Warmer Garage Work Space At The Tinker's Workshop

  It has been a busy week or more here at the Tinker's Workshop with more parts being made for the velomobile project, fiber glassing, sanding and fitting parts on the body and the list keeps growing. 

   With winter just around the corner I have also been working on prepping my garage so that I can continue work in the space without freezing in the process. I have the garage completely insulated now including the garage doors.  Not a fun task but one that will pay off with a much warmer space to work in when the snow is flying outside.

I finished installing another nice feature in my 24 X 24 foot garage this morning.  That's what this post is all about.

Here is a shot of my garage.  Looks like any other garage except now I am able to split the area in half with a roll up wall.  You can see it in white running along the newly insulated ceiling. 

With the wall rolled down I am now able to retain all of the heat from my space heater and the flood lamps in a space half as big.  This will make it a lot easier to keep the space warmer.  This worked out perfectly and is nothing more than painter tarp that come in 12 x 8 foot pieces.  As the garage is 24 foot long two of these tarps are all that I needed create the wall along with a few other parts to make it all work.  These tarps are sealed so no moisture (aka paint etc) can seep through.  So if it can hold moisture back it can also hold the heat in.

At the base of each tarp I laid down a 1 1/4 inch PVC pipe with an extension on it to make it 12 feet long. As you can see with the tarp hanging down it just reaches the floor and will seal off the air from below. 

I then rolled the tarp around the PVC pipe and taped it down with duct tape to hold it into place.

The upper portion of the tarp I stapled to the ceiling joist and then  I nailed a strip of wood 3/8th inches thick along it's entire length to better secure it.  

Along with this wooden strip are two small pulleys to make each section of the wall roll up properly.  These were again fastened to the ceiling joists three feet from each end of each tarp using small pieces of metal chain screwed into place.   

A  3/16th inch rope was then attached to a nail pounded into the ceiling joist on the opposite side of  the wall from the pulley. This rope was  routed under the PVC pipe (when the wall was down) and then fed through the upper pulleys.  When both ropes are pulled the tarp wall rolls up perfectly to get it out of the way when it is not needed. 

The ropes are then tied off at one end of the wall and secured using a metal cleat fastened to the wall. 

 I had to place the cleat up high on the wall so that the ropes coming from the pulleys did not block access in the garage when walking near the wall. 

The tarp wall tucks away nicely in the garage and is hardly noticeable when not in use.  But it sure will come in handy when I want to heat the work space during the cold winter months.  Total cost for the portable wall was around $35.  Not bad considering what the wall does and what it will help with when I am trying to stay warm while working in the winter months.

(Click on diagram for a larger view)

Here is another illustration of how the ropes are set up for the roll up tarp wall.  Hope this helps explain it all a bit further.  If you still have questions just let me know.