I’m building a new workshop, and I want to do this one right. I’m looking for ideas and plans. I’ve got the site picked out and will be transferring my existing machines and tools (listed below). I’m thinking 1500 sq ft, 10 ft ceiling, in floor heat, and built in dust collection.
If you have a favorite book, article or recommendation about this topic, I liked to of hear it.
Tom
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When you pour your floor set in some crossing runs of pvc tubing or electric conduit in a tic-tac-toe pattern wall to wall. They will be handy when you decide to move or add a machine, a circuit or data cable. I am fond of plywood shop walls for the ease of mounting anything anywhere.
MJ, Thanks.
I've never been that fortunate, but if I won the lottery, I would have the ducts for dust collection under the floor as well. That requires planning before hand though.
Extra outlets everywhere. Never put in a single duplex outlet, use doubles. Separate circuits, so you can convert an outlet from 120 to 240 very easily should the need arise. 20 amp outlets, never 15.
And yes to plywood walls, painted white. Wood floors if you can, it's kinder on your knees than concrete.
I in the last stage of setting up a new 900 ft2 basement shop for hybrid woodworking. I used Sketchup for the layout in a room with 9’ ceilings. While I have some columns the 13’ space between the rows of columns allowed my to establish three bays. The columns were boxed in to hold the electrical service for the equipment. Electrical was planned using the motor specs. Lighting is LED and was designed by a professional. HVAC is forced hot/cold air and really doesn’t get used much as the temp is pretty constant. I do run a dehumidifier. Dust collection is a 3HP cyclone w/ overhead exposed piping to allow for modifications and clean out. It is inside the shop. I have moved a couple of tools around but the shop is pretty much as planned. Last step will be rubber flooring/matting over the concrete once I am sure the equipment will stay where it is. Last item to consider is how your going to lift heavy equipment - I bought a used HVAC equipment lifter that will lift 500 lbs up to 24th high with a hand crank. It is built to fit into elevators so they are narrow. I paid $150 for it. Budget - sheet rock 2.5k, electrical 5k, lighting 1k, HVAC zone 7k. Flooring could run 2k. Have fun.
There was an episode of the New Yankee Workshop where Norm build a dollhouse. What dollhouse you ask. It was a scaled model of the New Yankee Workshop. Measured drawings are available. I got mine about 7 years ago (after the show was off the air) on the New Yankee Workshop website.
If I were building a shop, I would want AC and I would not want to be working on concrete so I'd want either a full or partial size basement underneath it. I'd want some sort of cyclone and have that so it could be on the outside. A separate finishing room and a separate wood storage area (mostly so I don't have to see all the wood).
I'd also plan to have an area outside that is covered by an extended roof so that on nice days I could do some work outside.
Congrats on the new shop. I'm in the planning stages for my own basement shop along with a new house about the same size. Builder is going to do frame/drywall/electric/HVAC as part of the build. I live in central Virginia and I'm wondering if the HVAC is worth it, or just add one or two baseboard heaters if it gets REALLY cold along with a dehumidifier to get rid of summer humidity. My current house has a basement and I never turn on the A/C but run a dehumidifier almost year round.
Quick questions: do you have access to water in the basement? Did you factor in an air filter in addition to the dust collector? Don't forget the fridge for some adult refreshments!!
Cheers,
Dusty77
I’m in a basement, albeit in northern Massachusetts so it gets colder, but summers are often humid. Basement keeps the temperature extremes away but still:
- I ran an electric portable radiator for years after I enclosed part of the basement and insulated. Prior to that the entire basement was one room and the winters were dreadful as it was totally unfinished. Eye protection, ear muffs and a ski hat.
- I upgraded to a Hot Dawg style heater when we had the furnace replaced a few years ago. I run a dehumidifier mostly in July and august.
I just upgraded the 20 year old Jet DC-650 dust collector to a Jet Vortex which is much nicer. I installed a Jet air cleaner several years ago, it hangs over my Jet table saw (see a trend?). The air cleaner collects a lot more than I thought it would. I’d encourage it.
My main goal is to avoid dust getting upstairs or into the rest of the basement.
I have an air compressor, but it’s on the other side of the shop wall to keep the noise away. I just run flex hose through a hole in the wall and have a way to wrap the 30 feet of hose up out of the way.
When I framed the walls I included double doors to get things in/out. I have a bulkhead staircase that is treacherously steep it seems when lugging stuff in and out.
My wife has said for years I could have a free standing shop, but I’m not in it enough to justify that expense. I do wish I had more than one tiny window, but rationalize it that I’m usually there at night so what would I look at anyway.
I like Building out the shop, its cabinets and storage. I lean towards smooth work flow. For years I would build a piece for the house, and then a piece for the shop. Less so now as it’s become well equipped.
I'll chime in. I rented a 2500 sq.ft. shop space for years. As the years went by the shop layout would change incrementally. At the end, fully half of the shop space was dedicated to assembly, sanding, and spraying.
If I have any advice, it's this: Give yourself room to move once the machine work is done. Being able to put an 8' pantry cabinet on a dolly and spin it around at table height will make your life infinitely easier.
I've seen so many shops where the layout began and ended with machine space and no thought was given to all the work that comes after the thing is built.
Just built a 1076 sq.ft. (100sq.m) workshop my wife got 368 sq.ft. 1/3, my workshop is the rest. Main features are, fully insulated, lining is drywall, floor is partial board flooring over concrete with rubber mats at the bench I will be installing a 5kw reverse cycle AC. All machines requiring dust extraction are on a separate circuit with iVac current detector to operate the dust extractor (with cyclone), this circuit can be isolated and locked to prevent the inquisitive from operating machines. Dust extraction and power to my combination machine is under the slab removing any trip hazards, the combination machine and twin drum sander are on a separate 20A circuit also connected to another iVac current detector and blast gates this circuit is also on the lockable isolation switch.
Final electrical commissioning is tomorrow 11/8/20, Hope your workshop planning goes well, I planned my layout using graph paper and paper cutouts for machines, benches, shelving it worked well and proved quicker than using sketch up as I am not a power user.
Good luck with the build.
When I built my shop a few years back... I used the Shop Planner on the Grizzly Tools website.
https://www.grizzly.com/workshopplanner
Good luck!
Dave
http://www.sapfm.org
Tempting though it may be, don't run any dust collection or machine electrics (especially dedicated circuits) until you've got them physically in place.
Take some time to look at things, go through work flow, spacing & where your DC will be. Keep the hardest to collect machines like sanders as close as possible to DC. I just wouldn't trust a machine layout on paper, but thats' me I'm a spacially wired person.
Someone mentioned ducting under the slab. Not a fan, for the reasons listed above.
One thing I did that works out nice is to run circuits to outlets mounted directly to the machine base. I don't know if this is "code" (and don't care) but this avoids the necessity of extension cords. I use metal flex type conduit and attach it to the DC duct, following it to machine.
The Grizzly's a handy link, Bluejay.
Having been through some shops and therefor floor plans I knew I didn't want to deal with being crowded. I worked a lot on the current plan to avoid that. My material is near where it gets broken down and my hardware and other consumables are away from the area where I actually assemble things.
My current plan has an 8 x 12 foot area for spraying and a nearly 20 x 12 foot area for assembly. Several people look at the open space and ask "what goes there?". They look confused when I answer "I do.".
After working where I had to do a sort of choreographed dance to get from behind the tablesaw, between the planer and drum sander, around the end of the outfeed table just to get to the bench I vowed "no more" on the next iteration.
There is plenty of advice on floors, walls and ceilings. I am just seconding (or maybe third-ing) a floor plan that lets you actually 'work' in the space as opposed to 'house tools' in the place ;-) Good luck and have fun.
Have a watch of Stumpy Nubs recent youtubes - he has just moved into a shop about that size from the look of it. Frank Howarth's is also worth a look. I'd probably want something in between the two myself.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmV1G2OQO9o - Frank
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATBIhUvd1xQ - Stumpy
I have an odd shop with half having 8' ceilings and half having 20' headspace. I have to handle quite a lot of heavy 6m long timbers for farm type work so for me, the extra headroom is gold. It's way easier to move these big bits around when you can stand them on end.
I also have an upstairs section which makes a great timber store, but the stairs take up valuable shop space.
In the end, it will come down to what you do. I build gates and furniture and do a lot of turning so have to accommodate many different options.
The only specific advice I will give is to see if you can leave space for an 8' x 4' assembly table. I copied the woodwhisperer's design which handily combines storage and a dead flat surface. It's gold, even if I had to make mine 7' long. I have it on castors so it is easy to move about to release space, but I can assemble the parts for a large bedhead on it and the flat reference is pretty useful. https://thewoodwhisperer.com/videos/episode-18-assembly-table-torsion-box/
Home Depot,and others,sell a 2ftx2ft interlocking wood fiber floor material with styrofoam backing that installs fast and is thick enough that with some dadoing you can fit metal conduit under it.Two coats of floor poly with a sprinkle of sand and you have a great floor
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