Sticking with the tool theme, I recently reorganized my everyday tools in the shop. These are things that get used All The Time and therefore must conform to First Order Retrievability.
Popularized by Adam Savage, First Order Retrievability is the property of an item (tool) that it must be easily accessible and you don’t have to move something to reach it. See this article.
Previously most of these tools hung on a two level shelf contraption above my main work bench. And it was pretty good. I was able to move hooks around and partitions to smooth the workflow. But. It limits the height of projects you can work on top of the bench. That had not been a problem for a long time. Usually, I run out of horizontal space first. For the blanket chest project though, I had a largish carcass on the bench while I reproduced early 19th Century moldings and ogee bracket feet. All I could do was perch it on one end of the bench that didn’t have the hanging tool tray above it. That didn’t fill me with joy. I just pictured this thing getting knocked to the floor, probably by me and smashed. As more and more work went into this, the price of catastrophe rose and I decided it was time to get that crap out of the way so I could use the workbench as intended.
There aren’t many options in a shop as small as mine and it’s already crammed full of tools and supplies. So, I needed something compact yet usable. Originally I had thought to make smaller, denser hanging tool holders that would leave more clearance over the bench.
I build a mock up out of scraps and that just wasn’t going to work. I am tall, the ceiling is 7-1/2 feet, but some items just would be conveniently reachable. Eventually, I split things into 3 areas:
- saws and block planes
- hammers and levels
- measuring/marking tools and chisels
The hammers and levels were hanging from the rafters and will stay that way, though I have reorganized them. The other two required tool…caddies? IDK. H. O. Studley I am not, but these seem to be working out so far, at least until the next great tool reorganization.
First up is a rack for chisels. Big ones hanging to minimize the vertical space they take up, smaller ones in little pigeon holes (some mock-ups at the end). In between I put in a couple of shelves for larger odds and ends. It’s approximately 14″ x 37″.
Next to it, you can glimpse the edge of the 18″ x 24″ organizer of measuring and marking tools. I’ll get a shot of that next time I take the camera downstairs.
The other organizer is also 14″ x 37″ and started off as a saw nest and grew to include block planes. I find I use hand saws more when they are easy to get to, this was the first thing I built. The old rack had them hanging down in the back and required a bit of effort to lift them out. As a bonus, if you weren’t careful, you could brush by them when going behind the bench to use the miter saw. Something that gets used a lot.
Hmm, while looking at the pic library, I remembered a little storage cabinet I made for wrenches. I don’t often need mechanical tools, but I do need them often enough that it’s worth having a set in the shop. I recently sprung for a set of SAE and Metric ratcheting wrenches. Super cool because if I need a ratchet, it’s probably in some horribly constricted space inside a power tool cabinet.
Anyway, I want them handy, but I don’t want my sons “borrowing” them and returning them all greasy (if they come back at all), nor do I want them full of saw dust. So, some scrap plywood became this:
And, finally, so shots of mocking up the chisel trays because…I shot them, IDK why, so here they are, haha.
