Images of my woodshop

I do not post much about my workshop, mainly because it is rubbish compared with many examples I have seen on the forums. While I admire and aspire to a shop with beautifully fitted cabinets, ones that would not look out of place in my kitchen, the thought of all that beautiful hardwood not being used on furniture .. well I just can't do it.

Now I understand that some ... many ... consider their shop as a place of private reflection, where one is free to worship brass and iron idols and icons, or just chat with mates over a beer. So I accept that shop furniture is high on the list of many. It is important to me as well (that place of reflection thing) but just not high enough on the priority list to warrant investing too much time. I work with recycled woods, many of which are now endangered ... like Jarrah. I bet you think that it grows on trees . In fact, the Jarrah forests have been decimated, for railway sleepers, fencing, firewood ... and the forests only grow in Western Australia. And now they have almost disappeared. I'd rather use wood like this for furniture in the house than in the shop.

So I built mine almost entirely from cheap, sustainable Pine, and used a little Jarrah here-and-there to tart it up. Three years ago, following an addition above the garage/workshop, I started from scratch with four bare walls - well, actually three since the fourth was a double garage door. I managed to get as far as a couple of cabinets, one for spokeshaves and braces, and another for rasps and files, and then added a saw till - none of which had doors or were protected against dust. I also constructed a long - open - set of shelves above the workbench for planes. The only cabinet that had a door was the one for chisels.

Dust, dust, dust ... oh how I hate dusty shelves!

This weekend past I decided to add doors to the shelves. This was going to be a quick-and-dirty job, using recycled cardboard (i.e. MDF) .. one morning tops, then I could get back to building something important, like the two campaign chests that were put aside about a month ago and sit there mocking me.

Well it got out of hand. The MDF doors got tarted up with Jarrah edging (OK still cheap-and-nasty, but they will do until the house is full of furniture), then I installed glass in the glassless doors in the spokeshave/brace cabinet (which I had built as part of a magazine article I wrote to illustrate joint making). And finally I rebuild the chisel cabinet to make room for all the new Japanese chisels (Kiyohisa slicks and Koyamaichi dovetail) that replaced a bunch I sold. And after this (so not finally!) I redid part of my hanging tools.

Enough with the words - where are the pictures!?

Just keep in mind that this is not about showing tools. More about tool storage. So if you want close-ups to see the tools, then ask (I am happy to oblige) but the storage has priority.

As I mentioned earlier, my shop is in a double garage and must share space with one car (two others live outdoors). There are power tools as well for the rough work ...

12” sliding tablesaw with router table, 12 ½” thicknesser, 8” jointer, 18” bandsaw, floor standing drill press, mini lathe, and belt/disk sander.

Turn around and face the rear of the garage, and now you are in the handtool shop. Facing you is my small workbench and above this are the MDF-Jarrah doors that now seal the shelves from the dreaded dust ...

The door on the far right is chisel cabinet. Inside it now looks like this ...

The only open section is where I keep the bench planes that are most used, a combination of woodies and Veritas BUs. Since these tend to be larger planes, it is easier to keep them out of the way if there is somewhere convenient to rest them ..

As you move left, doors #1 reveals ..

Mostly block and shoulder planes

Door #2 has more planes

And Door #3 has still more ...

But door #4 has none!

If you turn right, you will see my sharpening centre, with wet and dry grinders and waterstones ..

If you now do an about turn and face the far wall, this is what you see ..

That cabinet at the far left was the glassless glass doored offender. No longer. It now has glass ...

... and houses spokeshaves, router planes, edge-, side- and rebate planes, and braces.

Alongside is a cabinet for rasps, rifflers, files and plough and combination planes ..

The drawer contains files in a roll.

After this I realised that I really must fit glass-fronted doors to the remaining cabinets. This will be done another day ...

The lower cabinets were, in fact, kitchen cabinets (which I thought that was fitting reversal) that I was given by a neighbour who was upgrading. The tops for these are 1 1/2" plywood.

The hanging tools ... I find it easier to keep as many of the layout tools close at hand this way. Sometimes I think of this also as Tool Art …

The inclusion of my hammers/mallets is new. Keeping them off the bench top is a biggie. The bench is small (just 5 foot long) and clutter makes it smaller (a new bench is on the drawing board ... one day).

And lastly, I found a place for the screwdrivers …

I could not resist taking this one of Aura, my son's Shih tzu cross Maltese. Let sleeping benchdogs lie!

Hope this provides some ideas for some. Feel free to ask for details.

Regards from Perth

Derek

April 2011