How about some Tips N Tricks specific to the small machines and home shop spaces?

[RaisedByWolves]

IM a Toolmaker by trade and Im just setting up a small home shop.

Machine score and lathe setup.

Mini Mill Frankenbuild.

In the process I'm finding that what I'm accustomed to doing at work and in my full size shop in the garage, does not scale well to a basement shop inside of the living quarters. Chip control to keep metal bits from migrating on my shoes got me thinking about not only this, but also to the use of coolant and WD-40 and tracking that everywhere my wife does not want it.

For example, at work or in the garage I can spray and blow whatever wherever I want without concern, but with the small space in the basement shop this becomes an issue. Chips getting blown into/onto my compressor or stereo is not ideal, and coolant use can be downright wasteful.

Small tooling only requires small amounts of coolant, so looking around I found these 2oz needle tip applicators from Micro Mark and their brand of coolant Microflow Coolant.

Having received these and mixed up the coolant I found this very handy to put in just the right place in a small amount and the coolant seems to work pretty well. I mixed in 10% alcohol with the coolant, well, because I do things like that regularly as it aids in the evaporation of coolant residue and aids in wetting.

Having a spare applicator I filled that one with WD-40 from a dead can I had in the garage.

Here are the pair on my chemicals shelf ready to go.

Not sure why the WD-40 is black, but you can see that mixed to the proper concentration I have a half gallon of coolant pre mixed and have barely used any of the pint of concentrate. 2oz of concentrate maxes a half gallon of coolant.



Another idea I had was to hang my calipers up in a dedicated spot so its easily find them when needed.

I first did this in the garage, I was forever misplacing them and they need a "Home". Yes I cut the screw tips down with an air grinder.

I also did this in the basement shop, not so much so I don't misplace them, but to keep the bench neat and them out of the way.

You can also see my little bottle of diluted Anchorlube. The big 8oz bottle was a bit unwieldly and usually applied too much once I got it flowing, so the small bottle diluted 20% is just right.

The brown stuff in the small container between the two bottles of Anchor lube is the last of the sulfated SS cutting oil known to man. I keep this stashed away for only the most difficult cutting operations where nothing else will work. It is NASTY when you get it on your hands, but makes difficult to machine metals cut like butter.




So what have you found to be helpful specific to these small spaces.

 

[matthewsx]

I have a pair of old shoes that live on the steps going from my garage/shop into the house. I don't always remember to change into and out of them but it's a pretty good system. Also have some lab coats I can wear if needed.

I use dollar store spray bottles for WD40 and lots of other stuff. Everything hung up wherever works best, wheels, brooms from the dollar store and hand brooms/paint brushes for machines, sweep/vacuum rather than blow chips.

John

 

[Bone Head]

I don't blow chips, or anything else. Even though the 2 car garage is bigger than I'm used to dirt and what have you gets everywhere. Should I ever get a mill I don't want to blow stuff into the ways and such.
Did I mention blowing stuff out of my mustache it usually goes into my coffee?

 

[Karl_T]

tracking chips up from the basement is the second biggest NO NO for milady. As mentioned, I wear slip on clogs in the basement shop and take them off at the basement stair landing.

keeping chips controlled is a big job on my open mills and lathes. Have an open top metal box to slide around the mill vice. Use lots of plastic cardboard to quickly make chip guards on big parts, just tape and clamp together.

Chips still get away. A high power shop vac is the key. Also have a magnet on wheels for steel chips.

Oh the biggest NO NO, I only did ONCE. Used milady's oven to dry out welding rod. Did you know this puts off an odor that's almost impossible to remove? DAMHIKT

 

[markba633csi]

MMM welding rod casserole

 

[RJSakowski]

I made a couple of no spill containers from 4 oz. canned mushroom cans. I use acid brushes to put WD40 or cutting oil lube as I am machining. I have a flood coolant system set up for the Tormach but haven't used it lately because I don't use the machine often enough to warrant maintaining it.

For controlling chip migration, I use three door mats; one at the bottom of th basement stairs, one at the top, and one in the kitchen before walking on the wood floors. The kitchen has ceramic tile so if I have an embedded chip in the bottom of my shoe it is noticeable and the third mat or physically removing the offender works well.

 

[BGHansen]

Before my wife and I met, my shop was in the basement of my home. I stripped down to my skivvies outside of my shop, opened the door to a set of shop clothes/shoes. If I tracked chips on the carpet, it was because they were in my feet. I was also pretty religious about vacuuming up chips; had a compressor in the basement, but didn't blow chips.

My current shop is 50 yards from our house. More or less the same gig though my shop clothes are in the breezeway between the house and garage. I'll admit to blowing chips off my Bridgeport, but not my lathes. I regularly sweep and vacuum the floor though I wouldn't want to eat of it!

I have a gallon of Sulphur-based cutting oil, but tend to use a blend from Ridgid (will have to walk to the shop to get the model number) that's low-odor. I use Trim-Sol in my horizontal bandsaw and Tormach CNC, no issues with odors from it. I use Kool-mist #77 with a Noga coolant-mister on some CNC jobs on my BP. There's a bit of odor, but not too bad though it does make a mess. I use WD-40 when cutting Aluminum; the odor is what it is. My wife is a frequent user of the shop; she'll comment that she can tell when I've rattle-canned something, but doesn't notice any other odors.

Biggest plus for you is you are anticipating the problem and care enough to ask for ideas. I'm sure you'll come up with a good solution.

Bruce

 

[wachuko]

And here I thought I was going to be able to use the small side of the garage for my lathe and milling machine…

Sounded like a great idea. Now I am worried about chips and whatnot with the water softener, the batteries for the solar system….

Sigh

 

[RaisedByWolves]

I don't blow chips, or anything else. Even though the 2 car garage is bigger than I'm used to dirt and what have you gets everywhere. Should I ever get a mill I don't want to blow stuff into the ways and such.
Did I mention blowing stuff out of my mustache it usually goes into my coffee?

Been doing this professionally for better than 3 decades, never heard of this being an issue until I found the internet, and even at that it seemed like the "I wrap my files in felt" types that had concerns with this.

No offence meant to your concerns or to anyone who is protective of their files. But if high pressure coolant is not a concern on CNC machines, Im not really concerned with moderate air pressure. Short of surface grinders or machining bronze or cast iron on a regular basis its IMO a non issue.

Which leads me to another mod I've done, throttling down my air guns. I had two similar guns with different length and diameter copper tubes on them. One large, probably + 5/32" ID and another 3/32". The 3/32" gun blew just the perfect amount of air, but the length of the copper tube was excessive for every day use.

Cutting that down would have been the easy button solution, but its too good at blowing out deep recesses and blind holes, so I opted to modify the mega blow 9000 to be more sedate.

This took me way longer than I would have liked, honestly about an hour to get it just right, but in the end it blows juuust enough air to clear chips without launching them into low earth orbit and piling them on top of my bald dome.

The guns in question.

 

[RaisedByWolves]

I made a couple of no spill containers from 4 oz. canned mushroom cans. I use acid brushes to put WD40 or cutting oil lube as I am machining. I have a flood coolant system set up for the Tormach but haven't used it lately because I don't use the machine often enough to warrant maintaining it.

For controlling chip migration, I use three door mats; one at the bottom of th basement stairs, one at the top, and one in the kitchen before walking on the wood floors. The kitchen has ceramic tile so if I have an embedded chip in the bottom of my shoe it is noticeable and the third mat or physically removing the offender works well.

I like sardine cans as, well I like sardines but also as they have a wide low profile that lets the acid brush lie naturally well balanced. I also like to put a strong magnet in the bottom of the can to help it stick to iron/steel surfaces and collect the finer chips so they don't wind up getting recirculated into the path of a reamer flute and such. Having a second can for delicate operations is also a good idea.

I have a pair of old shoes that live on the steps going from my garage/shop into the house. I don't always remember to change into and out of them but it's a pretty good system. Also have some lab coats I can wear if needed.

I use dollar store spray bottles for WD40 and lots of other stuff. Everything hung up wherever works best, wheels, brooms from the dollar store and hand brooms/paint brushes for machines, sweep/vacuum rather than blow chips.

John

Not a bad idea, but it seems wasteful for the most part and messier than needed.

Just My "O".