How to Shadow your toolbox on the cheap with foam

[uwintoday]

I think I will do mine in blue foam. What drmil bit do you recommend?
I may look into closed cell foam such as a yoga mat cheap and many colors.

Any help with cutting or planing would be helpful.

i have a new 309 pc craftsman mechanics tool set and some odds and ends.
I need to buy a tool box. Was thinking of an 11 drawer or maybe just a tool cart 6 drawer.

This is for house hold use fixing lawn mowers cars or whatever breaks around here

 

[d_rock]

I did this a long time back but found that as I got more tools that I didn't keep up with it so I eventually quit. I did mine the same way but with a dremal router attachment. Used the blue camping foam. Quick tip....router in notches on the sides so you can get your fingers under and get the tool out quickly.

 

[uniballer]

Nope, too messy. Hate foam pieces floating around. Looks good but dont like the aftermath!

 

[uwintoday]

Thats it. just turn your oven to broil and pop them in.

How long do you heat the tools and at what temp.

did you let them just melt into the foam?

 

[Chamkila]

here is a little update

where did you get the clips to mount all the stuff to the lid?

 

[jrlp]

I think I posted this link on this board in another forum. I don't know who the originators of the idea were, but they had a great idea!

http://weldingweb.com/showthread.php?t=97071 post by COO

Trust me, this way is 100,000x better than any other way I've seen it done. It's foam, form-fitting, AND CLOTH COVERED! I used smooth-on.com stuff for the foam, much better than insulation foam.

Cut little 1" disks out of plywood or what ever using a holesaw, and cut them in half. Or slice a dowel rod into disks then half the disks.

Place them next to the tools when you put them down for the finger holes!

Forgot to add instant edit:
I'm about to remake mine. I thought of an idea after I did mine, and it's been bugging me since then. To make it EASY color-contrasted instead of having to individually paint each hole is super easy with smooth-on stuff. Do a thin layer of silicone or rubber on the top layer, then cover it with the foam colored differently.

You could use a flexible urethane 6x foam urethane, and for the top layer that would get abused from constantly reaching in to remove the tools etc use a flexible medium-shore hardness abrasive and chemical resistant top layer!

I'm definitely going to go this route when I redo my boxes. That website is a literal black-hole, much like tv-tropes. They have hundreds of how-to's with tons of pictures and a bunch of videos. After spending a few sleepless nights on that site, I have so many ideas of stuff to do around the shop. I have their plastic casting kit coming in.

It's a kit that lets you make a mold of part(s) and then make copies of it in much stronger plastic, or any material really. I work on quite a bit of old cars and it's very hard to neigh impossible to find uncracked/unblemished plastic parts.

With this, you'd be able to superglue, wire, or screw the part together so it won't fall apart on it's own, make a mold, then make the replacement parts yourself quickly and without much if any work. Hell, you could make your own phone cases pretty easy too!

http://www.smooth-on.com/Rigid-and-Flexible/c10/index.html is the site.

Goodluck, you'll need it!

 

[skulldrinker]

For people that do this are you done buying tools? My inventory changes from week to week.

 

[Chamkila]

I think I posted this link on this board in another forum. I don't know who the originators of the idea were, but they had a great idea!

http://weldingweb.com/showthread.php?t=97071 post by COO

Trust me, this way is 100,000x better than any other way I've seen it done. It's foam, form-fitting, AND CLOTH COVERED! I used smooth-on.com stuff for the foam, much better than insulation foam.

Cut little 1" disks out of plywood or what ever using a holesaw, and cut them in half. Or slice a dowel rod into disks then half the disks.

Place them next to the tools when you put them down for the finger holes!

Forgot to add instant edit:
I'm about to remake mine. I thought of an idea after I did mine, and it's been bugging me since then. To make it EASY color-contrasted instead of having to individually paint each hole is super easy with smooth-on stuff. Do a thin layer of silicone or rubber on the top layer, then cover it with the foam colored differently.

You could use a flexible urethane 6x foam urethane, and for the top layer that would get abused from constantly reaching in to remove the tools etc use a flexible medium-shore hardness abrasive and chemical resistant top layer!

I'm definitely going to go this route when I redo my boxes. That website is a literal black-hole, much like tv-tropes. They have hundreds of how-to's with tons of pictures and a bunch of videos. After spending a few sleepless nights on that site, I have so many ideas of stuff to do around the shop. I have their plastic casting kit coming in.

It's a kit that lets you make a mold of part(s) and then make copies of it in much stronger plastic, or any material really. I work on quite a bit of old cars and it's very hard to neigh impossible to find uncracked/unblemished plastic parts.

With this, you'd be able to superglue, wire, or screw the part together so it won't fall apart on it's own, make a mold, then make the replacement parts yourself quickly and without much if any work. Hell, you could make your own phone cases pretty easy too!

http://www.smooth-on.com/Rigid-and-Flexible/c10/index.html is the site.

Goodluck, you'll need it!

which smooth on one are you using they have like 50 million choices there. And do you have any pics???

 

[jrlp]

Hi,

The first ones I made I used FlexFoam-IT!® VIII but when I do it again I'm going to use:
FlexFoam-IT!® 17 or
FlexFoam-IT!® X

And the top layer that gets used the most will most likely be
PMC® -780 Industrial Urethane Rubber Compound (used to make gaskets, wheels, rubber parts etc)

That way the top layer is resistant to chemicals and somewhat flexible to hold the tools in place, and the foam backer can be made really thin, easily under 1/2" or so. Or as thick as you want to fill your drawer up.

That website is a black hole, as I said! The box I made like in WeldingWeb unfortunately got stolen out of a buddies shop a year or two ago. Since then my tools have been piled anywhere possible and I think it's time to remake it!

Great thing about that site is they show you how to make lots of things. I'm somewhat tempted to even make my own plastic toolboxes! Sadly, I know if I actually bought everything I wanted from that site it would sit in the corner of the garage for years

 

[Chamkila]

ohhh thanks for the great info. Another thing is that i dont want to use a plain tee shirt to make a barrier like that guy in your original post does. What else can you recommend?

 

[Chamkila]

ohhh the reason why i am bothering you soo much is because of my pathetic attempt at it

check it out here

http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=179753

 

[jjpp]

Wow, I wish I had that kind of free time.
I throw the packaging trays away because they take up too much space in my box.
I'm organized but this is just ****.
Don't have much of a problem loosing tools just remembering where I left them last

 

[jrlp]

I'm far from being **** about my tools. 99% of are beat to hell and missing chunks.

BUT, when you do lots of mobile work, you need to be able to keep track of your tools. If you go change an alternator at someone's house and leave a snap-on ratchet there, you've lost money.

 

[NewShockerGuy]

So what does one use and do to get a very clean cut when cutting foam? I have cut foam before and it just never looked right... looked like *** if I recall... I'd love to do this for my tool box screw drivers. Something big that doesn't require a lot of small detail as that always never works out for me..

-Nigel

 

[DekeT]

Would this work if you cutout the tool shape through a thin sheet with a sharp knife and then glued the cut sheet over another thin layer?

 

[young_buck]

I have been considering this for a while now but have been buying more tools than my box can hold

I am looking to get a larger box to accommodate for all of my tools then I am going to do this, I hate the feeling you get when you lose a $150 ratchet..

Will be getting a dremel soon and this seems like a good project to tackle with it

 

[d_rock]

another thing you can use to cut foam is a hot knife. I made mine, just used one of those big soldering guns with the trigger. bent my own "blade" with tig welding wire. I use it to cut HIF (High impact foam) on cars at work. Works pretty good

 

[AL`]

Wal-Mart camping mat works great:

http://garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=44693&highlight=camping

That was my first thought when reading the OP of this thread, mostly because I have one of those Walmart foam camping pads. It's also good for packing stuff when shipping.

 

[AL`]

Nope, too messy. Hate foam pieces floating around. Looks good but dont like the aftermath!

If a guy were going to use the router method, couldn't he just take that work outside, dust it off and bring it inside?

 

[49 ford f-3]

For people that do this are you done buying tools? My inventory changes from week to week.

You can leave space for extra tools, but if you want to do this, you probably will have to have a relatively stable set of tools. I wouldn't shadow things like punches that are to some extent consumable.

Here are some pics of my box. I used the Walmart foam. Still looking good after almost two years of daily use. Here is my blog about how to do it.

 

[alpinewhite]

Just found this thread. Any updates?

 

[FoaKnigh]

Jeeze i've joined this chat a little late.
I'd look into buying Shadow Foam, used to live over in the states and the shipping rate was a little steep but the product is ****** brilliant.
Easy peel is perfect for toolbox foam.

https://www.shadowfoam.com/product/easy-peel-packs/

Oh my god, it comes in packs too

 

[Black300zx]

I wonder...if you COULD put cloth/felt over the top, and possibly use a veneer vacuum to get the cloth tightly into every possible available corner...hmm...

Maybe speaker grill cloth or spandex if the felt/cloth isn't stretch enough?