WORKSHOP - do you have one for your DIY work?

Just moved into a house with a suitable shed after years of living in flats. It's bit of a tip, but just wait a bit. I'm going to paint it so it looks like a West Indian chattel house, all bright colours not boring brown. When set up with my father's work bench and assorted tools I'll be happy as a clam.
 
Buy a decent pillar drill 2nd hand. Far better than the stuff sold in B&Q etc. Prob about £200. I have 2x Meddings. For metal, Plasma cutter, 1mt and 50cm sheet folders. Bar and flat benders. Hefty metal bench with a big Record vice and a tct cut off saw + electric and hand bench shears. Metal lathe. Mig Tig & MMA welders. A few more specialised items like a 10 ton air driven punch and 20ton hydraulic press (handy for rigging..) Recently set up a small forge with a proper anvil for 'persuading'.
For wood: Planer thicknesser, band saw, bench saw and assorted routers. 2 x radial arm saws.
All this lives in the old stables off the back of the house, around 5mt x 12mt. It is not practical to heat it, so b. cold right now.
DW
 
I bought a Funditor precision table saw for my company and it is fantastic. I have recently discovered it was intended for trimming type blocks (wrong words but Linotype field).

It was intended for cutting a variety of plastics (and it still does) but for woodwork it is an absolute boon.

I have seen them advertised for £50 and they are single phase.

If and when I retire, it will retire home with me.
 
I have managed to convince my family that all of the following are essential:

Saws: table saw, bandsaw, hand-held circular saw, jisaw, chainsaw
Drills: mains SDS, mains Makita in drill press (good precision - no run-out), 25 volt battery drill, 9 volt Makita (nice and light for continuous use), 9 volt angle drill for awkward spaces on boats.
Routers: 1/2 inch beast normally in router table for spindle moulding. 1/4 inch for light work and use in cutting dovetails in dovetail jig.
Bosch hand planer (lust after a thicknesser)
Sanders: beast of a belt sander, bench mounted long belt sander, palm orbital, random orbit, power file, delta sander
Small angle grinder.
Biscuit jointer.
Woodturning lathe.
Sharpening - bench grinder - buy a cheap grinder, throw the wheels away and put good wheels on it.
Water cooled slow sharpening stone.
(endless jigs and attachments for sharpening turning tools etc.)
Surely that must be it for my machines!
Oh, no - two dust extractors/vacuum cleaners. Apart for the convenience of having one full time on the table saw, if you have two you can use them to clean each other's filters etc, which makes everything much more efficient.

Get lots of light! - movable, flexible etc.


The wooden frame in my workshop is used to build a polythene tent in winter so that I can heat only a small space to dry glue.

Time clocks are good for putting batteries to charge and forget.

Decent bench with vice and a dead-leg - a leg that goes from the concrete floor to the top of the bench so that you can give something a serious belt with a hammer and have no energy lost by flexing of the bench. Bench dogs do a lot of work for me - skelp them with a hammer to hold things in place. There is no such thing as too many clamps.

Considering installing roller blinds by the lathe and behind the turning position so that I can lower them to catch the chips rather than them covering the whole workshop when roughing out.

Woodwork and painting/varnishing are poor companions - dust. Would love to have a separate paint shop. However the family already think my workshop outrageous. Best place to paint is outdoors under cover when it's raining. I'm trying to factor that into my next workshop.

The original arrangement just happened - it is now a bit more organised than the picture.
 
First Mate and I moved last June-the first part of our planned downsizeing.

The workshop is all set up and progress being made on the 1913 AJS motorcycle under restoration.

I have a small cheapo Clarke lathe/mill, 3/4hp bench grinder, large pillar drill, Motorcycle hydraulic lifting bench, steel bench with vice, various storage racking, lots of maxi bins and a large steel dexion cabinet with doors.

Hobby compressor and MIG welder coming soon.

I have kept most of the usefull special tools from our motorcycle business-Pullers, taps and dies, hones, valve seat cutters, helicoil kits, pipe flareing tools and other such stuff.

The one thing still at the old house in the big workshop is the press. It is 7 feet tall, 5.5 feet wide, weighs about 2 tons and the gauge is red lined at 50 tons-which it reaches easily. It was used for dismantleing and re-assembling Speedway engine crankshafts. I still have access should I need to use it.

Last time I used it I pressed some radiused trapped ends in S/S tube for some struts to support the pushpit.

The previous davit installers had got their angles wrong-a triangle needs the widest possible base for maximum strength-they had it really narrow and with the load bearing strut not doing much supporting.

A nice workshop or shed is a joy-my problem is keeping my one tidy......................
 
'My name is Oldbilbo and I am a clutterbug!'

This below is my garden shed/workshop....


IMG_3745.jpg



It is 32' x 18' x 9', and bulked out.

There's a complete spare kitchen in there.... a double Belfast sink.... maybe half-a-dozen assorted anchors lurking in the shadows for the unwary foot..... several chains of chain..... more assorted rope than Jimmy Green's Beaulieu stall ( in fact most of it came from....! ).....a Triton Superjaws SJA200 and accessory jaws, a Triton Router Table RTA300 together with Jigsaw Kit AJA300..... several routers..... a cheap bench morticer that doubles as a pillar drill.... sabresaw...... circular saw..... biscuit jointer..... Li-Ion hand drill..... a trio of 240v hand drills..... an SDS beast of a drill with tool bits.... some Japanese pull-saws.... numerous sails for assorted boats.... rather a lot of s/s fixings..... lifting strops long and short..... plywood, lots of it..... wind vane assemblies, complete and incomplete..... dust/chip extractor vacuum..... several bins with long-handled garden tools, shovels, wrecking bars, props, plasterers' skims.... two sets of Plastimo furling gear.... two work benches, one about 24' long and t'other about 16', both piled high....

Do you think I need some counselling?
 
I have a single garage which is my workshop. (I used to have a double garage which was much better). This is it when I had my clinker dinghy so it was a bit of a baot store as well.
Have a variety of cheaper tools. Compressor, bench grinder, Mig & arc welders, drills, angle grinders, jigsaws etc. Most are fine for occasional hobby use, but the welders aren't. I wish I'd spent a bit more when I bought those. In fact I'd have bought a TIG welder if I was doing it again.

garage.jpg



Now it's an automotive workshop

After_leftlockstrings.jpg
 
Pillar drill or drill press. A solid base witha vertical post of steel. Sliding on the post is a table for sitting the work on. On top at the back is an induction motor, belt driving the top of the shaft on the bottom of which is the chuck. The belt drive usually has multiple pulleys so that you can decrese or increse speed from the 2850 RPM motor.
There is a handle to lower the chuck and drill onto the work. This is what makes it so good the handle has leverage so that you can easily apply a lot of pressure to the bit essentail for drilling stainless steel. The flat table and fixed drill axle means you are always drilling at rightangles to the job. I have a cheap chinese one which while it has limited height capability is just so much better than a hand held electric drill. More expensivee ones have a longer post so room for bigger jobs under the drill. So yes i think they are essential. olewill
 
For those who haven't already seen it, I love this video!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jlJOg6PT2N4

Anyway, I'm surprised this thread got onto it's second page before a decent bench and vice were mentioned! I think that's GOT to be the starting point - followed by a pillar drill. My personal preference is to buy old, heavy industrial stuff (or semi-industrial if you don't have 3-phase power. My experience f the lighter "DIY" stuff from the likes of Machine mart is that it's not very durable - or stiff. The latter being very important when you're trying to do a job much bigger and heavier than the equipment was designed to take. I have a fairly ordinary double garage - about 20' square, but like Bilbo, have had to build a shed in the garden and a lean-to shed on one end of the garage.

I mainly do metal and car maintenance, so probably not THAT relevant to the OPs original question. I have a 4-poster ramp in there (no, the garage isn't tall enough, but I can lift the car to about waist height - which is a LOT better than axle stands!) and scoot around under it on the remains of an old office chair. I have a welder, pillar drill, cut-off saw, couple of compressors, lathe, bench grinder and a variety of hand tools, but mostly automotive.

A mate of mine is into wood and has a bard set up for that. His best tool, he says, is a good quality radial arm saw, followed by a planer/thicknesser. The thing I envy him more than anything (apart from how much space he has!) is his dust extraction. Whenever I'm doing any fibreglass or wood work, my garage gets FILTHY (and wearing a respirator for long periods of time is pretty horrid. His extractor is housed in an adjoining outbuilding and there are various 6" tubes through the wall that he can position next to any machine.
 
William_H said:
Pillar drill or drill press. A solid base witha vertical post of steel. Sliding on the post is a table for sitting the work on. On top at the back is an induction motor, belt driving the top of the shaft on the bottom of which is the chuck. The belt drive usually has multiple pulleys so that you can decrese or increse speed from the 2850 RPM motor.
There is a handle to lower the chuck and drill onto the work. This is what makes it so good the handle has leverage so that you can easily apply a lot of pressure to the bit essentail for drilling stainless steel. The flat table and fixed drill axle means you are always drilling at rightangles to the job. I have a cheap chinese one which while it has limited height capability is just so much better than a hand held electric drill. More expensivee ones have a longer post so room for bigger jobs under the drill. So yes i think they are essential. olewill
Click to expand...

What you have described just sounds like a bench drill to me.
 
Nicholas123 said:
AH a pillar drill albeit a rather makeshift one.
Top tip:If you are using your drill as a press it's time to sharpen the drill.:encouragement:
Click to expand...
Apologies for my terminology. Me and google have got it wrong judging by the images I get back on that term. I call it a drill press because I wouldn't glorify it with the term "pillar drill". And yes it is a bit makeshift. It has some homemade modifications - like extra tapped holes and bolts to stop it flapping about when I'm trying to do something accurate. Managed to make a new banjo bolt with it, so it can't be too bad.

I agree with the sentiment that industrial strength is better, but I can't afford it for all tools. I usually end up replacing the ones that break or are limiting with more manly versions. I have the most pathetic band saw in the world, but it does endless work for me, so it's not all about money. But try replacing a blade on it - it's an incredible fart-about to get it sorted and the blade guides right. I find that often with cheap machines - it takes a lot of patience to set them up - and I wouldn't claim that they are great even when set up - but the budget isn't infinite. And I was reminded - respirator - yes - essential. Mine is in endless use. Specs and face masks don't work even with non-toxic dust - steaming up. And wood turning with an uncovered beard is an entertaining business.
 
"Apologies for my terminology."


Sounds ok to me. I suspect that drill press is another phrase we have adopted from America via China.


I almost forgot.

I think cheap tools are often a good idea, for example if they are going to be misused, rusted to a pulp or dropped overboard, ie on the boat. Or perhaps where the best tackle is out of your range; I have a biscuit jointer, an excellent piece of kit costing 30 quid, I could never justify paying 400 for a Lamello.
So we keep at it , getting the job done is the key. Tho I must say I could never cope with the smallest band saws, I would boot that into the long grass :-)
 
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