Need a HUGE tool box for almost no money?

[Fugio]

Sorry if this has been mentioned before, but maybe someone will find it useful.

I keep seeing you guys talk about huge tool boxes that cost a thousand dollars or more and wanted to share my alternative.

I have a top/bottom tool box for small tools that my dad bought for me about 30 years ago, and it's great!

But about 2 years ago I realized that I needed a REALLY box box for my big tools and power tools.

Well, about that time, a buddy of mine called me one morning and said he was picking me up for the day to do some work and to not ask any questions. Adventure time!

Turns out he had a job cleaning out a entire floor of a HUGE law firm for the "Texas Hammer" ambulance chaser you might have seen on TV. We didn't get paid, but we did get to keep anything we moved. Good deal!

So we loaded up about 30 HUGE law office file cabinets. Most were 6 feet tall or more and had 5 HUGE drawers. Every single one had high quality ball-bearing slides. They are all 42" wide. They are made to be stuffed with hundreds of pounds of paper. My tools will never weigh that much!

I took one that was 6+ feet tall with 5 drawers and another 36" tall one with 2 drawers (to put my sand blast cabinet on). Not bad for 3 hours of EASY work! I mostly just held the elevator door!

Anyway, these things are called "lateral file cabinets." You can find the large commercial grade ones all over craigslist for around a hundred bucks or less!

I've been VERY happy with mine and think they are an amazing value!

The only bad thing about them is that they have a safety feature which prevents opening more than one drawer at a time. It gets stuck all the time, so you'll want to remove it once you get the thing bolted into place. Most of them also come with a key and locking system just like any other tool box. I'm not sure if removing the tip over safety also removes the lock. I'll check if anyone actually cares.

It's too cold to go out and take a pic right now (also, I'm lazy!), but mine looks just like this:

 

[Fugio]

Oh, and mine has the weird flip-up top drawer like this one. I keep it open use that top shelf as my battery charging station. I see some on the Dallas CL right now for under 50 bucks.

 

[85camaro]

One con is that they're not mobile.

 

[DJAMiller]

Pretty awesome idea! Thanks for sharing!

 

[Playwme]

Map drawers are good for smaller items that you need to visualize too, and a good set of castor wheels aren't that expensive.

 

[priceman1414]

Thanks for sharing. nice idea

 

[RedneckWelder]

One con is that they're not mobile.

With some casters and maybe some angle iron and a welder, they can be...



These aren't much good for storing hand tools and the like in, but for storing bulky power tools like circular saws, angle grinders, large drills, and so forth plus cased tools of all kinds they work pretty well.

 

[stage20]

Oh, and mine has the weird flip-up top drawer like this one. I keep it open use that top shelf as my battery charging station. I see some on the Dallas CL right now for under 50 bucks.

These are medical files. I have 3 of them. Love the storage they provide. I have one loded down with bbolts and scrap metal
Only ones id buy. Easier to dig through than regular files

 

[92integra]

it would be hard for me to store thosands of dollars worth of tool in something that could be opened with a butter knife. but this is still a great idea for poeple who live in small town or good communities

 

[nicksnothereman]

I use buckets sometimes.

The thing is that file cabinets might (or will) have different weight requirements compared to tool boxes.

I'm not a big box guy, I'm a small box/bag guy. I probably should buy one so I don't have to dig so much but my organization is good enough.

 

[T45]

Good thread OP, I'm glad to see people thinking like this. Paper is very heavy and those files are filled 100% of the volume with essentially 'tree'. Much more % volume utillzed than a toolbox so I'm sure they are sturdy if not as fully break-and-enter-proof as some toolboxes designed for such contingencies.

 

[stage20]

One of the local pawn shops has one filled with pipe wrenches. Drawer for 6 and 8 one 10 and so on. Its overloaded and rolls fine. The drawer with 14" wrenches you cn tell weighs a ton. You have to push it all the way closed, but its still smooth

 

[Cope]

My wife taught The Texas Hammer's son in fourth grade. At that time, he had a modest office near the East End of Houston.

 

[Steinmetz]

"Texas Hammer" and "Smart Lawyer" are registered trademarks he uses.

That may tell you all you need to know.

 

[Davefr]

it would be hard for me to store thosands of dollars worth of tool in something that could be opened with a butter knife. but this is still a great idea for poeple who live in small town or good communities

A high end SO KRL box can be opened just as easy. (you just need a scrap piece of tin vs butter knife)

 

[Fugio]

The lock seems about the same as the ones on my Craftsman boxes. Yeah, just enough to keep an honest man honest.

I don't think you'd want casters on the tall ones. They'd tip over and kill you. But there's plenty of steel to mount them on the smaller ones as well as the large ones. Mine is bolted to a 2x4 base just to get it off the floor a bit. So yeah, this would **** if you needed to move it around, but in a garage where it's stationary, it's great!

You're right about it being best for large, bulky tools. And you'll never put too much weight in the good ones.
I keep 2 floor jacks (removable handles), 4 jack stands, and a farm jack in my bottom drawer.
Next drawer up is all power tools. 2 circular saws, sawzall, jig saw, angle grinder, router, and a coupld of others with all the blades and attachments.
Middle drawer is all of my air tools plus blades and attachments. Tons of them!
4th drawer up is all of my welding gear and supplies. TONS of it.
And the top "drawer" is a charging station.

 

[toddacimer]

A high end SO KRL box can be opened just as easy. (you just need a scrap piece of tin vs butter knife)

That's a bottom of the line KRA box and with the depth of only 18" I could see it being quite a bit easier to pry the lock plate up compared to a KRL which is 24 or 30" deep.

 

[n8n]

The reason that you can't open more than one drawer at a time is because they are, as you say, meant to be packed to the gills with paper, which is some heavy ****. 2 or more drawers open means it'll fall over on some diminutive admin assistant and lawsuitilarity will ensue. Probably would be a good feature for roll cabs as well!

 

[RedneckWelder]

The reason that you can't open more than one drawer at a time is because they are, as you say, meant to be packed to the gills with paper, which is some heavy ****. 2 or more drawers open means it'll fall over on some diminutive admin assistant and lawsuitilarity will ensue. Probably would be a good feature for roll cabs as well!

I believe that Lista rollcabs have this feature.

 

[Fugio]

The reason that you can't open more than one drawer at a time is because they are, as you say, meant to be packed to the gills with paper, which is some heavy ****. 2 or more drawers open means it'll fall over on some diminutive admin assistant and lawsuitilarity will ensue. Probably would be a good feature for roll cabs as well!

Correct! The problem is that if you load a drawer unevenly with tools, or if you get a cord stuck in just the right place, it thinks a drawer is open, so it won't allow ANY of them to open without a minute of jiggling and frustration. That's why you'll want to disable that feature.

Mine came with 2 holes in the back to lag screw it to a stud. I also put the heaviest stuff on the bottom and lighter stuff up top. I don't think it could possibly tip over now.

 

[Bull]

I have two three-drawer units that I picked up for very little money. I was going to bolt them together, add some kind of top, and use them as a bench. hat hasn't happened. I am able to store lots of power tools w/cases, boxes of parts for car projects etc in them.

 

[Outlawmws]

If you are worried about security for these, the make locking bars and flip bars so you can padlock them. It still only keeps the honest people honest....

Those holes in the back are not really for lagging to walls, its so you can bolt them back to back. Used for large file rooms and rows and rows of files. (think Gov and Fortune 500 Co.s)

 

[HDMac07]

From personal experience, most high quality file cabinets that are used in law firms and medical offices are just as tough as tool boxes. Several years ago I worked for the local school corporation for extra income over the summer months. Anyone who thinks paper isn't heavy, think again! We had to deliver paper to every single school in the city, over 1 million sheets total, and my forearms will vouch for how heavy paper is. We were also in charge of removing old file cabinets in order to bring in new ones and I would pay very good money to see someone break in to one of them with a 'butter knife'. They may not pass the 'drawer test' in some configurations due to awkward weight distribution, but those suckers are TOUGH!

 

[Fugio]

Back to back bolting makes sense! I think they were like that when we moved them if I remember correctly.

Works great for lagging to the wall studs though!

 

[zkling]

File cabinets and other industrial office storage works great for tools. Lots of people don't understand the density of paper files.

@ the security comment. You do realize that people store thousands upon thousands behind a garage door that can easily be opened?

 

[Fugio]

Funny, I was just thinking about this since I just moved all my tools from the garage to a dedicated workshop/shed. I've been thinking about armoring the shed. Might need a new thread about it!