Re - mis - dis - organization

T

TRX

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My project for today was to organize the "stuff" in my shop. Most of it has been stored in the "looks like space for it here" system. Now that I have new machinery and a bunch of new tooling I need a better plan, particularly since I just found I've bought multiple duplicates of some things because the first ones weren't stored anywhere near where they might be used...

An amazing amount of "stuff" has colonized the drawers of the toolboxes. And some of the tools, while expensive or useful, aren't used often enough to justify precious drawer space. A lot of things are getting evicted to secondary storage; mostly plastic storage bins in the otherwise-useless open spaces under the roll-about drawers.

I was looking at half a drawer full of threading dies. A full set of metric, and inch in 7/8, larger ones in 1" or hex, and their various die stocks. Then I realized that *years* will go by before I use a die, even though "make a tailstock die holder" has been on my to-do list for, oh, a couple of decades now.

Most of the problem is the nice wooden trays I made for the dies, each in its own little counterbore. The trays take up a lot of space. Hmm. For no more than I use them, dumping all the dies into a small box would probably be space and time effective. But when I noticed that some of the plastic end mill tubes are *almost* big enough to hold a stack of dies. Hmm. If I got a few appropriately-sized tubes I could load them with dies and dessiccant packets - I have a bag full of those - and evict them to some lower-rent storage space somewhere else.

So I turned to eBay and found that "end mill storage tubes" got me nowhere. There are plastic tubes for storing coins, some of which are the right diameter, but only a couple inches long. Eventually I found the proper invocation is "shipping tube", not "storage tube." The "shipping" keyword brought up a nice selection of stuff.

I also noticed that, besides round, square, plastic, and cardboard, the tubes are available in diameters up to 6" I have a number of tools - boring heads, for example - that could go into 3" or so tubes and then near one of the shelves near the milling machine.

Hey, it's a little thing, but every cubic inch of space must be fought for...
 
A common issue for most of us but very nicely written, TRX!
 
mikey said:
A common issue for most of us but very nicely written, TRX!
Click to expand...

Yes it is Mike , we grow our tooling and machines but most times our spaces never grow , or actually shrink over that time . What once started in a basement , now occupies that basement , another basement , a 2 car garage , a few bedrooms , the back yard , the kitchen , a patio ……………………….o_O
 
My problem is that stuff comes in but never goes out! Looking for another Vidmar now. There is no hope that things will change in my lifetime ...
 
After becoming basicly empty nesters for 7 years or so , all my children are now back home after college . Open space and flat surfaces come at a premium , so even if I can create such space , it's gone within the day ! :grin: My place is in a shambles as it is . I have to un-pack everything to find the things I want to disperse , and it's laying around everywhere . It's fine when it's packed up nicely in the Vidmars , but then I cant ever find what I'm looking for !
 
I've been lucky to score a couple of ex-military cabinets in estate sales. Vidmar and their like are scarce as hens teeth and way expensive around here. The mil-cabs are deep and heavy duty and can hold a ton of stuff so I don't get rid of the plastic tubes most of my tooling came in because there is another constant nemesis, rust. And while the wooden cases my huge old navy reamer set and Greenlee tap plate sets came in aren't exactly convenient they seem to be really good at fighting rust which metal tool boxes and the mil-cabs aren't. It seems another cab shows up about the time I'm out cab space.

I guess because a lot of machinists restricted themselves to a little machinist box they did the drawer dump method of organization from what I have observed on CL of retiring or passed machinists. We were talking about tooling irritants and for me the biggest irritant is digging through a dump drawer trying to find a specific tool. As a line mechanic digging for tools was a waste of time and $$. One of the best things I ever did was put all my sockets and wrenches on rails and racks. The latest tip since going to multiple tool boxes and cabs was put it where you first think it should be or makes sense. And I've learned, THEN DONT MOVE IT! :)
 
C-Bag said:
As a line mechanic digging for tools was a waste of time and $$.
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Hey Bag . I go thru this as a line mechanic also . I had to split machinist tools away from the mechanics tools . They wonder why I need so much space in at work , and I tell them because you don't supply me with machinist tools . I bring them in from home . I can't tell you how many of my own carbide end mills I've ruined doing company work .
 
Yup, bringing in special home tools usually never worked out. Especially when I didn't get paid extra because the job wouldn't have gotten done otherwise. I think your wages and mine were not even in the same quadrant. Not even parallel universes!
 
My shop resembles your thread title, it seems like every time I kind of get it into shape something changes and I'm right back to chaos. :)
 
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