new member saying hello

[Ned Bulken]

Howdy folks,
I just happened upon SMC today, looking forward to visiting, contributing and learning from yet another forum. (I'm on a couple of others currently as well).
A little about myself;
I've been woodworking for just about four years now, started out literally in my side yard without even a real 'shop' to speak of. I picked up a couple of tools as I went along, until I had a workmate, PC router combo kit, 10" Chopsaw, then I got lucky and am now partnered with a great friend.After a year and a half we now have a 1000 sq ft woodshop in a local business incubator, and are tooling up for custom cabinetry, furniture and anything else we can drum up. I just got word from a friend, who needs a wheelchair ramp for her significant other's father to be able to visit, that should be a fun project!
I see some familiar faces and names from other forums, so to all the old friends, hello again, and the new ones, glad to meet ya.

[John Miliunas]

Welcome to the Creek, Ned! I too have scooted around the other WW forums and, although there are a couple other nice ones, I like it here the best and have made it "home". I hope you will, too! We pretty much cover the entire range of skills here, from Newbies (like yours truly) right on up to folks who I would consider Masters in their particular venue(s). Most importantly, they're ALL willing to share their great wisdom and some, like in my case, be ready with stupid questions, as well! Drop by often and stay long! Great place to hang out!

[Dick Parr]

Welcome to the Creek Ned.

[Ted Shrader]

Ned -

Welcome to the Creek! Glad you found us. This is a great place to hang out and dangle your feet. I mosey around to other sites occasionally, but call this place home.

Regards,
Ted

[John Miliunas]

My apologies, Ned, but I'm a bit under the weather right now and forgot one of my main "Welcome" messages: We LOVE pictures! Post pictures of shop, tools, work, your dog, car...Aw heck, just about anything! "See" 'ya 'round the Creek!

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Welcome to the 'Creek Ned! I am a relative newby here. Like you I surfed other sites but I finally found this place. Neat people and good info too!
Again .....Welcome!
Ken

[Peter Dufresne]

I to am new... I am a regular on several other forums all related to home improvement or woodworking and I stumbled in here... seems like a nice place, I believe I'll stay a while

[Todd Burch]

Welcome Ned, and Peter! I kinda like this particular forum community too. There's a lot of good folk here. Not too many misbehavors...

[Mark Singer]

Welcome Ned, and hi John and Todd, Peter and Ken....see how friendly we are. If you make any woodworking mistakes ....ask me I am sure I did the same thing at least once

[Todd Burch]

Er..., uh... Mark - you just made another one... check names!!

[Mark Singer]

Todd, Iceberg...Goldberg who cares!

[Ned Bulken]

Whoa, thanks gang, what a welcome!!!



you asked for pics, here ya go: that's my workbench area in my partner john's and my shop, the bench is shop built, using ash and a commercial countertop glued together, with hemlock legs and torsion boxes for the bottom shelf of each half.
here's a better shot:

you can just see the edge of the short lumber storage rack, shop built storage bins and one of my latest projects.
Here's a close up of that project:

red oak and walnut occasional box

with the top open.

next is a wide shot across most of the shop:

we have 25'x38' of heated shop space, or about 1000 sq ft for those who are interested

here's looking the other way diagonally, you can see the stairs to our storage loft in the corner along with the business end of the tablesaw island, DC and general clutter :


finally here's a shot of the chopsaw station, and router table. Note the forced air furnace up in the corner.


small pics, but friendly to dial up folk like myself.
Hope you enjoyed the nickel tour of

madison woodsmith

[John Miliunas]

Ahhhh...Now you're talkin', Ned! Thanks for the pics and info. Looks like you guys have got the space to get down to some pretty serious WW! Well, until you get rich and famous and find that's still not nearly enough room! One suggestion I do have for next logical improvement/upgrade is: Especially if there are two of you working in the space, I'd really consider my next big investment to be in some type of cyclone dust collection system. It seems to me that you guys are into WW for the long-haul and keeping as much of the air-borne wood dust out of your lungs will help to keep it "long-haul"! I like the box, too. A good friend of mine has made many iterations of similar boxes, but I've just not gotten 'round tuit myself. Too many other projects in the way!

[Ned Bulken]

John,
Thanks! We've got the elbow room for now, when/if we outgrow this space we'll be successful enough to put up our own structure somewhere. We're in a business incubator building, so rent is fairly cheap, and they don't mind some industrious noise every now and then.
As for the DC, it is on the list, right behind a new benchtop mortiser and tied with a new planer. We're in the corporate shadow of Stickley & Co. so mission is very popular locally.
When we do get a DC, it will likely be installed up here:


this is the storage loft area, that railing which juts out to the left is a balcony out toward the center of the shop. We figure a DC up there would allow a nice diagonal run of pipe for the DC to most of the shop. In the short run, I noticed that penn state has a sale on replacement bags for the Jet, so that will likely get an upgrade as well. I also plan on building an air handler/sanding station which will help quite a bit. Thanks though for the tip, it was in the planning stages.

[Jim McFall]

Ned,
Welcome,
I do not post much but visit here every day to learn something.
Did you say Lakeport, USA ???
Been there once, for about 50 years or so. Gota say I like Southern PA
just a little better.
Good luck in your new business.

Jim formerly of smith ridge rd