Let's see your Man Castle

I do get some condensation on windows but not to bad. it was about 20 degrees yesterday and it was a slight mist on the windows.

As for the piping being galvanized- I dunno:huh. I paid the propane company to plumb it to code so I think so. Town Inspector passed it one, two, three and I'se got heat! Good Enough for me!

Crap! Poweranger jinxed me!!!!!

I had the heat on in the Mancave for about an hour and sure enough- condensation on the tank and the engine covers on the R bike. WTF do I do now?

Sorry! Check your tool box also. I ended up spending a lot of time wiping tools down with wd40 after using that heater. Some of them still ended up with a little rust. Since you already have gas line in it wouldn't be hard to plumb in a forced air heater or overhead radiant like I used. The heater will cost much more than those ventless ones. But if you want to spend much time wrenching in the cold it is worth it IMO.

I must admit the crapper was what really completes the place. And it was the last thing I put in. It should have been the second thing behind the Kegerator. Look at the pictures again the microwave is above the fridge. The coffee maker is on the counter also.

Here are few more build photos. Since I am on the subject of crappers here is how I did my septic. Very basic set up.

Single 4" drain with a Y for the 2" sink drain. The blue PEX line is the water line coming in from the house. I had that buried a few months prior when we did other excavation work for the house.



The drain from the barn. Only about 12' from the barn to tank. I vented the drain just outside the barn.



500 gallon tank I managed to salvage. It had big cracks and no lid. I repaired the cracks with construction adhesive and made up a lid from a 55 gallon drum lid. Someday I will get around and pour a more permanent concrete lid. The metal drum lid will eventually rust away. I ran a single drain field 30' long. You can kinda see it behind the propane tank.



I had enough drain stone left over from the septic on the house to finish this project.

I'd go to your town inspector and double-check what is code, before closing it in, just in case. I've encountered work from licensed contractors that wasn't to code. Likewise, one hopes the inspector is squared away, as well.

The use of galvanized versus black pipe comes down to the potential flaking and deterioration of galvanized causing plugged gas orifices and, also, the different strengths in the respective fittings. Where I live, black iron is code for gas; galvanized is only code for water.

Because you're not continuously running your heat, the colder, metal items are going to condensate, when you kick on the heat. That's just the way it is.

When the inspector came to do the final mechanical / plumbing inspection on my house he walked in, peeked under the kitchen sink, then went down stairs and slapped a sticker on the water heater. I estimated his total time for the final inspection at about 150 seconds. I wouldn't even trust an inspector to pick up bad work from the contractor. IIRC I did read that some gas was ok for galvanized pipe but can't remember what the circumstance was. I was always told the rule of thumb was black pipe and some types of copper. I buried copper pipe from the tank to the regulator on the building about 12" deep. I hope it was ok to use the copper for this?

The copper should be OK, my line from tank to furnace is copper, over twenty years and no issues.

Here are few more build pics.

I installed a floor drain in the shop area before we poured the floor. Floor drains are ok by code here except that they must drain out in the open or be vented where ever they end up so gas or oil fumes can not build up. I do not plan on ever pouring gas down my floor drain so I didn't vent it.





I had a old washer and dryer sitting in storage for ten years so I plumbed in a floor drain in the bathroom and a drain for the washer. All tied in to the main floor drain.



The concrete work. Worked on this for two days in 100 degree heat. Not fun!





Finished drive.




Here is sorta a birds eye view. Notice the snow guards I have on the roof. I did not install these until the second winter. I learned when metal roofs get a little sun all the snow comes off. And it comes off all at once. You do not want to be standing under it. It shakes the entire building when all that weight leaves at once. Then it piles up in front of the doors and being a little wet from the warm metal it refreezes into a solid chunk of ice in front of the doors. :eek1 I wish I had video of it.



Here is what it looks like when it starts. It inches slowly for a few hours then it all goes in one big slide.



I needed some trees in the front so I looked around trying to get a tree spade. I had access to trees that the power company was going to take down for a new power line a mile down the road. Some companies wanted up to 150 bucks a tree to move them 1 mile! I could rent one for 600 bucks a weekend from the bobcat dealer. I searched craiglist and found a guy that would do it for 600. Saved me the time of picking up the machine and doing it myself! He grabbed the trees loaded the machine up and drove the mile back and forth until all were planted.



The trees all in. We moved 15 of those large ones to different locations around the property.

Good to hear.

Yeah, it has to do with sulfur content and the source of one's gas. I'm not up on all the different standards with NG versus LP or even what the current, accepted standards are. I live in a small town that is behind the times. We don't even have inspectors to enforce our codes. Even if we did, I wouldn't trust 'em, based on what I've seen from our city engineer.

Same here. But our building and electrical inspectors are actually good, know their stuff, and take the time to actually look stuff over well.

Check into your Cathodic protection codes for metal fuel piping in contact with the earth. You will find that in your states Environmental Department guidelines. They will have different rules for different fuel types and piping materials.

type K copper is typically what is used for Propane/NG.

Great advice!

All right now I'm expecting you to have everything unpacked by the next time I come to visit you dad! We have project bikes to work on!!

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How hard is it to vent that floor drain? What happens when you spill some gas, forget to shut the petcock when removing a gas tank, your kid is too lazy to properly dispose of the gas in the mower before winter etc.

I have found that when I don't do something because I don't plan on ever needing it, I usually want/need it later whith much greater expense (washer/dryer hookups in the basement, 220V in the garage, # of regular outlets in the garage, etc)

Someday I will have a shop like that. The deal with my wife is that after my military career, she can pick where we live as long as I get a shop the size of a three car garage.

ETA, I should finish a thread before I post. What the other guys said

For ten years I lived in a 3 story townhouse. My truck lived in the street and I had a standard two-car garage for the bikes.