You have shops. We have shops. Let’s do a shop tour this holiday season–and if it keeps going into the new year, that’s totally fine, too.
All are welcome: big shops, little shops, it could be the closet that you work from. Professional shops? Sure, bring it. Home garage? Of course.
How it works:
Don’t clean up your shop. …
When we moved a few years back I had to downsize. Built this 24 x 36 shop. I've talked about it on other threads. The inside walls are covered with flat galvenized sheetmetal. Which makes it a joy to keep clean and to hang all the random collection of things. Just use magnets. I knew the floor space would be smaller so everything but the cabinets running down the long walls is on rollers. So storage racks, etc, can be moved to make whatever space is needed, Unfortunately i have 50 years of racing memorabilia that I can't seem to part with. Books, posters, flags, banners, programs.....
It has 150 amp service with 220 for the welders. Because it is completely spray foam insulated the little window unit in the back wall keeps it nice in horrible North Florida summers. There is a gaggle of 5000K LED strip lights on the ceiling.
Took this picture after coming home from last saturday's local car show.
I can work in there if i have to.
My space is "enough". Big enough. Warm/cool enough. Well enough lit. Enough outlets in more or less the right places.
The stove (chimney visible behind rear passenger corner of GTI) has been nice. Not a huge amount of heat, but I've only burned scrap pine chunks. Ought to try it with some hardwood and see what it can do.
The work bench is lovely and I dishonor its name by keeping so much garbage on it. Horizontal spaces become storage for excess.
Wish it had a 6 or 8" I-beam over the GTi, long-ways, so I could hang my trolley and chain hoist on it. That proved really useful in an earlier venue.
Always wish for better lighting.
Always wish for ~25% more floor space, but I'd just fill it with more crap. The right answer is to have better system for storing the stuff I don't need in the foreseeable future so that its not underfoot.
"Outside" storage is sufficient for keeping the next project(s) mostly out of the weather. Wish the footing was cement or at least a good base of gravel and pea gravel.
well, i cleaned mine yesterday, before i knew this article was ever coming out...
Halfway through upgrading the wiring and I had to pick the lift up and unpack it to get it unloaded. 
not sure why but my youngest is the only helpful one
No cleaning? Ok, I guess I'll put that off some more.
Main garage is 20x30.
Additional rear storage room 28x10.
I need to spend a whole weekend cleaning and organizing sometime, especially in the back room. If I had less engines it would likely be easier to walk back there but something else would fill the space.
My shop and project for the winter months, An FM turbo my 2002 Miata. This was a really good excuse to straighten out the shop, mostly just putting away tools. I get a bit OCD about cleaning my shop. I retired this year so this it the place I spend my time working on projects. The goal to to have a good autocross/trackday car by next summer. The shop is 24' x 32' so space is tight. I live in SD so heat is a must, I had 38" of insulation blown in the ceiling last fall and insulated the wall with bats. The garage doors and insulated and the heat is 2 electric heaters, 1 18,000 btu and one 22,000 btu. with the added insulation I don't use the 18,000 btu unit any more the 22,000 btu heater is more than enough, it adds about $130 a month to the electric bill so all in all it's not to bad.
In reply to james Kepford :
In reply to james Kepford :
In reply to james Kepford :
Not much has changed since the "30 min a day" thread, but fortunately not too much clutter added... actually - a little less clutter since I finally gave away the Miata power steering parts I've had in the garage for 10 years. I had them posted for $20 on FB but when I met the guy I just gave the box to him since my main goal was jsut to get it out of my garage without throwing them away.
Along a similar vein, I just finished installing similar LED strip lights in my basement, so for the first time in 37 years I can really see how cluttered and messy it is down there...
Here's the current state of my garage. The XR is getting a new track oil pan, bigger PS cooler, rebuilt rack and PS pump, and a bunch of other changes. They're closing down my office so I'm permanently working from home from now on. The plastic totes have followed me home among other bits.
Great thread idea. I'm enjoying seeing the variety of spaces we all use. I'll grab some shots this weekend.
Been get some little things done like redoing the top end on the F500.
The Datsun sits quietly waiting for another day out.
Moved out of my storage units this fall. Tight working on a 17' car in a 20' space. Brake job on the Jeep was much easier than brake job on the Benz.
After a winter away at snowjob I'll get my tool cabinet out of the trailer
And finally work on the racecar in the new garage space I'll be renting(from my family)
In reply to buzzboy :
Cool building, and I really like the oversize people door on the new shop! Every shop should have one like that.
Had a 2 car garage for the last 20 years, had to share the space with a water heater, washer and dryer, and to be able to park one vehicle in it at night, so it was hard to get much done. Sold the house, moved out to a a new place on a few acres in the country, and finaly had room to build a real shop:
20x40x16 metal building, 3 roll up doors (two 10x10, one 12x14), and two people doors. Insulated, ran 220v, 200 amp service to it underground.. Built an office/storage room in front corner, with decking overhead for loft storage, with stairway at rear added after photo. 8' ceiling in the office, 7' headroom in the loft at the wall.
After putting in some old windows, hanging old barn tin and a few signs
Work area in the back corner, behind the office. Wall cabinets were all sourced from Habitat Restore. Red drawer unit in corner is an old flat file cabinet sized for storing blueprints, I use it for hardware storage, Had to go in the corner because it's like 3 feet deep front to rear. Bottom cabinets are just 2x3 framework with plywood top and leftover laminate flooring for the counter top. Worktable is 4'x 8', old projection TV in the corner was a free salvage from the curb, works great. I put a wifi range extender out in the shop, so the shop PC, laptop, and old Blueray player have internet access, Blueray to TV via HDMI, means I can stream racing and foortball.
71 Bronco chassis coming along
UTV on the lift getting a refresh, son's XJ, future C10 project, my GMC in the far corner, 912 and Bronco hiding in the back corner. Overhead lights I salvaged form a church that was remodeling, tin roof sections along the walls are from old barns around the area that are torn down, I grab what I can, hammer most of the dents out, and put them up just as I find them. Still need a few mre pieces for the back corner.
My shop is 10x20' with 14' ceilings. With a 6x14' car in it. What do I like about it? I'm living a dream. This space maybe tiny, but the dream to have a space to work on projects has been there for more than a decade.
The biggest challenge is the limited space and limited power. Because I lease the space, I'm not allowed to rewire it. Thus I have to work around the two outlets I have.
I have eight 3' long LED lights daisy chained together and running off the single light socket. Which work amazing and really make the space viable for work.
And every power tool is battery powered (Ryobi since I have lots of 18v+ Batteries). The exception is, I bought one of Ryobi's tiny little air compressors to run the occasional air tool or small media blaster. But the compressor runs in 18v+ batteries too!
The space may be small, but keeping things mobile helps a ton. I have several HF furniture dollies and the car is own car dollies when not on jackstands. The mobility lets me do things like this:
I've even been able to carve out a space to weld - again everything I've got is on the low side of the power spectrum to keep from tripping breakers. But it works.
It's not the fanciest shop. Certainly not the biggest. There isn't pretty much any decor. But it's mine.
Mine is not pretty but it is functional. Mostly full of dismantled fossil at the moment. It's a thirty by forty eight hoop building with a forty foot sea can attached to the side for storage. I have a big old poultry barn propane furnace which gets the temps up in about ten minutes on cold days, but this time of year I am mostly in insulated coveralls and I only keep the heat on for a few minutes.
I also have a twenty by fifty lean to out the back for other stuff. I have a 1970 F100 I have been picking away at and would have painted this winter if not for the whole repower adventure. I have two long tarps in steel cables, one of which you can see bundled up below that I can pull the length of the shop to paint things.
Completely unre-touched, and no cleaning effort (I'm pretty buried right now)
The car shop:
The wood shop:
The Woodshop is a story unto itself, and I will do a thread on it sometime soon.
The wood shop looks very homey. I could spend some time in there!
In reply to buzzboy :
That's exactly what I built it as. It's a man-cave... a place I enjoy hanging out.
The old fashioned woodworking workbench sits in front of a window with a nice view of the yard. There is a small garden sitting area outside with wonderful Great Gatsby style deck chairs. The walls are covered with mementos... pics of my grandfathers, tools and toolboxes that used to belong to them, stuff that makes me think of my Dad, and great trips and moments in my life.
This weekend I'll be doing a Christmas project out there with my granddaughter.
My 'shop' is our 20x20 suburban garage. I'd like to get my hands on those responsible for thinking that 20x20 is sufficient size for a two car garage... even 4 feet more depth would make a significant difference!
Anyway, it was a blank canvas when we moved it, though it took no time at all to fill it up. At first, it was just a small Craftsman tool stack, a few shelves and a freezer, plus my wife's Legacy GT, my bike, and a Ford Cortina project.
A few years later, I was big into RC flying, so I built some benches, and added some more shelves. The Cortina project had gone to a new home by then and I wasn't doing a lot with cars, except for basic maintenance.
Then came the NA Miata, and cars became the hobby focus again... bigger tool box, more shelves, more tools, and eventually a steel bench to replace the wood one I made for building airplanes.
I've used the garage as a paint booth a few times over the years, but never for a whole car... just a little too tight for that.
Most things ended up on wheels to facilitate the ongoing Tetris game to fit everything in. These days, things are fairly roomy if the Miata is in... as it was for a pre-event inspection a few weeks ago.
As it sits today, the ZL1 is in (which is the usual state of affairs), and things are a bit tighter.
Welders/plasma, bender, roller, some other tools, tires and a cabinet on one wall...
Bench, tool cabinet, freezer and dog quarters on the other...
And more benches on the third wall...
About two years ago, our computer crashed, which resulted in a new one for the desk... the old one, once running again was relegated to garage duty, so I no longer need to come inside to reference manuals, parts, etc. It's also handy for streaming motorsport while working in the garage...
Over the years, I've come to make pretty efficient use of the space, though I could really use more. We'll soon be back in fabrication mode, as I think the NA is finally going to get a full cage this winter. Though my wife isn't going to appreciate the ZL1 sleeping outside while the NA is being worked on. The bike may have to go to the storage unit for a while so I can fit both...
This is my attached garage in full Christmas wood gift project trash mode. It's a ~23*20 so a really good sized 2 car. Ir actually had a 5*12 bump out when we moved in that got annexed into a mudroom.
And here is the main shop where all the rest happens. It's a b shaped 28*20+18*23 for a total sq-ft of 976. It has Room In attic trusses on the 28' section and Scissor trusses on the 18. I like the amount of light I added and the shape seems to work well for what I do. I had originally envisioned the space immediately in front of the 2 car as parking, and the extra for a small workbench and shop tools, and the 18' wide for a 2 post/whatever the project is. I never bought a lift and now just use the bump as the build table and the 18' as storage. It currently houses 2 cars but has had 4 in it. I just use the upstairs for storage.
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