Kim's Shop

[Kim]

I enjoy seeing pictures of other people's shops so I thought I'd contribute a few pictures of my own.  This won't be anyone's dream shop, but its my spot, and I'm happy with it!

My shop consists of a single bay of our garage.  And no, I don't have to share the space with a car.  I do have to share it with lots of other junk that other members of the family leave around. It gets cleaned up from time to time, but entropy is king, and it all comes back again!

This is my 'open area' with a bandsaw on one side and table saw on the other.  My general wood working tools here.


Turning around, here's the table saw again, with my HF 4x6 horizontal bandsaw next to it.
The shelves full of boxes behind the saws make the divider between my shop and the rest of the garage.
The multicolored thing in the lower left of the picture (right in front of the toolchest) is my youngest daughters painting project.  Its one of the projects she does when she's having some shop time with Daddy .


Turning a bit more, you see my tool chest, buffing wheel, scroll saw, and dust collection system (behind the plastic  there).  And in front of the dust collector is a compressor.  Behind this row of tools is a 'U' shaped set of benches, and we're about to step back there for a peek.


Starting to walk back to those benches, we go by my tool chest again.  In front of us is a pile of model rockets that I've built and flown with my kids (past hobbies!).


Then turning to the left, you're looking at my bench space.
The plastic you may have noticed draping down from the ceiling in several of the pictures is for a little 'sanding booth' that I made for one project. I was doing a lot of sanding with some rather toxic wood and didn't want to distribute the dust all over the garage. So I made the plastic booth.  I may take that down soon since I haven't used it in years and it just gets in the way now.  Never the less, there it hangs...


On one side of the 'U' is the Taig lathe, and in the back is the Taig Mill (the newest addition to my shop).


On the other side is a bench grinder and a drill press.  The hose dropping down is a 'mobile' connection to the dust collection system and can be hooked up to some smaller tools, or just used to clean up the bench tops if needed.


This pic shows the tool chest rolled around for easy access; I do this a lot when I'm mainly focused on metal working, since most of the tools are right here in my bench space.  You can also see the disk/belt sander which sits next to the lathe.


Here's some closer shots of some of the tools, just for fun!


This shot is right after I setup the Mill when I got it for Christmas (that's why its so clean!)




About a year ago, when I started doing more metal work, I debated over getting this HF saw.  But it came on sale for $169 and i decided to get it.  Boy, am I glad I did!  It has worked wonderfully for me and I love not having to use a hack saw to cut bar stock!  Its wonderful!


Thanks for taking a look around my place!
Kim


3-24-13: Fixed spelling mistakes

[zeeprogrammer]

Looks like a well stocked and very packed shop Kim.
Thanks for the tour.
Looks like a fairly diverse set of hobbies!

[b.lindsey]

Nice Kim, wish i had even half that amount of room...someday  maybe.

Bill

[vcutajar]

A well organised work space you have there Kim.

Vince

[Bearcar1]

Thank you for the personal tour Kim. From the looks of things, you are pretty much prepared for anything. That Saturn V rocket model I bet was a real gas to light off. And your sanding booth is a good idea as well. Something I probably should think about as I sometimes have a bit of sanding to do and the furnace filter pays dearly for it even though it is not inside the shop.




BC1
Jim

[Dave Otto]

Nice shop Kim!

Thanks for sharing.

Dave

[steamer]

Nice shop!

Dave

[Don1966]

Very nice shop Kim thanks for taking the time to show it to us. You have quiet a collection of tools and makes some of us tool envy.

Don

[chuck foster]

nice shop you got there kim 

i wish i had that much space to work in. the rockets look interesting.

chuck

[Kim]

Thanks for stopping by my shop!

The rockets were lots of fun!  They were a real kick to launch and see it all work right, watch the parachute eject and see it come back to earth (or see it smash into the ground when it didn't work right  )  But constructing them was the most fun for me.  Many of those rockets were scratch built, but the Saturn V was a kit.  It was a fun project in itself.  Its seen better days, and couldn't actually fly right now because of some damage it sustained... not from a flight, but from getting knocked over in my overcrowded shop!    But it was really fun to watch it fly!

Some people think I have a lot of different hobbies, but I find that all my hobbies really boil down to the same thing - building and learning.  I love to learn and I love to make stuff!  All the things I do are just offshoots of that one overriding hobby .

Vince, as for 'well organized' - that's really just an PR campaign.  I tried to take pictures on some of the better days, when things were too disheveled.  And I also cropped the pictures to remove some of the larger piles of junk.  I do try to keep it 'tidy' but only tidy enough for me to be able to find stuff (most of the time:)).  My shop's not for looks, its to being used!

Don, tool envy? that's what I get when I see all your guys big mills and lathes!  Someday I'm going to have to get a lathe were I can turn a substantial fly wheel (bigger than 4") and single point threads!  That's one thing I just can't do on the Taig.  I've thought about ways I can add this (there are several people who've posted their modifications for a Taig to do threading) but I'm not sure its worth the effort, especially when I've got 'big tool envy'. Not too long ago when I first joined MEM, someone told me that Taigs were 'gateway machines' to the bigger stuff... Boy, were they right!  And now the quandary, do I get a DRO for my bench top mill? Or do I wait till I can afford the big toy that I really want? Or do I just do both?    So many questions!

Thanks for the kind comments everyone!
Kim

[tel]

Very impressive - good use of space!

[Kim]

Thanks Tel!  You've got to make it all fit in the space you've got
Its about time for me to do a big cleaning so that I can make some room for more tools!  I've just about run out of spots and my list of tools I want keeps getting longer!

Kim

[Kim]

I got a new addition to my shop today.  Not exactly the 'big iron' most people brag about, but hopefully, a foreshadowing of things to come...

Harbor Freight currently has a 2 Ton Shop Crane on sale for $179.  That's $120 off the regular price which I thought was a pretty good deal!  And with what I hope Santa will be bringing my way soon, I thought this would be a good time to pick one up.

I'd read mixed reviews about the HF cranes, mostly relating to the holes not lining up for assembly, or the wrong hardware being included, etc. But my experience was very good.  All the correct parts were there, and it went together fairly easily. Only took me an hour or two tonight to assemble.  Now all I need is something to move with it!


And here it is all folded up, to wait patiently in the corner for its time to shine


Kim

[b.lindsey]

That really folds up nicely Kim for storage, not a large footprint at all!!  So what is it you hope Santa will be bringing to try it out on ?? 

Bill

[Don1966]

Kim I like that it's folds out of the way, very nice. 


Don