Garage - Attached or Seperate?

Ferocious

I’m currently looking at plans for a ‘L’ shaped single storey house. The longer face of the ‘L’ is to the front with the short bit going off towards the back on the right hand side of the house. I had an idea to extent this short bit at the back and make the garage out of it. It won’t have direct access (door) into the house since it would be adjacent to a bedroom.
What are people’s thoughts on attached garages? I can think of a few pros and cons but nothing really strong one way or another.

sinnerboy

advantages

exempt from planning perm to convert an attached garage ( not so detached)
you reduce the surface area (walls) directly exposed to the elements

Slig

Pros:
A detached garage is very hard to heat, if its attached then some of the heat from the house will leak in.
You'll save by building one less wall for the garage

Cons
Heat from the house will leak into the garage.
Very difficult to build a detached garage before the house so alternative temp storage of materials will need to be provided

GoneShootin

Slig wrote: »

Very difficult to build a detached garage before the house

Why is that?

sydthebeat

GoneShootin wrote: »

Why is that?

building a detatched garage before a dwelling means it is not exempt from planning......

Slig

GoneShootin wrote: »

Why is that?

Sorry, I meant attached. Difficult to build the garage first if it is attached to the house.

If you are looking at an exempted garage then if its attached to the house you have a max area of 40sqM while detached the max area is 25sqM

RKQ

If you have Full planning permission for a dwelling and detached garage, then there is nothing to stop you building the detached garage first!

Poor Uncle Tom

If the garage is detached and being built as an exempted development (no planning in place for the garage). Then it can not be built until the dwelling house is completed.

sinnerboy

Slig wrote: »

Pros:
A detached garage is very hard to heat, if its attached then some of the heat from the house will leak in.
You'll save by building one less wall for the garage

Cons
Heat from the house will leak into the garage.
Very difficult to build a detached garage before the house so alternative temp storage of materials will need to be provided

not if you build an insulated eternal wall type of wall between the attached garage and main house

sydthebeat

Slig wrote: »

Pros:
A detached garage is very hard to heat, if its attached then some of the heat from the house will leak in.
You'll save by building one less wall for the garage

Cons
Heat from the house will leak into the garage.
Very difficult to build a detached garage before the house so alternative temp storage of materials will need to be provided

this wall needs to comply with part l of building regs in that a reduced elemental u value can be applied, but in almost every instance some insulation will be required...

Slig

I take both of your points on the insulation of the walls but just to be pedantic:P.

The garage door is much larger than a normal door and even if it does achieve a good u-value the chances of it actually being 100% draft proofed are very small, especially with a roller shutter door.

Quazzie

Slig wrote: »

I take both of your points on the insulation of the walls but just to be pedantic:P.

The garage door is much larger than a normal door and even if it does achieve a good u-value the chances of it actually being 100% draft proofed are very small, especially with a roller shutter door.

I took it they meant the wall between the garage and the house and that although the garage might be colder the house wouldn't suffer.

Since we're being pedantic :P

GoneShootin

Slig wrote: »

Sorry, I meant attached. Difficult to build the garage first if it is attached to the house.

That's what I thought you ment

sunnysoutheast

We built an attached double garage, insulated to the same standards (well except for the insulated roller doors) as the rest of the house so as to allow an easy conversion if we wanted to. Ours has an entry door into the utility area of the house. Great for driving in the car in the rain and unloading in the dry.

One problem so far is that we've noticed some small "furry friends" who must have sneaked in when the door was open.

SSE

Ferocious

Thanks for all the feedback.
Detached sounds useful from th point of view of having it built before the house. Can't see it being very straight forward to build the attached garage portion of the house before the rest of it in my case since it will be simply a continuation of the roof and walls of the house.
If i did attach, I'd insulate the garage to the same standard as rest of the house (allow for possible conversion). Are you saying because of a garage door being there, the wall between the house and the garage would also need to be insulted to the same standard?

sunnysoutheast, any other benefits or downsides? I won't be having direct access to the house as you have although it won't be far from the back door.

sinnerboy

Ferocious wrote: »

If i did attach, I'd insulate the garage to the same standard as rest of the house (allow for possible conversion). Are you saying because of a garage door being there, the wall between the house and the garage would also need to be insulted to the same standard?

.

do this anyway - don't lose heat from house to garage

sunnysoutheast

Ferocious wrote: »

Thanks for all the feedback.
Detached sounds useful from th point of view of having it built before the house. Can't see it being very straight forward to build the attached garage portion of the house before the rest of it in my case since it will be simply a continuation of the roof and walls of the house.
If i did attach, I'd insulate the garage to the same standard as rest of the house (allow for possible conversion). Are you saying because of a garage door being there, the wall between the house and the garage would also need to be insulted to the same standard?

sunnysoutheast, any other benefits or downsides? I won't be having direct access to the house as you have although it won't be far from the back door.

Can't think of any other downsides, you'll need a "ramp" leading up to the garage as the floor level is only 100mm down from the FFL of the house which is 300mm above original ground level. Not sure why you'd attach it if you won't have access to the house! I've also seen people have a semi-attached which has a short covered walkway, that was another option we looked at.

We've basically insulated all the external walls and some of the internal due to the shape of the house. We didn't put the underfloor heating in it but we left a spare circuit if we needed to, the insulation's in the floor though. The screed would bring it up to the original floor level.

We've also put the central vacuum, network cabinet, consumer units etc. into the garage and use it as a larder (very popular with the mice). It's a pure coincidence that it's big enough for a snooker table!

SSE