Triple Rack Update

 Ahhh, back to work. The virus is still as real as it ever was but virus be damned! We need to get things rolling again even if in some new hybrid way. At least thats the feeling I'm getting from what I see out there. These days when I get a weird look from someone I'm not sure if cuz I'm picking my nose or just because I'm touching my face! The one thing around here that has everyone confused is the inconsistency. Some businesses require you to wear a mask, and others won't even let you in the building but just down the road some places are conducting business as usual right next to a restaurant that has curbside pickup only. Wisconsins "safer at home" recommendation runs until May 26th but based on the vehicle traffic I see out there, most people have had enough of that. All of that to say this. I wish all the mothers out there a happy mothers day but I'm hoping the families play this one smart. The last thing you want to do is pass on a virus you don't even know if you're carrying along to your dear sweet mother. I believe my kids have some kind of video conferencing deal set up to visit with my honey bunny. No flowers and kiss on the cheek this year. Happy Mothers Day Sweetums.

 Anyway I got side tracked there. I'm back to work and working out of my toolbox again. Because I've had a bunch of questions about the triple rack, I've decided to do an update. 

Later.

Parts Cabinet Update

 A week or two ago I posted a video about a parts cabinet I was building to store harbor freight parts bins. The cabinet has been done for a while and has been working great. I painted it, added a handle and put a rubberized pad on top. This has been my go to work area in the heated portion of my shop and of course has been the one centralized location for most of my small hardware. Notice I said "most" and "small". A guy just collects so much stuff that isn't junk. Its stuff that you need to do DIY projects along with keeping the house functioning. I did throw a lot of goodies away and know I'll regret it because I can think of twice I was able to go back to the garbage can and recover something I decided I needed. I think my brain is like a rolodex card holder. Everything has a card assigned to it and every time something is handled, that cards gets moved to the front. How many times have you dug around in the garage, found something and thought "I could have used that on my last project". You could have but that index card was buried way back. Not further back than BB guns or measuring the length of a skid mark you just made with your bicycle, but pretty far back. Maybe some of the cards get stuck together and things just get forgotten.

 The reason I'm posting now is because I ordered a label maker and it just showed up.

 It seems decent enough and prints out some very important symbols along with the alphabet. The tray below might not even have anything in it but I just had to print out that label.

 At first I thought the labels would be nice but not necessary but I've spent a lot of time pulling out trays, groaning, pushing trays back in and pulling out another. Lather, rinse, repeat.

 In the video post I said I wasn't sure about the extra seven large trays on one side. I decided on shelves for those blue plastic trays that were scattered all over the garage.

 One of those "index cards" had 'kawasaki hiway pegs' written on it. I reached back into the scrap metal bucket and recovered a handle for my parts drawer.

 As you can see I still need to get a few more trays but maybe not as many as it appears. I've been giving some thought to how I want to store nuts and bolts and I just might make a few of my own trays. We'll see.

Later.

Hades Over My Shoulder

 Last time I told you that I was keeping busy playing with my nuts...and bolts and all kinds of other hardware that needed to be sorted. I got a lot done with that and decided it was time to start making the storage system for the trays themselves. I had a few ideas and saw a few on pinterest and youtube but nothing was jumping out at me and saying "build this style." Finally I just looked around my shop area to see what would actually work. I have this weird file cabinet that was actually the donor for the roll up door on the tool box hutch. I only keep it around because its a nice little rolling work area. A lot of stupid little projects are done on this thing when all the other flat surfaces are covered in crap.

 I decided to harvest the running gear and scrap the thing. My new cabinet could be built to replace it and also hold the trays.
 To get started with the build I would need to get a 4 x 8 sheet of 5/8 particle board up onto a pair of four foot high saw bucks. Sounds simple enough but if you have to do it without damaging any corners on tender particle board then its a bit more of a challenge. If it were even a pound heavier I wouldn't have been able to muscle it up there, at least not without a backache.

 I got to use Grandpas table saw for a few cuts so thats bonus. The rest of the semi completed project can be found on the video. Oh, the little paper mache puppet is something one of my daughters made a few decades ago. I had to contact her and ask who it was supposed to be. My wife thought Zeus but its his brother Hades. I'm just glad it wasn't supposed to be me. He's been sitting right about in that same spot all these years and I had forgotten about him until he showed up over my shoulder. I picked the phone up to take a pic, it was in selfie mode, and there he was.
 Check out the video:

Later.

Tool Box Transformation

 I was thinking about what the next phase of my work toolbox might involve and that got me thinking about where it started.

 The following two pics are of "the train" as it was called by coworkers. The two stacks are each 42" wide along with a 16" locker making it 100" long total. These are 18" deep series one boxes and as you already know the hutch with roll up door is something I built myself. Including an electronic locking mechanism solved the problem of having to carry keys for unlocking the treasures within. The second pic shows the computer drawer I also made.

 The size of the box was borderline and what I really wanted was deeper drawers. When coworkers offered to purchase the individual boxes of the train, I decided it was time to upgrade to a 72" roll cab.

 I didn't sell the hutch and that was quickly set on top of the 72. At this point I was worse off from a cubic inch standpoint than before the new box purchase. Not a problem, I had a plan. When the 72 incher went on sale a week or two after my purchase of it, I went in to Harbor Freight with my receipt and the amount they refunded me was the same price as the 26" top chest. 

 Of course I needed a locker. Yes I sold one off the train but that one was not the same 22" depth as these series two boxes.

 I didn't like the way the tops of the boxes lined up in the above pic so put a lift kit on the 26 in the form of a slide out work surface. BTW, that slide out surface is working out great and I use it every day.

 I converted the deep drawer of the 72 into a "power drawer"in an effort to keep from cluttering up the hutch with more wires and chargers. It too is working out great.

 I wanted to incorporate a mini fridge into the new rig and decided bolting it on top of the locker would make me happy. 

 It didn't make me happy. At the time of the fridge addition I thought it just wouldn't matter if it looked a bit unsymmetrical but it really looked like ass sitting up there. I had some other storage issues including clothing taking up a big drawer and a printer in the hutch that was taking up valuable space. The obvious answer to me was an upper cabinet. This was a really fun build for me and in this pic its still not complete.

 Reaching all the way to the top of the upper cabinet was a challenge so I added a permanent step in the form of a truck running board. At first glance it looks a bit odd or out of place but this step is wonderful. Because I use this "work center" kinda like an office, I sit in front of the slide out table, put my feet on the running board and work on the computer. It works well for me. Oh, because I know some are thinking it, that running board will hold two grown ass men without issue.

 A fun detail was making this coat rack from some old Craftsman nut drivers.

 The five pieces stand 88" high and are the same length. I obviously have much more storage area than I did with "the train" even though I have a 12" shorter foot print. That 100" length fit ok in this space so I made a plan to stretch this box that extra foot, which ended up being 20".

 At first my plan was to use this locker as a side locker to the 72" box. While working on the design I came up with the idea to add a slide out panel along side this locker. The "gearhead on a budget" inside me really wanted to make this work but eventually I realized that what I really wanted were multiple panels and no locker at all. Enter the triple rack.

 The triple rack is 3 two sided panels and one solo panel on the back of a pocket door. The hutch was fun to build and challenged me with its roll up door and electronic lock. The upper cabinet was pretty straight forward and went fast. This side locker with pull out panels and pocket door wasn't difficult to build but required a lot of planning. By far it was more involved with all its slides, wood working, and that pocket door. The payoff is getting rid of layers of stacked tools in the main box and also having a place to hang some odd shaped tools. Its nice to secure tools that would normally hang on a wall for everyone to "borrow".

 Whats next? This tool box will not get any longer. There is space on top of the triple rack for another project but there isn't a plan in place for it yet. I do have a bunch of micro project improvements I still want to make and honestly I never finished the upper cabinet. Stay tuned for updates.

Later.

Another Triple Rack Update

 I know, you're asking why I keep talking about this damn triple rack thing and that tool box. The answer is because thats what I've been working on and the bottom line is that this blog is about what I'm up to. When I start another project we'll talk about that till you want to puke.
 In todays video I show you that I've cleaned the hutch. I have an office at the shop that I've pretty much walked away from except for a large filing cabinet. All my office type activities happen at my tool box now that its morphed into more of a work center. This time of year when spring landscape proposals are going out and people are signing up for fert and squirt apps is pretty busy for me as far as office type activities go and the "work center" has been an acceptable compromise.
 In the video you'll see I've started hanging hammers and pry bars. Here is the first hammer holder I cut.

 Each of those lines represent a stage in the thought process of how I wanted to make these holders. In the end they turned out way less complicated than the above pic would suggest.

 I also will show you progress on the hex bit holders. I've been using this part of the triple rack all week and am very happy with how it has turned out. Blow-molded cases blow and not having to deal with them speeds things up. As I age, my eyesight has been getting worse. I plan to put some type of labels on the front of the bit holders to help speed up the discovery process. Other than that, this section probably won't get any other improvements.
 By the way, I do own more than one shirt. This just happens to be my go-to shirt this winter and its always clean when I get dressed on Saturdays.
 Check it out:

Later.

Another Boring Post

 Yes I'm talking about the triple rack again but the boring I'm referring to was boring two hundred holes for hex bit holders. Maybe this blog can be a yawn fest at times but I enjoy creating it so lets move on.
 I finished moving my Blue Point socket set out of its blow molded case and onto a triple rack panel. I suspect I'll get asked about the labels I used so heres a link to their site. I got them on Amazon. I'm sure they will stick better to a smooth piece of metal rather than a rough piece of wood. I'm wondering if I should just shoot some clear over them now instead of waiting to see how long they stay put.

 Another panel making progress is the T-handle panel.

 Nice easy access to these tools will be much enjoyed. I just hated unstacking these things every time I needed one. 

 Clamping a "fence" to the drill press table allowed me to keep all the holes in a nice straight line. That fence was also the test mule for checking the various depths of holes I'd need for different style bits. The spacing was all on me and turned out ok.

 Check it out:

Later.

First Panel Complete

 Last week I showed you a video that included a mocked up panel on the triple rack that was designed to hold spray cans. That panel is now complete and functioning. It looks really simple and it is in design but there was a lot of work behind the scenes to get it done. Remember, there are a hundred different ways this could have been done but I'm a gearhead on a budget and chose a method that involved more labor than money.
 The first step was looking at materials available to me for cheap and then making a plan. If you've followed any of my previous projects then you know my thinking usually goes something like "how can I make this stuff I have available work" rather than "what should I buy to make it work".  My brother had some pieces of stainless steel he was willing to donate to the cause and I accepted. I had a few pieces of 1 x 4 pine and cut them to size then mocked up some cans so I could cut a few grooves in the wood to accept the steel.

 To bend the stainless steel 90 degrees without a brake I decided to cobble together a type of press brake. First I scored the steel with a cutoff wheel so it would bend where I wanted it to.

 We have a nice selection of steel we use with the press and also have a pair of blocks that allow us to lay a big piece of angle iron on top of. Then its just a matter of putting another piece of angle on top and getting the whole works to stay put while squeezing it with the press.

 The finished product turned out as well as I could have expected and the stainless cleaned up decent enough for a tool shelf. I can store 24 standard diameter cans on this rack which is plenty for day to day use. Bulk storage can happen somewhere else. Ya know when I first started thinking about this project I envisioned the actual panels to be made out of steel and all the tool holders from steel as well. Wow that would have been a nightmare. I kinda like this first panel with the grey wood panel and touch of stainless steel to give it that industrial feel. I also like the fact that those cans are no longer cluttering my work area.

 Stay tuned for more tool panel updates.

Later.

Triple Rack-First Tools On A Panel

 This weeks update of the triple rack includes items actually attached to a panel although they are still kind of in the "what if" stage of layout. The video promises some detail on how I vertically mounted a tray of T-handle wrenches so lets get right into it.
 The video will show the end result but here is the back side of a blow molded tray of T-handle allen wrenches. The plan was to put magnets behind the tray to hold the wrenches in place. The problem was that I didn't know how many it would actually take to keep the tools secure while opening, closing and bumping the panel they'd be mounted on. Harbor Freight finally had a sale on 18" magnetic tool holders so I bought a bunch of them. Each of these tool holders consist of eight 2" magnets that can be easily removed from their holder. I taped those magnets in place behind where the metal shanks of the T-handles would live.

 The next step was to spray the back side of the tray full of expanding foam insulation. Not only will this keep my tools warm and snuggly but will hold the magnets in place and give the blow molded tray some structure for screwing it to the panel.

 The final step was to stop by Uncle Tommys house and borrow a wood saw. Ya, I don't own a wood saw. Not that it matters a whole lot but a fine tooth blade would work better for this application.

 All thats left is to screw the tray to the triple rack panel. Check it out:

 Later.

More Triple Rack

 We had some snow the other night and that slowed down my progress on the tool rack project. Getting to work at 1:30am to plow snow really jacks up my schedule. I know I've said that before, and even recently, but its true. I like plowing and the timing of the snow events has been great from the point of view that we are able to get parking lots clean before cars arrive. I guess the only bad part is my sleep schedule.
 Looking back at last weeks video tells me there is some progress to report. The door is painted red. Ya I know I said I might spice things up but I'm cheap and already had the red paint. I can always change things up later if I go through some kind of mood swing and need a change of scenery.

 This wood panel is the one the door is hinged to. I glued this magnet into the wood to hold the door in place while gliding it into the cabinet/open position. My wood working tools collection is pitiful and I had to reshape a cold chisel for doing this wood work.
 Below the eagle on the sportster sissy bar overlooks the three panels that are now painted grey. These are the panels that will actually hold the tools. Choosing the shade of grey took about two nanoseconds and was decided in stride as the dude at the paint store and I walked toward the aisle with the paint I needed. He asked what color and I reached out and grabbed a grey sample while walking by. Never missed a beat.

 The panels were white with primer and looked nice and bright but I knew that my greasy hands would soon turn them grey anyway so why not try to hide the dirt a bit.

 While I was mocking up those panels I noticed that they slid too deep into the cabinet and might hit the back panel I was about to install. After removing 1/4" I'm left with six panels that have 19 3/4"  x  50" of usable space for hanging tools. Thats almost 42 square feet and I'm not even counting the seventh panel that is the back of the door slide. I started wondering about how much storage space I'm actually gaining and started comparing the triple rack to the triple bank 72" box it hangs on. If you go on the basis that tools in the box will only be one layer thick then its easy to compare size. Each panel is about the same square footage as the big drawer in the tool box. That means my new triple rack will theoretically hold about as many tools as the big center section and the left section of the 72. Of course the box will hold bulkier tools and a lot more weight but I thought it was fun to compare.

  I like to try to keep the dust down in the shop and temps were just right for some outdoor work. The ground was froze so when setting a wood piece down it didn't get wet but it was just warm enough to not need a jacket between cuts. Somehow working over a garbage can seems appropriate when you consider my lack of woodworking skills.  Thats all for now. I'm hoping my next report involves an assembled project with something hanging on at least one panel.

Later.

Triple Rack Update

 Last time I reported slow progress on the triple rack. It would appear that things are still going slow but actually a lot of work goes into these small accomplishments. Cut stock, mock up, primer, change the plan and start over, screw ups, paint, trip to store and then assembly. Don't forget pics and video, it all takes time. Some of the work was done at home, some at the shop and some at my brothers house in his heated shop.

 In the end it doesn't look like I got much done but I can see light at the end of the tunnel for the box and panels. The final step will be laying out the panels for tools and making the actual tool holders.
 Here are the individual slide holders. Getting all twelve aligned wasn't as easy as I thought it would be but in the end the panels work pretty smoothly.

 Even this slide works nice but it didn't earlier when I had accidentally run a screw through it.

 I'm no wood worker but I was able to figure out that if I clamped a piece of wood along side this piece of plywood I'd be able to use my new forstner bit to create this relief for the lock mechanism.

Check out the progress on the triple rack in this weeks video:

Later.