Mini-projects

I did several mini-projects for the shop with my recent vacation. None of them are really elaborate enough to do a post on their own, so we’ll just aggregate them here.

#1: Air Hose & Compressor Storage

My air hose has been on a reel, which was bolted down to some MDF to make it somewhat stable, for years now. And next to it, on the “wrong” side because the air hose had to twist a lot, the compressor had pretty much free reign under the oldest storage unit. It’s been bothering me for some time, so I finally took the time to improve the layout.

This is extremely simple — just a back, a side, and a shelf tacked onto the existing storage unit. Now the hose is horizontal and, more importantly, better anchored so it doesn’t move around. The compressor is now confined so while it still vibrates, it can’t wander all over anymore. And there is now a straight shot from the compressor output to the hose reel input.

I was hoping to save enough space to slip the shop vac in the rest of the space, but no — the vac is about an inch too wide. But the heater stores there, and I can use the shelf above the hose too. I haven’t figured out the best thing to store on it yet.

#2: Dust Extractor

I really wanted a smaller shop vac that would fit under the table where I do almost all of my sanding, routing, and assembly. My shop vac works, but it lacks any kind of decent filter, and because of it’s height there’s pretty much no place to put it that isn’t in the way almost immediately. So I decided to buy a dust extractor. To my surprise, guess which one provided the most bang for the fewest bucks?

It shocked me — I figured surely DeWalt, or Bosch, or Milwaukee would be cheaper than Festool for anything. The DeWalt was, by about $80, but it has proprietary hose connections designed only to work with DeWalt tools. I don’t have very many DeWalt tools these days. This Festool, which is the “baby” of the line, was only $340 and it fits under the table, which if I’m honest was really the most important thing.

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That is actually an aftermarket hose from Cen-Tek that I had already bought to fit on the shop vac. Because it has several interchangeable ends in different sizes, it actually fits my new Festool Domino, my Milwaukee sander, my DeWalt track saw, my DeWalt and Milwaukee routers … so far everything I’ve tried to connect, I’ve been able to. So the hose that came with it, which is identical except for only having a proprietary Festool connector, is sitting in a corner unused. (I’m glad I didn’t spring for the anti-static hose!)

#3: New Tool Storage

You might remember the tool storage outfeed table I made some years back. It still worked well for storage, but it was too tall to use for outfeed support so it just hung around storing tools. But I got tired of having to constantly move it out of the way, and with the new outfeed table being my primary assembly station now I wanted to bring more of my joinery, assembly, and related tools to the table rather than having to collect them from their storage places and return them there afterward. I had the space underneath the table going unused, so I decided to put more drawers down there.

It’s basically the same as my other storage units with drawers; the only differences are the number of drawers and the use of outrigger-style wheels instead of just bolting them to the bottom. I did this to give me more space for the drawers instead of sacrificing three inches to the casters. I don’t actually envision moving this very often, but the casters are there so I can if I need to.

With these new drawers, I was able to move all my screws, screwdrivers, sanding disks and sanders, wrenches and pliers, odd clamps, and similar right to the area where I tend to use them (and I still have 2 empty drawers). Less often used things can now go to the farther storage areas, and I have one less large object taking up floor space.

#4: New Floormats

Finally, something so simple I didn’t even take a photo of it. I actually went to Harbor Freight Tools and bought, on the recommendation of several YouTubers, some of those puzzle-piece floormats. I bought 5 sets of 4 mats each so that I could cover the entire work area in front of the tablesaw, turn the corner to include the router tables, and then have another one along the entire outfeed table. There was one tile left, which is sitting under the trash can just because.

No, they’re not as cushy as the Woodcraft mats they replaced. But they are comfortable enough, they cover a lot more floorspace, and they don’t slip around at all, which is nice. They don’t even complain when I get out the planer cart and roll it over them. And they are easier to vacuum the dust off of as well. Who knew, there are a few things at Harbor Freight that aren’t a total waste of money!

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