Below 265 SQ/FT Just Puttering About in my Basement Workshop

[mmsheb]

It’s a rainy Sunday here in North Vancouver, so it seemed like a good time to just putter about in the shop and build some Ikea style shelves for the shed.

My small 10’x12’ shop is big enough to work with 8’ lumber if I run the boards diagonally across it.



The old Ikea utility shelves I have from the 1990’s use lag bolts to connect the 1¼” cross bars. For these small light duty ones I just used construction screws into the 1½” bars.



I used heavy fencing wires for the cross bracing.



I only managed to empty out a few pots before the heavy rain came in. When all the annuals have finished flowering and their pots emptied out, the non frost proof ones will fill most of the shed.

Would you mind sharing the dimensions of your pot shelving unit? You use 1x4's with 1-1/4" cross bars, correct? Would a shelf on the bottom not make it sturdier, or isn't that necessary? Hope you're OK if copy this!
Thanks!
Mike in WI

 

[Xti04]

This past weekend's club ride was likely the last for the season.



It was time to wash the Bianchi, clean & lube the chain, charge up the Di2 shifter battery, and tuck the bike away for the winter.



Then I dragged the trainer & ancient Norco road bike out of storage, fired up the dormant Zwift account, and got ready for the indoor racing & club ride season.



Yesterday was my first indoor club ride in about 8 months. We had 11 riders on the hour long ride on the Zwift group ride platform in their various garages, basements, and apartments. It was great chatting to everyone on the conference call using the Discord app. I even won a couple of the intermediate sprint races!!.. Fun times on a rainy evening .

I tried zwift for a bit but just couldnt get into it. I had a wahoo trainer and all the sensors etc, but it just didnt do it for me. I ended up buying a mtn bike and sneaking in some woods riding on the days I couldnt road ride. I also moved my road rides to during work hours to squeeze some miles in. I miss having that kind of flexibility

 

[Just Puttering]

I tried zwift for a bit but just couldnt get into it. I had a wahoo trainer and all the sensors etc, but it just didn't do it for me.

Hi @Xti04 , glad you gave Zwift a try, sorry it wasn't for you.

I do find it a bit boring when riding by myself, but the races & group rides can be fun. Where else can you ride with Tour de France winners such as Brad Wiggins or Geraint Thomas on their club rides.

I ended up buying a mtn bike and sneaking in some woods riding on the days I couldn't road ride.

I do also have a gravel bike for riding in the winter when conditions allow.



I rarely ride the mountain bike any more despite being able to pop out the door straight onto some of Vancouver's most awesome North Shore trails. Generally, I just hike the trails these days.

 

[frojoe]

A fellow Vancouverite!

Great job on all the projects and the excellent organization, it's music to my ears, figuratively hehe.

 

[Just Puttering]

A few days ago, I discovered your very excellent site and have just completed reading it. I thoroughly enjoyed reading every post. You are so organized, and your projects are inspiring.

Thanks @mmsheb

I enjoy building shelfs, cabinets, brackets, and anything else I can use to keep tools and supplies readily at hand. I find a tidy shop a soothing place to be after a stressful day.

Would you mind sharing the dimensions of your pot shelving unit? You use 1x4's with 1-1/4" cross bars, correct? Would a shelf on the bottom not make it sturdier

Sure, it's 36"H, 36"W, 12"D. Yes on the 1x4, and I used normal 1.5" cross bars in the shed. I only rip 1.25" cross bars for the shelves in the basement so that it's compatible with all the other Ikea shelving down there.

 

[Just Puttering]

Great job on all the projects and the excellent organization

Thanks @frojoe

I did think I was somewhat organized, then I saw your toolbox setup on your garage thread....Wow, your wrench layout in particular

I actually started to build a garage closet a few days ago to clean up the one remaining cluttered part of the garage.



I am looking forward to laying out some shelves and tucking away the car car chemicals.

 

[frojoe]

Thanks @frojoe

I did think I was somewhat organized, then I saw your toolbox setup on your garage thread....Wow, your wrench layout in particular

Hah! The fudged-truth I like to say is that "I have so many tools and such little space that I have no choice but to keep them organized.. for efficiency"... but at the end of the day I accept the fact that I just like the look of them all having their perfect place.

 

[mmsheb]

Thanks @mmsheb

I enjoy building shelfs, cabinets, brackets, and anything else I can use to keep tools and supplies readily at hand. I find a tidy shop a soothing place to be after a stressful day.



Sure, it's 36"H, 36"W, 12"D. Yes on the 1x4, and I used normal 1.5" cross bars in the shed. I only rip 1.25" cross bars for the shelves in the basement so that it's compatible with all the other Ikea shelving down there.

Thank you so much, Phil. I'll plan to build one probably over our Thanksgiving weekend (in the US). I appreciate this information.
Mike in WI

 

[Just Puttering]

I spent this morning building shelves in the new garage closet. I used the old treated 3/4" plywood & lumber from this summer's deck demo project. It was nice to re-purpose this treated wood that I had temporarily patched the deck up with about 10 years ago.

Even without paint & trim, I am thrilled at how much this cleaned up the mess of car care stuff on the rickety old metal shelf unit.



The new shelves gobbled up all the **** with a huge amount of room to spare. Looks like I even have room to add one more shelf.



I am trying to resist the urge to run down to the garage to straighten the 2 lower center shelf supports

 

[Just Puttering]

I do enjoy building shelves, brackets, drawer dividers, and other items to help keep the clutter down.

Organizing the tool wall was a particularly fun activity. However, I did have to re-build a couple of the floating shelves as I used the wrong screws.

The 3/4” plywood walls in my shop are perfect for holding screws, but the regular construction screws compressed the fibers in the wood I used for the shelves. This allowed the shelves to sag a bit with the weight of the tools on them. Regular Kreg pocket hole screws did the same thing.

Switching to Kreg HD screws, and shimming the pocket hole jig a bit (Jig is designed for 2x4 lumber) to ensure the screws were exiting in the top third of the shelf solved the problem.



I am a big fan of these HD screws. It’s not the strength that I fine appealing, but rather the oversized head which matches nicely with their stepped drill bit to reduce the wood fibre compression at the bearing portion of the screw head. The flat part of the head is even larger than some of the structural screws I have used.

Two of these HD screws in my simple 3/4” plywood bracket have held my most used drill on the wall without the slightest bit of sagging for more than 5 years now.



The bracket also holds the pilot & countersink bits close at hand so I remember to use them before, rather than after I split the board.



I use the drill for most of my screw driving rather than the impact. I only pull out the impact driver if I am sinking lots of screws, as I find the noise distracts from the peaceful contemplative aspect of most of my projects.

Luckily, in Canada, square drive screws are the most common type, rather than phillips, so I don't need the impact driver to prevent stripping.

 

[rharman]

< snip >

When I went to place the cams on the workbench, I realized that this was the first time I had held a camshaft in my hands since the late 1960’s. That thought sent me on a happy trip down memory lane.

One summer when I was 9 years old, I got to help my dad re-build the engine of his 1960 Chevy Corvair in our open carport. I can still clearly remember using the suction cup thingy to lap the valves, and tapping in the pistons with the back of a hammer after my dad had tightened up the ring compressor.

< snip >

I still remember my dad teaching me about valve lapping (we may have used an old suction cup dart) and, yes, using the hammer handle to push a piston down into the cylinder. Pretty sure we were rebuilding a Briggs & Stratton for either my mini-bike or go-kart. That would have been early 1960's.

Thank you for that post. Sent me down memory lane as well. Very nice memories. Can't believe he's been gone since 1986.

 

[Just Puttering]

I still remember my dad teaching me about valve lapping and, yes, using the hammer handle to push a piston down into the cylinder. Pretty sure we were rebuilding a Briggs & Stratton. That would have been early 1960's.

Thank you for that post. Sent me down memory lane as well.

Hi @rharman, always happy to trigger fond memories.

I also remember lots of Briggs & Stratton repairs with my dad. He used to drive around with me in the late 60's on the neighbourhood junk days and fish old lawnmowers out of the piles. It was always super embarrassing when he would have me pick one up from in front of a friends house.

He taught me how to do spark plug thread repairs, carb cleaning, and other minor things these mowers needed to get them running well, and then sell them in the old Buy & Sell newspaper. He always picked that paper up on the day it came out and pounced on the Freebie offers.

We must have done a dozen or more engine swaps. It seemed about half the mowers we found had rusted decks, and the other half had perfect decks, but dead motors. Engine swaps were far easier in those days with only a few common Briggs engine variants.

 

[Krfjkm]

Hi @rharman, always happy to trigger fond memories.

I also remember lots of Briggs & Stratton repairs with my dad. He used to drive around with me in the late 60's on the neighbourhood junk days and fish old lawnmowers out of the piles. It was always super embarrassing when he would have me pick one up from in front of a friends house.

He taught me how to do spark plug thread repairs, carb cleaning, and other minor things these mowers needed to get them running well, and then sell them in the old Buy & Sell newspaper. He always picked that paper up on the day it came out and pounced on the Freebie offers.

We must have done a dozen or more engine swaps. It seemed about half the mowers we found had rusted decks, and the other half had perfect decks, but dead motors. Engine swaps were far easier in those days with only a few common Briggs engine variants.

Is a Briggs swap harder than a Ferrari swap?

 

[Just Puttering]

The stuff on the shelf behind my computer was looking a bit dusty, so I wandered down to the shop, fired up the compressor, and blew the dust off some items including this 14” high open segmented vase my Dad turned a few years ago.



He used to give out handmade ornaments, and turned wood artwork at Christmas every few years which was really cool. Alas, he is about to turn 90, and his vision and balance no longer allow him to do precision wood turning.



I marvel at his talent and patience every time I hang this open segmented wood turning on the Christmas tree.



It's great to see my son spending time with my Dad in his shop. Hopefully Dad's talent will continue to rub off him. My son already makes furniture far nicer than anything I have made.

 

[Ruxpin]

He used to give out handmade ornaments, and turned wood artwork at Christmas every few years which was really cool. Alas, he is about to turn 90, and his vision and balance no longer allow him to do precision wood turning.

Wonderful pieces

 

[ChefRex]

You are blessed to have such a talented farther, be sure your kid knows this.

 

[Prospecter]

I suspect your father also loves the time with his grandson, and the opportunity to share a lifetime of learning. That's the stuff that keeps us going.

 

[Just Puttering]

Wonderful pieces

You are blessed to have such a talented father, be sure your kid knows this.

Thanks @Ruxpin & @ChefRex

It's nice to visit the kids, and see examples of his artwork proudly on display in their homes.

I suspect your father also loves the time with his grandson, and the opportunity to share a lifetime of learning. That's the stuff that keeps us going.

Nicely said @Prospecter.

I think it's partly my Dad's influence that contributed to my son switching from his prior career to finish carpentry. He is now a project manager for a high end custom millwork shop, but I still think his grandfather has a few things left to teach him.

Though I do think it's my son influencing my Dad on T shirt selection :

 

[Just Puttering]

Sitting on my desk for inspiration is a 3” five layer Chinese puzzle ball my Dad turned. It has a solid 3/4” ball in the centre, within 4 concentric hollow spheres. It was turned from a 4” block from a limb that blew off the walnut tree in his backyard.



A few years ago he borrowed my oxy acetylene set to make some tooling. I didn’t give it too much though till a few months later when he returned the welder and handed over this ball.

It blew me away that he used the rosebud tip to bend a series of steel rods into various radii then brazed a carbide tip to each one. The series of 1/8” handmade chisels had a double curve in them to reach in through the larger holes, then bend around to cut away the individual layers. He made all that tooling to learn how to make concentric layered spheres.

Crazy thing is that for every puzzle ball he finished, he had a half dozen or more explode on him. The slightest wrong angle on the chisel would wedge the tooling between the fragile wood layers and KAPOW!

This ball is slightly blemished and he left it unfinished. The few perfect ones he made were displayed and sold in a gallery. He only started getting serious about woodturning after he retired from an electrical engineering career, and by the time he hit his 70's, his stuff was nice enough to be displayed at art fairs and a number of galleries. He enjoyed his woodturning booth at art fairs into his mid 80's.

 

[Just Puttering]

I finished the new closet in the garage this morning. Rather pleasedb with the way it turned out and hid all the clutter.



I found the bright blue bins looked a bit jarring, so I think I will build a simple cabinet to fill the space. For now, since I had the paint open, I just hit them with the roller.



Now I just need to dig through my various racing & car posters and memorabilia and get something up on the bland walls.

 

[frojoe]

Looks awesome!! Love seeing updates from someone local.. now is a great time for garage work since we're in for rain for the next 3-5 months!

Cheers,
Joe

 

[Just Puttering]

The other day my dad returned to me this meat tenderizer that I made 50 years ago and gave to my mom for Christmas. It is one of a number of my grade 10 metal shop projects he still has kicking around.



I remember it being rather fun packing the foundry sand for the head and handle, firing up the furnace and pouring the aluminum. The three big machine lathes were pretty intimidating at first for a 14 year old, but turning and knurling the handle turned out to be pretty cool once I got the hang of the tooling and settings.

It all seems to have turned out all right, but the weight of the 12” beast was a bit much for mom to give it any real use. I think I might hang it on the tool wall with the hammers and mallets.

It was a shame that all the metalwork classes were long gone by the time my son got to high school.

 

[mmsheb]

That is an awesome meat tenderizer. Yes, display it!
Not metalworking, but I made a wooden sawhorse for a 4-H Club woodworking project. I entered it in the County Fair and won a ribbon. That was 62 years ago, and I continue to use that sawhorse if not weekly certainly monthly!
Mike in WI

 

[Just Puttering]

That is an awesome meat tenderizer. Yes, display it!

Thanks @mmsheb

It's definitely going to be hung up on the workshop wall.

I originally intended the Tool Wall for woodwork hand tools. Over the years, frequently used items like Hex keys, LED worklight, circular saw, etc have found their place on the wall, but even so, a meat tenderizer is a pretty weird addition to a wood shop.



The heavy tenderizer will get lots of use for correcting projects that don't behave themselves.

 

[mmsheb]

Phil, use the tenderizer when you have hard wood and need soft wood! 
Mike in WI

 

[Just Puttering]

Fun with making a Garage Banner.

Over the Christmas break, I spent some time fooling around with the built in photo editing tools that came with the Mac laptop I bought last summer. The photo apps were reasonably similar to the paint & photo editing apps on my old Windows PC.

I had figured out how to put 2 images side by side into a single JPG for posting to garage journal by watching some youtube videos. I figured that by watching some more youtube I could learn how to make custom banners for the garage.

I was down at the Seattle Vintage races this past summer, and while chatting to one of the racers, I snapped a picture of his toolbox showing an old decal from the long gone racetrack I used to frequent in the 70’s & 80’s.



So by using the toolbox snapshot, and figuring out the tools for cropping, straightening, blemish removal, and file size enhancement, I was able to get an image suitable for printing a 18” x 48” banner. One of those online printing companies that claim to be local, but are actually based in India printed the fabric banner for only $23 with free shipping. Wasn’t expecting much, but when it showed up 10 days later, I was very happy with the result.



So I now have a new banner from my favourite old track that closed in 1990 and am working on a few more images for my next cheap banner printing order.

What Fun!!!

 

[Just Puttering]

It was time to make a BMW banner.

My wife recently noted that I have all sorts of Ferrari books & memorabilia kicking around, but seem to ignore her BMW. She’s had the 2012 BMW 128i 6spd manual convertible since new, and it’s a blast to drive, so she’s right, time to hang a banner next to her car. Alas, no BMW F1 banner appears to exist, so I had fun making one.

I always loved the idea that the 1983 F1 championship winning Brabham BMW was powered by an engine based on the same M10 cast iron block as the BMW 320i that I had at the time. It was the last cast iron block to win an F1 championship title.

Fascinating that the engine team sorted through piles of used 2002 & 320i engine blocks with 100,000 + Km on them knowing that all those heat cycles made the blocks stronger. At over 60 lbs of boost and up to 1400 HP in qualifying tune, the 1.5 litre turbo engines only lasted 2 - 3 qualifying laps…wild & fun times!!!

With an image of a modern BMW emblem, and a pic of Nelson Piquet’s 1983 BMW powered drivers championship car, I made something my wife is really happy with.



Can’t wait to get it back from the printers.

 

[Just Puttering]

Brrrr!!! it was a cold ride today.



I am the Clydesdale on the left looming over everyone

I typically try to hide in the back of photos, but this picture was so rushed that I didn't have time to skedaddle away. Great 45 mile fast club ride despite the cold with 11 riders out today.

 

[Just Puttering]

Arghhh….Crappy Amazon Bearings!!!

A couple of weeks ago I changed the bearings on my bike trainer. After several years and roughly 5,000 Kilometres, the bearings on the heavy flywheel were getting noisy.

The various internet forums all said that whatever you do, don’t use cheap Chinese bearings. So I think you can all guess what I did .

Amazon had SKF brand bearings listed which are typically considered a quality product. The images showed the proper SKF made in Switzerland box, and the bearing image had the proper SKF stampings so I ordered them. What arrived was not what was listed, but I had already spend over an hour taking the trainer apart and had to destroy one of the original bearings to get it out, as it had seized to the flywheel shaft.

Of course, the Amazon bearings that showed up were from China, but since the Chinese NBK brand factory installed bearings had served me well, why not install the new ones?



It was alarmingly noisy when re-assembled, but tolerable. But now, only 2 weeks and just a few rides later, the bearings are already starting to make outrageously loud noises as they grind themselves apart, so I have ordered proper SKF ones from a local industrial supplier.



So the first bearing change & power meter re-calibration took 2 hours, and the second should be about 90 minutes, plus another hour sourcing & driving to get the proper bearings.

Thanks Amazon for wasting 2½ hours of my life

 

[Just Puttering]

I popped the new SKF brand bearings in the bike trainer last night. Oh so quiet

I broke open the 2 week old HiPicco brand bearings and was amazed how trashed they were.



The inner race looked so rough and porous that it may as well have been made out of cast iron. The drive side of the outer race was literally breaking apart. This was after only 8 rides of approx 45 minutes each. The old NBK brand Chinese bearings installed by the factory lasted 5 years. I expect the high quality SKF bearings to last even longer.

The belt drive loads on the flywheel drive bearing are pretty very high to get it spinning up to 2500 RPM, but still, destroyed in only 8 rides....crazy.



Learned my lesson on this one...no more off brand Chinese bearings for me!!!

 

[kppolich]

I popped the new SKF brand bearings in the bike trainer last night. Oh so quiet

I broke open the 2 week old HiPicco brand bearings and was amazed how trashed they were.



The inner race looked so rough and porous that it may as well have been made out of cast iron. The drive side of the outer race was literally breaking apart. This was after only 8 rides of approx 45 minutes each. The old NBK brand Chinese bearings installed by the factory lasted 5 years. I expect the high quality SKF bearings to last even longer.

The belt drive loads on the flywheel drive bearing are pretty very high to get it spinning up to 2500 RPM, but still, destroyed in only 8 rides....crazy.



Learned my lesson on this one...no more off brand Chinese bearings for me!!!

Just did a service on my Kickr Gen 5. I had some sqealing, the bearings were fine but a tooth brush running right on the grooves on the inside of that pulley you have pointed out cleaned up the old, ground rubber. Wiped everything including both sides of the belt and its back to whisper quiet.

 

[Just Puttering]

Just Puttering About in my tiny workshop on the weekend on a very tiny project.

I ripped a rebate into an 8' 2x2, chopped some 45's, fired some finish nails in the corners, and fired brads through some plywood to make a couple of simple 7"x7" frames.



Splashed the second coat of black on them last night.



My wife has been drawing landscape patterns and hooking small rugs while we watch TV in the evenings. This morning I stapled two of her little rugs into the frames.



They represent sunny scenes from our garden. My happy wife is enjoying them on our fireplace mantle.

 

[Just Puttering]

It was nice to walk up to my front door this afternoon and be greeted by the daffodils and crocus that I planted last fall.






Spring is in the air...Yeah!!

 

[Just Puttering]

This morning seemed like a good time to start waking up the first batch of our overwintered tender plants. I starting with the geraniums.

In mid November, I chopped ⅔ of the top growth off a couple dozen of the geraniums (pelargoniums) with hedge shears, yanked them out of the ground, chopped off ½ the roots with a spade, jammed them in a few plastic storage containers, and loosely spread some old potting mix on them.



They sit with the agave’s, dahlias, and other tender stuff in the back corner of the unheated but frost free garage without any water or care all winter and go mostly dormant. The one tiny window in the garage side door does result in some sad pale top growth.

It was a fine morning to work at the potting bench and start to pot them up.



I have various window sill extensions that I set up for the next couple of months as we start to place dozens of pots, seed trays, cuttings, etc in many of our windows. In a few weeks, the inside of the house will start to look like a jungle till it all gets planted outside in early May.



Seems to work well, as we have several geraniums that are many years old. The garden at our house up in the North Van mountains is heavily forested and the flowers do just ok, but the ones we plant out at the shared family cottage out in the countryside get huge.



Always surprises our friends to see 5 year old geraniums that are the size of small shrubs.

 

[Krfjkm]

My grandmother taught me to “deadhead” the geraniums— pinch off the tired or dead flower heads. Do you guys up north do that?

 

[bugnut]

Geraniums and spring flowers are always a welcome sight!

 

[Just Puttering]

My grandmother taught me to “deadhead” the geraniums— pinch off the tired or dead flower heads. Do you guys up north do that?

Hi @Krfjkm

Thanks for pointing out that I should take a moment to deadhead before snapping the pic . I usually do deadhead most of the flowers early in the season, but typically get tired of doing it by mid summer, just when the gardens need it the most.

I am pretty much a one season gardener. Super crazy for gardening in the spring. To busy with car shows, sports car races, cycling, and hiking in the summer, and the fall and winter are shop and garage time.

Geraniums and spring flowers are always a welcome sight!

Thanks @bugnut , Spring flowers, waking up overwintered plants, and seed starting are some of my favorite parts of spring.

Of course my most favorite thing is putting the Ferrari back on the road for driving season!

 

[Prospecter]

Thanks for pointing out that I should take a moment to deadhead before snapping the pic . I usually do deadhead most of the flowers early in the season, but typically get tired of doing it by mid summer, just when the gardens need it the most.

Just tell folks you are saving the seeds.

 

[Just Puttering]

I recently made my wife a warping board to help her cut warp threads to tie onto her loom.



It was a fun little shop project, and my wife loves using it to wrap weaving yard around the pegs in different patterns, which when cut off, create hundreds of warp threads the identical length.

It makes setting up her looms quicker. Particularly for her vintage 1950’s Leclerc loom.

 

[Just Puttering]

After our warm wet winter, I am starting to see the beginnings of some moss growing on the roof, so I grabbed the Frankensprayer, and sprayed some moss spray (Benzalkonium Chloride).

Years ago I used to use a chlorine solution, but that only lasted a year or two before moss started reappearing. The Benzalkonium stuff that’s in several commercial roof sprays lasts 5 years +.



My hacked together extended reach roof sprayer works surprisingly well.

With it’s 12' painters pole, tank hanging by a rope from an S hook on the ladder, and a spring clamp on the trigger so I can use both hands on the pole, I can spray 35' to cover the whole roof from the ladder at eaves level. Portions of our roof have a pitch which is too steep to walk on.

I simply cut the plastic sprayer wand and attached the two pieces together with a 15' vinyl tube and a couple of tiny hose clamps. Zip tied the spray tip to a pole.