Small shop material storage?

M. Moore · Dec 20, 2022

Here is my rack. It is 8’ tall and holds 10-12’ long material on four supports. Primarily flat bar stock with some angle and some tube as well. The pieces lift down and either go left or right for cutting on my cold saws. It is a very efficient system for my work.
The deliveries roll in on a modified lineberry cart that can easily move around with 1500 lbs. I don’t do a lot of round bar work so I don’t carry much stock.

I used 1.5” square tube and then have a 1” tube inside that I can pull out for crane loading then I flip or slide the pieces back. The 3/4” x 4” x 10’ is just over 100lbs so the crane is handy for those but most stock I can just lift off as needed.
I get all my stock pre-cut in half at the supplier given I use fairly short pieces all the time. For longer stock I have a bandsaw setup outside.

wheelieking71 · Dec 21, 2022

Rack welded to one wall of a connex/sea-can. I have a 40ft high-cube, and had a pile of random steel rems. I just started welding shit to the wall till I had a rack.
It isn't pretty, But only sticks out 18-20" from the wall and is super functional. It is made from scraps, so it is made from a very high mix of sizes. If a guy didnt know and looked at it empty he would think "was this dude on meth?!" LOL. But, it was free! I'll see if I can dig up a pic......

604Pook · Dec 21, 2022

M. Moore said:
Here is my rack. It is 8’ tall and holds 10-12’ long material on four supports. Primarily flat bar stock with some angle and some tube as well. The pieces lift down and either go left or right for cutting on my cold saws. It is a very efficient system for my work.
The deliveries roll in on a modified lineberry cart that can easily move around with 1500 lbs. I don’t do a lot of round bar work so I don’t carry much stock.

I used 1.5” square tube and then have a 1” tube inside that I can pull out for crane loading then I flip or slide the pieces back. The 3/4” x 4” x 10’ is just over 100lbs so the crane is handy for those but most stock I can just lift off as needed.
I get all my stock pre-cut in half at the supplier given I use fairly short pieces all the time. For longer stock I have a bandsaw setup outside.
View attachment 382028 View attachment 382030

That's a nice setup.

604Pook · Dec 21, 2022

Thanks guys, given me some ideas.

I am 6 hours each way to our main city area and where my family's shop is, that's where I will be getting most material delivered to, then cutting to appropriate sizes then dragging it up with my own trailer. There is a couple fabrication/repair shops in the town (an hour round trip away) that carry some of your generic steel materials but I will be paying a hefty markup to purchase anything from them. I could truck stuff to town as well, but again, paying a hefty trucking/handling fee.

I will be building some covered storage racks outside the shop come spring/summer, to cold to do that right now as its currently -40c outside and has been the past week. Will be nice when it warms up to -20C...

604Pook · Dec 21, 2022

gustafson said:
My opinion, small shop should not be buying enough stock that it is an issue. I have one 8L 3w 8H rack with all my stock on it. No way that amount of stock is arranged vertically in that dense a space. It is right next to my saw so I can pull it and slide it on the rollers.
I have another shelving unit with stock I should have thrown away stashed in a corner.

why is that line struck out? mystery...

Not having material here, is a real pain and can hold up work for days/weeks. I live in an area where hoarding of any material is a common thing, as you never know what you will need.

MrWhoopee · Dec 22, 2022

For stuff between 2' and 8', I used a piece of gridwall to store vertically. It holds a surprising amount of material in a very small footprint. As long as stock is arranged by length it's easy to find and retrieve what you need.

Freedommachine · Dec 23, 2022

Garwood said:
Shipping containers and semi trailers are great for storing materials.

^^^ this for sure.

I bought a 40ft container and filled it with shelves and bins on one side and narrow pallet racks on the other with a walkway down the center.

The container holds almost everything requiring storage; spare motors, wiring and electrical, conduit fittings, stock material, big taps and dies, bins of horizontal mill tooling and HSS endmills, auto parts, extra hardware, hose and fittings, lengths of chain, sprockets, pulleys, ...

All of the surplus that clogs up the shop and rarely gets used; but when you need it, you've got it and know exactly where to look for it.

I'm still organizing, moving stuff around and going through a qty of label maker sticker tape. The process takes some time but it has been a game changer for me in my 1500 sqft shop.

richard newman · Dec 23, 2022

Freedommachine said:
I bought a 40ft container and filled it with shelves and bins on one side and narrow pallet racks on the other with a walkway down the center.

Do you have any problems with condensation and rust?

Freedommachine · Dec 23, 2022

@richard newman
Yes, that is an issue. I installed a vent in one door and another in the back wall and found that it helped to cut down on the condensation quite a bit.

Now it only gets wet on the most humid days or when the outside temp rises very quick - it only happened once or twice this year.

I'm going to install a fan on the back wall in the spring to keep air moving. I'd like to have it switched on by a moisture sensor but I haven't looked into it yet. I have no doubt the container will stay dryer than my shop after that.

snowman · Dec 23, 2022

Garwood said:
I think it depends on the work you do.

I do a lot of emergency repair work and having a chunk of material on the shelf is the difference between me getting the $5000 or the Cat dealer getting it.

I find there's kind of a network of material hoarder folks. Machine shop owners, farmers, loggers around here. Once you have a few semi trailers worth of stock piled up you're suddenly part of the club and you can barter with other's for things in their stash.

I like living right on the ragged edge of what could be considered hoarding. I give away and scrap a lot of stuff, but I also have one hell of an organized stockpile of hardware and materials. A friend of mine puts me to shame and he's getting ready to close his shop down and retire. He's asked me to take his 5 semi trailers of materials and tooling collected over 50 years. That's a scary prospect for me. I think that would put me solidly in hoarder territory, but I might be OK with that. Haven't decided yet.

Anyone in Lenawee County Michigan I'd like to join your club.

I have passed the ragged edge and am considered a hoarder, and would like you to come take it away for occasional access to your hoard.

I have alternate locations at friends and relatives houses.

Freedommachine · Dec 23, 2022

Garwood said:
I think it depends on the work you do.

I do a lot of emergency repair work and having a chunk of material on the shelf is the difference between me getting the $5000 or the Cat dealer getting it.

I find there's kind of a network of material hoarder folks. Machine shop owners, farmers, loggers around here. Once you have a few semi trailers worth of stock piled up you're suddenly part of the club and you can barter with other's for things in their stash.

I like living right on the ragged edge of what could be considered hoarding. I give away and scrap a lot of stuff, but I also have one hell of an organized stockpile of hardware and materials. A friend of mine puts me to shame and he's getting ready to close his shop down and retire. He's asked me to take his 5 semi trailers of materials and tooling collected over 50 years. That's a scary prospect for me. I think that would put me solidly in hoarder territory, but I might be OK with that. Haven't decided yet.

This is similar to how I operate as well but with a much smaller amount of stuff. I've tried to limit myself to one 40' container. Once I started getting it all organized, it became far more useful.

I can go straight to the all-thread shelf and grab just what I need. It's like having my own hardware store right there beside the shop. If I don't have something, there is a scrapper up the street with a large quonset hut type building packed floor to ceiling with all kinds of stuff.

IMO, the organization is what really changes "piles of junk" into useful supplies.

I've been planning to build a rack with pvc like implmex mentioned for awhile now. I picked up the pipe at an auction, I just haven't made time to actually build it.

ksimolo · Dec 24, 2022

I did the 40' shipping container with metal shelves. It works real well. To prevent rust, I put a dehumidifier inside of it with a separate controller so that the dehumidifier was only powered when it needed to be. The setup works very well for me.

M. Moore · Dec 24, 2022

I have two twenty foot containers. One is filled mostly with wood, zero condensation in that one. The other has some wood, about 1/4, and there are shelves all down one wall loaded with misc stuff like electric motors, switches, bolts, plumbing fittings etc. I was just in there the other day and had a small amount of condensation on some items but it was unusually cold for this area at -14°C.
The wood acts as a regulator for the relative humidity inside the container which was a nice bonus I discovered after loading the first one with wood. I never get a wet ceiling.

ktmtek · Dec 25, 2022

604Pook said:
I am used to having a 60' of floor to 18' up material racking at the family business, which we had storage for odd ball off cuts in pallet type bins for the off cuts.

I moved 6 hours from that shop, and live in the woods on a dirt road, 30 minutes from a small town with minimal materials available. I figure I need to stock my commonly used materials, along with some handy sizes so I have material on hand for whatever comes up. I will likely be bringing material back with me from big city trips so I save $ on the shipping.

Needing some ideas for storying round stock, flat bar and tubing. Max length 20' but I will likely cut things down to 10' unless for a specific job.

For guys working out of small spaces how do you do store material?

My workspace is extremely limited, it's 4.5'x20', it's literally only enough space to have 1 length of the wall lined with all my stuff. I have 2 workbenches with custom shelves, then in between the work benches I have my 20 ton press on locking wheels for mobility & my wide 4 drawer filing cabinet (works fantastic for storing all my tool sets that have cases and various cases of hardware as well as storing any precision ground material that I might have), the i have another metal storage cabinet that's about the height of an end table and it doubles as my welding station with my MIG & TIG machines and I built another metal rack and shelf that go over the welders with a cubby to store my consumables & on the top shelf is my oven for powder coating & last I have my floor standing drill press at the entrance facing the door because if I had it perpendicular I would be tip toeing and tucking my gut in to get around it. On the opposite its literally nothing but a walkway to get up and down the shop. I have tried many different storage ideas most of which sounded great on paper or in my head, but in the end the majority ended up being a frustrating PIA. Only recently have I finally figured out a system that has been working very well and saving me the headache of constantly shuffling things around. The most important factor for me was to not have stuff end up in my way especially when I'm not even using it for my current project. My revelation was when I looked up and realized that I can essentially "double" the area of my work space if I utilized the space above my head. So I built big U shaped brackets and lined them up and down the whole area of the ceiling hooked them onto the rafters & those brackets hold any of my flat bar round bar tubing and even narrow sheet & plate stock that are 4'+. For my 2'-4' stock I have a rack squeezed between my welding cart and a workbench that holds the materials standing up. For my materials that are <2' similar to the ceiling i have u brackets underneath the tabletops on my workbench that I store them on. Lastly, I store any of my larger sheet and plate materials along the wall in between my workbenches and the wall. Sorry I carried on for so long, to sum it up, when options are limited look up and underneath for storage space

Georgineer · Dec 26, 2022

ktmtek said:
My workspace is extremely limited, it's 4.5'x20', it's literally only enough space to have 1 length of the wall lined with all my stuff. I have 2 workbenches with custom shelves, then in between the work benches I have my 20 ton press on locking wheels for mobility & my wide 4 drawer filing cabinet (works fantastic for storing all my tool sets that have cases and various cases of hardware as well as storing any precision ground material that I might have), the i have another metal storage cabinet that's about the height of an end table and it doubles as my welding station with my MIG & TIG machines and I built another metal rack and shelf that go over the welders with a cubby to store my consumables & on the top shelf is my oven for powder coating & last I have my floor standing drill press at the entrance facing the door because if I had it perpendicular I would be tip toeing and tucking my gut in to get around it. On the opposite its literally nothing but a walkway to get up and down the shop. I have tried many different storage ideas most of which sounded great on paper or in my head, but in the end the majority ended up being a frustrating PIA. Only recently have I finally figured out a system that has been working very well and saving me the headache of constantly shuffling things around. The most important factor for me was to not have stuff end up in my way especially when I'm not even using it for my current project. My revelation was when I looked up and realized that I can essentially "double" the area of my work space if I utilized the space above my head. So I built big U shaped brackets and lined them up and down the whole area of the ceiling hooked them onto the rafters & those brackets hold any of my flat bar round bar tubing and even narrow sheet & plate stock that are 4'+. For my 2'-4' stock I have a rack squeezed between my welding cart and a workbench that holds the materials standing up. For my materials that are <2' similar to the ceiling i have u brackets underneath the tabletops on my workbench that I store them on. Lastly, I store any of my larger sheet and plate materials along the wall in between my workbenches and the wall. Sorry I carried on for so long, to sum it up, when options are limited look up and underneath for storage space

Don't apologise - there are some very useful ideas in your post. And yours is a genuinely small shop which makes my 8 ft x 16 ft palace look enormous.

Some of the others remind me of a book I once bought called "Designing the Small Garden" by Lance-Brigadier Sir Tarquin ffosdyke-Cholmondeley-Numnah-Smythe, K.C.B., D.S.O., A.B.C., X.Y.Z., E.T.C. or something like that. I thought it might help to get the best out of my 12 ft x 13 ft back garden. It started "When designing for a garden of half-an-acre or less... " I threw it out the window, and it hit the neighbour three doors down on the opposite side of the road in his back garden.

George

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