Projects Budget Workspace - Doing More With Less

As I was organizing my workspace this morning, I thought of a couple of guys here that inspired me to post this one. I have always had to do more with less but it hasn't curbed my enthusiasm for restoring and driving classic vehicles in my retirement years. This has always been my mantra since I was young. Necessity is the mother of invention. My brother and I built a 327 Chevy race engine back in the 80's out of this toolbox and a torque wrench on his patio.

I know you minimalist guys are out there. Let's see what ya got!

Joe

 

I’ve the same Craftsmen box!

 

You have a cement floor to work on, that is way ahead of me at the moment.
Beats the tar out of having a bunch of shop equipment and no shop to use it in as I have.

 

MR48 I feel your pain about equipment with no shop. I did adapt and overcome by getting a 20 foot shipping container and setting some stuff up. I now have a 20x20 2 car garage at home which is nice but it gets tight. I have an enclosed trailer that I store in progress projects in during the summer so I can park my drivers in the garage. I also have equipment scattered around 3 towns at my friends places so o can use it.

 

Several years back buying shipping containers at auction, they were pretty cheap, mainly because of the cost to move them. My dad hauled many for friends who’d buy two of them, set them side by side and flat roof between. One of his friend went a bit further with a peaked roof over both, cut out for some windows, welded in iron for window frames, etc. ran electricity for lights, welder etc. had about a Years work invested and made a damned nice inexpensive shop.

 

Only luxury I have at the moment when it doesn't rain. I'll trade you a few sacks of Quikcrete for an impact gun

Joe

 

I was offered one for $1200 several months ago but have to haul in fill to keep it from flooding. Only place I can park it is in a low area behind the house. Did elevate the patio back in April, hoping to use it as a workspace, plenty of room. Only problem is access. Drainage is a big problem down here in the Land of Cotton.

Joe

 

Built my Modified in this space below, minimal enough?

 

As you can see my shop. It`s full of customer projects. And a few came by to see me(picture from a few years ago)I have to work on my car outside in the gravel. In the heat and cold. Like I`m doing right now. Getting ready for a show next week. I keep my car across town.

 

I was thinking about this, this morning. The day under an old Merc with a tranny on my chest lying in the gravel in an ice storm. It was my daily driver and I had to haul my family in it. I'm very thankful for what I have and really can appreciate the cramped spaces. Reminds me of Grandpa Bob's little wooden one-car garage. Barely fit his '55 in there and hand-built all his cabinets from wood. One dim light bulb to work by but he got it done until he turned 90. Here he is in his '17 Touring T just after he came back from WWI.



Joe

 

I don't have any photos but two tips. Wheels and height. If You can put a single shelf up high to store rarely used stuff it is free space. Put whatever you can on wheels. Yes it takes a bit longer to wheel what you need out of a corner but saves space.

Steve

 

Did the change a transmission thing lying on a gravel driveway in the snow thing 45 years ago. When I moved in with
my better half I told her I had to build a garage to hold my tools. She loves to tell people that I told her I was building a garage, but not that it was only 60 square feet smaller than the house. It was all I could get past zoning or it would have been larger.

 

I can relate, here are some photo's of my back yard as a shop.
I now have an actual "carolina car port" one car garage ( 12 x 22) small, but a god send.
(pm me if you decide to go that route , the car port that is) . My buddy Sam helping me with the short block. And lastly, the "taj mah-hall".

 

I have way more space than you guys - however, you have inspired me to get back to work on my car.

 

Back before I bought this house complete with 1800 sq ft shop I had nothing but a partial gravel drive.

IF it fit thru my patio doors in the kitchen of my last house then my kitchen became my short term work shop. Infact I built 2 engines in that kitchen!

I'd take my parts into the kitchen, do what ever magic I was going to do, sanding, straightening, rebuilding etc. Then once that part was done it got stored in my 8x10 little metal shed and then on to the next part!

Yep there were days when I was on the ex's sh*t list but she understood...

 

Man, don't build engines in the kitchen. You won't get supper
Do that in the living room

Joe

 

Doing a modification to my car I`ve wanted to do for 20 years. Wait till the week before a big show to start ? Quit at 9:00(Sunday) when it got dark. I spend at least 50 hours a week in my shop as I`m self employed.

 

I'm hoping the young cats are reading this.....rock on brother.

Joe

 

I once did a cam swap, carb, intake and headers on a mustang in a self service car wash in portland oregon . I was young and drag racing was life!

 

Re: Post #14

rbrewer,

I like your chain hanger set up for painting multiple parts. More capacity, heavier duty, quicker and easier to setup/takedown than anything I've come up with yet.

Tools in the cellar with very limited working space. No garage or barn for over 40 yrs now, anything big, along with painting, I have to do outside.

Ed

 

We had so much more fun building cars in our back yards or in front of the house on the street. I remember putting plywood over top the street because the jacks wheels would get caught in between the Belgium blocks that the street was paved with..
We would start by sweeping up a spot in the back yard and then putting up a frame out of 2 x 4s then covering it with plastic. Some of the sheds we made were really nice. When the winter came we would put paneling and other material that people would throw away over top the plastic and built a little fire place out of red bricks.. I wish I would of taken photos.. I remember getting a pack of hot dogs at the butcher shop and a loaf of bread at the bakery, with a six pack of 16 ounce bottles of Coke a cola. We got branches from the apple tree that we were eating all its apples all summer and speared the hot dogs and cooked them over the fire. When it was all done and we were eating I remember thinking we have it made. That was all real food, no preservatives and apple branches gave the hotdogs such a good flavor..

I was working on a real bad ass 63 Pontiac Catalina 2 door hard top, all black with 8 lug wheels. We were putting in a brand new 66 421 tri power that was never used. I got the engine from the local Pontiac dealer for taring the dealerships roof. When the salesman said I could have the new 421 engine tri power and all for taring the roof, I flew up that ladder and had that roof done in three days! I really thought I was the richest kid in the world, maybe I was...

That Pontiac ran so nice and was so fast. I did have to open the floor hump up to get the Turbo 400 in place of the slim jim.. The guy at the dealership gave me the transmission too, it was out of a demolished 66 Bonneville that was going to the scrapper. They let me strip it out in turn for sweeping and squirting the whole garage floor down over the week end.. Businesses were so different back then..
They gave me a full set of 63-64 8 lug wheels, drums, center caps, lug nuts and beauty rings for changing out the breakers in the garage panel. When they built the place they didn't use switch grade breakers and the breakers were failing..
Those 8 lugs looked so nice on that 63! I never should of sold that car. I did get a lot of cash for it though.. Parking it in my home made plastic garage and driving it in the snow and salt was killing it. The guy I sold it too still has it. He had a nice heated garage back then. The first thing he did was put it up in the air and clean all the salt from the undercarriage That's what that car deserved..

 

Thanks, the chain was actually rigged to hold up a leaning evergreen I liked, after all that work, the tree died anyway.

 

I’m building my coupe in a two car garage with my OT Camaro next to it. I complain sometimes but I gotta remember that I am blessEd for what I do have. I built a dolly to store my body on with enough room to crawl underneath to work on the chassis.

 

In high school my buddy switched out the cam in his mustang in a Super Shops parking lot. Good ol days.

 

Posted before, here’s mine, two car garage in suburbia

 

I'm a long time fan of the This Old House TV series and have seen a number of segments showing how to organize/build limited space workshops.
One thing I taught myself though was to declutter the shop by establishing seperate space for items that are not car related. Those small garden sheds from Lowes, H.D. etc. aren't terribly expensive and can be set on pyramid blocks without the need for a permit.
Another is by "throwing shit away" that is never going to be used, I see this all the time here looking at posted photos.

 

I thought I was lucky to have this old shed when I built my Model A, when it was raining I worked here on a dirt floor with a drop cord trouble light.

In dry weather I just rolled the truck out in the sun and worked on the ground with the the same drop cord light. HRP

 

100000000%

I go as far to only have project parts in one area. If they are too big for the shelving. I put them into storage.

It's a constant battle with a small shop that has projects going on.

Now that the kids are older, they wreck the shed organization (where the lawn stuff is and such) has to be dealt with every so often. But, that's way more manageable than all that stuff dropped into my workspace.

 

I was raising a family working 70 hours a week and built my 32 in the basement garage of a bilevel house . I was 2 months into it and hit with a bomb shell, stage 4 cancer in the lymph nodes . The good Lord , helped me through the rough stuff and the 32 was finished . That was 29 years ago .