New Shop from Old Garage Office

[minorhero]

Hello folks,

 

I have been absent from woodworking the last few months while the rest of life ganged up on me and made me quite busy. One reason for this was the purchase of a new house. Said house came with a detached garage and a car-port the previous owners converted into a home office. When I first looked at that car-port come office I immediately identified it for shop space. Well the time has come to start working on making that conversion come true. The office has wood sub-flooring and a combination of carpet and 1/4 "hardwood" flooring. Today I took some very rough measurements and ripped out the carpet. My plan is to fill in the remaining space where the carpet used to be with plywood of some kind that is 1/4 thick so the "hardwood" flooring which doesn't look bad in and of itself will be even with my new floor. I haven't decided on what yet. I may just put down some kind of vinyl tile as well and would be open to suggestions. 

 

The previous owners had some built ins done in lough of regular office furniture. My first thought was to tear it out, but when I really sat down and thought about it this simply did not make sense. Better to use it as work space and storage, at least for now. Though bits of it may get torn out as time goes on.

 

The space that is free of built ins is roughly 19'x17'. The total space with built ins included is 19' by 27' give or take a foot. 

 

Here are some pictures:

 

 

 

 

 

The previous owners did stained glass work as a hobby, hence the windows. There is attic storage accessible through the attached garage as well. I am thinking about running my dust collection and compressor in the attic as a result. Power will be an issue as the garage does not appear to have its own panel but rather runs off the house line. The air conditioner/heater runs off a 240 but to my knowledge that is the only 240 in the space. 

 

I have a LOT of machines so it will invitably get tight. But I am looking forward to finally having my own space instead of sharing it with farm equipment in the barn its all currently located in. Since my machines are all decades old restorations mostly from the 40s-70s its going to be a pretty spiffy looking shop when all said and done.

 

Next up will be cleaning up the space, putting down whatever I am going to use for flooring, and finding some way of dealing with the sliding glass door so I will be able to bring my machines in without mangling the tracks (build a ramp??). Then will come the big move which will be handled by professionals of some flavor. I will try to update as I go but any suggestions would of course be helpful.

[Coop]

Holy Crap. A workshop with a/c, fire place and ceiling fans! Yep, I could certainly live like that!

Great find!

[minorhero]

The fireplace is actually fake. The rest is real though. The previous owners liked antiques. When they found a fireplace but didn't need an actual fireplace they purchased the mantle and installed it in the garage, despite the fact that there is no place to make an actual fire.

[woodbutcher74]

Holy Shop Space Batman!!! I'd give my eye teeth for someplace like that. I think as cool as the stained glass is, it would have to go. Let more natural light in. As far as the floor goes ,some of those cushioned tiles would be nice. Let us know how it goes.

[RichardA]

Holy Crap. A workshop with a/c, fire place and ceiling fans! Yep, I could certainly live like that!

Great find!

    And a bar!  No shop is complete without a bar.......  What a find!  A bar!  Amazing!

[minorhero]

Thanks guys! Pretty happy with the place!

 

How do the cushioned tiles hold up under floor machines like table saws, jointers etc?

[Tom King]

Looks to me like the place for a workbench is where that peninsula is. I'd take that out, and the flooring, run a floor buffer with sanding screen over the plywood, and paint it or not.

[rodger.]

I would love to have that space for a workshop - plenty of room with some planning and smart layout. Congrats!

[woodbutcher74]

Thanks guys! Pretty happy with the place!

 

How do the cushioned tiles hold up under floor machines like table saws, jointers etc?

I have no experience with it, have seen it at several home shows. I believe you would set your machines and tile around them. I just googled it and a place called Rubber Flooring Inc. had some good examples. Lowes and Menards also carry something like I was talking about but don't know how well it would hold up. 

[..Kev]

Should be an awesome space!  I look forward to seeing it come together!

[minorhero]

Gotcha, at least at the start I am going to have to move my machines around to find the best layout so its probably not going to work too well for me. All of my machines are currently on wheels and I probably won't change that after I move. Another option I suppose is using some kind of hardboard or as flooring. Basically I just need something that will be durable enough to use as flooring but also only 1/4" thick. Cheap would also be very nice

 

My workbench will not move with me for 2 reasons. 1) It can not fit through the door, and 2) it was a pretty crude example of the breed and I am looking forward to building a proper one.

 

For the start that peninsula probably will be my work bench. After I build a proper bench that peninsula and possibly other sections of the built in will get torn out.

[Jim DaddyO]

Nice space!  Looks like you're well on the way.  I would keep a lot of the existing cabinets too, for a while any way.

[RichardA]

Thanks guys! Pretty happy with the place!

 

How do the cushioned tiles hold up under floor machines like table saws, jointers etc?

   I bought several horse stall mats I have in front of the bench and in front of the T/T... My only problem with them is they're 3/4" thick, and I find myself stubbing my toe from time to time.

[Coop]

AW, the "wood sub-flooring", does that mean that there is concrete below it?

[minorhero]

It used to be a car port, so likely there is either pavement or concrete. Whichever it is I am sure its terrible unlevel with 2x4 or 2x6 laid down on top and plywood on top of that. I don't think removing the wood subfloor is going to be a good option unfortunately.

[wdwerker]

Pretty sure 1/4 hardboard will be your best bet. Anything resilient won't like the weight of machines on wheels. Horse stall mats are the only exception. You can make a bevel strip to ease the transition to the 3/4" thickness.

[minorhero]

Progress has occurred!

Its been a while since I had a chance to do any work on the shop. Its amazing how many little things can break in a house the first time you touch them.

At any rate things are calming down on the house front enough for me to turn my eye to the shop. I have been doing a lot of thinking about flooring and eventually decided on going with a 3/4" sheet good of some type. I decided to go so big because of the condition of the floor. It looks like the floor is plywood resting on 24" centers. That is a pretty big gap to be sticking machines weighing 400 to 700 lbs on not counting wood I toss on top. So out comes 3/4" sheet goods attached perpendicular to the original flooring. I eventually settled on what Home Depot calls "premium" 3/4" OSB.

First thing I did was remove that tack strip that held the carpet down. After that I ordered my wood. Here it is delivered, all 14 sheets:

 

And here it is after several hours of installing it.

 

 

 

 

 

Its not quite done, though the great bulk of it is down at this point. Next up is a lot of small pieces being shoved into places underneath the built-ins. After its all done I am thinking I will paint it. I had my house painted recently and there is a LOT of gray exterior paint left over. While not the ideal stuff to put on the floor it is exceptionally free (at this point). Sooner or later I will also need to see to electrical as the shop was really not built for being a shop and I will likely need to do.....interesting gyrations to get enough electrical into the building. Though it currently has enough that I could install my machines as is, I would just need to run extension cords all over the place to make sure certain machines were not on the same circuit and likely have to ensure other machines never ran at the same time.

Tomorrow I will likely get the rest done and start on painting. 

[estesbubba]

Wow that is going to be a nice space - almost too nice to cut wood in.

[Brendon_t]

I've been hoping to catch this transformation.  I think the 3/4" was a good call. 

What are the major machine offenders you see that could make a shop that large feel cramped?  Have you got a layout planned? 

[minorhero]

No layout planned yet.... not really anyway. I have poked around a bit with some post it notes figuring out the likely configurations. The list of machines are as follows:

1. Miter saw
2. Table Saw
3. Drill Press
4. 12" Planer
5. 8" Jointer
6. Large Lathe
7. Large Scroll Saw
8. 14" Bandsaw
9. Router Table
10. Mortiser
11. and rebuilding a 12" Radial Arm Saw right now
12. HF dust collector

Then I have some not strictly woodworking tools but things that help me restore woodworking tools. I have a small h-frame press on a stand, a grinding station, a tool cabinet, and various other hand planes and hand powered tools like drills circular saw etc.

Plus I will be making a new bench eventually as well.

All of the woodworking machines I mentioned are floor machines. Actually they are all restored cast iron machines from the early 1900s to about 1960. Thus dust collection will be an issue. I am thinking strongly about buying an air filter. 

[minorhero]

Some more progress!

Finished laying down the 3/4 OSB. Also I had a weird bookshelf and a half that I pulled from the main house and installed in the shop as well. Always can use more storage.

 

 

Next up is painting the floor.

[RPCV_Woodworker]

Ditching the RAS will free up a good chunk of space...

[minorhero]

A lot of folks really don't like radial arm saws. Having used one (a good one properly calibrated) for a few years I can't possibly imagine working without one. Plus the one I am restoring is a real bad ass machine. 

[minorhero]

And.... painted.

 

 

Next up is a look at the electrical situation. I have 9 sockets and the A/C unit is running on a 10th that is 240volt. No idea how many of those are on the same circuit. Certainly I will want at least 1 other 240 socket.

[minorhero]

Alright some bad news. I have been tracking down breakers figuring out how much power is actually in my shop. What should be understood is that the electrical situation in my house is fairly absurd.... The shop is detached from the house. The electrical runs into the house as a main panel. There is a sub panel that handles various things added onto over the years, and a giant generator turn on box and the generator has a box for the outlets and equipment it runs. When I bought the house it was sans-generator, but all the wiring is still there. The electrical wires run out of the basement, underground (under a driveway and brick walkway) to the shop.

I purchased one of those nifty "breaker finders" and discovered that ALL NINE of my sockets run off the same 15 amp breaker. The 220 volt outlet being used to run the AC/Heater is run on a separate breaker of course. And... that's it.

So question now is, in a perfect world, how many breakers should I have? I always figured you run about 2 or 3 outlets in a shop on one breaker. That way you can have multiple machines running at the same time. I also was spoiled before this with an entire barn with its own dedicated panel at my disposal. Can a shop be run on a single 15amp breaker at 110 and a single 20 amp breaker at 220? Can I simply daisy chain some 220 outlets off of the existing AC/Heater outlet and run my 220 through those?

Thoughts?