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This year my wife and I took on a few outside projects and I talked her into letting me finish half the garage for my shop. I have been unsuccessful at working out of my father’s house.

I painted the walls with water tight basement paint and have been trying to take care of the floors. I purchased an epoxy finish for both garage bays. I will be framing the garage in half leaving me with a 14 x 23 space to use and the same on the other side for a car and storage. The ceiling has insulation but I don’t plan to close it in just in case I need to run more elec or get to pipes. I will be doing the 2x4 framing on Saturday and the electrician is coming on Sunday.

Is there anything you (as shop owners) wish you did while you were setting up your shops? I want to do more to the floor but I do not have the money.

For lighting I'll have two sets of ceiling lights. I am going to set up a cyclone for dust control and run the pipe right outside instead of trying to filter it. I also plan to hang a ceiling filter. I am trying to leave plenty of room for work bench space but this will be a woodworking shop so I need the room for several tools.

I just put down VCT (Vinyl Composite Tie) on my garage floor and it is like a whole new room. Easy to keep clean and feels good on the feet. I was going to do the epoxy, but kept worrying about being able to get it down properly (and staying down). When I priced the difference between a good epoxy job (with box story epoxy kits) and the tile, the tile was just a bit more expensive. I got the tile at Lowes. The tile was way easy to put down. Almost fool proof. You just mark where your first row is going and then spread the glue. Once the glue dried (and that is the cool part) start laying the tile.

I think it is durable. It is the same stuff you see in hospitals and shopping center. They pull pallet jacks over it all the time. I actually dropped a large hunk of wood on it from my attic and couldn't find where it hit. My wife’s family moved a large antique safe into my garage when I wasn't home. They had problems getting it into the garage and left some scratches. I just removed the polish that was down and recoated it and it looks fine. If it had been epoxy, I would notice the scratches 'till I moved.

For me that is really as far as I have gotten on getting my garage ready. Keep us posted on what you do and how you like it.

John

Good for you. I hope you are MUCH faster than me. I could not be ready for an electrician after one day's work. It took me longer than that just to plan the electrical. But I'm slow as Christmas. Good luck in your building and even better luck in your planning.

Ed

Every project seems to take so much longer. The electrician is my uncle so he is helping me plan everything. I have about 4 guys coming to help so hopefully it will work out with out to many problems. Hopefully we get work done first and beers done later but sometimes it seems to go the other way around.

I've been refining and reworking my shop space ever since I moved into it, about 13 years ago.

One thing that I really wish that I could have done back when I moved in, but just ran out of time to do, is to get a better floor in. I have the old concrete floor that is uneven, breaking in places, and hard to sweep clean. I has, however, accumulated the history of 13 years of full time work, so there is a certain charm in that. Still, I wish that I bad a good floor.

Other than that:
-good storage
-good lighting, general and task
-flexible layout, put everything on good casters right from the beginning.

_________________
Expectation is the source of all misery; comparison the thief of joy.
http://redrivercanoe.ca/

flooring seems to be my big issue too. I don't have that much extra so I am going with a patch and paint approach. I thought of putting a floating plywood subfloor down but decided against it for now. I can always add one later.

As for mobility I already have a few items on casters and I just picked up an adjustable base for my non-existant bandsaw. The floor has a slight pitch so many tools will be set up so they are level.

Outlets, lots of 110v outlets, and if you can afford it, at least
two 220v outlets along each of the long walls about 25% of the
length of the wall in from the corners. 20 amp breakers for the
110, and 20 or 30 (I did one of each) for the 220. 12 gauge
wire for all the 20 amp circuits, 10 gauge for the 30 amp. If you're putting in your
own lighting, have the electrician put a couple of junction boxes
in the ceiling, on the center about 25% of the way from each
of the end walls. You'll want more lighting than you think at
first. If you watch the sales, you can get 4' or 8' shop lights
at very reasonable prices at local box or hardware stores.
Try and get ones with covers on them- they are usually pretty
flimsy, but hitting them with a long board by accident usually
won't break the light tube (and release some mercury into the
shop). Code says if you hard mount the lights they need to be hard
wired, but I've often just run regular 3-wire appliance cord to a
junction box with receptacles mounted to it. Put the lights
about 18" to 24" out from the walls, so you don't cast shadows
on your benches.

If you're having the electrician put in a sub-panel, make sure to get one
with room for more circuits. The larger box won't cost more than a couple
of dollars more, and you'll have room for expansion.

_________________
Gene

Politicians and diapers must be changed often, and for the same reason- Mark Twain

Later. I thought that, too. Later easily becomes never, that's why I mentioned the floor. If you don't do it now you may never do it. Not only is it an issue of easy cleaning, foot/leg/back comfort, but as you point out, keeping your tools level. Keeping the tools level becomes an issue when you have benches that line up with your power tools for infeed/outfeed, etc.

As the floor is the bottom of everything in your shop, you really do need to start there. Everything else CAN be done later. Once you start putting stuff into the shop, and working in there, doing the floor will be very difficult.

_________________
Expectation is the source of all misery; comparison the thief of joy.
http://redrivercanoe.ca/