Garage built in hillside sweating

[rickyb01]

Looking at buying a home that has a 24x20 garage built into a hillside. It has double barn doors and a 36" walkout door in the front. The floor is concrete, the walls are cement block and the ceiling is about 12" of poured concrete with real heavy gauge steel roofing covering the concrete on the ceiling. The whole garage is in the ground except for the front. When I walked into it today it had water from condensation dripping off the metal roof. Any idea's on getting rid of condensation. I would like to store tractor and four wheelers in this space but don't want to invite rust. Outside of keeping the doors open it has no ventilation so maybe a whirlybird on top would help. Any other idea's. Thanks Ricky

 

[Ed of all trades]

I would try the whirlybird, I would think that it would help a lot. Ed

 

[dieselcrawler]

I agree, ventilation is key. Been helping a friend design an addition to his house, and the study of vapor barriers and condensation is complex.

 

[RedNeckRacin]

Agreed, warm air and cold surface = condensation. Get some ventilation going and you should be fine. It sounds more like a bomb shelter than a garage!

 

[KennyG]

With a poured ceiling, how much ventilation can you get? I agree that's the way to go but the key is probably that the walls are not well insulated. You can't do much about that now and it will probably take several vents.

 

[B7510HSD]

Dehumidifier leave it run 24/7

 

[buickanddeere]

Should have been insulation under the floor and outside of the walls.

 

[Deere Dude]

Sounds like a nice Obomba shelter. Just throwing something out here on top of some good ideas about venting, but I would consider insulating the whole inside with 1" blue-board or Styrofoam. Studding the walls, the same thing.

 

[Gary Fowler]

Sounds like a nice Obomba shelter. Just throwing something out here on top of some good ideas about venting, but I would consider insulating the whole inside with 1" blue-board or Styrofoam. Studding the walls, the same thing.

That isn't going to be cheap but should be effective. I would first just try putting a fan or two inside to keep the air moving and see how that works. If you have to insulate, I would rent a stud welding gun and shoot some stud nails onto the sheet metal, then you can hang your insulation very easily. The CMU block walls will be a challenge to put studs on. A construction adhesive is what I would use to stick the Styrofoam to the walls. I doubt that you would need to insulate the concrete walls if you get the ceiling done. The adhesive would need to be compatible with the Styrofoam.

 

[Snobdds]

Need a couple of vents in the lower section of the walls and either gable end vents or roof vents. Need cool air coming in the bottom and hot air leaving through the top. Right now you have warm moist air trapped at the top. A roof vent will work, but you need something to break the negative pressure in the building, hence the lower wall vents.

I would use spray foam for insulation.