My garage shop (w/lots of pics)

[Andy Pratt]

Like another recent poster, I realized that I really enjoy looking at pictures of other people's shops, so I figured I would post some of my own.

All comments are welcome, it's my first shop so I'd like to hear any advice you seasoned guys have on machine layout and equipment location.

It's a temporary shop before a move across the country in a year, so the DC piping is laid out foolishly now so I don't have to re-buy the expensive fittings later.

Here's what I started with for a garage when I moved in last year. It's 16'6" long and 13" wide with a 2' cement fireplace back. The trash pile was a gift from the previous renters.

(I'll include 4 sets of pics from start to finish)

[Andy Pratt]

Here's the second set of my process of fixing up the place. Ran one 220V 30A circuit and one 110v 20A circuit. For a single person shop that's been enough for me to run what I need, probably should have installed 4x receptacle boxes instead of 2x.

Lighting and air filter are on extension cords along the ceiling.

Laundry room is 80% my woodworking storage room (not married) so that saves a lot of shop space.

[Andy Pratt]

more of building process

[Andy Pratt]

Here's the shop after all initial work was finished. I'm doing my best to look happy now that all the heavy lifting was done. The close confines of the shop means that most of my lumber storage occurs in the living room. This was the first decent load of lumber I bought. I've used most of it for smaller projects and have created a new larger pile in it's place.

[Norman Pyles]

Purdy saw ya gots there.:)

[Lance Norris]

The close confines of the shop means that most of my lumber storage occurs in the living room.

I can relate to that. My lumber storage is my kitchen and my bedroom. My wife isnt real happy about that, but she likes the work I do.

[Andy Pratt]

Here's a few of my early projects.

Lamp is a walnut crotch base with a turned spalted maple post mortised into the walnut (screwed through from bottom).

Plane shelving is mostly spalted maple, keep all of the nice handtools I have in or around that.

Table is an abomination: I basically tried to teach myself some woodworking techniques (M&T, panels, edging) with available wood, with the aim of having a functional if odd kitchen table if the project happened to work out. I made the legs of ash, apron of pine, put an old wooden desk top (thickly veneered poplar paneling) I salvaged on top of that, glued a pine panel to the top of that and edged the whole wretched assembly with some hardwood strips I was given. I know this project is conceptually flawed in many, many ways but I didn't know much about wood movement at the time. It's held up acceptably for practical use, but is not elegant in any way.

Stool is 2" mahogany I salvaged from an old table top. M&T stretcher to legs and legs to top. Hand carved the handle. Shouldn't have made the top hang over the sides, or should have splayed the legs, as it's tippy in use.

Needless to say I'm just learning the basics as a prelude to starting a business in a year or two, so none of this stuff was sold except the birdhouses (my first sale).

Hope you enjoyed the post.

[Andy Pratt]

Sorry, forgot to include the table I mentioned. The top looks nice, I'm afraid that's where it ends though.

[Bruce Page]

Nice shop Andy. Nice equipment and a plush lumber storage area!
I take it that you’re single…:D

[Craig D Peltier]

Nice job, you seem ambituous, nice compact shop.. I like your stool you made. I just got a load of maple and spent 20 minutes trying to figure where to put it. My fiance says well for now-- how about the formal dining room:eek: I couldnt belive it. I just blew it off like it was no big deal ,I found a spot. Now I know I can store in our Dining room.:D

[Mike Heidrick]

Great shop and great saw and DC.

Is that nordfab?? I am jealous!

[Tim Malyszko]

Great shop and I love the table. You have a nice setup there.

The lumber storage doesn't get any better than the living room!!!

[gary Zimmel]

Great shop. Love that TS.....and DC.....

[Michael Weber]

Mine look almost exactly like yours. Well, almost exactly like the first set of pictures. :(

[Andy Pratt]

Thanks for the comments guys. The ducting is from Duct Incorporated. Not sure if I can post a link here but you can find them under google. Can't remember why, but there was some reason I picked them over nordfab. It's all laser welded and they custom made the y's to have all of the fittings overlap in the direction of air flow, down to the 1/8" precisely. I ordered the self cleaning gates from lee valley and one of the Lee Valley reps precisely measured their interior and exterior dimensions for me on the phone. Between the excellent customer service of both companies on the phone, the result was that when the gates and y's arrived, they friction fit together in every direction, I was pretty impressed. For the price I expected it, and I certainly was not disappointed.

[Greg Hines, MD]

Its a pity that is a temporary shop. It looks like you have done a great job with it. Quite a bit better than most permanent shops out there.

Doc

[Al Garay]

Very nice choice in equipment and good use of space. Did you order your power equipment from Woodcraft in Seattle?

[Steve Rozmiarek]

Does your DC work well? Thinking of ordering one today. Where did you get the over head guard for your saw? And more importantly, would you do it again?

Nice temp shop, thanks for posting! You ought to bill somebody for the cleanup though!

[Andy Pratt]

Sorry for the delay in responding to the last posts, for some reason they didn't show up in the original post, only in my weekly notification. When I followed the link there, then they were visible. Anyone know if I'm doing something wrong?

Greg: Thanks, I wanted to go through the process of setting it up full-scale so that I would learn the hard lessons before making mistakes when I build a shop for real next year. It was a lot of work just to have to tear it all down after only two years, but the experience I gained as already been worth it (don't ask the same question on moving day though).

Al: Yes, I ordered all of the major machines from the Seattle woodcraft. Caught great timing and got everything on sale + rebates (except sawstop of course) so that saved me a ton of money. I forget his name now but the guy who delivers their stuff to residential addresses was absolutely amazing. Helped me set up everything, showed a real interest in helping me do it right (since I was brand new to it at the time), put together the sawstop mobile base for me (he's fast) and made a special trip out two weeks later with the backordered drill press and refused to take anything more than gas money for the latter. Overall superb customer service in every way.

Steve: DC works very well but I don't have a lot to compare it to. I'm never eating a noticeable amount of sawdust unless I'm using the chopsaw (not hooked up to DC yet), when I forget to turn it on there's a huge difference and I'm choking on it, so although I haven't done any scientific tests, it's doing what I had hoped it would. I got the overarm guard on amazon, if the name's not visible it's exacto I believe. They were the only one I could find with 4" pipes. I really like it and use it 99% of the time (only time I don't is when I have to do tenon cheeks). I'm in a lucky situation because this is the first table saw setup I have ever used, so I didn't develop bad habits on anything else. The guard makes small cuts a lot more tricky, but I've built some modified push sticks that now make them feasible and easy. The hugest plus of it to me really isn't even the safety aspect, it's the huge improvement in dust collection, especially keeping it from spraying in my face. It gets solid marks here, and that's what really matters, and why I'd buy it again in a heartbeat.

[Joseph Ragsdale]

Would that, by chance, be Jet's JJ-6CSDX jointer with quickset knives and Powermatic's PWBS-14CS 14" bandsaw?

I ask because I'm looking to buy those two machines. As for the jointer, either the Powermatic 54A or the Jet JJ-6CSDX.

Nice shop and nice projects.

[Don Bullock]

Wow!!! What a dramatic transformation. Your shop is looking great. Congratulations on the SawStop. Nice choice.:D

[Matt Day]

How did you finish the table top?

Very nice use of space there.

[John Crough]

Awsome shop and equipment! I'd love to move mine out of the basement, I can't stand having to haul tools and wood through the house to get to my shop. The next shop will be a stand alone building when the kids are done with college, so Ive got about 15 years to save for it.

[Andy Pratt]

Joe: You are right on the names of both pieces of equipment. I would say that, as almost everyone on here recommends, it's better to go with at least an 8" jointer to start off. The size/cost increase is negligible and the return is good. From what little experience I have (It's very little) all of my rough cut lumber has been from 7-12" in width, with 75% or more being 7-8" in width, so it seems that 8" is a common size for mills to cut to, wherease I've rarely if ever gotten 6" rough lumber. In short, at least in my area, I'd have a lot less waste if I'd gone with an 8" instead. Hoping to upgrade to a 12" j/p combo next year.

Matt: I finished the table with three coats of linseed, sanded lightly in between, and two coats of low-gloss (satin I think is the proper name) poly. I only did the top, so it's cupped some as a result, from what I understand you need to finish both top and bottom the same to equalize moisture absorption/wood movement.

Thanks for all the positive comments everyone, I definitely appreciate it.

Andy

[Dan Lee]

Andy
Nice looking shop.
How do you like that PM2800 drill press any issues?
I've been thinking of getting one but have been put off by a few not so favorable reviews floating around.
This weekend I hope to see one in the 'flesh'
Dan