Tooling (Re)Organization

[BoilermakerFan]

This thread finally was the kick in the *** I needed to get a 3d printer.

I bought a used Anet A8 according to the machine is has 50 minutes of use.



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Jump in our 3D printer thread too. And search YouTube and Thingiverse for the Anet A8 upgrades/mods. Those printers can be a PITA with little problems, so double check over everything too.

 

[gemniii]

This is an excellent thread. I especially love lilscorpion's attention to detail and numerous pics.

Though I really can't understand how he crammed so much "stuff" into the space he has.

1 critical question - it's past the middle of March - where is the wife's car?

And as to space:

<snip> then we have to buy a new house with a bigger garage. <snip>

We did look at a house end of last year that had a 4-Car garage and below it another 4-Car garage. It didn’t have a shed though so we moved on.

<snip>

I was getting short on space until we bought our "retirement" home.
I had a 15x15 workshop in the basement and a 10x15 shed.
Wife agreed to this little place in the country. With 5,500 sq foot of shop space. Which I quickly started to line with pallet racking.

This thread will greatly help me in designing cabinetry for under the pallet racking.

Many thanks OP.

 

[lilscorpion]

I’ll update here too. The FolgerTech F5 is interesting to put together. Tolerances are not what I would expect for a kit that was clearly cut on a CNC. Last night my son spent a combined total of 5 hours attempting to get the bottom/floor plate installed. It wasn’t until I creatively disassembled part of the bottom that I was able to finally make it work.



Now we need to figure out the guide shafts and lad screws. The instructions want you to install and align one at a time but it turns out that the stanchions at the bottom can’t be perfectly centered in their holes if you want it to work because the holes aren’t aligned with the extrusion frame. Best guess is that the extrusions were likely cut slightly oversized from what they were supposed to be causing the frame to be slightly larger than the size the machined parts were designed to fit.

So

This completely reminds me of my first CNC plasma from Torchmate. Though it’s a kit and you have instructions, you better plan on figuring some **** out. Tweak here, tweak there, move a hole over, buy some screws that done have messed up heads, etc. For those of you shopping, this is a fairly well designed kit that was put into production using average at best machines and processes shipped with meh-level hardware. If you set your expectations there, you’ll be happy. If you’re like me capability-wise, you’ll fee like it would have been a dozen times faster to machine all the parts yourself.




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[lilscorpion]

Time's getting away from me. New Job, Son's spring lacrosse, daughter's hot in the middle of dance competition season, and regular family stuff is all keeping me plenty busy. I'm still stealing time to make progress but I've slacked a little on updating the thread.

I wanted to get moved into the bench as soon as possible so I'd have easier access to my tools. When I moved the existing drawer bases I also managed to disrupt the location of many of my tools so finding stuff is now nearly impossible which makes spending time in the garage extremely painful. So I started with the easiest drawers which were size for size matches to the craftsman box and all I had to do was swap the organizers. Instant progress.

Williams Screwdriver Trays fit nicely. Almost hate dropping that Harbor Freight nut driver set in next to them. At some point I’ll need to buy a respectable set of nut drivers and pitch these. There brutal to use - Casting lines in the handles eat into your hand quickly and the shape is not very hand-like. Overall the trays fit nicely. I decided to drop one of my mechanics time savers for hex bits in there so I could have them in the same drawer as my universal ratcheting drivers. Previously I had to walk about 15 feet from my toolbox to the back of the tandem to get a different bit when I needed them. Now it’ll be in the same drawer (duh right?).

Craftsman Screwdriver Drawer organizers look good in the drawer too. I like the orientation better for both of the screwdriver drawers. Now I’m picking them up just like I’d have them in my hand. Feels more normal.

Small pliers and misc pliers drawer. This is a new drawer which is handling the overflow of my actual pliers drawer. I plan to make some organizers but I’m on the fence about keeping the small pilers here. Even with the pliers on end they won’t take up more than about a 1/3rd of the drawer and the other pliers that are sharing the space are all goofy pliers. I don’t have to commit to this drawer being for pliers but for now that’s where they’ll be.

Pliers Drawer is equally as nice as the screw driver drawers. The orientation change is also positive and the most used pliers (mid-sized) are right in the front.

SAE Wrench Drawer. The wrench drawer is slightly tighter than I’d like but it seems like it will work well. the depth turned out perfect. Missing’ some wrenches has me thinking that it’s time to maybe upgrade to some Williams Super Combos?

Metric Wrench Drawer (since I nearly exclusively use metric wrenches maybe I should put this above the SAE drawer?). A little room to grow.

Heres’ the drawer I’ll keep my woodworking/remodeling hammers in and some of my electrical stuff that didn't fit in the electrical drawer (or I may not want to put in the electrical drawer).

This will be the automotive hammer and body work drawer. Some of you may want to know why I have two drawers. After a couple of random moments where I unintentionally failed to clean a hammer that I put away I grabbed it while I was doing some work on/in the house and got oil/grease on my hands, my clothes, whatever I was working on, the carpet...it was a crappy moment. My wife joked and said "you need two sets of hammers"...so I got a second set.

Air tools. Way more room to grow than i have any concept of growing into. At this time there might be one or two tool's I'd like however I'll be the first to admit I don't, and likely won't, need. I'm thinking a divider may be a good idea in this drawer.

Standard sockets, extensions, and miscellaneous impact tools. Previously I did't have enough space to leave sockets in their container when i received them so I always needed to consider organization at the same time of purchase. Now it's not as much of a concern. With this much space I may move my 3/4-inch sockets into the drawer as well.

My metric sockets may be the most comprehensive set that I have and they don't barely fill the drawer. May also need to add a divider and split the drawer's duty with something else.

Here's my paint drawer. These organizers needed to be rotated 90 degrees in order to fit in this slightly smaller drawer. I actually like the orientation better as they're now facing me the way I always access the drawer (from the front of the garage). The only thing I dislike is that the cup organizer is just slightly too tall which makes the metal cup just barely hit when the drawer closes. I'll come back and address it later.

Router drawer used to be packed but two things changed which now makes me feel like maybe I don't actually need a drawer for "router stuff". The first is that I'm going to store all the bits in a Systainer. The other is i'm going to build a rack of sorts for the routers installed on the router plates. This will work for now but I need to figure out what the longer-term plan is.

I didn't really have a good plan for this drawer - punches, picks, etc but I do know it's not usable like this. Maybe I'll add a sliding upper drawer or something? None of the items are really that tall so a drawer within a drawer could work.

That's a good chunk out of the drawers from my bench from before. There's a few items that I'm going to get rid of and a couple drawer's worth of materials, hardware, and other components that will find another home. I still have 2 of the top drawers that are empty and two left to move. Good start and usable again.

 

[Bob Heine]

Air tools. Way more room to grow than i have any concept of growing into. At this time there might be one or two tool's I'd like however I'll be the first to admit I don't, and likely won't, need. I'm thinking a divider may be a good idea in this drawer.

I don't mean to lead you astray but you are missing a handy belt sander from your air tool drawer. It has become one of my go-to metal finishing tools and I would probably spend big bucks on one if I thought it worked much better than the Harbor Freight one. At $30 it's almost a throw-away if you don't find it useful. At one time HF sold a different model that really was a throw-away (I keep it as a reminder). One of this model's flaws is the tension spring, which can eject itself into another dimension (or the garden if you are sanding outside). I needed another sander to measure the spring diameter, length and strength to order a few from McMaster-Carr.

https://www.harborfreight.com/38-in-belt-air-sander-60627.html

 

[lilscorpion]

I don't mean to lead you astray but you are missing a handy belt sander from your air tool drawer. It has become one of my go-to metal finishing tools and I would probably spend big bucks on one if I thought it worked much better than the Harbor Freight one. At $30 it's almost a throw-away if you don't find it useful. At one time HF sold a different model that really was a throw-away (I keep it as a reminder). One of this model's flaws is the tension spring, which can eject itself into another dimension (or the garden if you are sanding outside). I needed another sander to measure the spring diameter, length and strength to order a few from McMaster-Carr.

https://www.harborfreight.com/38-in-belt-air-sander-60627.html

Yes! I could have used one a couple of weeks ago and I think I have it on one of my Amazon lists. Ok sweet, looks like my space won’t be wasted. I used to be an advocate for HF stuff but it seeks their quality (even for cheap tools) is going down and prices going up. I’ll drop by and check out their current model though. Worth a look. Thanks for reminding me.

After uploading I also realized that I could do something to organize my air hammer punches and that will likely take up some space as well.



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[lilscorpion]

Out with more old before having space for the new

Though, up until this point, the shop has been somewhat usable, I sense I'm approaching the part of the build where it stays in almost a perma-mess. I've acquired another set of flip up wing brackets so I’m ready to install the next “flip up bench top” however I’ve decided that the cabinets above it must go first in order to be able to be able to work without being hunched over the whole time. This pic gives you an idea of the current state of things before I get started.

The upper cabinets were built using melamine as well but they were installed in such a way that all of the cabinets down this wall are really one piece. This was a good idea when installing them for strength but now it ***** because the only way I can uninstall them is to destroy them.

Since there's no delicate way to disassemble them, I picked a spot where the face-frame had a slight lip, tuck the pry bar, give it a tap with the hammer to seat the pryer, and influence it away from the casing.

A.most too easily the face frame pulled away from the edge of the melamine carcas. With the face of the box exposed I'm reminded how I assembled these 8 years go. Apparently it was yellow wood glue brad nails, and biscuits. I was remembering only yellow glue and finish nails.

he face frame wasn’t coming off in while pieces though, since the framewas coming off in chunks I realized quickly that these were not coming down in one piece and will not be salvageable for either sale or gift. Soon as you cross that threshold, it's hammer time.

Once you turn to the hammer, it didn't require much effort at all to get cabinets 1 and 2 down. Lesson learned about material quality in the process. The melamine cases were assembled using yellow wood glue, fully stapled, and then screw 4 screws per edge all the way around. After removing the screws i gave the bottom a light whack and it came free all the way around. Clearly the screws were what held it all together.

With the cabinets clear now, I have plenty of room to work. I could keep going but it would be nice to be able to keep the lathe tooling and other cabinet in place to store all of the stuff while the new ones are being built and installed so I hold off for now.

3 full size upper cabinets are now nothing more than a scrap pile. You’ve served me well.

 

[Nuts]

There are lessons to be learned from destruction testing.

 

[lilscorpion]

There are lessons to be learned from destruction testing.

The lessons learned are valuable. In this case I think the biggest takeaway is that the amount of time spent building cabinets is not necessarily proportional to their strength.

translated - I spent so much time building the cabinets out of the melamine that it pains me to think they weren't really strong. The cabinets I built here I finished in probably 1/10th the time.

 

[lilscorpion]

Where I last left off (like 30 minutes ago) I was making space to add a flip-up work surface. So, it's logical that I would now install said work surface. Before I do, let me show you the new hiding place for the steady rest and one of the 150lb rotary table. So as EOC_Jason pointed out, here is where I "stored" my massive-a$$ steady rest on my last garage build effort.

Even though this seems equally out of sight and out of mind, it’s actually plenty accessible now even though it's probably obvious that I'll not use it in the next 10 years.

here’s what I made room for. Previously the MFTC and the miter saw would sit out in the main walk-way in front of the lathe which made doing anything on the bench difficult. Now they’ll tuck back in behind the lathe but I’d like to have a work surface over them for whenever I’d like to use it for additional workspace.

Drywall makes for completely crappy backing material for something like this so I added a strip of 3/4-inch baltic birch securing it well to the studs behind it.

By holding the brackets into place I'm able to transfer the hole centers to the wood. Doing it this way ensured that the bench would be at the same surface as the cabinet base and made it really easy to transfer the hole centers by myself.

I can then transfer the location of the bolts to the other end by simply measuring because the backing sheet is level. After marking and drilling the holes, i removed the plate and counter sunk some regular bolts from behind and installed them with both lock and regular washers. The result was protruding studs that made it really easy to install the brackets.

With the brackets raised up, I now have a place to rest the work surface to ensure it's level.

It’s a little too long but it gives me an idea of what it will look like when it’s finished as well as how little the brackets impede the space below.

As a reminder - I'm repurposing the counter tops from the bench that used to be in the rear corner. It was about 10" longer than it could be so I cut it down on the table saw. After doing so I had to glue in some additional build-up on the end so I had enough meet to mount the brackets to. In this picture the top is upside-down waiting for the glue to set up.

Once the glue drys I attach the top to the brackets and load it up.

I can use the work surface while the items are stored beneath without issue. I can also fold it down and store things that are larger than the space allowed under the bench

I rolled the MFTC and Kapex Miter Saw into place to ensure that I could have the surface up and store the items at the same time. Worked nearly perfectly.

A benefit of storing the MFTC under the work surface is that I can always access anything stored within it's drawers easily like it's a drawer base.

Ok, so quick recap - mission accomplished. I was able to increase the work surfaces within the shop AND figure out how to store some of the larger items that previously took up floor space.

 

[BoilermakerFan]

I’ll update here too. The FolgerTech F5 is interesting to put together. Tolerances are not what I would expect for a kit that was clearly cut on a CNC. Last night my son spent a combined total of 5 hours attempting to get the bottom/floor plate installed. It wasn’t until I creatively disassembled part of the bottom that I was able to finally make it work.



Now we need to figure out the guide shafts and lad screws. The instructions want you to install and align one at a time but it turns out that the stanchions at the bottom can’t be perfectly centered in their holes if you want it to work because the holes aren’t aligned with the extrusion frame. Best guess is that the extrusions were likely cut slightly oversized from what they were supposed to be causing the frame to be slightly larger than the size the machined parts were designed to fit.

So

This completely reminds me of my first CNC plasma from Torchmate. Though it’s a kit and you have instructions, you better plan on figuring some **** out. Tweak here, tweak there, move a hole over, buy some screws that done have messed up heads, etc. For those of you shopping, this is a fairly well designed kit that was put into production using average at best machines and processes shipped with meh-level hardware. If you set your expectations there, you’ll be happy. If you’re like me capability-wise, you’ll fee like it would have been a dozen times faster to machine all the parts yourself.




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I missed this post earlier. Man, I'm surprised that the kit has been that much of a PITA to put together with poor tolerances. I hadn't read or heard that in review videos I saw. I did see that that some of the hardware could be improved and the t-nuts can be a pain, but having to fight with the bottom...

Did you reach out to FT to see what they say? Have you received an email from 713 yet about the upgrade parts?

 

[niget2002]

I'm curious why you felt the need to make the bench top foldable? It looks like a great place just to have a nice bench top.

 

[lilscorpion]

This is an excellent thread. I especially love lilscorpion's attention to detail and numerous pics.

Though I really can't understand how he crammed so much "stuff" into the space he has.

1 critical question - it's past the middle of March - where is the wife's car?

And as to space:

I was getting short on space until we bought our "retirement" home.

I had a 15x15 workshop in the basement and a 10x15 shed.

Wife agreed to this little place in the country. With 5,500 sq foot of shop space. Which I quickly started to line with pallet racking.

This thread will greatly help me in designing cabinetry for under the pallet racking.

Many thanks OP.

Ah, questions regarding my commitment to my wife. Yeah, yeah...I’m a little behind. We’ve agreed to shift it to May. The root plan is still in place just a little off on the end date. She’s ok for the moment but beginning to mention “the deal” every so often.

5,500 sq ft shop space!! That’s awesome and I’m so jealous. I can’t even imagine having a shop that size to buildout. It would take me 10 years at my current pace. Do you have a lot of equipment?


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[lilscorpion]

I'm curious why you felt the need to make the bench top foldable? It looks like a great place just to have a nice bench top.

There were 2 main reasons: (1) I wanted to be able to get behind the lathe from the head end. Occasionally I drop something and before I had to do a contortionist move nearly laying on the lathe. (2) I didn’t want to be constrained to storing things in that spot that only fit below the top (e.g. my shop cart).




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[lilscorpion]

I missed this post earlier. Man, I'm surprised that the kit has been that much of a PITA to put together with poor tolerances. I hadn't read or heard that in review videos I saw. I did see that that some of the hardware could be improved and the t-nuts can be a pain, but having to fight with the bottom...

Did you reach out to FT to see what they say? Have you received an email from 713 yet about the upgrade parts?

Haven’t heard from 713 yet, have you?

I’ll have to accept some of the responsibility for being frustrated. My expectations are fairly high. I expect instructions to be clear and not back you into a corner. Reality is they’re written by humans who aren’t building the kit for the first time. I’ll get over it. I’ve decided to pause and order a few parts to sure up one of the considerable design flaws I just can’t accept involving how the guide rods are mounted. I’ll probably document it on the other thread as soon as I can get the parts.

The other aspects are just the consequence of what their machining their parts with and or the accuracy of their setup. Plastic parts are cut on some kind of CNC router table and their processes aren’t really dialed in to make nice and accurate parts. More likely for pure speed of production. E.g.- The parts are cut in a single pass so lead-outs are nasty because the parts are shifting as they loosen from the drop. The long extrusions in the kit were likely cut with the stop set to “close enough” which ended up being a tad too long. They gang-cut parts so all pieces at that length would be exactly the same no matter what so you can’t “see” the mistake when looking at it. I suppose I could measure...I’ll check tonight and see if the measurement matches the supplied BOM.

I can complain for hours [emoji12]

I’m not calling them because it’s easier to fix it than it will be to get them to understand my findings. Mine will be sweet when it’s done. Oh yeah, ordered and enclosure. Should be here tomorrow I think. To install I have to disassemble part of it again. Lol


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[tjpavlov]

I just wanted to say thanks for the referral to Ahturf.com. I am in the middle of my first big drawer project for some cabinets right now (17 drawers, wish me well!). I went to Ahturf.com on the recommendation of this thread and had a great experience.

I had a couple of questions about what screws to buy, so I gave them a call. I talked to Robbie in their hardware department. He answered all my questions and gave me a pretty big discount on my order. He said that if you are doing a larger order, always call it in because they will discount from the web pricing. I think he knocked like 10-15% off my bill, which was incredible.

So thanks for the recommendation!

 

[lilscorpion]

I have the benches installed and now the flip up top back by the tooling bench. Though I have work surfaces, I also have piles everywhere. Next step needs to be the counter top for the tooling bench (far back right corner in the pic).


Slightly better view shows just how disrupted my work space is at the moment (in case you didn’t believe me).


My counter tops are made by gluing a laminate sheet to a substrate (in my case baltic birch). The process is fairly easy but a little work needs to be done to give the bench some girth for both strength and appeal. To do so I “build up” the edges by glueing strips around the perimeter and then some supports through the middle.


I mark where the boards need to be with a pencil, remove them, and then apply glue within the lines. Once the board is in place I use narrow crown staples to secure the board through the drying period. The staples do add strength in the end but it’s the glue that does most of the work.


Here’s a little tidbit to save off. When gluing up the table it seems really easy to just lay it on a flat surface, clamp it down, and let the glue dry. Problem with that approach is 2 things can mess you up. First, the work surface may not be flat. Second, the material may not be flat. What I do to correct that is stand it on end and check it’s flatness with a straight edge. As you can see here, it’s not flat.


To correct the bow in the top (while the glue is still wet) I clamp some boards on edge to the table and clamp them in place.


I then tighten/loosen the clamps just barely until the straight edge shows no light and leave it on edge until it’s dry before removing the clamps.


Once dry the ends get trimmed to length before it can be test fitted.



Since it’s too cold to glue the laminate to the top I decide to leave it in place and use it until the weather improves. I took a moment to break the edge barely with the router as to prevent it from splintering up as I move around it. It’ll do for now.


 

[lilscorpion]

I just wanted to say thanks for the referral to Ahturf.com. I am in the middle of my first big drawer project for some cabinets right now (17 drawers, wish me well!). I went to Ahturf.com on the recommendation of this thread and had a great experience.

I had a couple of questions about what screws to buy, so I gave them a call. I talked to Robbie in their hardware department. He answered all my questions and gave me a pretty big discount on my order. He said that if you are doing a larger order, always call it in because they will discount from the web pricing. I think he knocked like 10-15% off my bill, which was incredible.

So thanks for the recommendation!

tjpavlov...you're welcome. To be completely honest, I was paying it forward. As luck would have it, I just came home to a box from Ahturf.com myself. I think I've chalked up about a dozen orders or more thus far with zero issues, consistent service, and ideal outcome. I will admit, I've never called so I've never been given an additional discount over web pricing. What I do know, based on plenty of research, is that web pricing is already much lower than any other place I've found on the web...so getting an added 15% would be AWESOME. I'll be calling next time for sure. Thank you back.

 

[BoilermakerFan]

Haven’t heard from 713 yet, have you?

I’ll have to accept some of the responsibility for being frustrated. My expectations are fairly high. I expect instructions to be clear and not back you into a corner. Reality is they’re written by humans who aren’t building the kit for the first time. I’ll get over it. I’ve decided to pause and order a few parts to sure up one of the considerable design flaws I just can’t accept involving how the guide rods are mounted. I’ll probably document it on the other thread as soon as I can get the parts.

The other aspects are just the consequence of what their machining their parts with and or the accuracy of their setup. Plastic parts are cut on some kind of CNC router table and their processes aren’t really dialed in to make nice and accurate parts. More likely for pure speed of production. E.g.- The parts are cut in a single pass so lead-outs are nasty because the parts are shifting as they loosen from the drop. The long extrusions in the kit were likely cut with the stop set to “close enough” which ended up being a tad too long. They gang-cut parts so all pieces at that length would be exactly the same no matter what so you can’t “see” the mistake when looking at it. I suppose I could measure...I’ll check tonight and see if the measurement matches the supplied BOM.

I can complain for hours [emoji12]

I’m not calling them because it’s easier to fix it than it will be to get them to understand my findings. Mine will be sweet when it’s done. Oh yeah, ordered and enclosure. Should be here tomorrow I think. To install I have to disassemble part of it again. Lol


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Nope, not yet...

I guess I'm bummed you had the issues. I was considering a HE3D H500 which is basically a CR10-5S but with some nice upgrades, but it's a moving bed Y-axis machine like the CR10-S so I was going back to the FT-5 because I think it will fit in my enclosure, but I haven't double checked the exterior dimensions... but now you've got me gun shy on the FT-5. I can probably build my own in a more heavy duty fashion if I build a larger HyperCube Evolution...

 

[lilscorpion]

Nope, not yet...

I guess I'm bummed you had the issues. I was considering a HE3D H500 which is basically a CR10-5S but with some nice upgrades, but it's a moving bed Y-axis machine like the CR10-S so I was going back to the FT-5 because I think it will fit in my enclosure, but I haven't double checked the exterior dimensions... but now you've got me gun shy on the FT-5. I can probably build my own in a more heavy duty fashion if I build a larger HyperCube Evolution...

Nah, you're going in informed. Reality is, the tweaks (if) needed, are easy for those of us who get it. It's always going to be difficult to impress guys like us. The target audience is likely not us. I have 0 print time thus far so I'd hold a decision on the product at least until I close out the challenges we have.

Andrew and I went in eyes wide open. Given my plasma table experiences I knew that we should be able to get it to high-level prod runs if we can get it through the builds. We're close.

 

[lilscorpion]

Cabinet (re)Design Research

The cabinets I have in the shop today were designed without any specific intent other than to store lots of stuff and keep it all out of sight. In most cases the dimensions of the cabinets were kept as long as they could be while still being installable by myself. None of them were designed with contents in mind and, for the most part, it wasn’t difficult fill them. The downside to this approach is that i frequently found that something wouldn’t fit dimensionally or nest well with other things and the result was wasting space. What I need is a design and/or layout that’s more flexible. One that can be adapted to my changing needs over time without having to tear down and rebuild. More or less, I want to figure out how to prevent the need for a “Tooling (re(re))Organization” thread in 10 years. So this go-round I’m going to try something different.

So, to make sure I stay on track, I’m going to lead into the build with very specific requirements:

1. Standard sized cabinets - if possible, they’ll all be the same. Makes building them much easier and faster.
2. Keep the organization of the tools contained within as modular as possible - this enables re-configuration, re-design, and expansion without much effort.
3. Keep consumables close to their tools
4. Just like in the drawers, make tools as accessible as possible.
5. Attempt to make tools and consumables more mobile. I find that I use them equally inside the house as I do in the garage.
6. Plan for a move. Though I don’t see us moving anytime soon, I’d like to be able to move the cabinets with me to my next shop (unlike the last set that had to be demo’d out).
7. More visually pleasing than before - with doors closed the shop looked neat and tidy. Because things didn’t have space crafted for them it still felt like a mess. This time I’d like the garage to look organized without doors on the cabinets…maybe I won’t even need them.

For about 4 years now I’ve been a follower of the FOG (FestoolOwnersGroup.com) where I’ve learned more than a thing or two. A few years ago someone posted up a link to 4 YouTube videos where a guy built a set of cabinets under the title Chaostheorie cabinets (

). All 4 of the videos are in german (I think) and I couldn’t understand a single word however the concept was interesting enough that I watched all 4 beginning to end…more than once I’m not convinced the execution leaves you in an inherently organized place however the concept is intriguing. The high level concept simplified is all cabinets are the same size and somewhat easy to build. I’d bet money that in the time it took to build and finish one of my previous cabinets, this guy built all of his, loaded them, and started another project.


I like that he added drawers into the mix. Gives him a place to store things like consumables and other items.


There’s something about how it looks from a distance. What Impresses me the most about this system is every drawer/systainer is mobile. You can “undock” each of them, stack a group, and take them inside. Or, if my wife gets all crazy about a new house, I can move the tools an come back for the cabinets. So much easier than the last move. For a DIY’er like me, it’s ideal.


This design pattern has caught on and many have followed suit by building either the exact same design or slightly modified. For years now I’ve been toying with the idea of building my own but it really wasn’t until last November that I had the epiphany that made them really make sense in my shop.

 

[BoilermakerFan]

Nah, you're going in informed. Reality is, the tweaks (if) needed, are easy for those of us who get it. It's always going to be difficult to impress guys like us. The target audience is likely not us. I have 0 print time thus far so I'd hold a decision on the product at least until I close out the challenges we have.

Andrew and I went in eyes wide open. Given my plasma table experiences I knew that we should be able to get it to high-level prod runs if we can get it through the builds. We're close.

That's nice to know, but I checked the dimensions of the FT-5 and my enclosure... the FT-5 is too tall. The HEVO standard size is a little too deep too so I'm going to have to go custom on it... but I think I can fit a 300x300x500 print volume in the box.

 

[lilscorpion]

That's nice to know, but I checked the dimensions of the FT-5 and my enclosure... the FT-5 is too tall. The HEVO standard size is a little too deep too so I'm going to have to go custom on it... but I think I can fit a 300x300x500 print volume in the box.

Cut the four uprights and it’ll become shorter [emoji6]


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[BoilermakerFan]

Cut the four uprights and it’ll become shorter [emoji6]


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Yeah, I looked at that, but I think it will still be too tall.

 

[lilscorpion]

So I have my concept - standardized cabinets with modular customized inserts. Oddly enough, the concept isn’t new to me or my shop however previously it was completely unintentional and it wasn’t until November that I was able to have that Ah-ha moment. Around October of 2017 I was working out the drawer spacing of my first sys-port and found that I had some dead space that standard Systainers couldn’t fill. I had made the mistake of installing the first 5 drawers from the bottom up and two from the top down. Doing so landed the dead space right at a usable height. After a few weekends of walking past the Sys-Port I came up with the idea of making some simple trays and modify them to hold my MFT implements. Worked great.


After using the Sys-Port wall for a few months I decided I wanted to move a few things around. While doing so I needed to get these two “trays” out of the way so I could get in behind them. I released the slides and moved them to another location in the SysPort. Woa…it hit me. Any cabinet that had the same width and the same slides, could accept this trays without modification. I could move them across the shop if I want. The same concept would apply to any shelf or insert that attaches like a shelf.

With only a few hours left Saturday so I decided to do the machine work for the cabinets and get it out of the way so I could start with assemble Sunday when I got back at it. I rough cut all of the ply and cleaned up the garage and called it a day. This (Easter Sunday) morning I was only going to get a few hours in the shop so, armed with a coffee, I began assembly using less complicated joinery. In all of my cabinets I dry assemble using the domino to align the boards and then drill and screw them together. To speed things up I skipped the domino process and instead fired a few pins to get the boards located the way I want and followed with drill and screw. Progress was quick, maybe even 3x.


Adding the middle divider without dominos is much more difficult so I build jigs to take the measuring out of the assembly process. With two boards exactly the same length I can add the divider, insert a board on either side, pin, drill, and screw and it’s perfect every time.


I’ve only cleared enough space on the wall for 2 cabinets so I’ll get these hung first and come back for the others later.


These cabinets will sit flush against the wall so there’s no need for adding backs to them. I do need nailers so the next step is to get out the pocket hole machine and drill a few pocket holes and attach the nailers.



I use the same stop on the miter saw to cut the nailers as I did the spacers (used for assembly a few steps up). In doing so, the nailers pull the cabinets square and a substantial amount of strength to the assembly.


These cabinets will be the same as the bases. on the frontside I’ll machine the face for dominos and attach 3/4-inch baltic birch face frames. When building face-frames to be removable, it’s nice to glue one side of the domino so they don’t move and simplifies the fitting and removal process down the road. I use some CA glue to quickly lock them place. A small squirt into each hole, push in the domino, spray the activator, and I’m ready to attach the face frame. it’s that fast. CA glue is awesome for a variety of tasks. Maybe I’ll do a little bit on it at some point later.


Since I was in too much of a hurry to snap pics while making the face frames on the two base cabinets, I’ll do so on this cabinet so the process is more clear. I machine the verticals of the face frame first. These are the ones that lock the two together. These are the only pieces of the face frame that I must install before mounting the cabinets to the wall because the machined holes dictate the spacing of the cabinet.


The verticals are installed to rough length (slightly longer than they’ll need to be)


and fill in with the uppers and lowers. With them in place it’s now clear where the verticals need to be trimmed to sit flush.


Since I can take them off, cutting them to length on the miter saw takes only seconds. Now they’re ready to be hung.


 

[Ctcarden62]

Great thread! I have noticed that you have several wide drawers in your new cabinets. how wide are the big ones and how much weight do you think they will hold?

 

[lilscorpion]

Installing the uppers - Part 1

With the first pair of cabinets complete, it’s time to get them hung. I probably should have snapped an action picture so you could see how little I need to struggle when installing these cabinets but I didn’t. The reason I didn’t was because once the first cabinet was hung and I swung the second cabinet up into position, I found that it didn’t fit. (remember a few posts ago I eluded to my design dimensions not being the final dimensions?). The cabinet was supposed to be ~33.5” long right? I quickly measure the hole and I get 35 5/8”?!


I should have had a few inches to spare…I quickly pull the tape on the cabinet and it measures 36”? So recap - I machined most of the boards Friday night. I know cut all the sides to length but ran out of time and I left the tops and bottoms to be cut to length first thing Saturday. Since I did’ have a lot of time this morning, I walked out into the garage and dove right into assembly WITHOUT cutting the tops and bottoms to length. So I assembled the cabinets using tops and bottoms that were only rough-cut to 36”…making may cabinets now 36” long.

I had a choice, go with 36-inch long cabinets and demo more of the previous cabinets or dis-assemble the cabinets, cut them to length, and re-assemble. The disassembly process seemed like a waste of time compared to demoing which has to be done anyway. So back to remove, teardown, cleanup.


And now there’s more than enough room. Too bad I didn’t assemble a third cabinet.


With the second cabinet in place, I can see it all come together. The previous cabinets were about 21" deep and these are 12 1/2" deep. The look is so much more open and now I can use the top of the lathe again for tools and I'll have a lot more room over the chuck to get in over the part when I need to measure. This is going to be awesome.



 

[BoilermakerFan]

I forget, is the garage heated in the winter? If so... might as well fab up a base cabinet and enclosure for the FT-5 while you're making saw dust.

 

[lilscorpion]

Great thread! I have noticed that you have several wide drawers in your new cabinets. how wide are the big ones and how much weight do you think they will hold?

Thank you! Big drawers on the main bench are about 46” long x 24” front to back and 4” deep. The drawer has double 100lb full extension drawer slides, 1/2” thick bottom and will have a 3” tall strengthening rib down the middle to support the bottom (when I get around to it). I’d bet it could support way more than 200lbs.


The big drawer on the Tooling bench are about 2” deep and only 1 pair of 100lb slides. They’re only for my extra long rulers so nearly empty weight-wise.

 

[lilscorpion]

I forget, is the garage heated in the winter? If so... might as well fab up a base cabinet and enclosure for the FT-5 while you're making saw dust.

It could be if I ever get around to installing the heater I’ve had sitting on the shelf for 8 years now. Actually though, it’s really only good for ~65 - 70 when it’s zero out so probably not gonna work well for printing.

I’ll probably end up building a cabinet at some point. Probably should finish putting the F5 together first tho.



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[lilscorpion]

I was able to find one of the Tooling cabinet’s long drawers open from a distance.

 

[Ctcarden62]

Thank you! I am in the middle of setting my shop up again and cannot decide whether to build my own or purchase Lists for my tool storage.

 

[kf4zht]

It could be if I ever get around to installing the heater I’ve had sitting on the shelf for 8 years now. Actually though, it’s really only good for ~65 - 70 when it’s zero out so probably not gonna work well for printing.

I’ll probably end up building a cabinet at some point. Probably should finish putting the F5 together first tho.



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You've been taking about that heater as long as I've been following your threads. I feel like all of us that have stolen ideas from you chipped in 5 bones we could pay someone to mount it. Then you couldn't use excuses like being too cold to work.

Have you ever tried pegboard or similar doors on cabinets. I'm setting up my tiny shop now and was going to do cabinets over the lathe, but considered making it where I could hang common lathe tools like chuck keys on them for easy access.

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[lilscorpion]

You've been taking about that heater as long as I've been following your threads. I feel like all of us that have stolen ideas from you chipped in 5 bones we could pay someone to mount it. Then you couldn't use excuses like being too cold to work.

Have you ever tried pegboard or similar doors on cabinets. I'm setting up my tiny shop now and was going to do cabinets over the lathe, but considered making it where I could hang common lathe tools like chuck keys on them for easy access.

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I think the heater thing is really just a long standing joke between me and all of you. At any moment I could easily hire someone into the house and have them extend the gas line to the garage and have the heater in place within a day. Instead, it sits up there on the shelf because I don't. I know, at times, I've subjected you guys to the following statements:

• Too cold to spray (my term for HVLP finishing)
• Too cold to do metal working (or work on the jeep)
• Too cold for laminate adhesive
• So cold I had to wear a sweatshirt.

Truth is, even when it's cold I still manage to get a lot done through the coldest months and, once I get moving, I'm really not that cold. I live in Denver which can get cold but rarely is.

Pegboard! Yes, I've seen pegboard used on cabinets. In fact, some of my favorite shop cabinets from YouTube have pegboard centers. Tim from benchworks has an amazing shop which incorporated pegboard in that way. Here's some pics of his build.

If you want to check out his build videos, here's the link to the first of a few in his shop build series -

. The guy is seriously talented.

As for me, I'll said I'd never use pegboard for cabinet doors because it allows dust to get inside tool easily. It's a neat idea to keep tools on the outside of the door because they'd be more accessible. I've not done it yet because it doesn't feel as organized as tools being put away. To be fair, I've never really liked pegboard either.

 

[lilscorpion]

... cabinets over the lathe, but considered making it where I could hang common lathe tools like chuck keys on them for easy access.

After processing that sentence for a few minutes I realized the use - hang tools over the lathe. I wouldn’t want anything externally hanging over the lathe. Maybe above my workbench but not above the lathe.


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[lilscorpion]

Drill (re)Organization - Drill Module

I'm still a few posts ahead of you guys so I'm trying to get you caught up.

The urge is to press forward on getting the upper cabinets assembled and installed but the mess is killing me. To de-clutter and regain some usability I decide that I’ll instead built some of the modules as I go and organize, as I go. First thing is always the drill storage. They’re the most used tools in my shop and the most easily misplaced (even when you have a few). I start by installing a shelf in a few locations to try out spacing, height, etc.



I use scrap pieces to get an idea of where it could be and then I grab it an put it back to see if the clearances are enough.


I did have a few ideas about a slide out shelf, a multi shelf, and more of a holster approach but I decided that this particular piece is not something that needs to be re-invented. The fact that it’s a module alone it what makes it unique. I shifted into GSD mode and quickly knocked it out.



When ready to test fit, I drop it into place and load it up. The simple-most measurements enabled me to add external rails as well which allows me to store up to 10 drills in one rack given the depth of only 12 inches.


Comfortable it’s right, I add in the end rails and cut a taper into the front side of the module to help my hand not get beat up when going for a drill.


The beauty of the module is that it can be completely removed and re-installed very quickly. It sits on 4 shelf pins which get a few screws to prevent it from moving. Here I’ve removed it to cut some Systainer feet into it which will help locate and retain a tool box that will sit above the drill rack.


The concept works. I like it. Even better that I can move it somewhere else if I choose to do so. Plan for the space below the drill rack is to have one or more drawers that will hold drill bits, hex bits, etc.


One down, the rest to go…

 

[RonRock]

I just wanted to say thanks for the referral to Ahturf.com. I am in the middle of my first big drawer project for some cabinets right now (17 drawers, wish me well!). I went to Ahturf.com on the recommendation of this thread and had a great experience.

I had a couple of questions about what screws to buy, so I gave them a call. I talked to Robbie in their hardware department. He answered all my questions and gave me a pretty big discount on my order. He said that if you are doing a larger order, always call it in because they will discount from the web pricing. I think he knocked like 10-15% off my bill, which was incredible.

So thanks for the recommendation!

I also ordered from them after reading the thread.

Wish I would have read this post before I ordered. Damn!

 

[rvieceli]

not to be too nit picky, because you do wonderful work, but having to lift that systainer out of the dimples rather than just slide it off a smooth shelf would make me crazy after a few times.

 

[lilscorpion]

not to be too nit picky, because you do wonderful work, but having to lift that systainer out of the dimples rather than just slide it off a smooth shelf would make me crazy after a few times.

I very quickly learned that and have an idea I need to test before I cut into even one more shelf. I’m hoping to get to it this weekend and will post more when I have something to show.

The reason I wanted to try locking them in is I’ve had a few situations where I had systainers half loaded and the contents shifted while I pulled the systainer forward and, as a result of not really having a grip, I managed to fumble with the damn thing almost all the way to the floor. I was hoping that locking them in would force me to have a handle before they leave the shelf. Instead I w created an innovation moment (maybe).


More to come.


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[lilscorpion]

Rough crowd. Get it though fully NIH and/or old hat.

Ok, some new shizzle that you can do something with (but certainly no rocket science here) -

You guys get "module" right? Maybe I went too fast and skipped some details regarding the concept. Let me a-slow it down and clarify.

A shelf sits on 4 shelf pins like these...

4 of them usually which get inserted into holes that you drill into the cabinet using a fixture or machine...kinda similar to the one I made out of scrap plywood.

This fixture combined with a brad point bit and a stop collar yields perciesly located holes to support a shelf within a cabinet.

You drill some holes, move the fixture to the other side, and repeat.

Now you have 4 holes. Take 4 shelf pins and insert them into the holes.

Now you have 4 points that are capable of supporting a shelf. Drop in a piece of plywood (or fancy a$$ shelf assembly) and run a few screws up through the shelf pin into the shelf material (or fancy a$$ shelf assembly).

and you have a shelf you can build off of (or to) or support an assembly which will contain or support tools. In this case, support nail guns so you can figure ut what you're gonna do next...

So I have a base, now what to do with the nail guns or did i include too many hints?