Shop mats

I went the cheap route and have sets of the HF ones stacked 2 or 3 high. Also have some from Amazon which look to be the same as the HF. They do slide around if the edge is kicked. But they tip up on edge very easily to dump swarf off the tops for vacuuming or sweeping. At 60 I'll feel my back after a few hours of standing on concrete, really like the mats.

Bruce
 
darkzero said:
Another option that I have seen quite a bit. They use some sort of wood riser. Not sure how they prevent fatigue but I hear they work well. I guess the wood planks are springy? Off the top of my head, Tom Lipton uses one & so does AvE. I tried searching for them but not sure what they are called or if they even sell em. I assume the ones I have seen are all shop made & woodn't be hard to make. ;)

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In the shop where I apprenticed back in the mid '60s these wood mats were called duckboards, and they were in front of every machine in the shop, and were made by the carpenter shop on site; generally, they had narrower slats than toe one pictured, and chips easily fell through, and regularly, the sweepers came by, took the mats up and swept all the chips away (and gave us a bit of a break in the process). In my own shop, I used duck boards in front of the principal lathes where there was a lot of standing, and odd mats of rubber or old conveyor belting on less used machines; my motto, whatever works or is cheap, or somebody gives me is fine.
 
I am using wearwell mats also.
 
I have a lot of excess plywood. I think I will turn some into a duckboard for my bench. I realized that I have a stall mat that I can cut in half for the mill and lathe.
Thanks all!
 
I've even used a bunch of layers of double ply cardboard (the heavy stuff from fridge boxes). Seam the edges with duct tape. They last for a year or so.
 
I have a 9x12 foot section of used conveyor belting.
Pierre
 
I'm going to try the Wearwell, my puka-puka mats are irritating for swarf :)
 
I am a fan of tall stools. If just the right height it is easy to alternate between standing, sitting and leaning. Not doing any one of these for too long seems to be the key to avoiding back and leg pain for me.

I've been considering getting a horse mat from Tractor Supply.

C-Bag said:
For what it’s worth I spent my whole life standing sometimes 14hrs on concrete. But I was moving around doing things not standing in one place. It was more about me feet than my back. But I notice when I’m doing machining standing In one place what gets me is my back and the back of my legs tightens up. i was given mats and they don’t work for me. The only thing that does is taking some time to stretch like do some toe touches and stuff.
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I took a class from a guy who had been a sports physical therapist before becoming a "leadership" consultant (the government loves to hire consultants to tell employees that they are happy even if they don't know it). He was a big proponent of stretching, and claimed something like 90% of low back pain was caused by tight hamstrings. Since that class I have made a point of doing leg stretches throughout the day, and I do have far less back pain than I used to. At least I got something useful out of that class.
 
I had a anti fatigue mat for my mill and lathe. Fatigue wise they were ok but a pain to clean chips. Hot chips would stick to the surface. I built a couple of wooden platforms similar to what Tom Lipton has. It's made from 1/2" x 2 1/2" pine planks with 1/2" space between planks. It has some spring to it, so it's comfortable. Very easy to clean, most of the swarf falls thru to the floor. Lift it up , sweep or vacuum the swarf. Done
 
Horse mats are hard rubber and provide little cushioning unless you're a 1200# horse. I would consider an alternative.
 
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