u/ApartmentSuspicious3

I'm an engineer but not a structural guy. Hopefully I can ask this with the right inputs and terminology. I think most of my question is more material properties at this point.

I am building a gym in my garage. I'm not concerned about protecting the concrete slab at this point, but rather the underlayment that will create a moisture barrier / room for water to evaporate out. The barrier I am looking at is rated at 10,000-12,000 psf (69.4-83.3 psi). This will between the concrete and the rest of the flooring stack.

I currently plan to have about 2 to 2.5in of plywood topped with 0.5in of rubber in the primary drop zones. That thickness is mostly dictated by a platform that will basically be a giant wedge to counter garage slope in one area, then maintained throughout. So the total flooring stack up will likely look like:

0.5in rubber
0.75in plywood
0.5in plywood
0.5in plywood
0.5in plywood
Underlayment
Concrete

For reference, standard deadlift platform practice is 2x 0.75in plywood topped with rubber.

So to the question at the heart of my problem - how much is the impact load distributed by all that plywood and rubber?

If anyone actually knows a good assumption or numbers for the wood/rubber cushioning, lets also assume a 495lb barbell dropped from 3ft.

I have bumper plates, but for sake of simplicity for now lets just assume they're iron with no bounce. They're 2.3in wide, there would be 10 total with 5 on either side of the bar. I don't know what is reasonable for how much of their diameter squarely hits the floor in reality. Hopefully someone who knows about dropping circular stuff is on here?

Is anyone putting vapor barriers under their rubber flooring / platforms on concrete slabs? Or am I overthinking this?

So we bought SW cashmere on sale to do a couple rooms. Bought duration to do another. Worked great for us as novice painters.

Fast forward a couple months, I am painting our garage to be a gym. No sale going on at SW and I care less about the garage so I decided to go to the other end of the spectrum out of curiosity and got valspar ultra at lowes.

I am simultaneously impressed and not with the valspar. It seemed to cover suspiciously well with the first coat when I was brushing corners etc. But when I rolled the ceiling, the next day I noticed many roller strokes seemed pretty visible, like the paint wasn't leveling right and leaving streaks where maybe my pressure was too much on the edge of the roller. Never had this happen with the cashmere inside. Don't think my wife experienced this with the duration either.

Skill issue? Or have I simply discovered why everyone says cashmere is super easy to paint with?

I assumed its a bit of a free for all, first come type environment but before accidentally being an asshole to people I figured I'll ask here.

Do yall solicit multiple quotes at once? Or do you do them in sequence and tell the earlier ones you want time to get back to them?

I have a situation right now where I asked for a price from a drywaller yesterday, he said he'd text me, haven't heard anything yet. Now my hvac guy (who recommended the first) just called to tell me he has someone else that wants to do it and wants to come see the place today. If the second guy gives me a price I think is fair, is it rude to just accept and move forward?

Edit: the reason I feel some obligation to the first is he did come out and spend a few min giving me a list of materials to buy for him if he were to do it

I am building a gym in my garage and want to put a squat rack in the back corner facing the door. I'd obviously like it to be level and am trying to evaluate my options here. There is the obvious slope towards the door to deal with, and some right > left slope from the corner from movement or initial pour who knows which.

One option is obviously try to level the whole thing or one section. Seems expensive, or a total mess to fix if I screw up, and overkill.

Next idea is building a big 8x8 out of 1/4" OSB, stepping up sheets on top of each other. Might get tricky with the double slope direction but relatively cheap to build. Throw 3/4" plywood then rubber flooring on top. Maybe build the entire thing on top of a 6mil vapor barrier, rest of the garage floor will be rubber flooring.

Third... I've seen a couple people online suggest building the main supporting wedge as above but with shingles. On it's face this seems like a pretty good idea to me. They're basically incompressible right? And hypothetically pretty easy to cut and use to fit the slope contour. I got some from the previous owner lying around though and for some reason 1/4" osb is just gone around here at lowes/home depot at the moment.

Main problem I see with the shingles is what do I screw the top plywood layer to... I guess nothing? I guess I could criss-cross four 4x8 1/2" plywood to keep the height down instead of 3/4" and just sit it on top of my mighty shingle wedge but as I write this it is starting to sound pretty dubious.

Anyone got any other ideas? Seems 1/4" osb wedge is the way

Trying to plan my build. Anyone notice any annoying wobble on things like benches or machines set on the floor because of the slope? I imagine if I have a bench set up so I am facing the back of the garage it isn't noticeable.

But what about turned 90 degrees so I'm facing perpendicular to the slope? Any noticeable left to right wobble then?

I didn't realize how big the slope is in my garage and it is suddenly causing me great consternation trying to decide if I want to bother leveling anything or shim or what

I've been working at improving for a few weeks now. Definitely super novice still but I can feel some steady improvement from when I first got serious.

My shooting mechanics overall still need work but I can shoot relatively straight when I manage to get everything to go right. On a good day before I am too tired I can do the drill hitting the cueball across the table and landing it back on my cue 5 times in a row. Maybe I should be able to do that 10+ easily but it's something. I'm still focusing mostly just being able to shoot straight and get stop/draw/follow down, but obviously I still do a break or two and play with my wife for fun so I am practicing my aiming a bit there.

So I expected shooting mechanics to take a while but what I didn't expect was how hard aiming would be. I've first was trying ghost ball, and I found I have a hard time of keeping track of the spot I picked as I get down to aim. Today I thought okay let me try to associate that spot with the object ball instead, and that seems to go a bit better but man, I feel like just visualizing where I want to hit the ball is almost harder than hitting it there.

Tldr: I suck at seeing and then aiming at where I want to hit the ball even though I can somewhat hit it where I want especially if there is a really obvious mark or it's straight. Is that normal? When I picked up this game I thought it was like an 80/20 split of mechanics/aim but it sure feels like 50/50 to me.

I've been getting quotes to get a single ductless 18k minisplit in my garage and the first two I got just seemed outrageous, I don't know if I am way off or getting hosed here.

Can anyone recommend a fairly priced installer? And/or what has your experience been in the area?

So I may just be looking for problems at this point but I worry maybe my attic is too poorly ventilated. Just moved in a couple weeks ago. I put a temp sensor up there and the attic hit 127 when it was like 85 outside.

Roof was installed 2022, seems everything is fine up there in the attic at the moment but I hardly know what to look for. I have no soffits, not even any room for them on the back side, straight to gutters. I'm pretty sure I have a ridge vent from the outside, it's hard for me to see any flow path to it on the inside. If anyone has any tricks to be able to verify better from the inside I'd appreciate it, I don't really see any light or anything but maybe I wouldn't for a ridge vent?

I have one gable vent and the other side looks like it has a cutout in the tyvek/foam board for one but no vent, just siding straight over. Seems there is no sheathing... separate problem I know. But the lack of vent almost seems intentional.

So my question is do I add the second gable or not? The house has stood since 1978 and the roof seems to have been perfectly fine for the last 4 years. Home inspector had no notes on the roof or the attic ventilation. But surely the one gable vent isn't enough intake for the ridge vent? Or if there is no ridge, then there is just hardly any air movement at all.

Either way adding the gable is probably the thing to do? I was already planning to blow more insulation into the attic after I got bathroom fans installed. Maybe I just blow in more insulation and quit worrying until it is time to replace the roof again?

I'm in the early stages of planning to turn my 2 car garage into a gym. The annoyance of detaching various parts of the automated garage system and putting up drywall and putting it back, plus attempting to insulate and then adjust the spring, got me thinking: how about no to all that?

I am thinking the barn doors are easier to insulate myself or cheaper if buying an insulated product. No more opener/rails ever to be in my way in there. I guess I can see some minor annoyance opening/closing but once the gym is built they should stay closed.

Only thing I'm thinking is can you really do this well with a single 2 car opening or now are we talking about also constructing a central pillar? My driveway is sloped a decent amount, no good for opening? Any idea what kinda pricing to expect before I waste someone's time estimating?

Anyone know of one being sold that doesn't have "no pain no gain" or something written on it as well? Just want the basic thing, "45lb" on it maybe "york" or something but no live laugh love type bullshit.

So context, we closed about two weeks ago and I don't have perfect history on the entire house. No idea when the siding was done or by who, it wasn't the previous owner or if it was he didn't record it.

I've got a couple pieces of loose siding right in the middle of the back of my house I contacted an exteriors/roof guy to come look at amongst other things. I sent him some pictures and he called back just to give me a heads up he had concerns that attempting to fix the loose pieces could turn into redoing all the siding if the initial install was off.

That makes sense to me logically I think? If you screw up and put em too tight somewhere, eventually some might pop loose and you're just screwed?

So if all that is just how it goes, my next question is what to do now if I don't want to redo all the siding? What is the best way to tighten/shore up the loose bits? It looks like an area 2-3 pieces high.

Maybe I am wildly overthinking this... I want to fix the previous owner's hackjob sump installations and include a backup. I plan to enlarge the hole that currently has a garden hose in it and connect to 1.5" pvc.

What do I put through the wall that will poke out the other side? Pvc will break down quickly when exposed to uv right? Do I just put pvc through and cover it or is there a better material to put in the wall?

I'm looking to get a 100 amp sub panel on my garage and 2 outlets on each wall plus 1 more on the ceiling.

My garage is semi-attached with a covered breezeway. Of course the main panel is on the other side of the house in the basement... so it's about a 50ft ish run of cable just to get to the house wall next to the garage breezeway, then up and around the breezeway or under some decking.

First house and first major project, trying to get my bearings on what things really cost. Located southeast PA. $5700 quote seemed high initially but as I google and think it through it seems ok? I am having the same company do two bathroom fans (new install, nothing existing currently) for me for 2600 so I'll be able to get some idea of their work.

Trying to do some research on tables before moving to a space that can accommodate one. I didn't think to measure the basement when we did the home inspection. I'm pretty certain it can accommodate the full 9 foot though and would certainly prefer to get the full size.

I will be just a home and bar player for the foreseeable future. But I am the type of person that is an enthusiast about everything and I don't want to go bottom of the barrel. I've been looking at used tables in my area hoping something nice will pop up but I don't see a lot at 9 feet.

If I decided to not bother with the used market the Presidential Carter seems like a pretty enticing value for the 9 footer. The Brunswick Glenwood seems nice enough too but if the Presidential would suffice for the casual enthusiast I'd rather spend the extra money on furnishing the room.

Appreciate any advice. Sorry if this is asked 24/7, I didn't see too much searching the sub for either