What's your small (1 car garage) shop look like?

[mark mcfarlane]

I'm struggling to design a new 'retirement shop'. Its fairly unknown as to what kinds of things I'll end up building regularly. Built some furniture in the past (bookcases, tables, vanity,...), likely will stay that route.

My 2 1/2 car garage needs to house auto-related tools, fridge, kayak stuff, bikes (not hung, ready to ride or it won't happen,...) House is L-shaped with garage sticking out. The only place I can build on my tiny lot is opposite the garage, and nothing larger than 12'*23' due to easements,... which puts my front door down an alley (left center of pic below). Lot is irregular so I think I might be able to hang a shed off the back end for DC.

Anyway, I was wishfully thinking I could store a lot of stuff in the 2 car garage, including a car, and long term wood storage, and build a dedicated, air conditioned (south Texas) shop with just the essentials inside. Here's a pic. The far left of the pic is the right edge of my 2.4 car garage.

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clockwise from the sink we have (everything on wheels):



Bench, and possibly bench drill press, spindle sander,...
DC
Kapex
Project wood storage
Big MFT at window (4*8 breakdown area), hand power tools underneath
Bandsaw
then a Euro Slider Combo (5 function) in middle of room, big enough to cut 48"*48" on the slider, jig-able to rip longer boards.


Tools are currently placed with at least 6' of infeed and outfeed. Wall storage will all be on French cleats, run like a plate rail around the room.

So how are you organizing your too small shop? Pics/diagrams please.

I'm aware one can get by without a table saw, but I have an uncontrollable (spl)urge for a Euro Slider.

[Nathan Callender]

If I weren't going to build much out of sheet goods I would seriously consider a bandsaw and j/p clmbo as the only full size tools. Then I'd build a large bench for bench top tools and another bench for hand tools and assembly.

That being said, I do love my table saw and would hate to give it up, and a slider would be awesome. But, at the end of the day, I don't like working in cramped spaces.

[cody michael]

1 thing I do is I run my planer outfeed outside, works pretty good, my shop is slighlty bigger 16x26 and the space savings help alot, if you could setup a few of your tools, planer, jointer, tablesaw etc that if you need more room you could run out a door, helps me at least.

[mark mcfarlane]

Thanks Nathan and Cody for sharing. I'm also worried about being cramped, but it might even be worse in the garage.

Actually, clutter and mess will 'get to me' more than tight spaces. I really like a clean space. I either need to fit a shop in this 12*23 space, share the garage with 'everything in life', or buy a new house. I was hoping, by judiciously only putting the 80% used tools/supplies in the new shop, I could make it work. My current garage has an 8' ceiling. I could go 9' sloped up to ~12' with lots of high windows in the new shop. Easier to air condition than the garage, easier to control sound (I'm a night owl)....

Moving isn't off the table, but I have a somewhat unique house for my area. My backyard is a fairway and then the lake. I can easily pull a Kayak into the water, someone else mows my backyard (every day), and I can sit on the back porch and get a cold beverage and a snack every few hours when the cart girl drives by. The front of my house also needs a facelift, it is about 25 years older than all my neighbors, and the lot needs serious regrading (we are below the street, water drains to the back toward the lake). It may not be possible to build as I have shown, dead restrictions, drainage,....

I'm hoping to hear from some space-constrained folks who got creative and are happy. (actually, I was really hoping to have space for separate j/p and saw/shaper, but I can't make that work very well, although the j/p could probably be swapped with the bandsaw as needed.

I'm a dreamer.

[Ray Newman]

This might be of some help:


Prior to moving, I made a 2 or 3" to the foot scale drawing of my free standing shop. I then made small scale cardboard cut-outs of the machinery, workbench, windows, doors, etc., and moved them around to find what I thought would be an efficient work flow and use of space. Turns out that I did very little modifications to the plan once I moved into the shop.

My previous shop space was 'bout one-half a two car garage -- good casters and stout rolling tool stands/cabinets are worth their weight in gold.

[paul cottingham]

My shop is 9' wide and 20' long. I have crammed a tablesaw with a large outfeed table that doubles as an assembly table, a planer that also feeds onto the assembly table, a small jointer, a drill press, a small 12" in craftsman bandsaw that surprisingly useful, and a workbench. There is a fair whack of storage. I mostly use hand tools except for thicknessing and long rips. I am taking over a small room off the shop as well and will likely use it mostly for hand tool work, like riving or drawknife work, and a small bench. With space for assembling large carcasses.

its tight, but doable.

[Dan Jung]

Here's my old shop layout. 11 1/2' x 22'
It was tight, but it worked.


http://i722.photobucket.com/albums/ww227/UpInSmoke2015/oldlayout_zpsthmwoe0s.gif (http://s722.photobucket.com/user/UpInSmoke2015/media/oldlayout_zpsthmwoe0s.gif.html)

[Michael Stein]

Cramped... although usable. I am actually in the process of changing the layout in mine, to hopefully make it a bit more usable. Have some wood storage in the garage (wall), but most of it is stored in the backyard shed. My predicament, I am young (29) and know that this is not our "forever home," however, the next time we move, will be. The next house will either have a 2.5 car garage, and already detached 25x30 (or so) building, or the space for and we will set funds aside to build a shop. I am working with what I have for the time being.

Here is a shot looking in through the garage door. I also have two shelves of fishing gear/other stuff in the garage that I would love to move, but I have no other place that I could store it, unfortunately. Once the changes are done, I will have to take some updated pics. Also, I need to install some better lighting.

[Michael Stein]

If you care, this is about the current layout. Still working on the proposed layout, and before I move anything around, I have some other honey-do projects that need completed. The machines outside the border are a miter saw, which is on a flip-top cart under the planer (or vice-versa) and the proposed bandsaw upgrade. Still saving for that purchase, might be a christmas present to myself with the Christmas bonus ;)

[Rich Huhra]

My shop is 10 x 24. In it is a grizzly 8" jointer, delta unisaw, craftsman 10" bandsaw, 12" radial armsaw with 14' bench, 2 dust collectors, delta 12" bench top planer, 18/36 sander, 4 drawer chest of drawers for tool storage and wood wall rack for storage. I've never had a problem with space. You just have to arrange things so work flow is easy.

[mark mcfarlane]

Thanks Ray, Paul, Dan, Michael and Rich for sharing your setups. I'll definitely be making some mock ups before committing to a build. I'm still about a year away from moving to this home permanently.

[Jim Dwight]

My shop garage is 14x24 and still under construction. I have a 8 foot long cabinet built with drawers and my CMS and RAS sit on top. It needs a 4 foot extension and then a Ron Paulk style top complete with flip stops. Above this I have 3/4 conduit into holes in doubled 2x4s in the walls to form a wood rack. I got rid of my home made bandsaw when we moved. In addition to the RAS and CMS, I have a table saw, floor mounted drill press, Inca jointer 8 5/8 wide, and a track saw and other hand held tools (also a bench top hollow chisel mortise). On the other long wall I plan a rolling workbench/cutting bench for the track saw with tool storage under it. On the wall above the rolling bench I will have cubbies for frequently used tools. At the moment I have a lot of clutter but I'm making a couple bookcases, one is nearly 8 feet long. It is challenging my little shop. I would like to spray the final finish but that will be a challenge with the shop as it is currently. I may just do I anyway. The Fuji needs to be used!

Jim

[Mike Schnorr]

This is an interesting read as I am working on my design right now for my new shop. Lots in Newberry are only 40 ft. wide so I am limited on space but I wanted as much as I could get without overbuilding the lot. I settled on 18' x 22' so I could still drive around it in the winter time. I am waiting on sand right now so we can pour the slab. I like the flip-top tools idea to save space and will no doubt be using quite a few casters. Thanks for sharing your ideas everybody!
Mike

[John McBride]

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I don't know if you can gleen anything from these pics, but my shop is about the same size as yours....or will be once power is run. It's 12x24

Maybe you can get a feel for the scale of the shop space with gear inside. I sourced all the equipment specifically for this space. The thought was, once the new shop gets built(someday) I can keep what works best, and upgrade to larger machines.

I used to have a European combination machine in a previous shop. Robland x31.

I went with an Inca 510 jointer/planer combo, General int'l. Contractor saw, sliding miter(not yet mounted) small drl press (not yet mounted).

The two gorilla racks are useful, but take up a great deal of floor space. Eventually, I will look to try to replace them with cabinets hung up on the wall to free up space underneath.

As has been mentioned...casters are your best friend in a shop this small. Storage is at a premium, so big points for creativity.

My shop is still kind of a ways off from operable condition. But I am enjoying the continuous mental gymnastics of arranging things in my head, before I make them semi-permanant.