My garage/workshop....

[dirk1984]

Hi all! Dirk van Zyl here all the way from Cape-Town,South-Africa.
New to the forums here and I am loving it!
Thought I'd post some pics of my garage/workshop.

Some history,I am a qualified automotive technician and did my trade through Kia motors.
After 5 years with them I got a job offer from Mercedes-Benz,after close to 5 years with them I was retrenched with a bunch of other guy's due to the economic downturn.
Being South-Africa,finding a job is nigh on impossible,especially for a pale lad like me.
Decided to do my own thing,small specialist service and diagnostics and I am doing fine.

So,here we go....

 

[stick004]

Glad to have you on board. (or is that abroad...) Keep the progress pics coming. Can't wait to see how you get your space layed out.

 

[Blackbomber]

How much space are you working with? My garage is small, less than 20 square meters. Yours looks like it could be similar. It's encouraging to know people are making a living in small garages. Gives me no excuse not to have a workable hobbiest shop in a small location.

 

[dittle fart around]

That's a nice amount of space for what your considering. Clean up that wiring make sure your safe working in there. Lots of ventilation and lighting you know stuff like that. You're on your way dude, good luck.

 

[dirk1984]

Thanx guy's! Real awesome forum this.
Busy loading up more pics,these are a couple of months old already! LoL!

 

[dirk1984]

How much space are you working with? My garage is small, less than 20 square meters. Yours looks like it could be similar. It's encouraging to know people are making a living in small garages. Gives me no excuse not to have a workable hobbiest shop in a small location.

Hi there!
Yeah it's about that size,just slightly smaller than a double garage.(In S.A standards.)

 

[dirk1984]

A few more...

 

[Mad40er]

Looks great! I am a fellow Capetonian, now living in California. Good to have another on the board!

 

[dirk1984]

MOAR.... (LoL)

 

[dirk1984]

There have been some changes since these photos were taken,new bigger compressor and so on,will upload later after these old ones.

 

[dirk1984]

....

 

[dirk1984]

This is a very handy piece of kit.
Oil suction machine,just pressurise it with the compressor and stick it on the dipstick tube of a Mercedes and **** out all the oil.
On other makes it works really good too,you have different adapters for popular dipstick variants.

On some cars I still drain the oil though!! LoL!

 

[dirk1984]

Some of me certificates...LoL!!
I have quite alot due to both companies I worked for where very serious about training and product knowledge.
I just put up the most important ones,Merc maintenace tech,Kia maintenance tech,Daihatsu diagnostic tech,electrical,etc along with my trade qualification.

 

[dirk1984]

....

 

[dirk1984]

I suppose you can tell I like motorcycles from the posters!!! LoL!!
I'll post a pic of my own bike later on,infact just above to the left of the picture of the cabinet with the EIBACH sticker on it there is a pic of me on my bike goig around KILLARNEY race track here in Cape-Town.

 

[dirk1984]

Fridge was stocked with this poison for a while!! PLAY ENERGY DRINK.
Just about weened myself of that stuff!! LoL!

 

[dirk1984]

I am very proud and protective over my tools.
Made up of Kennedy cabinets and a mixture of TENGTOOLS,SNAP-ON,BETA,RACO,WURTH and some other makes.
All top quality and was FREAKIN' expensive to build up over the years!
There are guy's with shinier and better stuff,but everything I have comes from experience and knowing it's the right tool for the job.

 

[dirk1984]

Some of my lifting equipment,behind the crane there is my new compressor.
Very cool piece of kit! I bought myself a low level lift like the kind which is used in tyre shops.Going to pick it up over the weekend and will make my work alot easier!! Will post pics as soon as it is here.

 

[dirk1984]

This is where I dump all my old oil and drain that suction machine of mine into.
When it's full I give AFRICAN OIL COLLECTORS a call and they come and fetch it along with all the old filters and they pay you!! AWESOME!!

 

[dirk1984]

Cheers for now! I'll post some more tomorrow! Have a nice day or evening depending on your time zone everyone!

 

[vtx531]

What floor coating do you have?

 

[shopnut]

I see a large counterweight in one picture. Is that for the door? Is that common down in S-Africa?
(edit - Saw another picture - definitely for the door. Still curious if it is common)

Show us more pictures! Bike too! - I'm interested in what you guys ride down there.

 

[Steve from Socal]

From one Mercedes guy to another,

Wilkommen

Steve

 

[ConCretin]

Thanks for the tour. Great looking shop. You'll fit right in around here.

 

[dirk1984]

What floor coating do you have?

Hi there!
Because I am just starting out I opted not to redo the floor but just clean it and paint it with DULUX (a paint brand down here) shop floor paint.
Stuff is sticky to paint and get's super hard after 16 hours.

 

[dirk1984]

I see a large counterweight in one picture. Is that for the door? Is that common down in S-Africa?
(edit - Saw another picture - definitely for the door. Still curious if it is common)

Show us more pictures! Bike too! - I'm interested in what you guys ride down there.

Hey bro! Yeah it's a counter weight for the door yes.
In older houses (built in the late 60's-70's) the "single" garages were slightly smaller than a double garage and it had big heavy steel doors.
Those spring setups would just buckle under the weight of the door! LoL!
It's very old and does not look so nice anymore,but until I can buy me a roller door it will do!

 

[dirk1984]

From one Mercedes guy to another,

Wilkommen

Steve

Thanx man!! The 126 series Benz like in your AVI is my all time favourite!

 

[dirk1984]

Some more.
The pics jump around a bit,these from when I am already working in there! The white car in the one pic was a VW POLO with throttle body trouble and the cylinder head on the table is from a KIA SPORTAGE 4x4 I am overhauling the engine on.

Here's a couple of my bike also for shopnut! We ride all kind of stuff down here,really expensive new sportbikes,the big BMW type off-road tourers are very popular and among the English folk in Sea-Point the HARLEY's are king!

 

[dirk1984]

A few random shots.
All the parts on that trolley is from the KIA engine I'm doing after it had been cleaned.
This is my least favourite type of work,somebody else took the stuff apart and when they saw they can't handle it,towed it over to me. LoL!!

 

[dirk1984]

I have to go and do some work now! LoL!! Will post more later and as soon as the garage is empty and the lift is in I'll post a nice overall view pic! Have a nice day all!!

 

[dirk1984]

Woah! Been a while since I posted,trolled alot though!
Few things have changed in the meantime,busy moving into bigger place so I can't complain about business,can always use more though! LoL! Will post some pics of the new place as I go along.

 

[ryanp77]

Love that Valentino pic

 

[HSpencer]

Welcome to the Garage Journal. You have done a whole lot of upgrades since the first photos!! I really like the over the bench wall tool cabinet. Looks like your going to have a very nice and comfortable shop to work in. The floor paint made a huge difference. It is looking good, and thanks for posting your shop!! So from the photo with the lift, is that a new shop? It looks real nice.
Cheers

 

[dirk1984]

Welcome to the Garage Journal. You have done a whole lot of upgrades since the first photos!! I really like the over the bench wall tool cabinet. Looks like your going to have a very nice and comfortable shop to work in. The floor paint made a huge difference. It is looking good, and thanks for posting your shop!! So from the photo with the lift, is that a new shop? It looks real nice.
Cheers

Hi there! No the one with the lift is same place as from the first picture,that is how it evolved to make it comfortable to work in.
Got a new bigger place I am moving into,just struggling to upload the pics!

 

[dirk1984]

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/...omment_id=5071336&notif_t=photo_album_comment

I cant seem to upload the pics,say's they are to big and I am not that computer savy! LoL!
Check out the link for some of the new place. Will update that album on the regular.

 

[Olliecampbell]

Looks great.

I've got garage door counterweights like that...mine was built in '67. I'm keeping them as they're quite cool

 

[dirk1984]