Help with shop layout?

[Bob Crosley]

Well, I haven't had time to put in my new 220 line for the saw, and it's pretty cold out there, so my current activity has turned to shop planning. Courtesy of Grizzly, I have the current layout for my garage. My garage is a 2 car garage that doesnt get used for the cars, so, with some exceptions, it's mostly mine.



You can see two areas that aren't mine. The area marked holiday storage is a floor to ceiling set of shelves that hold all the holiday decorations for each season. That's not going anywhere anytime soon.

The deep freeze holds our surplus food. That has to be located one of two places. It's current location, or the spot marked with the big B. My wife has to be able to come down the stairs from the house and be right at the deep freeze, to ensure marital harmony over the loss of the garage.

Currently, the bottom left area occupied by the DC and the bench holding the grinder and mortiser is filled with lawn gear, and outdoor stuff. The plan is to build another shed in the yard to hold that stuff, but I could see that being a year or so before that will work out. So my plan is to put up racks, shelves, etc. to confine that useage to the smallest floor space possible.

That bench with the mortiser and grinder will likely also house the CMS. (Grizzly doesn't have any CMS's in their planner) There was a bench in FWW's Small Woodshops issue that had the CMS in a recess in the top, to put the rest of the top in line with the CMS table. Other benchtop tools were stored below and put on the wings when needed. I'll probably do something similar.

My plan for my eventual assembly table will be about 30" by 60" with shelves underneath to store all my assembly related stuff. Including a shelf for my pancake compressor, my nailers, cordless drills, etc. Might even try to figure out how to get some clamp storage under there.

Router table is currently in an extension of the Unisaw.

Soon, I'll be wiring, insulating and drywalling, so assume pleny of light and power.

Some problems with this space...

• There's no wood storage now. Have to come up with something compact for that.
  
• There aren't many unbroken walls. This means that I can't put my DC in one spot and run a single low duct to my major chip producers.
  
• The garage door is 8' high. Great if I owned a Hummer, but not so good in trying to store stuff above the door.

One thought I have is to put my DC in the upper right corner, and run a line down the common wall with the house and the wall interrupted by the small door. Then line all major chip producers up along those trunks. That would maximize DC efficiency, and minimize ducts across floors and extension cords. Might create some workflow problems.

What suggestions do you have? Let's throw out ideas and I'll be happy to update the shop diagram to accomodate. I could use some experienced help in figuring this out.

BTW: everything will be on mobile bases.

Thanks!
Bob

[Ken Weaver]

Bob -
One thing that pops into my mind is to swap the table saw and the assembly table. This brings the saw (and jointer) closer to the large door and gives you room (with door open) to handle large stock. Also may help make clean up easier (blow things out the door). Also it puts the assembly area and your bench closer together. This essentially divides your shop into two areas, milling and assembly. I would like to do that in my shop (3/4 of the garage) but I have some traffic patterns that prevent it.

[LarryG]

I agree with Ken about swapping the TS and assembly table. One possible glitch, though, would be if you intend the assembly table to double as an outfeed table. Even so, I think the overall workflow will be improved.

Putting the freezer at the alternate 'B' location will be best, I think, since it will give you a longer bench space for the grinder, mortiser, and CMS. I have 10 feet to the left of my CMS and six feet to the right and wouldn't want any less.

Could the holiday decorations be relocated to the area where the drill press and bandsaw are? That would get most of the mess-makers in the same end of the space, closer to the DC, and would further separate the machining and assembly areas. You might also then be able to have some wood racks where the decorations are now -- handy to the big door -- and park the DP and BS in front of them.

Lastly, I guess it doesn't matter since everything is on wheels, but you've got your bandsaw facing the wall ...

[jethro]

Bob, if you have a 9' or higher ceiling, you may be able to put the Christmas decorations on hanging shelves to save you floor space. The whole back wall of my 20' wide garage has a 2' deep shelf at 7' high, above the old kitchen cabinets I use for tool storage.

And, BTW, you need a bigger dog.

[Thalermade]

How about moving the freezer to B. Also build new storage for the decorations to the right of the freezer (B). Basically, give her the front width of the garage.

Then build a wall to separate her area from yours. This will give you some more wall space as well. It will sacrifice some shop space though.

The current decoration shelves could be changed to your lumber storage , exactly where you need it, near the big door.

Have fun
Russ

[Hoover]

I go along with Thalermade's suggestion. Seems like there would be a better flow of traffic for the shop. The freezer would be closer to the stairs from the house, and the rest of your shop would laid out closer to each tool. Just my .02. It would seem to be easier to load and unload projects, lumber, tools(!!!),etc.

[Woodnut]

quote:Originally posted by Thalermade

<snip>
Then build a wall to separate her area from yours. This will give you some more wall space as well. It will sacrifice some shop space though.</snip>

Not to mention, you could add a door to the "wall" and seal off your area, which would:[list=a][*]lower noise transmission up the stairway[*]minimize dust accumulation in the LOYL's shelves/freezer[*]have a place to add a lock so that little curious hands can be protected from sharp things, but still have access to the ready supply of HotPockets
</ol id="a">

[mater]

quote:Originally posted by Ken Weaver

Bob -
One thing that pops into my mind is to swap the table saw and the assembly table. This brings the saw closer to the large door and gives you room (with door open) to handle large stock. Also may help make clean up easier (blow things out the door).

I agree with Ken as this is how my saw is setup. It gives me more room when I rip plywood and long boards. The other suggestions seem to be good also.

[Bob Crosley]

Wow, thanks for everyone's input. Here are a few responses. I've updated my design to swap the assembly table and saw. I just can't post it from here. (I'm travelling for work) I've also made a few other changes, namely, moving the deep freeze to location B, I'm making the CMS counter longer and still playing with locations for the planer and jointer to try to maximize infeed/outfeed space.

I actually looked, at one point, at putting the decorations on high bins near the ceiling. The problem is that with the number of bins I have, I'd have to put a 3' shelf around ever part of the garage not blocked by the garage door guides. And then I'd just have enough. By putting everything in the one area, I have room for more bins, and the space is limited to one area. I plan to put a rolling sheet goods cart in front of those shelves.

I have to admit, the wall is an intriguing idea. Unfortunately, it's likely to kill my shop budget. Bigger issue is that to put a wall in there with wiring, etc. and reducing the size of the garage means we might have trouble when we try to sell. Bare minimum, I'd have to rip the wall out if the new owners wanted to use the garage for something strange, like cars.

Thanks everyone for the ideas, and I'll update the diagram when I can.

Bob