Shifting away from the gaming news to more of a home improvement topic, to show off some of the garage workshop improvements we have been working on. This also doubles as my location for the resin 3d printer, so it is sort of relevant.
As is typical, when we moved in, the garage became a common dumping ground for all the miscellaneous items – boxes, tools, spare parts, etc gathered in the space. The plan had always been to set half of the garage as a workspace, and initially I made some progress with a work table, but then stalled out with a number of old shelving units stepping in for true organization.
With prompting from the wife, we purchased an built a replacement workbench/storage unit, which was able to storage and organize most of the tools from the old storage cabinet, as well a much of the resin printing supplies. It also provided a good location for the printer and parts themselves with the addition of a couple of silicon work mats.
Behind the workbench, we mounted some peg board sheets, to which I then used various hooks and pieces to hang the majority of my hand tools. It is still a work in progress, I shift items here and there occasionally, but almost everything fit in a useful location, and I have some remaining room for growth. The support for the peg board also gave me space to place battery charges and other miscellaneous items, and mounted into the wall studs, is proving to be very sturdy.
To the side, I mounted an old Ikea cabinet using a french cleat, providing for paint and chemical storage. This was much more of an afterthought, originally the cabinet was not going to be used, but the size fit the space fairly well and was too good to pass up. Although my saw was a bit uneven on the straight cuts, the cleat was close enough to be workable, and it was hidden behind the cabinet anyway. And the old toolbox fits underneath it without much issue, so no lost space.
On the other side of the garage, we used some Ryobi tracks and started to hang the garden tools and power equipment, gathering various items from around the space. The garage doors themselves allow for 18 inches of space on the side, which provides enough for the lawn mower and similar tools, and the rest are hung on the wall. A couple of sturdy hooks mounted into the wall studs provided space for the step ladder, though it had to be hung upside down to fit the space. And fortunately it does not block the fuse box, in case that becomes necessary.
My spare wood panel storage is now in the back corner and more consolidated, though I still need a space to store (or at least organize) my scrap wood pieces. The next idea is to add a shelf below my home-build work table (the non-purchased one), which would store my router table and likely be able to fit a good bit of these extra scraps. That would leave my table saw, which I would hang on the wall, except for the hassle involved in pulling it out – it would likely make me much less likely to actually use it.
