Like many people here, my shop has undergone many changes. The latest
change was due to a gift from my cousin:
Her father – my uncle – was a woodworker and she gave me a tool
cabinet he built and used. It’s nothing hugely special in terms of
materials and workmanship. But he was (he passed away about a dozen
years ago) my favorite relative so it has strong sentimental value.
It also has practical value.
The first photograph show the main workbench portion of my shop as it
has been for several years. The workbench itself is a thick slab of
beech. On the left end of that is an ancient leg vise someone was
throwing away, and a planing stop I built into the bench, raised and
lowered with a spiral cam made from oak. To the left of the leg vise
is an auxiliary bench made from plywood.
You’ll notice the tools are all mounted on boards. Those boards hang
form the wall via French Cleats. I got the idea from a Fine
Woodworking article. I thought this was a pretty nifty idea as it
confers great flexibility in two ways:
1) You can move a board of tools anywhere else in the shop,
wherever you may need them, and
2) You can reconfigure the tools on a board any way you like.
In the years I’ve had this setup, never have I moved a tool board from
one part of the shop to another – my shop is tiny. Nor did I take the time to
reconfigure a board though they need it.
As you can see, the tools on the boards are roughly organized as to
function. The leftmost board is the “marking out” board. Then the
screwdriver board (though I never moved the brace from the marking
board to the screwdriver board), then the saw board, and lastly the
planes. This organization didn’t even reflect my work style, for
while I started out with the marking tools, I went to saw, plane and
chisel long before it was time to screw the project together. And
that wasn’t the worst thing:
Having all my tools exposed like that mean they became master dust
collectors. So any time I felt the need to clean the shop, each tool
had to be pulled from it’s rack, the racks an boards vacuumed, then
the tools replaced. Huge waste of time.
Inertia is a powerful thing, but the inertia was exploded by the
arrival of my Uncle’s tool cabinet. As I say it’s nothing special;
pine box with a couple of doors; pegboard front and back.
I hate pegboard.
Before you pegboard aficionados grab your cudgels and pitchforks,
let me say that it’s because of my own ineptitude: Every time I try to take
a tool off a pegboard hook that hook wants to come with it and it’s a
comical mess. But as you see there are some tool racks on the doors
and I noted some of the hooks have a secondary peg that helps to keep
the hook attached to the pegboard.
First thing I did was give the pine a coat of shellac, and two coats
of varnish. Then I painted the inside/back of the cabinet a light off
white. My workshop is in a dark dank hole of a cellar and I like all
the light reflection I can get. While painting and varnishing, I
wondered what I was going to use those 4 drawers for. They look
really handy – but I couldn’t’ figure out what I’d put in them.
I pulled out the draw knife to hack away at new French cleats,
and mounted the box to the wall. I decided to organize my tools based
upon the rough order of need. This order amounts to:
marking
sawing
planing
chiseling
assembly (screws and nails)
So marking tools went to the lower regions of the main box – more
frequently used marking tools towards the bottom/center – less
frequently used towards the top. My Stanley No. 48 made some edge
dados rather quickly for mounting blocks.
Once that was done, I -re-mounted the doors and removed the tool
racks.
Organization and planning is not complete, however. In the last photo
you see the remaining tools I need to store in that box. Lots of
chisels on the left; screwdrivers and gimlets, and augur
bits. Something will have to take up that space in the center of the
main box – maybe the bit brace and augur bits.
And I still don’t know what I’m going to store in those drawers.
Replies
Last year I went from pegboard to french cleats and hanging boards. Thanks for posting all the pix. It's neat to see how other shops are layed out. I found that after having a tool in one place for many years made me reach for that spot for months after the tool was moved. Have fun - be safe.
Beautiful work
Very nice. The amount of overhead space you have is luxurious. I have to be careful not to hit the incandescent light bulbs with my head as I walk around my shop. My shop is long and skinny, as the attached photo shows.
Overhead Space
Some one here said that if your mind is too open your brain will fall out. That applies here some how. I think. Maybe not.
My shop was in a basement for a long time (doing smaller scale metal work; brazing and lathe work ) and you can see the results. (see first photo) Not pretty !
I must admit I wasn't too pretty before but that's beside the point.
Still, I didn't fully appreciate taller ceilings until I got in way over my head , so to speak, building our dining room table. To plane the ends I had to climb onto my bench like a scaffold so I could use downward force on the plane. (see second photo ).
. . . oh and my head has, fortunately , long since rearanged its self to its former rocet shape.
Isn't the human body a marvel ?
Snapshot
Roc
Enter that photo in the "Worst ID Photograph of the Year" contest. The DMV and the Passport folks at State Dept. have been winning this far too long.
And there's even a Phase II
Now it so happens that those pegboard panels in the doors are floating free in a dado. And the door frames are screwed together. That means I can remove the bottom of the frame, slide out the pegboard panels and replace them with......something else. The pegboard is 1/4" stuff so the simplest would be 1/4"plywood. I see I can get 1/4" birch, ash, oak, walnut and cherry, faced ply. That would be nice.... nicer than the pegboard.
Or....
I can think of it as a development opportunity and, using the former tool boards, plane out some raised panels. Heavy, though. Although the doors are connected to the main box via piano hinges.
But one of the advantages of pegboard is that I can screw on wooden tool holders through the holes in the pegboard - that's what I did on the back and one door. If I have solid wood or ply I won't want to do that. Don't even much like doing that with the pegboard since the screw heads show on the front of the box.
I was mulling this predicament over when I decided that I would mount the tool racks using oak brackets. Screw the brackets to the inside sides of the door and slide the tool rack into slots sawn into the brackets. This allows me to mount the tool racks now and do whatever I decide to do with the pegboard later.
Another mod I'm thinking of is to build a horizontal saw rack and mount my saws in that rather than hanging them vertically. I have depth to the box that I'm not using and that would free up more real estate on that saw door.
Pegboard.
You can get woodgrain pegboard that looks nicer than plain. Try threading cable ties thru the holes on either side of the pegs and tying them off. Keeps 'em on forever.
And the lightbulb lights overhead....
NOW I know why the hooks had this ultra-thin wire wrapped around them...so thin I broke it when pulling the hooks off.......
The wire was holding the hooks on.
But I didn't notice the wire until after I removed the hooks from the pegboard.
Ahh Uncle Ralph, you were very smart.....
This is an interesting post, thanks !
It is great to have things that others you like have used.
Nice job on the planing stop. Stout too. I like that.
Peg board; it is less of a battle if one buys the larger peg board hooks, 1/4", so they jamb in the holes ( assuming you have the peg board with the larger holes. But I know what you mean, I seem to only have the 1/8" pegs around when I want to hang some thing up then go through the comic scenario you mentioned.
In one of the the drawers might I suggest saw sharpening stuff: triangular files and tooth sets.
Roc,
Thanks for the nice compliments.
The planing stop works fabulously but there are limitations. Now that I have a leg vise, I can create one of those tiltable planing stops that stretch across the entire bench.
I don't think the holes in my pegboard are 1/4". But as I wrote, elsewhen in this thread, I now understand why there were these shreds of thin wire on all the hooks I pulled off the pegboard.
I'm slow but eventually I get it.
One drawer for the saw set and triangular file might be a very good idea. Although I don't use them often.
Binging and purging - a secondary effect
I admit to having binged on tool acquisition over the years.
My shop is so small that I wasn't able to binge on the big items like table saws, joiners, planers, sanders, lathes etc. But that didn't stop me from collecting a lot of stuff. Stuff I just assumed you needed. Everyone has to have a folding rule, right? And a center finder - gotta have one of those.
Well every once in a while I get the urge to clear things out. I once gave away 450+ books because I was tired of storing them and hadn't read many of them in over 20 years.
Gone.
The motley, disassociated (some might call it "eclectic" if they were in a kindly mood) collection of furniture in the living room, dining room, spare room?
Gone.
And now with the introduction of this wall mounted tool box, the urge to purge has struck again. That folding rule, and center finder you can see in the last photo, are on the way out I think. I almost tossed the calipers. Do I really need a coping saw? Or the wooden marking gauge that really didn't work well and was supplanted by the much nicer cutting wheels?
Since my stuff is small, I have a multi-level procedure:
Anything I want to get rid of goes into a spare metal toolbox. If I don't take it out of the toolbox for a year - out it goes.
Why a whole year?
Well some of my woodworking is restoring my 90+ year old wooden sailboat. So my woodworking is a bit seasonal. And truth be told, there are some tools I have that I know I will not be using within a year, but have to keep anyway: it'll be some time before I need those caulking irons for the boat - but eventually I will need them.
Being able to fit my most-used tools into this new box both because the storage space is large and because I am tossing tools is most satisfying.
Tossing out books ? Books ? As in ones library ?
I am shuddering . . .
I can not imagine not having my library !
People do that ?
Live without stacks and piles and shelves and shelves and shelves of books ?
Really ? ! ?
But . . . but . . . but . . .
how ?
I mean . . .
Really ?
Still shuddering.
They can have my books when they drive a holly stake through my cold heart and send each of my limbs to a different part of the solar system.
Quake . . . shudder . . . tremble.
PS: keep the coping saw for cutting loose the waste between dovetail saw cuts in very hard wood.
A person can't have too many marking gauges just tune it so it works well.
Rest easy.........
I kept about 200 books and didn't throw out any of my woodworking books ;)
The marking gauge was trash - the set wing nut left depressions in the shaft. Worthless.
I have 3 others so that's enough.
I've never tried the coping saw technique of removing dovetail waste. I'll give it a try before I toss the tool.
The box is dated
Very cool (to me):
I pulled out one of the drawers along the bottom and noticed this inside the box:
Hidden informational treasures
I think that is cool, as well. Hidden dates and names add to the family-history value, to be sure. As such, I like to sign and date my work, too. The practice dates back to at least the pyramids, when work gangs would "sign" the work in hidden ceiling vaults.
To Me As Well
Provenance .
Can't beat that ! Interesting it is late November.
Done!
... for now....
I've organized my tools to the best layout I can think of for now. I'm not totally happy with the coping saw/Incra protractor/scissors/hammer layout but actual use will suggest a better layout.
Next?
A new rack for those planes you see to the right. They will go in the bay to the left of the tool cabinet.
This forum post is now archived. Commenting has been disabled