing.

For those that are nit-pickers, I'm not talking being "allowed" to do something, I'm talking being able to "accomplish" whatever.

JOAT Have a nice day! Someplace else.

[RonB]

We are looking at various rural properties to build our retirement home. Occasionally a property pops up with a mobile home or older double-wide modular and I think that might be a good shop option. My only concern, with heavier machines, is floor. I worked for a mobile home manufacturer years ago. Floor structure in most is plenty beefy to support a 400-500 pound machine, but the sheeting in some is a little anemic, especially if aged, rotted or delaminated. Pretty easy to fix though with these cheap to free prices.

RonB

[J T]

Sat, Feb 4, 2006, 3:34pm (EST-1) [e-mail] (RonB) sayeth: We are looking at various rural properties to build our retirement home. Occasionally a property pops up with a mobile home or older double-wide modular and I think that might be a good shop option.

Yep, and then you could plant some bushy trees all around it to hide it, and make it purty. Built in heat & aird, leave one room as an "office", with a recliner of course, hook up one bathroom, a small fridge, and you'd be squattin' in tall cotton. Pure luxury. I think I'd want a wide door somewhere in it, so if you build a boat you can get it out.

JOAT Have a nice day! Someplace else.

[brianlanning]

I'm an IT worker, and whenever times are good, I tolerate living in a big city because the money is good. But when times get tough, my wife and I consider cutting our losses and moving out of the city. At the hight (or pit?) of the dotcom bust, I had what has got to be the coolest idea I think I've ever had. But it takes the right kid of person to do this. We also have 8 kids, which helps.

I was considering how I could get the most usable home square footage for the least amount of money. I suggested to my wife that we buy a plot of land somewhere. At the time, it was florida. But anywhere rural would probably work. Then we would get four long single-wide mobile homes. I would gut them, replacing the flooring, wall coverings, everything. Pressure wash, repaint. Basically, make them presentable. Then I would arrange them so that the "front doors" would all point toward each other. They would be arranged in a big square. Then I'd build a deck connecting them all. Access to the center would be at the corners of the square with gates for security. I also invisioned a large waterproof canopy that would allow light though, but shield the deck from water and sun. One trailer would be a bedroom/bathroom/office for me and my wife. One would be a central livingroom/diningroom/kitchen, and two would be bedrooms for the kids. Then my mind went sort of crazy. I thought about the shop in the trailer idea. And what about a home theater/playroom for the kids? An outdoor bathroom/shower/garden would be nice also. Any time you want an addition, just pick up another trailer shell and turn it into whatever you want. Window air conditioners and heaters could be run only when you want them on. All that's missing is a garage where I could put a lift.

At first, my ultra-practical wife considered it, but then she decided that she likes real houses. So for now, that's where we are. If all of IT gets sent to india or china though, I could easily see doing something like this. She jokes that it's our destiny to end up on one of these extreme homes shows.

brian

[Mark & Juanita]

... very interesting idea. I worked with a guy who had 8 kids; his thought was to have a small home (dormitory really) with a large steel building behind it, in which the kids and family could spend the day. Kind of a gymnasium affair with nothing but 4 walls, concrete floor, heating, lighting, and air conditioning.

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[brianlanning]

We thought about something like that also. It would be a large square building with a line of bedrooms down one wall with a large bath for the kids. Our bed and bath would be at the far end of the building. There would be a large kitchen in the middle with wrap around counters where everyone would eat. The rest would be open space with polished concrete floors. The wall opposite the bedrooms would be large sliding glass doors where you could open that wall to the outside. The ceiling would be the loft/warehouse unfinished look.

I thought about making a "livingroom platform" that was large and round with casters. maybe 15 feet in diameter. On it would be couches, a coffee table, and some sort of entertainment center. It would get power and communications hookups from an umbilical cord hanging from the ceiling. You could rotate it however you wanted, move it around or out of the way for special events.

I also thought about a large computer desk that sort of served as an office. 12' in diameter shaped like a large letter C. It would have a large desk platform, with a higher platform over that for printers and such (I have a lot of computer equipment). It would have the same umbilical hookups and also be on casters. It would also have canvas "curtains", like sails, that I could open or close as needed. When the wall is opened up, I could wheel the computer desk/office outside.

I also thought up plans for movable walls. The wall would be maybe 10' or 12' wide, as thick as a normal 2x4 stud wall, and on two 3' long piece of 4x4 that run perpendicular to the wall. There would be cables to tether them to the ceiling to prevent them from tipping. The walls could be finished with t&g siding with pictures and artwork bolted in place. I figure maybe a dozen of these could be in various places. And they could stack up out of the way for big family gatherings.

Having a lot of kids really changes your attitudes and priorities. We're shopping for a house at the moment. Our two biggest concerns are whether or not we can easily block access to the kitchen by the little kids, and whether or not we can easily convert the formal livingroom and diningroom into bedrooms. I've got a lot of weird ideas about what a family van should look like also. :-)

brian

[J T]

Sun, Feb 5, 2006, 8:59am (EST-3) [e-mail] (brianlanning) has been smking sawdust and says: I'm an IT worker, Then we would get four long single-wide mobile homes. arranged in a big square.

Saw something along those same lines, years back. Guy took two single-wides, spaced maybe 50' apart, then joined them with a center section, roofed over. Nice neat job. Just saw from the outside, so don't know what the inside looked like. Probably one Hell of a lot cheaper than building a house that size from scratch - plus he'd have a place to live while he was doing it, with no extra housing expense - which would help. Personally, I think that would be a better idea than four of 'em.

JOAT Have a nice day! Someplace else.