Show It Or Hide It

[John Nordyke]

I have a fairly new 30x30x12 shop space (2 years old), and put up quite a bit of shop made french cleating. Pretty much all my tools, clamps, open storage for paint and finish, etc. is 'exposed' - no wall cabinets. I like the look; it is ego-enhancing to scan the accumulation of tools and gizmos I've collected over the past 40 years.

Alas, even though I have "good" dust collection and an air filtration system, dust still piles up and over and into every cranny. Next week when the weather warms, I'm going to open doors and windows and literally use my leaf blower to clean house!

I could always revert to making wall cabinets and tucking everything out of sight, but....dang it! Anyone else faced this and found a way to really keep an 'exposed' shop clean??

[John Lanciani]

Sounds like it’s time to make your “good” dust collection system a little “better”. A well functioning system shouldn’t be leaving piles of dust anywhere except in the bin.

[Paul F Franklin]

I've known woodworkers that built nice wall hung tool cabinets with doors that open to reveal purpose build racks and hooks to store all their fine tools. Fine furniture in every regard. Every one of them admit they always leave the doors open because they like to see the tools and it's faster to access them without having to open the doors. Me, I like lots of drawers for storing less frequently used items where they will stay clean and chip free. But I like my frequently used items to be out in the open, right at hand.

[Don Coffman]

Been down that road ... french cleats & leaf blower. I went back to cabinets and drawers, but my change was more from a security concern, although I'm sure a better dust control system would enhance my shop. I live in the sparsely populated area and decided I didn't want many thousands of hard-earned dollars of tools displayed for easy/fast "pickings" in my absence.

[Malcolm Schweizer]

I installed slatwall in my shop, and I love it. I had this same concern- would everything be covered in dust? I do exactly what you are planning- I take the leaf blower and blow everything off periodically. Here is what I have found: (1) Things stay CLEANER than when I had them in drawers because dust still found its way into the drawers. (2) It's so easy to find things and, more importantly, to put them back where they belong when done. (3) I gained a lot of floor space over having rolling tool boxes.

[Jim Becker]

You can still use your cleat system with closed cabinets. In fact, for a shop, that's a great way to do things because you have the ability to totally reconfigure everything as time passes and your needs change. That's exactly how I'd do things if I actually had walls that were conducive to a cleat system!! That said, I put all the upper cabinets I ripped out of our kitchen last year into my shop wherever I could fit them and that was a great move to keep more stuff "more dust free" than they were on exposed shelves, etc. While it's nice to be able to look at great tools...keeping things clean has value, too.

[Roger Feeley]

I've been in my "Show It" shop for two years and dust really isn't a problem. I have two dust collectors. One is for the machines and piped with 4" PVC. The other is an ambient air cleaner (Jet) that I run if I've been sanding a lot. Sure, dust gathers on things but I don't much care. When I'm going to be doing a lot of varnishing, I fire up the Jet and run one of those round dust things over the floor trusses above so dust doesn't fall down on my work.

But we are two semi-retired people in the house so we don't do a lot of running and stomping to dislodge the dust.

When we built, I tried something that's worked out pretty well. My last basement was a little musty and the bride complained about dust escaping into the house. This time, I had the builders put HVAC vents into the basement but no returns. I sealed the door to the basement stairwell. Then I mounted a 20"x25" furnace filter in the wall between the shop and stairwell. The result is that the HVAC blows into the basement and the air flows from the basement to the upstairs through the filter and into the stairwell. I have to blow out that filter from time to time so I assume it's working pretty well. Also, no complaints from the wife.

[Mike Wilkins]

Some tools lend themselves to being inside a closed cabinet to keep the dust off. Routers and other motorized tools should be kept dust-free as much as possible to keep the dusty stuff from getting inside the motor housings. Will extend their life and life of the bearings.
Never been a fan of tools hanging on the wall exposed. No matter how good your dust collection happens to be, normal shop use will cause an accumulation of dust over time.

[John Nordyke]

Thanks for the input, everyone.