Hi All. I’m new to this forum, and I’d like to ask for some thoughts and opinions.
My current shop is a bit too small, no heat, no a.c. I’m considering moving the workbench, hand tools, band saw, lathe, and more to the basement of my house and leaving the table saw, jointer, and planer in my current shop. This would free up enough room in the current shop so I could handle 4 X 8 plywood, store lumber, and do preliminary cutting and planing in “the barn”, then do the joinery and handwork in the more comfortable and roomier basement.
I would have enough room for everything in the basement, but I dread carrying sheets of plywood or big boards down the stairs, much less the heavier machines. I mostly work with smaller furniture pieces, and the majority of my time is spent with hand work. When the temp falls below 40 or above 90, I tend to avoid the shop, so this type of move could add several months to my woodworking time and get me off the couch.
Any thoughts, opinions, or experience with this type of thing?
Replies
thoughts
A few things to think about:
1. what else is in the basement? Will sawdust, shavings, etc. cause any problems?
2. environmental acclimation of lumber prior to cutting - i.e., should you store lumber in the basement for a while prior to dimensioning in "the barn"?
3. finishing fumes - will they cause an issue in the house?
4. extraction of finished pieces - is the basement access large enough?
To add a couple more thoughts to your proposal of a split shop... how much of a "process" will it be to go back and forth from the two shops? I can envision doing some tablesaw work, moving the parts to the handtool area then needing to go back to the table saw for a for another trim or extra cut... with small pieces it would be minor but bigger projects could be a pain
Split shop.
The way I work, I just can't imagine having a split shop. I have a basement shop of about 1000 sq ft and use the garage to ruff cut sheet goods with sawhorses and a circular saw to make it easier to get it down the stairs. I'm back and forth between jointer, planer , chop saw and table saw so much I can't think of doing things any other way. In the 1000 sq ft I have managed to fit in a lathe, DC system, band saw, drill press, table saw, three benches, large router table as well as the planer and jointer. That said, only you know how your workflow will be, but there are other considerations to think about. Allowing the wood to stabilize for temp and humidity before cutting to ruff size. Allowing more time between first milling and final milling. The advantage of edge gluing soon after edge jointing before any wood movement occurs along the edges. The advantage of being able to run a glued up panel thru a planer to flatten it. All I can picture is having to run back and forth between the two shops a lot. On the other hand if you don't need dust collection in the unheated shop and can make do with a mask, you will get better use out of the dust collection in the basement shop, which you will certainly need to keep the rooms upstairs from filling up with dust, as well as your lungs, and prevent sudden death at the hands of the spouse. But in reality, with the amount of sawdust and wood chips coming off the planer, jointer, and table saw you will probably need DC in the upstairs shop as well which adds to the cost of having to have 2 DCs.
As an example… I see myself jointing up some legs for a table upstairs, carrying the blanks down stairs to mortise them, carrying them back upstairs to taper them on the jointer, carrying them back downstairs to fit them to the tennons on the aprons. Those aprons went thru the same process of being brought down to get stable, up to be ripped on the table saw, down again to have the tennons cut and fitted to the legs... you get the point.
Just food for thought. I just do this for a hobby. Self taught. Not an expert by any stretch of the imagination. Good luck.
If it were me, I'd definitely want to have the table saw in the basement. I go back and forth between it and everything else so much that I really wouldn't want it to be off somewhere else away from the bench.
What if you set up "the barn" for just rough dimensioning? Maybe just a 4'x'8 table and track saw for cutting panels and a chop saw for cutting lumber to rough length? A simple shop vac could provide dust collection for both tools. Then you could store lumber up there and you'd have smaller, more manageable, pieces to carry down to the basement.
The table could also be used for final assembly, especially for large projects.
Sounds awesome to me, but my entire shop is about 175 sq feet so I can only dream!
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