Every shop should have SOMETHING olive drab in it! Military storage is among the best in the world.
A guy that comes to my swap meet has been going to military surplus auctions, and last year he had a bunch of cabinets--all kinds of different shapes and sizes.
This one was $40, and was EXACTLY what I needed to store my corded power hand tools such as drills, skill saws, etc. As a bonus, it also has a six inch deep top storage area that swallowed a lot of my boxed tool sets, like my Dremel tool, brake flare kit, an old tap and die set I can't get rid of but never use, etc.
I paid him for it last November, picked it up yesterday and got it placed and loaded last night (in the middle of finally finishing my shop)
One thing about military dimensions--they're not standard! It's 4'3" long, a little over two feet deep, and almost 3.5-feet tall. The big drawers are almost 11x11, and are full-length. No slides; each drawer rests on the shelf and drags across it. A couple of the drawers are VERY heavy... very thick steel. The others are light.
The top has a fiber board pad on it, secured with a generous number of flush-mounted aircraft-style rivets. The lid's hinge is away from the back, so you can put the cabinet flush against the wall and open the lid--if it was hinged along its back, you'd have to pull it away from the wall to open the lid. Nice design, as it saves several inches of floor space.
This cleared off three shelves on my 4-foot shelving unit, and I'm not even coming close to optimizing it. Being under lid and in drawers, the tools should definitely stay a lot cleaner. It's perfect for stashing stuff I use regularly (drills), and stuff I rarely use (all my concrete and a couple auger bits)
I'm going to cover both sections of the top with masonite (screwed, not riveted), and I'm probably going to mount an aluminum hotel pan (big cookie sheet--available at any restaurant supply store; I paid $3 each for used ones, $8 for new) to one side of the lid to set fasteners and such while I'm working on that side of the shop. This area is where cars will be parked, so I was just thinking that I needed a work surface of some kind over there before picking it up. I'm also going to make a short upstanding sheetmetal flange around the back and both corners (up to the hinge) to keep things from rolling off the back of the box. I may also incorporate a can holder along the fixed portion of the top, for brake kleen, WD40 and drink cups.
This thing is a HUGE benefit for organizing my shop.
I'd kinda like to paint it, but if I do it'd be red to match most of the other stuff in there. I really don't want to take the time to have it soda blasted and paint it now, though--I want to use my shop, not make a cabinet pretty. Maybe later, after the surface rust and OD Green wears off... but I've got a LOT of projects stacked up before getting to that.
Once my stomp sheer is dialed in (after moving it across the shop), I'll make a bunch of dividers for the drawers, which should put all my pop rivets in one little drawer, rather than two as it is now. Some of the big drawers need dividers too. A few of the drawers have dividers down the center of them, tack-welded in. Those gotta go.
For $40, I couldn't be happier.
A guy that comes to my swap meet has been going to military surplus auctions, and last year he had a bunch of cabinets--all kinds of different shapes and sizes.
This one was $40, and was EXACTLY what I needed to store my corded power hand tools such as drills, skill saws, etc. As a bonus, it also has a six inch deep top storage area that swallowed a lot of my boxed tool sets, like my Dremel tool, brake flare kit, an old tap and die set I can't get rid of but never use, etc.
I paid him for it last November, picked it up yesterday and got it placed and loaded last night (in the middle of finally finishing my shop)
One thing about military dimensions--they're not standard! It's 4'3" long, a little over two feet deep, and almost 3.5-feet tall. The big drawers are almost 11x11, and are full-length. No slides; each drawer rests on the shelf and drags across it. A couple of the drawers are VERY heavy... very thick steel. The others are light.
The top has a fiber board pad on it, secured with a generous number of flush-mounted aircraft-style rivets. The lid's hinge is away from the back, so you can put the cabinet flush against the wall and open the lid--if it was hinged along its back, you'd have to pull it away from the wall to open the lid. Nice design, as it saves several inches of floor space.
This cleared off three shelves on my 4-foot shelving unit, and I'm not even coming close to optimizing it. Being under lid and in drawers, the tools should definitely stay a lot cleaner. It's perfect for stashing stuff I use regularly (drills), and stuff I rarely use (all my concrete and a couple auger bits)
I'm going to cover both sections of the top with masonite (screwed, not riveted), and I'm probably going to mount an aluminum hotel pan (big cookie sheet--available at any restaurant supply store; I paid $3 each for used ones, $8 for new) to one side of the lid to set fasteners and such while I'm working on that side of the shop. This area is where cars will be parked, so I was just thinking that I needed a work surface of some kind over there before picking it up. I'm also going to make a short upstanding sheetmetal flange around the back and both corners (up to the hinge) to keep things from rolling off the back of the box. I may also incorporate a can holder along the fixed portion of the top, for brake kleen, WD40 and drink cups.
This thing is a HUGE benefit for organizing my shop.
I'd kinda like to paint it, but if I do it'd be red to match most of the other stuff in there. I really don't want to take the time to have it soda blasted and paint it now, though--I want to use my shop, not make a cabinet pretty. Maybe later, after the surface rust and OD Green wears off... but I've got a LOT of projects stacked up before getting to that.
Once my stomp sheer is dialed in (after moving it across the shop), I'll make a bunch of dividers for the drawers, which should put all my pop rivets in one little drawer, rather than two as it is now. Some of the big drawers need dividers too. A few of the drawers have dividers down the center of them, tack-welded in. Those gotta go.
For $40, I couldn't be happier.
