Grassroots Temporary Garage Expansion?

Ok, so I have a 2 car garage, roughly 22'x24' give or take. It's great, but my truck won't fit all the way in, much less with room to work. 

The truck is a 2000 f250 Quad cab 6.5' bed, which, I'm pretty sure the transmission went out of last night. 

I have gravel in front of the garage where I can park the truck, but if I pull the transmission out right there, I won't be able to get anything else in the garage at all until it can move again.

So I've had an idea, but I'm not sure that it's a good one...

*Very rough drawing, I'm no artist.*

If I were to pull the truck in so that the cab of the truck is fully inside the garage, then jack it up on jack stands, and close the garage door onto the bed, is there a simple solution to close off the rest of the garage?

I've thought of completely boxing in the back end of the truck, but that's not ideal for multiple reasons. 

I'm sure I could lock the garage door in place at it's halfwayish point wherever that would end up being, so I'd have to figure out something to close off on each side of the truck, and underneath. It would have to be semi-easily removable, because I think I'd have to take down the barrier to work, but when I'm not working I want it to be fairly secure against theft, and critters. 

Just spitballing here, suggestions welcome. If it was springtime, I'd pull the transmission out in the church parking lot of somewhere nearby that I had permission to leave the truck for a while, but it's winter, so that's not gonna work. I could still potentially call in a favor at the shop I used to work at and use the lift, but I don't want to intrude on their operations at all, and the truck would have to stay on the property till I got the transmission back. If I had a somewhat easy way to do it at my house so I can work at my speed, that would be best.

I would grab an ez-up garage from harbor freight and stick the truck in it next to the garage if possible. It would be out of the way, out of the elements, and you could pump some heat in it while you are working (maybe). 

I have done this for exactly the same reason. My truck wouldn't fit all the way in. I pulled the door down to the top of the bed, then used a tarp to fill in around the truck. Theft isn't a problem for me so that worked fine, and made access easy. I would imagine you could use plywood to fill in the sides.

This sounds like a solution for Tyvek and a lot of gaffer tape!

In reply to TR7 :

I would do the HF tent in a heartbeat, except that would block any other access to the garage. I don't have any yard space to work with really. Plus, I'd rather have at least gravel to work on rather than grass. 

D2W said:

I have done this for exactly the same reason. My truck wouldn't fit all the way in. I pulled the door down to the top of the bed, then used a tarp to fill in around the truck. Theft isn't a problem for me so that worked fine, and made access easy. I would imagine you could use plywood to fill in the sides.

Plywood is what I was thinking, just not sur how to make it easily removable. 

AWSX1686 said:

In reply to TR7 :

I would do the HF tent in a heartbeat, except that would block any other access to the garage. I don't have any yard space to work with really. Plus, I'd rather have at least gravel to work on rather than grass. 

I personally would rather work on the concrete vs. the gravel.  I'd put the truck in the garage like you're thinking, and abut the HF tent up against the garage... but backwards from what you're probably thinking.  Since you're concerned about access, why not turn the tent around, and cut out the "back" side of it and put the cut side up against the garage.  That way you can still roll down the door and access through the normal tent door at the other end and walk through it to get into the garage?  

Not sure if the tent needs that back wall material for tension or whatever, but it looks like the roof is fairly independent at first glance.  

In reply to xflowgolf :

1000% I'd rather be on concrete than gravel!

I think I see what you're talking about now.... A full sized HF "portable garage" would be too long for that, but I think they have a smaller one. 

I can also move one of my security cameras out to the garage for a little extra security.

Found it!

 1. Pull the truck in as far as reasonable.

2. Jack it up. 

3. Put down the garage door "onto" the bed, and lock in place.

4. Setup HF tent below with the opening at the garage door, leaving 3 solid sides facing out. 

Not 100% thief-proof by any means, of course nothing is, but out of sight out of mind goes a long way. 

https://www.harborfreight.com/10-ft-x-10-ft-portable-shed-63297.html

Look on the app, should still be a coupon to get it for $169 or so

In reply to AWSX1686 :

That's exactly what I was going to suggest. I've also got a truck with a bad transmission hanging halfway out of my too short garage at the moment, but I'm just living with it like that for now. 

you can shorten the HF garage , just use half the poles and double up the tarp :)

I  took 6 foot out of mine to make the City inspector  happy !

californiamilleghia said:

you can shorten the HF garage , just use half the poles and double up the tarp :)

I  took 6 foot out of mine to make the City inspector  happy !

That's a really good tip. Definitely makes it more versatile for future use!

Also thanks to RevRico for texting me a coupon to make sure I got the best deal. #GRMfam

In reply to AWSX1686 :

At least around here you can look on craigslist and often get the poles for free , the covering died and the owner does not know he can buy a new covering.......

And you can keep cutting tubes to make it shorter or not as wide....

Two observations:

- whether the truck is in the garage or the driveway the garage is tied up. 

- a winch is probably cheaper than the tent and may have a longer and more useful life. 
 

Based on those observations I would consider buying the winch and working on the truck in the garage. Use the winch to move the truck in and out of the garage as required, and close the door with the truck outside for security purposes. 

In reply to No Time :

Actually, with the truck in the garage, it leaves one bay open. It's a 2 car garage. Unfortunately the parking scenario in front of the garage forces me to park the truck across/in front of both doors. Not enough room to have it parked nose in, only blocking one door. 

I actually do have a winch, which will likely be used for this project, but a beefy enough one actually costs quite a bit more than the tent. 

Anyways, I think I may set aside a Saturday to pull the trans all in one go, and then pull the truck elsewhere to store it till I get the trans rebuilt or a replacement acquired. 

In reply to AWSX1686 :

Ah, that makes more sense now.  I was thinking that the truck would parked in line with one of the doors/bays, not across. 

In reply to No Time :

I wish!

californiamilleghia said:

In reply to AWSX1686 :

At least around here you can look on craigslist and often get the poles for free , the covering died and the owner does not know he can buy a new covering.......

And you can keep cutting tubes to make it shorter or not as wide....

This is almost exactly what I did for the GFs greenhouse. In fact, one bar was bent, and she wanted it longer. I replaced the center sections with the appropriate size EMT for very little, and ordered proper greenhouse plastic. 4 years later it is still going strong after 2ft snow loads! A tarp and an old greenhouse/garage/tent might be the ticket for someone on a budget. 

P.s. be sure to secure it, stake it, tie it down. Don't ask. :)

So to pull the transmission I was able to do that in one go and move the truck elsewhere. As for re-assembly, I have a slew of things to do, so it's going to take a while. The tent plan is working. Still a little nervous about the security of it, but I have a camera and a bit of an alarm system setup too. Realistically, it's probably no less secure than the garage is normally. Locks keep honest people honest. 

This is what I came up with for the duration of the transmission replacement. It worked pretty well as I could work on concrete, and have heat. The only intruders were some cats I caught on camera. lol