So if you ever read
Lil Scorpion's original thread - and I'm guessing you have if you've followed for any length of time - there's a boat load of great ideas there. It's certainly where I picked up the whole "french cleat" thing, or, as several snarky commenters to my Instagram mentioned, "Freedom Cleats". Rich.
But first I needed to address my stock storage shelf...
I just checked the date and I built this in 2014 - 6 years ago. It's so old it was from when I shot verticals. That's old. Anyway, it worked well when it was hung on the wall but I never anticipated putting so much weight on it. In the end, when Lara and I pulled it down to put the Bridgeport in, it had over 300lbs on one french cleat that just spanned two studs. But it was pulling out and after the Bridgeport went in it sat on the floor. Being hard to sweep around.
I have decided I no longer like pocket screws. That's what was holding the french cleat in the cabinet. They didn't fail but were on their way. Perhaps it's not fair. They did hold the whole time but, nonetheless, I declare our relationship over. For the moment. For things in the shop.
Same with edge banding. I never want to do that again. Yuck.
So I just ran the Festool track saw over the cabinet after pulling the shelves. Cut it right in two. I took it apart and used the band saw to cut the notches for the stretchers that would hold the load.
Considered putting it on a french cleat that stretched to three studs but in the end decided that if I didn't move the first one for 6 years I could probably take the chance and just screw this new one into the wall. The space between them is so that I could get their inner dimensions wide enough that the stretchers would stretch to catch three studs.
My goal was to get the material off the floor. I make a real effort, inspired by Scott Kolb, to clean the shop every night unless I'm really in the middle of something. And I hate sweeping around things. so if I can get it off the ground I can sweep under it easily. I am a little embarrassed at how bad this looks because I just used the rest of a left over sheet of pre-fin shop grade plywood. The last that I had left over. I didn't edge band it or even sand or finish the edges and they're not even cut perfectly. All in all a hot mess. Nonetheless I'm okay with it for now. It's burly and at the right height and the center section is either going to be for small sheet stock scraps or the 5c collet closer.
Still undecided.
But, driven by the memory of Lil Scorpion's original thread where he put french cleats, er, Freedom Cleats behind his bench I decided to do the same thing only a little different. Since the lathe was already kicking up a stripe on the wall I decided instead of doing the lattice I would do a full 11" of plywood that would go across the length of the cabinets and have a single cleat. I was using up the last of the shop grade.
With the shop grade ply out of my life I set about making the first thing to hang on the cleat - a collet rack from baltic birch. I still had two full sheets left over from the back room and we'd actually already finished them. And by "we" I mean Lara actually finished them. Thanks Lara! Hope you come back to Oregon soon. And learn to post here.
I did consider rigging this up in the mill and using the DRO to drill the holes but I just didn't want to cover the mill in sawdust. So I went old school - pencil and square. Interestingly this is the sort of thing I know I would have botched many years ago but I have come to terms with a new level of precision this past year. I don't know which came first but somehow I recalibrated myself to just go another level in. I don't know if I ever mentioned it but last year I finally made the rank of "High Master" in pistol shooting - the highest rank there is and with an average score of 97%. I just stopped accepting "10's" and decided to focus on the X and I got more 10's. So I've stopped accepting mm's and am trying to split lines and account for pencil widths.
It just narrows the window down. Nothing is perfect but it's closer.
All that to say that the grid turned out pretty close to perfect. I really enjoyed trying to hit the bullseye with the forstner bit's tiny triangle point - exactly. Later tonight I'm going to edit some iphone video for my IG story on this. It's sort of a way of testing things.
Also, I love baltic birch. I know I've said it before but just slap me if I ever buy shop grade again for anything.
So I've tried making holders in steel or aluminum, my thinking that I'm in a metal shop and that's what I should do, but it never seems to sit as well with me as when I use wood. Something about the softness of wood holding hard metal tooling seems really right to me. I have decided I love the dichotomy and I'm going to make all holders and racks from baltic birch going forward. This is my test part - the proof of concept.
I have only 55 collets right now but I made this to hold 70. Some are oversize and I'll probably get a few more down the road. I was going to cut it at the bottom but then decided that the space under it would sort of be wasted and so I ran it to the top of the materials cabinet. It will help keep that from getting stacked on.
It wasn't dry yet so that's why there's no collets in it. I also made it just hover over the material shelf. It's sort of an experiment to see if it will deflect when loaded. My goal in moving these next to the lathe is to separate the tooling for the mill and lathe so they're closer to their respective machines. I may make another rack to hold the chucks but I don't know if that's a wise use of space or cleats. I should make a drawer for them under the lathe but... meh.
So that was today - a day spent making a collet rack. A day well spent.
Gregor
It's one of those necessary evils. When done correctly and monitored properly the outcome is perfect, HOWEVER, if not done correctly and levels not observed during the passivation process the life of a condenser is cut tremendously and you're in for nothing but headaches.
