Man Cave

[heartstrings]

For awhile now, my wife and daughter haven't been wild about my doing stuff like bringing drill batteries into the house and charging them on the fireplace mantle, or hanging a ballcap or my solar-powered auto-dark welding helmet on the fire poker rack. Then there's the mount of the 8-point buck staring down at them with cold-dead eyes from above the fireplace mantle. They would also prefer that my banjo, mandolin, guitars and (sometimes) guns didn't junk up the living room either.. So, my Wife has come up with a brilliant solution: she said I need to build myself a man cave.

It only took about 3 seconds for me to get over being dejected about being practically banished from the rest of the house. Right away I began thinking of all the stuff I can put in there. I could finally set up a small sound system, computer interface and mixer board and record some songs. Then there's some antique stuff out in the barn such as my crosscut saw, an old hand corn grinder, and my grandpa's old tools including his "cotton scales"(he was once a sharecropper/mooshiner) umm no, I don't have his old still.  I could put three windows, about 10' of them, on the north wall for bird/squirrel watching and maybe a potbelly stove in one corner.  My mind is racing now. It probably won't be large enough for me but, maybe it will keep the women happy. :)

 

[No Nicolaitans]

Complete with dormer jacuzzi!

[heartstrings]

Yes, one of the church men, helping me hang drywall upstairs mentioned that I should put a hot tub in that dormer. So, my wife and I found one of the perfect size on clearance at Lowes. They didn't keep that size in stock so it had to have been a special order one. It's perfect size, color and everything. The motor, controls, and all were even on the side they needed to be on to access connection from the kneewall closet. It would have been very difficult to access them had they been on the other side. I assume the unit had been rejected by a customer because the plug-control knob was off center, That's the only thing I could see wrong with it but it's no big deal to us, the thing works perfectly.

There were already "king pin" truss webs of yellow pine, three of them, in that section of roof which are very strong. I build headers at the top and bottom, cut out one center web, nailed a 2x8 all along the bottom side of each truss and spanning both load bearing walls, then another 2x8 down the center connected to the bottom web of the truss I had altered. I then installed short floor joists between them and covered with 3/4'' plywood. The tub weighs around  900 to 1000lbs when occupied and full of water but the two kingpin truss sections and nailed-on 2x8's hold it just fine.

Edited June 26, 2017 by heartstrings

[DaveW]

The only problem I can see is that with a common wall you will have to keep the noise down.

No way you could make it fully detatched? Maybe carport between?

Then you could use tools later in the evening......

Would love a real man cave, but first I need to become a real man...........

[Salyan]

I'd suggest you build it off the left side of the house, possibly with an external entrance next to the utility entrance. That way it won't block any windows, and the noise transference will have a pantry/closet to go through before affecting the rest of the house. (I'd be very surprised if your wife was ok with blocking the dining room windows!)

[heartstrings]

Thanks!

We considered that, but the septic system is on that side of the house. My house was once a double-wide mobile home and the one small window, to the top left of the dining room, was once the bathroom window. When we "remodeled" we removed all of the inside walls, actually all of the mobile home walls but that window is still there in the exterior wall I had added on. Being a former bathroom window, it is too high above the floor to look out of anyway so my wife has requested that I make that into a "shadow box" for her to put little whatevers in.  The other openings you see are of a window I removed, and a steel door. I should have removed the windows from the drawing. The rest of the house is already very sound resistant as I have installed insulation in every wall. The only way you can tell if it's raining is to get near the fireplace or be upstairs. You can't hear the sheep bleating or a dog barking unless he's right near the house. So I know I can insulate this room well. What I'm more concerned with is noise coming IN to the "man cave" rather than going out.

I plan to use 2x6's for the exterior walls of the new room, insulate them with R-19 fiberglass, polystyrene sheets on the ouside, drywall on the inside, and possibly add another 4 to 6" of insulated wall on the side against the dining/living rooms. I can leave a little space between that second wall layer and the existing wall so that none or very little wood is touching. This drastically reduces sound transfer. The wall already has a double-pane insulated door so that will help too.

As far as my noise goes, there will be a TV of course but, all I would ever do in there, 90% of the time, is play acoustic instruments and the only one she has every complained about was the banjo. She loves the guitar. 

[Salyan]

Ah - that makes more sense, then!

[DaveW]

So you are, in reality, fancy trailer trash!!!!!!!

Sorry, couldn't help that.........

(And I mean it as a joke - please don't take offense.....)

[No Nicolaitans]

Good for you HS! I hope it works out! To be honest, when I first saw this thread, I thought it was an elaborate joke!  

It wasn't until your second post that I realized it was real...

Unfortunately, if I were lucky enough to have a man-cave, this is the best I could hope for...a man-grotto. 

Edited June 28, 2017 by No Nicolaitans

[DaveW]

Actually HS I am amazed that your place is based on a double wide - never would have guessed from the pics.

 

And NoNics - man grotto......

Chair, pillow, somewhere to hang your coat......

I have a couple of shelves in the car port that I can't leave anything important on or it gets stolen.......

Had a fishing rod stolen from the roof of my car one night.

And the passenger side mirror off my Cruiser another night....... (over a few years though.)

[swathdiver]

Nope not big enough!  It should be no smaller than your shop which is bursting at the seems already! 

 

[heartstrings]

This is true. It will probably half full of junk before it's finished. 

[OLD fashioned preacher]

40 minutes ago, heartstrings said:

This is true. It will probably half full of junk before it's finished. 

Junk -- items you keep for ten years thinking you'll use them --------------------- then get rid of them the week before they're needed!!

[heartstrings]

12 minutes ago, OLD fashioned preacher said:

Junk -- items you keep for ten years thinking you'll use them --------------------- then get rid of them the week before they're needed!!

Two years ago, I sold my commercial sandblasting rig. It was a rotary-screw compressor with four-cylinder International engine, a 600# pressure pot, and a remote air supplied respirator rig. I did miss it momentarily back a few weeks ago when I had to hire a local monument company to sandblast some signs for me, because they came close to ruining one $2500 sign. I don't miss it bad enough to buy another rig though.

[swathdiver]

Did you ever fix that rock polisher?  Still sitting in the middle of the shop?  Throw it away and you'll need it the next day.  Keep it, and you'll never need it.  Same thing with me!