DIYbanter - View Single Post - About finding stuff in the shop; Real machinists need pay no attention.

Mark F

wrote:
On Dec 2, 3:10 am, spaco wrote:
I don't have a very big shop, but I spend 'way too much time looking
around for this or that tool when I need it.

The reason I tell you this: On Saturday, I had to finish a rather
finicky job and I used the list no less than 4 times! I'll bet I saved
myself at least 20 minutes.

I am satisfied that this is "a good thing",
But, if anybody on this NG has a better idea, I am open to it.

Pete Stanaitis

Nope, your on your own on this one - the shop situation usually
reflects the rest of your life, because if you are a highly organised
person, then you wouldn't be asking this question.

The ideal, fantastic, machinists erotic dream is to have a storeman,
who checks things in and out, organises consumerables, replaces broken
tooling, has every item in the size you need, and cleans and oils your
machines at the end of the day.... The trade off is their nearly
always grumpy *******s cause they have to put up with you being slack
and hopeless and disorganised.... (apprentices take some time to
recognise that you NEVER atagonise the storeman, as he can make your
life absolute hell with very little effort on his part. You must
remember Xmas, and preferably his birthday as well, and take keen
interest in pictures of his grandchildren....)

Yep, Total Fantasy - the real world, mm, yes - a bit different, as
follows....

My shop - totally chaotic, have a vague idea where "some" things are -
the measuring tools in their own drawer, the rest.......have started
buying small plastic boxes, the 3 for $2 kind, they stack easy, label
them with a dymo machine, even built their own shelves for
them.....one day, I will finish cleaning up and sorting and actually
put things in them.....(hey, theres so many more interesting things to
do....)

One method that has a at least 95% chance of finding the "lost" tool
is to start a methodical clean up, starting with the workbench,
putting things back into racks/pegboard etc,spreading ever wider until
you find it. If your "sorta lucky" you will get to clean and wipe down
your benches just before you find said lost item. (then you can stop,
until the next lost tool crisis......) Oh, and the swarf tray under
the lathe is the LAST place you look - not because it is not likely to
be in there, its just a pig of a job.

A fatal thing to do is randomly stuff tools, consumerables wherever
they can fit at the time. Especially in unmarked boxes, or plastic
crates under the bench - you will have to do serious excavation to
find anything, complicated by being in the wrong section in the first
place....and get sidetracked by finding decoy items as you go...

The most deadly of all is to have something in your hand when the
phone rings - you will have no conscious memory of putting it down, so
theres no chance of finding it. Plus, small items ABSOLUTELY hate
light, they will try to scurry under benches and into dark corners
behind usually bloody heavy and hard to move items.

So. There. Didn't give you a solution, just telling it like it is. If
your a machinist for a living, either an employee or working for
yourself - your correct, its not a problem. Because if it was a
problem, your employer, or you, would go bust.

Hey, if its been chaotic for you for eons, it aint going to change -
think of some ways to make it easier, rather than the moon shot of
total re-organisation.

Remember, its only a hobby, its only a hobby, its only a hobby.

(and I have managed to waste 20 minutes writing all this, still have
boxes of "Junque" to sort out, and jobs to do.....if I can find the
right bit of aluminium I "know" is in here somewhere, I distinctly
remember saying to myself "mm, this will come in useful one day,
better keep it..."

Andrew VK3BFA.
You almost had me sending out the disciplinary team to present you with
the Judgemental Prig of the Year award, until I read on...

I direct the reader to two pieces of work that I'm sure many will
appreciate for their defense of those having enhanced visual filing
skills. This is not a term that Debbie Travis would use, by the way...

The first is the Economist of several years ago, in which
two extremes of "workplace organization" methodology were described.
At one end of the scale was Andrew's first example, the perfectly
organized, stored, cross-referenced and indexed, restocked and
"tidy" workplace. (The management of which, I suggest, might take
more time than available in a normal shift, leaving little opportunity
for real work...)

At the other end of the spectrum is the "visually organized" workplace,
sometimes called the "volcano" strategy, in which everything of
interest (if only for a few seconds at some point) is within view
and within reach. In a desk situation, "stuff" is piled up like blocks
in a children's game, around the edges of a vanishingly small patch of
space which is used for actual reminder-jotting or for changing the
batteries in the PDA that was supposed to help the user organize his
or her life.

Where's the agenda for the meeting that starts in 5 minutes?
Well, it was about a foot up the pile, slightly to the left of
centre, close to the yellow 2-for-1 pizza flyer that expired
last month. You get the picture.

The Volcano term refers to the ever-rising height of the pile,
and with occasional gravitational interventions causing parts
thereof to spread onto the older piles of "stuff" on the floor.

The second item worth a look is a short feature film called,
appropriately, "Clutter", which gladdened my heart. While
the maker of this video did poke a little fun at "us", the
effort did provide some support for our cause by illustrating
that even the most frightening clutterbugs can be highly efficient
in their retrieval skills.

Me? well, my spouse manages to keep me from spreading too
many things into the non-workshop rooms in the house. My
workbench (well, each of several) has no room for sorting,
nor does the floor, and there isn't any more space for shelves.

But I have a wonderful time, every year or so, diving into the
boxes and bins, reacquainting myself with my many treasures,
and stacking up a bit of stuff for the dumpster. And I'll
get to that job at some point, but right now, I have to
get another cup of coffee, run down to the hardware store to
get a 1/8 inch drill (which will eventually find its way into
the drawer full of other 1/8 inch drills, when I find said
drawer) so that I can fix the broken weed-wacker that some
maladroit discarded. Now, where did I put the car keys....

/mark in clutterland