Shop photo

[Gerald Boggs 209]

I tried searching for a thread of shops, but had no luck. Admin guys, feel free to relocated this.

 

My forge and work space. Actually it's my old shop in the basement of my house. This is where I worked before I build a shop next to the house. All were glad I was no longer burning coal under the living room :-) My new forge is hard to get a clear photo of and anyway, it's in a state of reconstruction/reconfiguration. I'm replacing the coal forge and at the same time, building a large hooded area that will cover both the coal forge and gas forge. When the current shop is reconfigured, I'll try some photos with my new found photography skills :-)

 

As one can see, my shop is a pretty Spartan in terms of equipment, but still I can do all I need.

 

I'm just posting this now, as it was not stored in my main use area, I had forget I had this photo, .

Edited January 19, 2016 by Gerald Boggs

[Dave Stephens 424]

Nice! I like the big barrel quench bucket.

 

We had some shop tour threads that started a while back, but they were in individual threads, not a category.

 

Perhaps we should create a category. I love learning how other smiths set up their shops.

 

Dave

[Caleb Harris 51]

I could sure use that barrel of quench oil...

[C.Anderson 13]

I think I can add to this one .

Here's a few pictures of the only time my shop has EVER been clean lol. 10 minutes after I finished building it

Forging area and heat treat oven in the middle back, and what ended up a finishing bench on the right.


Grinding area and my forge on the right. That bench is huge and weighs a freaking ton...and is NOT going to be fun to move next month.


The other side of the shop (the first two pictures were taken from the double doors). That bench has been with me since shortly after I first started making knives in 2008 lol. It currently holds a drill press and various other items, and is consistently the messiest bench in the room.

I should take a couple of 'now' photos, after about 6 months of working lol. You guys would laugh for sure!

[Wes Detrick 487]

Post them Cris!

I love seeing people's shops. It gives a nice sense of what people manage with. Here are mine.

 

 

My garage is my shop, and this shot is from the garage door. I keep my forge close to the garage door and always forge with it open so I don't die cause what would suck.

 

 

 

This is my grinding, drilling, sanding, whatever bench.

 

 

 

And this is my finishing bench. Buffing, etching, sharpening, leather work, other stuff goes on here.

 

Edited January 19, 2016 by Wes Detrick

[Gerald Boggs 209]

Nice! I like the big barrel quench bucket.

 

We had some shop tour threads that started a while back, but they were in individual threads, not a category.

 

Perhaps we should create a category. I love learning how other smiths set up their shops.

 

Dave

One of the advantages in living around wineries :-)

 

I think this thread is becoming THE shop thread.

 

A finishing area, that's what I need. Right now, I just move stuff around, big waste of time.

Edited January 19, 2016 by Gerald Boggs

[Joshua States 1,717]

Everyone's shop is so clean and organized! I'd be embarrassed to post pics of our shop, it looks like a bomb went off in it.........

I like to say that we thrive by "bringing order out of chaos."

 

BTW-Nice archery target Wes, I have the same one. Nice Harbor Freight sander Chris, I have that one too!

Edited January 19, 2016 by Joshua States

[Wes Detrick 487]

Ya, today was shop cleaning day Joshua, so it made sense to take pictures then. Make no mistake, this is the nicest it looks and that is rare... so post them if you want to

[N. Runals 16]

Great to see other peoples shops! I propose we change the title of the thread to "Show me your shop"

 

Joshua I'm right there with you. At the moment my shop is insane, I try to at least once a month take a day (and I do mean a day) to clean and reorganize the work space. I know that it would be more effective to take an hour a day and pick up after myself, but that just doesn't seem to happen.

 

Maybe this will inspire me to clean the shop and get some photos of it this week. I do know that I work better in a tidy environment.

[JPH 239]

Hello:

 

Here are a couple of shots of mine..sorry for the mess..in the middle of a production run.

 

Just about right for the way I work,,,a little close for more than one though

 

JPH

 

 

[VaughnT 11]

Some really nice operations going on here. I think I'll refrain from showing the mess that is my shop. I don't have any fancy tools or such, and sure can't seem to get things organized and cleaned up. Maybe one of these days, but no today!

[Dave Stephens 424]

Here's a video of mine I did after I moved to Florida and got the new shop set up. It's not this clean anymore.

 

 

[Frank Barnes 50]

Here is my small shop.

[Jeroen Zuiderwijk 231]

Here is my small shop.

 

That's bigger then my living room. Which also happens to be my workshop

[Steve Karakostas 15]

Here's mine. Pretty small but it does the job.

 

[Don Abbott 115]

Here's a video of mine I did after I moved to Florida and got the new shop set up. It's not this clean anymore.

 

Dave, what are the dimensions of your shop (floor space)?

[Dave Stephens 424]

 

Dave, what are the dimensions of your shop (floor space)?

Standard 2 car garage.

[Joshua States 1,717]

@Frank Barnes: It's nice to see that I'm not the only guy with a mic-stand in his shop!

[Roman Dan 41]

My smal shop.

[C.Anderson 13]

@Frank Barnes: It's nice to see that I'm not the only guy with a mic-stand in his shop!

Hey! I have one too!

 

I use it to hold open one of my tool box lids, lol.

[C.Anderson 13]

So, I finally got moved. My new shop will be in my 2 car garage (roughly 18' x 19'). So far, this is what I'm thinking:



That pretty much covers my current tooling, and leaves me a bit of bench space for a 20 ton air/hydraulic press, and horizontal disc grinder.

I just installed a 100amp 12 slot distribution panel along the left wall (roughly over the EvenHeat). My two grinders will be on one 8ga/40amp circuit, the oven will be on it's own 8ga/20amp circuits, and I'll be running miscellaneous bench lighting on that wall from other 12ga/20amp circuits. The remainder of the shop will run off of existing circuits with power strips.

Any ideas I may not have incorporated?

[Justin Mercier 65]

Hooray shop cat! =^.^=

 

I dont see any place for your quench oil container, i'm assuming you'll want to keep it near your heat treating oven.

[Alan Longmire 2,726]

Nice! My cat does not approve of smithing, it offends her delicate sensibilities. She will come in and howl at me when I'm doing finish work, of course.

[C.Anderson 13]

Nice Alan, lol. Oreo is actually (or was actually) feral. The old shop/house was in a very rural area, and we had cats EVERYWHERE. They didn't tolerate people very well at all though, and trying to catch one was futile. That said, about 6mos ago I came out of the shop and saw her sitting in the middle of the field next to our property about 30yds away. My kids were playing outside, and when I pointed her out they said her name was Oreo and they talked to her all the time lol. Soooo, I called her by her name, and she turned and meowed back. From then on I looked for her pretty regularly, and would call her name and 'chat'. She is literally THE most vocal and responsive cat I've ever seen...seriously. When my kids said they talked to her, it wasn't a one sided conversation, lol. She also has a rather large range of expressive sounds she makes. It's seriously cool. Anyhow, over time she got to know me, and would come in closer and closer, until eventually I went ahead and just fed her a bit. She was incredibly thin...even with the amount of birds she was clearly eating (the dairy behind us was a bird breeding ground...doves like you've never seen in your life). Anyhow, from there it didn't take long until she was a resident in our yard...and even moreso in the shop. NOTHING bothered her, and she'd bring mice IN while I was forging to eat within arms reach. She also killed any scorpions she found lol. Pretty much every video on my youtube in the last 4 months has her in it, and a good 60% of the pictures I've taken she has photobombed. If the back door was open she'd come into the back room of the house as well. She never really did fully take to the kids (too skittish and they scared her...if they got too close she'd be ready to fight rather than run too), but if I was around I had a little black and white shadow. Even now though she'll still swat at me if I move too quickly while picking her up or even petting her lol. Over the last months she pretty much became my best little buddy (and I'm NOT usually a cat person), and I'd find myself chatting to her while I worked...then realize and feel kind of goofy before continuing on anyhow. She even had me hunting her doves lol, and when she saw me with the pellet gun would go into a stalking type position and just wait. She learned incredibly quickly that the sound of the gun going off most likely meant food, and the birds rarely hit the ground before she'd have them.



Anyhow, when we moved I was going to leave her. I didn't think it was fair to take a free, basically wild animal and limit her into the rather large cage that a home would be for her... just because I'd miss her. I also wouldn't have an outside cat in a residential neighborhood like this. I actually think it's kind of cruel, as it's only a matter of time before they're plowed by a car or ate by someone's dog etc. That said, while moving over the last two weeks, SHE'D come running out when we'd show up to load another load after a day or two. She would literally berate me for 5-10 minutes with a barrage of half barks and small growls, all the while twining between my legs. You could literally feel the offended tone in her dialogue lol. So, on the last day I decided to go ahead and give her a shot at moving. I figured if she'd take to a litter box, and didn't seem too restless in the house...I'd keep her. If not, I could always return her to where she came from.

I now have an incredibly expressive house cat lol...that follows me everywhere I go. Seriously. She sits on the rim of the bath tub while I shower. She's even taken to the kids more and will lay with them on the floor to watch movies. All in just the last few days since I brought her here. As an example, this is what I see looking over my left shoulder as I type this lol:



So...drawing her into the shop plans was sort of a given .

On the qeunch buckets Justin, they're ammo cans and fit under the benches to be pulled out as I need them .

[Dustin Stephens 1]

Thats awesome dude, my wife would be proud, I too was not a cat person until I had 2 show up and those 2 have grown into lets say less than 20 more than 10. All outside and I dont have to worry about moles, snakes, mice, or even ground hogs. One inparticular has taken a liken to me and she is "MY" cat. When I am around, the rest of the world does not exsist to her. Very nice dude! I believe that some animals are reincarnated loved ones we have lost along the way

Edited March 24, 2016 by Dustin Stephens