The creation of a workshop.

[ejparrott]

I bought a cheap kitchen knife - I heat it up with the blowlamp and it goes through like butter, and doesn't make a mess

[Snagger]

My nice new shelving had been in use for just a few days, when I entered the garage to find things didn't look quite how I had left them. Thoughts of WTF...... passed through my mind.

CollapsedShelving.JPG

Now I had not loaded these anywhere near their rated capacity, so I was greatly and unpleasantly surprised to find such a sight.

As you can see in the photo, the vertical members of the shelves are two-piece. The top clips into the bottom, and this turns out to have been the weak point. the replacement units have a single piece vertical, of much thicker steel. So a word of warning to avoid 'stacked' shelving.

I'm glad the supplier was so helpful.

I used to build commercial shelving, everything from lightweight stuff like this in offices, through medium gauge shop store room shelving, heavy duty fixed and mobile racking in bank vaults and financial institution archives to the huge warehouse fork-lift racking (like you see down stairs in Ikea). Dexion was the best quality but was a pain in the backside to build and is hard to find (long out of production).

What was universal was bracing of the uprights - the verticals were always either diagonally braced front to rear or has solid sheet bolted in (some types were made of single sheet with a folded face front and back) and across the back uprights, at least on alternating bays in rows. All the fixed racking was also tied back to the walls or ceilings with fed-bolts, stays and screws with rawl plugs or screw out feet that press up against the ceiling from the tops of the uprights. Spliced or split uprights were avoided where possible, but when used had strong flitch plates.

I can't overstress the importance of diagonal bracing or side and back-cladding any free standing bays and tying back to the wall any units that can be, and make sure the bay sits on a firm and level base. It sounds a little dramatic, but I have seen bad installations that were positively dangerous and had to work on replacement or repair of systems that had caused injuries through partial or total collapse, including those big warehouse types. You'd be shocked at how much damage a falling bay of shelves, or even just a pot of paint that falls off a wobbly one can do.

[ejparrott]

Thought you might like to see what I was doing yesterday. We've had the new workshop container spray-foam insulated now, and we've panelled it out with 9mm ply all round

[miketomcat]

We have a similar workshop at the boat yard but ours is a reefar box off a refrigerated lorry so already lined and insulated.

Mike

[heath robinson]

Mine's the same thing, the back of a fridge lorry. Lovely and warm, but not a lot of intrinsic strength to the walls for fixing stuff to.

[mickeyw]

[quote name="Snagger" post="766181" timestamp="1396119953". Dexion was the best quality but was a pain in the backside to build and is hard to find (long out of production).

What was universal was bracing of the uprights - the verticals were always either diagonally braced front to rear or has solid sheet bolted in (some types were made of single sheet with a folded face front and back) and across the back uprights, at least on alternating bays in rows. /quote]

Dexion would have been my first choice, but like you say, it can't be found any longer. The few old Dexion shelves I do have have plenty of bracing brackets (are these what you're calling flitch plates?) and are pretty robust.

These new quick assembly units have brackets that clip one bay to the next. Cynical me says this just ensures the whole lot falls over rather than a single bay

However when I have these in their final position I'll be tying them to the wall.

[Snagger]

Regular Dexion for storage room use (shops, vaults etc) used the same type of uprights used as weapon racks in MoD LRs, though often with just the one row of holes on each flange, making the large flange a little narrower than in those applications. They usually used a triangular gusset bolted in at each corner of specific shelves for stiffening. The cheaper brands, like Mobile Storage Systems (not to be confused with the MSS of LR drawer and chest fame) used lighter gauge uprights with equal flanges and a single row of circular bolt holes at 1" pitch, so had less flexibility of use (as in adaptability, not distortion!) and used plain straps of steel with a single bolt hole at each end and in the middle to be bolted to the uprights in an X, forming rigid triangles. It was imperative to form the X with two straps because they were flat, acting in tension only - they were not rigid and would buckle in compression. By forming the X , whichever way the rack tried to collapse, one strap would be in compression but the other in tension, holding it upright. For racks over 4', we usually had two X's at each end and on the back on alternating bays - the middle bay was plain but stitched to the bays either side for support by bolting through the uprights and shelves at each shelf level.

The rough rule was that all ends had to be side braced (ie, straps from front to rear upright) on the outer end of that bay, all end bays had to be back braced unless just a pair, you could not have more plain bays than braced, and that you could not have more than two consecutive bays without bracing. So a single bay would be would be brace each end and at the back, a pair would be braces at each end and one back, a trio would need end braces, both end bays would be back braced. A quad would have each end and the centre side braces and each end back braced. A quint would have a fully braced centre and back and side braked ends. You get the idea...

Some installations required more secure storage and had sheets of steel that bolted to the uprights to create a solid face cupboard. In this case, the brace straps weren't required (and would have been in the way).

For domestic use, you don't need to meet the commercial regs and aren't going to be dealing with the weight and height that commercial installations do. As long as the bays aren't free standing (your photo suggests they are), you can suffice with tying the uprights back against the wall with decent fixings and forget about all the bracing. It's only going to be an issue for free standing installations. For your installation of three bays, it would not have collapsed if it had been against the wall and tied back, but your plans suggest it will be in the future. diagonal bracing or sheet cladding through the clip holes at each end of the run and across the backs of the two end bays will be fine if yuo do need it away from the wall.

The flitch plates are just for jointing to uprights vertically but were very rarely used on regular scale racking (the uprights were normally cut to the required length at the factory). Flitch plates only seemed to be used in warehouses because the roofs were so high, allowing taller installations than the factory could accomodate in a single upright. These were sturdy plates and inserts that would bolt to the joining ends of the standard uprights, bolted through at least two holes in each face of each upright in the joint (so at least 8 bolts in a regular installation and 16 in a warehouse's Dexion Speedlock installation).

It's worth taking a close look at the racks at Ikea or Wickes (or at the 8x4 boarding sections at Homebase and B&Q) to see how it should be done (though I did come across bad installations from time to time).

[mickeyw]

Well what a busy summer it's been, the new truck I bought turned out to need rather more work than expected (don't they all!), and has consumed a lot of time.

Some progress to the workshop has been made though. I now have fully insulated and lined walls, although the ceiling has yet to be insulated. I also have plastic conduit all round with plenty of 240V sockets.

On Friday I had a mass eviction of unwanted rubbish and made a surprising amount of space. Yesterday I dragged a load of carp from the corner the mill will eventually reside in, and had a thorough hoover and dust with a view to painting the floor. The concrete is old but fairly clean still, but does have a number of cracks running across it. Last night I got one coat down, then another this afternoon. The paint was Leyland floor paint in good ol' battleship shade. Th floor painting will be slow, and bit by bit.

Here's a close up of one of the floor cracks. The concrete isn't super hard, and there are a lot of loose bits around the cracks. I tried pouring paint into the crack in an attempt to bond the loose bits. Time will tell how sucessful this will be, but I'm not overly hopefull.

What products are there to deal with this kind of repair? I dont think filling with cement will last long, so I am expecting some kind of epoxy epair product???

[Retroanaconda]

Good to hear progress is being made

I've heard that v-ing out the cracks with a grinder and the filling with PU sealant or the like can work.

[A Twig]

Best bet is some sort of vinyl reinforced patching compound, brands such as Quikcrete I think.

[CwazyWabbit]

We know you want to dig it all up and re-lay it really Mickey .........

[mickeyw]

No. Absolutely do not want any hassle on that scale Barry.

Of course a brick built workshop with heating, and big enough to fit the 110 in would be most desirable

[Anderzander]

Nice to see this moving on

[bishbosh]

Don't cut a "V" as you will create a feather edge that will break up. Better to cut two parallel slots about 10mm deep either side of the crack then break out the material in between. You then want to get some repair material, a non shrink grout would be good and fill the nice hole you have just made.

Only problem with this approach is most floor paints need to go on "old" concrete so you'll have to wait an age before over painting. The alternative is to use a non cementitious repair material but they tend to be spendy but don't need time to dry out so you can paint them quickly.

[mickeyw]

Got a bit more floor painted/treasure moved from A to B and B to C and so on over recent evenings.

Areas done now have two coats, and the cracks have had a good quantity of paint poured into them. It certainly seems to have glued all the loose bits in place rather well.

While it is all still clean I wondered about simply gunning some sealant into the cracks. It should remain flexible, and less likely to come out, unlike a thin bead of cement. Hopefully it will also prevent a tonne of carp ending up stuck in there. What do you think?

[ejparrott]

We've got some special floor gooey rubber stuff between the pads at work, but where I dug it out to lay a cable through one it's just got ordinary silicone sealant

[mickeyw]

Oh dear. I had forgotten about this thread. Over two years have passed, and a little progress has been made.

The insulation is pretty much done.

I've had to replace the roller door tube motor, as that failed and had no manual overide. That made things a bit tricky getting gear in and out through the side door for a while. I also replaced the timber cladding that was trapped behind the roller box.

 

I actually managed to fit the RRC inside for quite a few months before it was evicted so I could work on other jobs. It just fits under the roller door.

Last summer I finally completed the 10mm² SWA supply from the house to the garage, so that means the Colchester lathe is finally operational again, and no more running an extension cable from  the house when I want to weld. The cable had been buried for at least a year but it took far too long to get it connected up at both ends. I now have a CU with separate circuits for the phase converter, the sockets, the lights, and eventually I'll add a 16A socket for the welder.

The floor still isn't fully painted as I just have too much of it covered.

The Bridgeport is still at my parents' house. I need to clear enough space for that first. Currently I have V8 parts everywhere while I rebuild the 110's engine - an unplanned and unwelcome job at this particular moment.

Other equipment gained include a free vintage vertical bandsaw that needs a little TLC. Also I bought a small media blasting cabinet to help clean up certain engine parts. I'm running crushed walnut shells - they're great for cleaning carbon deposits without damaging the aluminium components.

[Kierran.M.110]

Nice thread revival, I can't believe how much you you've got crammed in there 

[mickeyw]

4 hours ago, Kierran.M.110 said:

Nice thread revival, I can't believe how much you you've got crammed in there 

Yes, crammed in to the point of it being difficult to move 

A tip I picked up from ingenious woodworker and engineer Matthias Wandel (find him on Youtube) is to have as much equipment as possible on wheels. that way it can be nested away when not in use, while the items you want to use can be moved into a usable position.

Obviously this won't work for everything; like my lathe, mill and #1 bench are far to big and heavy. My supplementary benches are currently Workmates with large boards clamped to them. They can be dragged about, but this often leads to the contents rolling or rattling off in the process. My longer term plan is to make a couple of mid-sized mobile benches, maybe with fold down extensions too. I shall try to make these matching heights so they can be pushed together for bigger projects.

[Cynic-al]

One of my grandads old mates used to make dolls houses and had everything in a single garage which all folded away like transformers so he could get his car in at night. He had a circular saw on a wardrobe sliding track which hinged out from a wall for cutting board.  A table on wheels where each side folded up with a different power tool on each side ie router, bandsaw etc. His home made tools were as impressive as his dolls houses.

He even had a bathtub sunk in the floor to use as a pit for car servicing

[steve200TDi]

Awesome bandsaw - you can't beat the old stuff, just carries on working, maybe after a little TLC though

Steve