Alan's Workshop Build

[Hudson Carpentry]

Hello All

Well I have now signed up for my 4th workshop. Some say im mad having only moved 4 months ago but I have out grown that space two. Quick history to any that may not know me. I started my first work shop a few years back after coming our of the house renovation scene. It was an addition on the side of the house with roughly 900 sq/ft in space over a few rooms. The workshop its self only around 380 sq/ft. The rest was office space, reception and storage. I moved from there to a unit with 1200 sq/ft in one room. I lost the office but had one at home. Then I brought an engineering business which had 500 sq/ft + the wood shop (gained my office back). I out grow the engineering shop and moved that to a 1500 sq/ft unit 4 months ago and expanded the wood working into that unit as well as they are close by. Now a 4000 sq/ft unit came up for grabs next door but two. Im now in the process of moving both my other units into this bigger one.

I have always rented out benches within my shops as there too big for little me, plus the company is welcomed. I have now turned that into a business too called Rent A Bench. So this workshop build is my woodworking business, engineering business and the rent a bench.

The unit as I taken over it. Pics to follow..........

 

[TrimTheKing]

Sounds interesting Alan, particularly the rent-a-bench scheme.

Looking forwards to the thread.

Cheers
Mark

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Office space.

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Basement

Love the old tiles

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

The workshop space.

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

So we moved in Saturday 30th Aug.

First on list, Paint the office.

Started putting the desks in also.

Next we started building the spray booth. A nice 3x6m in size. This will have a turbine sprayer and a full air system complete with air line conditioner. Powered by a screw compressor. Further down the line, powder coat spraying facilities. Its a room so we can also use it as a finishing room.

Started moving some machines and benches.

 

[Wizard9999]

Holy @&*%, this in on a whole different scale!

Alan, may I be so bold as to ask whereabouts you are located?

Terry.

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Holy @&*%, this in on a whole different scale!

Alan, may I be so bold as to ask whereabouts you are located?

Terry.

Arnold in Nottingham.

Its always been known im not a hobbyist on all the forums I have been involved with over the years.

 

[Wizard9999]

Its always been known im not a hobbyist on all the forums I have been involved with over the years.

Alan

Don't get me wrong, no implication of criticism intended, so sorry if that is how it came across. As a complete novice I will find it very interesting to see how you go about things, kit you use, etc. just a shame we are not closer to each other, I would have been interested in renting a bench until my workshop is built.

Terry.

 

[Mike G]

Jeez, your heating bills! That's a helluva volume to keep warm....

Is the shell watertight? Those rooves are notorious for leaking water. I suggest you don't stand anything vulnerable or expensive directly below the gutter on the midline of your roof (you appear to have a table saw and maybe a P/T there ATM), at least until you know that it is OK in all conditions. Melting snow is the usual test.

Best of luck with this, it looks a grand space. I'll just get back to my piddling little 29.99 sq metres now......(where's the slinking-away-quietly-feeling-deflated emoticon?).

 

[Newbie_Neil]

Hi Alan,

I'm really glad that your move from Station Road was so successful.

I'll have to pop over to see you sometime.

All the best,
Neil (Station Road)

PS I think your "batty" landlord is still trying to sell the property.

 

[Pinch]

Bleedin 'ell Alan - 4000sqft :shock: way to go Sir!

I remember your workshop thread in TWHmk1 and if memory serves, this was never completed - I see why now.

Good luck with it chap.

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Terry nothing was taken out of context maybe my post was misleading to why I said what I did sorry.

Roofs do leak in 4 places. All is in hand to sort them. They are other side of workshop though so not near the gutters. My previous engineering work shop has same roof, 12 leaks so you're not wrong.

Hello Neil yes move went well enough. Here are some low quality pictures of thev workshop I moved in from station road.

Ok seems I can only find one photo. You're more than welcome to visit.

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Pinch

Yes that was the above workshop. It was close to finished but lost the time to keep posting sorry. Ill try keep on top of this thread.

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Found another pic of the new now old workshop.

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Neil yes the old batty landlord is. She tried selling it herself for 380k but writen more about her personal history there. Its only valued at 200k max. She wanted us to pay 400k for it.

Shes had it on two different estate agents now but not lowered the price to even close to the market value.

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Mike I have placed the ts and pt where they shal live. The pt us under the gutter but between joints which is where they normal leak if they do. Both are well out of the way of current leaks.

I like keeping these two machines close to each other. Often there used just after each other so makes sense but more so for ease of dust extraction.

The two large extractors (well single bag units) are going high on the roof of the spray booth and office. Vibration dampers to reduce noice. It maybe tricky to remove bags but there is standing space on the roofs and full bags can be past down to someone else.

Done a little in office too. They are the under top units I built for the 1st workshops office that Neil speaks of. Been in storge since so thought although they need a bit of cleaning and modding they'll come in for this office.

There are two more to go in yet.

 

[Robert]

One of the units we had back when I was in business was just like this one.

Something else to consider is they are very easy to break into through those roof windows. The wired glass was held in with snap in or bolt on retainers from the outside. You'd think the bitumen putty stuff would seal the glass in but it goes brittle with age and glass removal can be easy.

I used to have my main PC in a beaten up old tatty full tower case and a rubbish PC in a shiny new case next to it. think the bait PC was stolen twice before we opted for a monitored alarm system.

If it is rented the gutter leaks are not your problem. We fixed ours by installing a gutter liner. One long roll of plastic pre bent to the profile that ran the length of the building with no joins and no more leaks.

Temperature was always a problem though. too hot in summer and freezing in winter even with propane space heaters running. The heat goes up into the roof where the cold glass is.

Anyway good to see business is going well for you. Look forward to seeing the workshop develop.

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Security is pretty tight. If they want to get in they will of course but with onsite anr camera. 15 cctv around the site. 4 of my own. Alarm. Serious locks. Bars on ground windows and fire doors, gates everywhere to access site its not that easy.

The leaks are upto me. The roofers have been trying to fix the leaks in my old unit for a while with no luck and after going up to see there work I have lost faith in them. I drove the rent price down by saying ill do the roof on this unit.

It does get cold. The office will be a favourable place in winter.

Today I have been very busy. Shattered now after moving 4.25ton in machines alone. Most got dumped then moved to where they live later so moved them twice.

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Well Saturday and an overnight stay till 2pm sunday and this is where we got.

You can see the back of the lathe which is now wired in and in use. The small gray draw unit next to in contains most of the lathes cutters, quick change tool holders, jaws and tail stock accessories.
Far back is the bridgeport mill, also wired in but somethings wrong, the head turns on when the mill gets power without pressing the on button. The shelving between lathe and mill contains morse taped drills, chucks, machine vices, hold steady, slot cutters, parallels, chemicals and other accessories used on these machines. The other machine is a adcock and shipply horizontal mill. Picking bins on wall are end mills/drills. Slim black draws between house collects, large head milling cutters, special lathe cutters, bstp tap and dyes (which ill probably move to live with all my other taps and dyes), carbide inserts and tips and other stuff.

Next is the warco virtual mill. Shelving for general stuff. An air tank which is just a receiver tank for the screw compressor (which now lives in the basement) which holds air fir the next machine.

An automatic aluminum cutting saw.

Here are the extractors up high.

The pipes will obviously drop down to machines etc. You can see the drop for the ts and pt. To turn the extraction on the DOL will be attached onto the down pipes support leg.

Conveniently there was some old wire conduit in perfect place to help support the overhead pipe to these two.

Today I had to do some real work. Booooo. However I did get the silly big cramps from the old shop and attached them to the wall in new and managed to get some picking bins out old and up. These house things like biscuits, dowels, brackets, brads, catches etc.

Heres a view of the spray booth in its current unfinished but used condition.

 

[kirkpoore1]

Alan, I love the amount of light those windows are letting in. And of course the headroom. Are you going to put in some ceiling fans to keep the hot air from pooling too high? They do a good job in the clerestory in my shop (16' ceiling).

Kirk

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Hello Kirk.

I was pondering on the cost of the ceiling fans. Not looked into it yet but if not to much its a thing I wouldn't mind doing.

The light was the first thing that drawn me to this unit. The wood working shop I have just moved from had no windows at all. My workshop before that had only 1 outside window. This unit light wise is total luxury for me.

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Well today not alot appeared to get done. Only picture was of these units.

Other than the white bit being on the other side this is virtually how it was in the other workshop. Ill probably store other things in these cuboards/draws now. They used to hold metal working tools, vacuum former, socket set, welders (before engineering shop) etc.

The radial arm saw and 5m bench is now down but not up in new place.

 

[Robert]

We had ceiling fans up high blowing the hot air down. People do tend to turn them off when the heat runs out as do those working near the fan who see it as a draught. Variable speed would be a good idea but the controls aren't cheap I seem to remember. It does make the average temperature warmer but there are winners and losers...

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Not alot done again..

Sanding and gluing panels this morning then a visit from my dad meant I only got some of the radial arm saw done.

 

[Rod]

I like the portable toilet?

Nice space there, going to be a lovely set up!

Rod

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Well the radial arm is finally installed electricity an all.

I have had this bench ever since my first workshop. It used to have SCMS on it untill I purchased the radial. I had to adjust the beds to suit the radial but was never happy with the new over hang. I didn't have time in the previous shop when I assembled it to do something.

How ever that just peeved me off seeing it again so I had to deal with it.

All the legs are secured to the wall and floor and brackets elsewhere stop it all from racking. The centre table that holds the saw has batterns on the back which also helps keep it all upright. The bench intotal is a little over 5m so will support any lenght of timber.

Something else thats always bothered me was the pigeon holes. They sit behind the fence but 'other stuff' finds its way infront and blocks the bottom row. No pics but I quickly made up a plinth for them to sit on so the bottom row starts above the fence.

This is a 3phase machine but my old old shop only had single. After taking to Bob I brought an inverter which adds some really good safety features which I would say has saved me twice. So just a single 230v feed to the inverter was needed as I feel keeping the inverter is a better idea than turning it back to proper 415v 3phase.

I taped into the conduit surrounding the unit. Put in some plastic conduit to come from that to the fcu. Wired back to the board and we are done. Ill sort out the showing inner core under the inverter at some point.

 

[Mike G]

Well the radial arm is finally installed electricity an all............

What a great table. I feel luxurious with 3.5m of saw table and a hole in the wall of the workshop. It looks as though we have the same RAS.

 

[kirkpoore1]

I wish I had a long table like that for my RAS, but I just can't afford the space. When I bought it saw it came with two 8' long sets of rollers and I had to leave them behind.

No dust collection on the RAS? Mine makes so much mess I had to add a big plywood box to catch and direct the sawdust down to a pipe pickup point.

Kirk

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

There used to be a hopper under it and catch point behind the blade but it only seemed to catch the dust that only ends up on the table without, not in the air. So I don't see much point in buying a 4th extractor or the 18m run of pipe if using a current one. My current extractor thats closest isn't up to an 18m run either. Air born dust from it is minimal so im not to bothered about putting it back in.

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Mike the model of my radial is.

Well a weekend in the shop again. I felt quite run down and light headed abit so I've taken my time a bit. Still reasonable amount done.

Started organising things to make some room for the rest of the stuff that needs to be brought over.

Managed to get up what I call the spanner wall.

Not found them all yet. The section to left is new although the tool rack isn't. Some tools in. Will be putting other bits on the board like thread gauges, rulers, other measuring things, monkey wrenches, large dye wrenches.

Got this picking bin rack shelf up and found a few bins that hang on it. This will have quite a few drills bits, metric tap and dyes, some imperial tap and dyes and 3 bins full of allen sorry hex keys. I hope there is room for my other imperial taps and dyes also unf and pipe taps. If not I may put a second bin rack up next to it.

I plan to put a bench top on the wall here and vice for taping and dying.

I managed to get another bench in its position.

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Under the bench is the cupboard with grinding and polishing stuff in. Not in the pic bit also under the bench is my unit of draws full of metric nut and bolts.

Never really stood at the back wall and looked around but here is this view.

Still loads to find homes for but most of what's on the floor is in organised piles.

 

[9fingers]

Good to see things taking shape Alan

Cheers
Bob

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Not alot done. Everyone seemed to want to chat today.

Got the extraction to the ts and pt finished.

I put the DOL on the down pipe. Gave me the perfect place to earth the pipe run. As for noise in the office, a slight hum if your listening for it. PC makes more noise.

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Hard day yesterday moving timber. Getting it down from nearly 3m high while stood on ladders is difficult. Still with some help I got about 60% of it moved.

As a temp rack I screwed together some pallets.

does the job now. Most will live ontop of spray booth and office but some in basement.

The day before I get about making some shelving in the basement for boxes etc. This served as a means to use up some old timber. The skip pile is getting rather big so it made sense. Saved money also but taken more time to build.

First I set about making the section around the column. This is fixed to the column, joists snd one into the wall. Although the walls look dirty (have been cleaned) and have holes in, I still quite like it so don't wish to put more holes in.

The section to the right is free standing albeit one bracket on floor and one screw into joist, then cross pieces connecting each side.

Now as the shelves tops any onld piece of sheet material laying around will do. Saves me storing or skipping it. This is how I left it.

Will keep adding to it as I come across suitable bits.

 

[9fingers]

I like the pallet idea Alan. Quick and effective with lots of useful pockets for different species/sizes.

Bob

 

[Wizard9999]

I like the pallet idea Alan. Quick and effective with lots of useful pockets for different species/sizes.

Bob

:text-+1: Yes, I thought that was a very nice idea.

Terry

 

[Rod]

Watching with interest

Rod

 

[AndyP]

And you are doing all this and presumably still running the business at the same time.

 

[Hudson Carpentry]

Yep Andyp. Long days, even a few overnighters