Work Shop organizing and storage

[earp]

What are some ways to organize tools and parts/materials?
I have carpentry tools, automotive tools, metalworking tools,
and painting tools. I have all kinds of parts,etc. I have some
rolling carts 3'x2'x6' that I'm using for holding tools based on
usage. Please help.

[Frank S]

I haven't been able to set mine up like I want it as of now, but I do have several associated tools located in roll- around tool cabinets and top chests.
For my painting equipment and paints I keep all of the related materials and tools (IE spray guns, sanders, respirators, gloves, aprons, pressure regulators, paints solvents others) in the same fire resistant cabinet.
For my lathe and mill tooling I have 2 places 1 is on the wall where I keep all of my quick change lathe tooling and large drill bits the extra chucks are located under the lathe for the Mill I have a dedicated 7 drawer Kennedy roll around tool box it holds the collets end-mills various vices chucks and related articles for the Mill.
for my general mechanics tools I have far too many tool boxes way too full to be organized very well, but 1 5 drawer Chraftsman roll cabinet has nothing but pneumatic tools in it and my impact sockets 1" drive down to 3/8" drive the top 2 drawers have all of the small die grinders the very bottom drawer has the 1" & 3/4" drive impacts and sockets the 2nd from the bottom has the 1/2 & 3/8" stuff the middle drawer has the truck axle nut sockets and seal installing tools
1 7 drawer roll cabinet has my precision measuring tools another cabinet has things like cylinder hones gear pullers some specialty tools and other things. all totaled if I were to line up my roll cabinets in a straight line they would occupy a 35 ft or more section of wall So for right now until we get relocated to our new digs I have these spotted in 2 House hold goods van trailers. 1 of which also serves as my machine shop while the other one has 96 15" by 10" by 20" parts bins stacked 8 ft high along to walls in the front of that van and my large Leblond lathe that I am not using right now that van also has half a dozen of the roll around cabinets in it including 1 Snap-on 5 ft by 2 ft by 7 ft tall tool box.
My biggest problem is I have no place to set up my table saw, router table, vertical band saws, tile saw and all of the rest of my wood or ceramic working equipment so all of that is stored as well
1 tip for storing things that are humidity sensitive like used reclaimed metal automotive parts. for small items after I have them cleaned up I place them in a qt. or gal heavy duty freezer bag. Just before zipping it closed I puff a bit of 75/25 argon co2 mix in the bag for a few seconds then zip the bag.
I also use the gas in my left over paints that are only a partial can for some paints the ones that won't eat plastic film like glad wrap I press a sheet of this in the can over the paint all the way to the surface sealing out any oxygen.
Hope you get some ideas from this

[Toolmaker51]

Storage and accessibility are difficult to plan ahead for. It occurs to us once a collection grows to the point of "where is my..." I work with the same dilemma.
So, if I had to do it for someone,
1] I'd start with an inventory. My trick is to use Windows Excel, but use 1 sheet for 1 type of tools, say plumbing. Instead of back and forth to keyboard typing, 'speech to text' is very easy. It can sort, or highlight according to set identifiers, and editing in or out is better than a bag of erasers!
2] List every item. Unless you have multiple channel locks for different 'departments' leave off tools you use in different areas.
3] Separate them into related groups. Tubing and pipe cutters, reamer and threading, go together for example. Your system should suit you. When stuck, I visualize what would be together in a catalog.
4] Once you see the physical size of "Plumbing" and judge portability that will cue what type of box(es) is called for. I buy used toolboxes on craigslist or local classifieds.
6] Do the same for whatever categories you have to organize.

My variety is extensive, so broad I'm thinking of doing some kind of rental program, I think it would be a great means of advertising and would reach exactly the kind of people I'd hope my machine shop attracts. But the machinist tools are organized by what kind of operation they work for, lathe, mill, grinding, etc. The mills run from 3AM to 50NM tapers, so the bigger tools are with bigger machines. But 5C collets get used in each area, so they're stored in general cabinet right in the middle.

Maybe this gets you going, maybe not. I'd be glad to contribute or bounce ideas back and forth, in your thread or PM. I'm in here frequently, it's my Facebook so to speak, no phonies-posers or senseless "I'm at the mall" crap. If you respond here, we'll get a lot of other HMT contributors to dive in. That's what makes this site so dang interesting.
Reading posts these people put up, it is clear the base of knowledge, resources, and experience is the real deal. I'd say all of us are here to share and relate "...how I solved" this that and the other!

[earp]

Some great ideas! Thanks!

[C-Bag]

I work out of your standard 18'x20' 2 car garage and do oxy-acetylene welding/mig/plasma, mill, lathe, mechanic, powdercoating, metal forming and very little wood working. So for me I work completely out of work stations. My father in law built packing house equipment and had a shed but would also build on site and needed his stuff portable to install the equipment after he was done anyway. So after working with him for a summer I fell in love with the logic of being able to reconfigure to what you were doing.

I know this sounds sacrilegious but no big stationary workbenches. I have a HFT single drawer tool cart I put a hinging top across the handles and that is a portable work top/powdercoat station with storage for my welding helmet/leathers/gloves and related tools. Then a 1,000lbs lift table that has a heavy duty top for welding and beating things into submission I have several of those beam clamps for hanging electrical that are cheap at Home Dump that I use to clamp various tools and fixtures for the process at hand onto this top. Since the lift is mostly up I've blocked it up to take the pressure off the hydraulics and under it is where I store my tapping fixture, my 8"XY rotary table and 4" vice.

My drill/mill came on a heavy duty table that I have an old snap-on top box under for mill tooling and have several times for big jobs moved it out into the doorway of the garage in the sun for the ventilation and better lighting. I made the castors individually leveling so I could level the machine if need be.

My main work station is an ancient 3 drawer toolbox that I have my bench mount drill press, 6" grinder/multi tool disc/belt sander, 8" bench grinder for lathe bits and general grinding with a mystery rail that was included in some appliance that there was no use for but turned out perfect for hanging my 4.5" Makita grinder and two drill press vices on the back of the tool box along with the modded HFT tubing fishmouth cutter. The top drawer is 40yrs of odd nuts, bolts and washers in somewhat loose organization. The open bottom has the circular saw.

The best for last is as a line mech I hated how test equipment and air tools just ate up drawers and would turn into a tangled mess! So I made a what I call a clamshell cab that is the height and width of the end of my rollaway and the side next to the cab all the air tools are hung up and in the door all my test equipment hang on hooks. Very tidy and no struggle to deploy.

[Toolmaker51]

NO stationary work benches?? That's not sacrilegious; we question what galaxy you hail from! That 40 year hardware collection is probably CGI, a hologram to fool the Men in Black.
But our mini mill concepts are identical, and dedicated work stations at least similar. My machines are portable too, once.
My pal C-Bag proves every day he knows what he is doing, like hanging corded tools. That he serves a world-wide market from that 18x20 proves it too.

And earp, I'm glad you like our spins on your project. And we can re-tune our own.

[quitespy]

Hi All, Organizing a workshop is never easy (still busy with mine). After a lot of research and found nothing for a small workshop layout, These ideas did not just come to me I battled for about a year sorting out and moving my workshop around to make sure I have space to walk stand and can comfortably work in the shop and of course tools are easy to find. Floors have no clutter on them. Oh and still busy with it in between projects. As I use a tool I find a place to hang it. My workshop is a single car garage. Small but compact for what I need to do

So Far this is what I have done.....
I checked and sorted all the duplicate tools, including all tool boxes. From these I setup the first tool board "let call it the main one" that I put a full set of tools on.
For the rest of the tools I put tool boards up at each Machine, like the Drill press, lathes, welders, cutters, planer etc...
On each of these tool boards I placed tools that would be used on and for these machine.
Any additional hand held power tools like drill machine, grinders etc.. I placed the extras at the machines that it would be used with. Example 2 small angle grinders one with a cutting disk one with a grinding disk, Placed at the welding/plasma cutting bench.

Each machine got a shelf, which the cutting tools, drill bits, files etc. fits with that machine, are placed by that machine.
For the next part I checked all hand held machines which came in their own containers measured them up labelled them and built a rack to place them on. Made sure that the racks are high enough to fit any trolleys under.
For the tools without boxes I purchased fit to size containers for them. All these I labelled and placed on the shelving.
I bought a few extra containers of which I put, projects in progress in, to make sure they don't lay around.
Now remember we emptied the tool boxes.
These I use when I do an outside job. I will pack all the tools required in the tool box from the boards and when done with the job will put them back in place and store the empty tool box. I also take one of the empty project containers with to place all the parts in for the job I am working on.
This way I know I won’t forget my tools and of course I can see all tools are back when on the boards.

While I was looking around to place any machines and tried to see what I could use from the other machine to save space. Example.. My wood planer, I place the wood guide on the metal bench "pic below". My Mitre saw and bench saw bolted together so I can use both the platforms to place wood on when cutting.
My baking oven for powder coating and sand blaster on top of the oven. Compressor under a rack in a corner. I built a gantry crane in the year so I could move these machines.
Well that's about it, great site and contributions
Hope that everyone's ideas brings us all to making our workshops better

added a few pics to hopefully make the explanation easier. Hope this helps a bit.

Thanks Kevin




At my lathe the start of the tool board in the background.

[richardcrane]

I have a general (mostly woodworking) shop in an old barn (20 x 20ft) that had been converted into a two car garage. It was mostly un-organized until a few months ago when I embarked on a "save myself from myself" campaign after going out and buying a tool that I knew I owned but couldn't find.
I have a variety of storage units and workstations that I'm gradually upgrading -- tablesaw in the center, workbench and handtools to one side, beginnings of a radial arm bench opposite. I found labeling in big bold letters all enclosed storage has helped a lot. To help organize I borrowed from our public library The complete illustrated guide to everything sold in hardware stores / by Tom Philbin and Steve Ettlinger -- Turned out very helpful, for the table of contents and index -- found I own stuff from just about every category, and it's very useful in designating storage locations and combining categories in sensible ways.

[pennswoodsed]

Any chance that you might favor us with pictures , hanging lighting clamps and machine stations ? The whole deal sounds fan-dam-tastic.
Regards,Ed

[Toolmaker51]

Fellow HMT'ers;
I just bought The Complete Illustrated Guide to Everything Sold in Hardware Stores / by Tom Philbin and Steve Ettlinger. A'zon's got them; $4.00. 1 cent for the book $3.99 s/h. Complete Illustrated Guide to Everything Sold in Hardware Stores: Tom Philbin, Steve Ettlinger: 9780025363106: Amazon.com: Books Looks like there's been a couple editions, and other guides by same authors. I'm well-versed in mechanical hardware, a breakdown of carpentry and construction fasteners will help in the building project. I recommend scooping up a McMaster-Carr catalog; bug your company purchasing guy for his old one.
Thanks go to richardcrane.