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Metalworking (rec.crafts.metalworking) Discuss various aspects of working with metal, such as machining, welding, metal joining, screwing, casting, hardening/tempering, blacksmithing/forging, spinning and hammer work, sheet metal work. |
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Strategies for dealing with stuff/supply/material collections?
OK, the Big Question that hangs over the heads of so many of us. I have a large
(for a basement shop anyway) stash of all kinds of stuff. Supplies, fasteners, parts, equipment, whatever. My problem isn't storage per se (so recommending Vidmar cabinets won't help in this case), because I have vast ranks of shelves, cabinets, and boxes with everything in them, but the fact that my neat storage is occupying most of the spatial volume. Running out of room for people and tools. What kind of tactics do you guys take to maintaining stashes of things without it getting out of hand? I'm not talking just junk here--mostly good stuff that now and then I find myself dipping into. Lots of boxes of switches, oddball screws, whatever. What kind of "supply line" do you keep? How much backstocked stuff? What do you do when it's time to thin out the flock? Sorry for asking such a broad question, but it's a lot easier to work through this kind of thing with outside input. Or rather outside input that doesn't say "well why don't you just toss all this out" while looking and your drill press and bandsaw. You guys must have developed methods to deal with the madness. GTO(John) |
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Strategies for dealing with stuff/supply/material collections?
I have put alot of this kind of stuff above my head, I have bins that fit
between the 2 x 10s holding the floor above. I just put plywood up, paint it white and have lots of room for these bins. I have cleared up a bunch of floor space while keeping it neat and clean. I just label each bin and slide it in. |
#3
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Strategies for dealing with stuff/supply/material collections?
I face this all the time. Too Much Stuff. There is only one real solution:
use it or lose it! In my shop I have machinery, tooling, tools, supplies, stock, and projects underway. I took a bit of space and built some shelves and got a bunch of big boxes and now when I get a project underway and then it gets put on hold for some time (i.e. waiting on a Mcmaster order or waiting for another project) it goes into a box on those shelves. That helped a lot. I also gulped hard and deprioritized some bigger stuff like my pressure washer, a diesel-fired Landa hot water attachment that went with it, some great cast iron crane wheels, my salmon smoker and my welding rod ovens, and sold them off. From that I got an entire room which is now used for band practice. Yes, sometimes I miss my pressure washer! But 4 people in my house use the music studio *all the time*, so it has a higher priority. I also sold my 10 ton boom truck. Out she goes. Got me a huge piece of driveway back. I am pretty ruthless when it comes to stuff like boxes of switches or oddball stuff. I got one of those sets of plastic drawers back in the mid-80s and I put a bunch of stuff like that in those boxes. I carted them around for 20 years and then pitched most of it and regretted keeping them that long. I keep now what I might use in projects I'm currently envisioning, or items that are hard to find and can always be sold (e.g. Square D start/stop buttons in enclosures) but basically there is another principle that really applies he let the store store. Buy what you need. My dad had a thing about nails. In one of our kitchen pantry cupboards were jars full of nails. I never once saw one of them go out and into the house, but by God he never let anyone touch those jars of nails. How much is a whole cupboard worth of space in a kitchen pantry worth over 40 years? Jeez. You need to be ruthlessly honest with yourself. (I believe that some of us have found our way to this hobby just because our subconscious minds have guided us here just to learn this lesson!) Do you USE any of those switches or miscellaneous on projects? Do you really? Grant Erwin Kirkland, Washington GTO69RA4 wrote: OK, the Big Question that hangs over the heads of so many of us. I have a large (for a basement shop anyway) stash of all kinds of stuff. Supplies, fasteners, parts, equipment, whatever. My problem isn't storage per se (so recommending Vidmar cabinets won't help in this case), because I have vast ranks of shelves, cabinets, and boxes with everything in them, but the fact that my neat storage is occupying most of the spatial volume. Running out of room for people and tools. What kind of tactics do you guys take to maintaining stashes of things without it getting out of hand? I'm not talking just junk here--mostly good stuff that now and then I find myself dipping into. Lots of boxes of switches, oddball screws, whatever. What kind of "supply line" do you keep? How much backstocked stuff? What do you do when it's time to thin out the flock? Sorry for asking such a broad question, but it's a lot easier to work through this kind of thing with outside input. Or rather outside input that doesn't say "well why don't you just toss all this out" while looking and your drill press and bandsaw. You guys must have developed methods to deal with the madness. GTO(John) |
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Strategies for dealing with stuff/supply/material collections?
Welcome to the club...it is good to hear that I am not the only one
with this continuing problem. ) This is my approach... First, find a moment or two where you can sit down and actually THINK about what you "need to keep" versus "want to keep". The definition changes as your interests and activities change. While some will argue that you need to keep EVERYTHING, the reality of space and time dictates otherwise. One needs to remember that your storage space and what you store both cost you money and time. If you do not use the item or cannot find the item, the space and time it has used up has been wasted no matter how important or how valuable the item is to you. The frequency that you use something should dictate how important it is to you. The small box of screws that you reach for every day is more important than the fill-in-the-blank that you use once every year even though the difference in their dollar value may be ten thousand fold. With that said, there are still items that you use once in a blue moon that allow you to perform a function that nothing else will...they too should be placed on the "keep" list. The frequency of use should also dictate how accessible the item is. The wrench you use daily should be at your fingertips, the jig that you use once a year can be stored in a very out of the way location. The cost in time and money to replace an item is a factor to consider. If you can go to the local hardware store and buy the item at a reasonable price, this item has little reason to be taking space up in your shop unless you use it EVERY DAY. Again this is a changing consideration. The increasing price of steel and its availability has suddenly made those dropoffs I walk around look alot more important. Another "tough love" approach is to assume that you have to move your shop and its storage. An old saying states that three moves equal a fire. Try playing the "what-if" game of "If I had to move next month, what would I take with me?". While it is emotionally distressing, the space that one can free up following through on this apporach can be eye opening. I would also note that if one does have to move (and we ALL do sooner or later), your move will likely be to a smaller shop and storage area because of life's demands in regards to changing jobs, health and increasing real estate prices. The bottom line is that you do not want to move (or store) one more item than you have to. Another related approach as to determine what to really keep is to consider renting space to store your items. When one actually sees the monthly cost of storing the material, it many times shines an unwelcome but realistic light on how "valuable" the items in question really are. You are presently paying this cost in your current storage, it is just a hidden cost. Efficient use of space is another issue that one always needs to address. My storage areas were FULL according to my neighbor but I was able to place another Bridgeport, a forklift and a rolling toolbox in the storage area in short order. Different preceptions by different people. Then again, he still doesn't understand why anybody would use their garage for anything but parking their cars in (*Sigh*...Show me a man with an empty garage and I will show you a man with no dreams). Now on to the subject of efficient storage. Since you are limited by the cubic volume of your storage area, you need to realize that ANY space that doesn't contain storage or machinery is wasted space (that also includes the space you take up in the traffic areas of the shop/storage area). Areas under, over, around, inside machines that don't contain storage are wasted space. ALL workbenchs, machine stands and cabinets should have storage built in. Any drawer or cabinet that is not constructed to hold parts, tools or supplies to its total cubic volume is wasting space. All floor, wall and ceiling space is fair game for storage capability. A friend of mine stores all his bar stock under the traffic areas in his shop in a false floor that he walks on. He has storage cabinets hanging from the ceiling. His walls have multlayered cabinets that can be accessed on a moment's notice for very dense storage of small parts. Another point is to really LOOK at your current storage and see how you are using it. Are ALL the shelves, drawers and boxes FULL or are some of them only partly used? I would guess an overall shuffling of storage so you FILL all the areas of storage completely will find you a sizable amount of space. Note that to have efficient storage it takes considerable time and effort on your part so again make sure what you are storing is worth what you are willing to invest. One big help in using shop space is to put certain tools on wheels. While the biggest gains are in the area of woodworking where the materials tend to be large and bulky, the same concept pretains to metalworking. When one can roll the tool to use and then return it to its storage location, one can reuse the same floor space for a number of tools. The savings in floor space can be used for more storage. I also find that standardizing on the storage cabinets/drawers/containers has helped me alot. We all tend to spend our money on the machines and supplies and leave the storage to the haphazard approach of using whatever we find. I found that when I started to standardize on different types of storage (SAME SIZE filing cabinets, card files, flat files, small parts cabinets), my storage was much more efficient in time and money. The catch is that it can and will take time and money to do the standardization. That is why Vidmar cabinets are so popular. For us mere mortals who need to justify the cost of the hobby to the spouse, file cabinets, card files, flat files and small parts cabinets are the way to go. I tend to not use shelving units because they tend to waste space unless you are using uniform containers that fit them. Also remember that the wall behine storage units allows one to store sheet goods and rod stock very efficiently. Have you considered storing some of the items (parts, machines, etc.) outside of your current area? I have never been a great fan of this because outside storage tends to be less than optimal for the conditions (theft, water, sun, vermin damage) it offers. You may also have some neighbors who will be less than thrilled at looking at your valuable "junk" and keeping the neighbors happy ranks right up there with keeping the spouse happy. Get on their bad side and you and your hobby will suffer. I hesitate to mention this because I have seen marriages end because of it but is there any chance that you can relocate some of the "valuables" to the living space that your spouse uses. If so, be thankful for having a very special and understanding spouse. Finally one can study how storage is used in an environment like a submarine to find ideas as to how to use storage space more efficiently. I have always been amazed as to how they find a place for everything and still function efficiently. To help the group offer more advice, I would suggest describing in detail how your present storage setup is configured. Pictures would be especially helpful. TMT (GTO69RA4) wrote in message ... OK, the Big Question that hangs over the heads of so many of us. I have a large (for a basement shop anyway) stash of all kinds of stuff. Supplies, fasteners, parts, equipment, whatever. My problem isn't storage per se (so recommending Vidmar cabinets won't help in this case), because I have vast ranks of shelves, cabinets, and boxes with everything in them, but the fact that my neat storage is occupying most of the spatial volume. Running out of room for people and tools. What kind of tactics do you guys take to maintaining stashes of things without it getting out of hand? I'm not talking just junk here--mostly good stuff that now and then I find myself dipping into. Lots of boxes of switches, oddball screws, whatever. What kind of "supply line" do you keep? How much backstocked stuff? What do you do when it's time to thin out the flock? Sorry for asking such a broad question, but it's a lot easier to work through this kind of thing with outside input. Or rather outside input that doesn't say "well why don't you just toss all this out" while looking and your drill press and bandsaw. You guys must have developed methods to deal with the madness. GTO(John) |
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Strategies for dealing with stuff/supply/material collections?
GTO69RA4 wrote:
What kind of tactics do you guys take to maintaining stashes of things without it getting out of hand? I subscribe to the theory that if it's not out of hand, my junk pile is depleted. |
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Strategies for dealing with stuff/supply/material collections?
Thanks for the advice. We could run a daytime self-help show for HSMs.
Anyway, most of my stuff storage is in a long basement room next to the shop. Multiple 24x48" (shelf size) Wilson industrial shelf units going up to the low ceiling. On the shelves are gray plastic storage boxes of a couple different sizes. They fit very well and use all the available space. In the shop itself are 12x36 shelves with small quipment like meters, portable welder, etc. Also have four file cabinents and more shelves with paperwork, but that's for another discussion. The big problem with me is the mental handling of the stuff I have that's already sorted. It doesn't make sense to keep thousands of 1/4-20 bolts that I can buy if I need more than a dozen. Accordingly, I've gotten rid of lots of items like that. On the other hand, I have lots of things that I never use but might need to (where on a Sunday afternoon do you get metric hardened socket-head capscrews or 1/4-24 bolts with wiring holes?). As far as actual storing goes, I'll be adding more large shelves and making better under-the-bench tool space. Most of my stationary tools (geared towards woodworking) will be going on casters soon. Between-the-joists stock racks are impractical because of the design. And loading equipment into the yard or kitchen could be dangerous to my health. Thanks a lot. As odd as it sounds, getting things in shape is easier with outside input. Just need to find a decent small lathe and I'll be in good shape. GTO(John) |
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Strategies for dealing with stuff/supply/material collections?
I store "Stuff" in plastic totes in metal shelves. Shelves are adjusted so the totes just fit, 2 per shelf. In addition, I've picked up a few bakers racks, the SS racks on casters, I have bought plastic boxes that fit the rails. On some I have made wood shelves to hold specific items. These are "task-oriented" as they can be moved to the work - car or machine. For example, one is for battery maintenance. It holds a booster charger, various battery testers & tools, plus holddowns, cables, ends etc. On 2 Apr 2004 07:25:56 -0800, (Too_Many_Tools) wrote: ||Hi John, || ||I am surprised that you have not received more responses to this ||subject. || ||Maybe no one else has a space problem :)...Yeah right. || ||Come guys, how do you work this issue...enquiring minds want to know. || ||A subject for discussion...how does everyone store items discretely ||outside to gain inside floor space so items in question are still ||under the radar of the spouse, the neighbors and the zoning board? || ||Too_Many_Tools (who is resuffling the shop yet again for another mill) || || (GTO69RA4) wrote in message ... || OK, the Big Question that hangs over the heads of so many of us. I have a large || (for a basement shop anyway) stash of all kinds of stuff. Supplies, fasteners, || parts, equipment, whatever. My problem isn't storage per se (so recommending || Vidmar cabinets won't help in this case), because I have vast ranks of shelves, || cabinets, and boxes with everything in them, but the fact that my neat storage || is occupying most of the spatial volume. Running out of room for people and || tools. || || What kind of tactics do you guys take to maintaining stashes of things without || it getting out of hand? I'm not talking just junk here--mostly good stuff that || now and then I find myself dipping into. Lots of boxes of switches, oddball || screws, whatever. What kind of "supply line" do you keep? How much backstocked || stuff? What do you do when it's time to thin out the flock? || || Sorry for asking such a broad question, but it's a lot easier to work through || this kind of thing with outside input. Or rather outside input that doesn't say || "well why don't you just toss all this out" while looking and your drill press || and bandsaw. You guys must have developed methods to deal with the madness. || || GTO(John) Rex in Fort Worth |
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Strategies for dealing with stuff/supply/material collections?
"Grant Erwin" wrote You need to be ruthlessly honest with yourself. (I believe that some of us have found our way to this hobby just because our subconscious minds have guided us here just to learn this lesson!) Do you USE any of those switches or miscellaneous on projects? Do you really? Grant Erwin Good post. I have gotten rid of a lot of stuff.... including big tools..... over the last few years. The rule is, if you haven't touched it in 5 years, out it goes! Mark |
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