Muy bueno.
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Muy bueno.
Very nice floor. You are wise to wait two weeks before putting any load on it. I've always waited at least two weeks before putting any serious load (a car) on a fresh pad; curing takes months and I was advised by a guy doing this over 40 years two weeks is safer option.
First time for me too to see heavy machines on pex pipes. I have seen a few times basement floors that were flooded and had to be jack hammered/cut because of broken pipes but looks like yours went well.
If concrete stays wet on the surface, it never cures all the way. That's why they say Hoover Dam is still curing. Normal circumstances twenty eight days is the typical cure time. Temperature and humidity impact that as does moisture in the ground if there's nothing there to stop that factor.
Catching up on two weeks of progress here.
The carpenters got the bottom half of the wall sheeting on, and the last of all of the strips that cover the seams are installed for the glass board as well.
http://scontent-ord1-1.xx.fbcdn.net/...4b&oe=5980FB0B
The mechanical/bathroom/office walls are a bit further along than this, (as in done), but this give you an idea of what's going on. The far left is the mechanical room and I think I'm going to do a set of sliding barn doors there. The center is the bathroom. On the right is my office. The ceiling is made up of 2x10's, 12" OC. Probably overkill, but I'd rather go overbuilt than under. I don't really know what I'm going to put up there, but I like to keep my options open.
http://scontent-ord1-1.xx.fbcdn.net/...88&oe=594CE252
I bought some trees! I figured for $2k I can't really go wrong. They're some sort of Maple tree, supposed to be really bright in the fall.
https://scontent-ord1-1.xx.fbcdn.net...74&oe=598D8226
The bathroom plumbing is all roughed in and passed inspection.
http://scontent-ord1-1.xx.fbcdn.net/...56&oe=597AA677
The pickup and install trailer fit nicely inside.
https://scontent-ord1-1.xx.fbcdn.net...8d&oe=59779E7D
The service is all built and ready to go for the power company to come hook the lightning up. We didn't run the wire from the CT can on the outside of the building to where the outside transformer goes since it's pretty easy to steal a zillion dollars in copper when it's like that. The electrician is going to start getting the racks up and start hanging pipe this coming week.
http://scontent-ord1-1.xx.fbcdn.net/...41&oe=59889C0A
http://scontent-ord1-1.xx.fbcdn.net/...9c&oe=59784F41
I started moving some of the machines that have been sitting in storage over there. My Northfield #4, Diehl SLR, a couple of OMGA chop saws that aren't being used, a Castle machine, and my SAC FS305 jointer. I still need to get the Tannewitz Type U in there, my new compressor and the pop up saw are also still in storage.
http://scontent-ord1-1.xx.fbcdn.net/...87&oe=598DAE33
I actually got to set something in the place where it's going to be used.
http://scontent-ord1-1.xx.fbcdn.net/...36&oe=597BD562
Nice progress, Martin! Nice shiny floor, too. :)
This is great, Martin! And that floor looks really nice. Looks like the guys did you a good job.
What's glass board, and where difd you use it?
Fred
They did a VERY nice job on the floor.
Glass board, or FRP same thing. It's OSB with a fiberglass face. FRP stands for "fibre reinforced panel" That's what's sheeting all the walls. It's tough, very bright and reflective for light, washable, and I'm hoping because of the textured surface it has some sound deadening qualities.
Find yourself some machine skates, makes moving anything over 10k pounds easy peasy.
That's a VERY nice building you got yourself there. Please keep posting on the things you do in the shop as well as the construction of it. Very interesting.
I'll try and keep bringing the updates in. I've got a mountain of stuff that I need to get built in the old shop, for the new shop, and I have zero time to tackle it.
I've actually been half looking for some for a while. At this point I don't have anything all that heavy, but the cnc I'm looking at is 14k#. If I ever take the leap into an actual moulder I'll likely be going used and have to wiggle it into place on my own.
Oh, and I FINALLY got a date for when the power provider is going to knife the wire in the ground. May 10th. Had I known, I would've started that process six months sooner....
The service is all built and ready to go for them. I'm going to be real happy not having to run a generator anymore. It's tiresome and expensive running five gallons of gas through it a day. Plus maintenance. I was running the heater off of a little Honda suitcase generator with an aux tank. Changing the oil every four days was unpleasant. I got really good at it though. I could have it out of that pickup, drained, filled, and back into the pickup in five minutes.
Hello do you have any updates on the new shop. I hope all is well and going good.
Busier than I'd like to be. Been pretty steadily putting in 80 hour weeks and haven't had time in front of a computer to post a good update. Should be going through my final inspection on Tuesday and if I don't get pinged too hard on anything I'm expecting to get my occupancy. I've got one little kitchen to blast out, which I started on today, then we're pulling the pin and start moving equipment over.
Thanks for the update - been wondering - glad to hear your building ordeal is nearly done! I guess the power got hooked up without any glitches?
Fred
We've been down for two and a half weeks. I was shooting for two between moving and getting set back up again. The wiring is basically done. The only thing left is to wire the dust collector motors, which involves mounting a box on the wall with the starters and switches in it, and punching a hole to the outside. Right now there is just two motors, the main fan motor and the shaker motor. At some point, (after I've recovered a bit financially), I'm going to get my airlock rebuilt, and add a transfer fan to blow sawdust into a trailer or dumpster for disposal.
Airlines have a couple hours of work left. I'm waiting on parts for that, but the main loop is up, all of the piped drops are up, the compressor is functioning, and the filters are mounted. I just need to get the last few pieces in the system and I can charge it and see what I screwed up. I went with Prevost air lines. Not the cheapest, but really nice stuff, and depending on how many leaks I've got at the initial start up, at this point I'd say really easy to work with. It took some thinking to keep the airlines from crashing into everything else. There's a lot of electrical, lighting, and overhead door hardware to contend with. I ended up using Sammys and threaded rod to hang it down from the ceiling, and out away from the wall. The piped drops on the walls, I bent a kick into them with an emt bender and just used a saddle fitting to tap into the main line. Pretty slick stuff.
Dust collection is the next hurdle. My HVAC guys have the return air back into the building, and the dirty air going out through the wall and connected to the baghouse, but the main trunk isn't in yet. They were waiting on a fitting they mis-ordered.
Pictures!!!
http://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-...bf&oe=59CB1B7C
This is the mess as it sits right now. Nevermind the pallet of wire scraps either. The actual scrap from this project was pretty minimal. What is sitting there, is what I stripped out of the old shop and some take offs from reels that I got for free but were just a twinge too short.
http://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-...1c&oe=5A0F12C3
Bench area. Right now I just have the single bench that was in the old shop. My plan is to dumpster this bench and build three new nice ones at some point. One will be sitting where this one is, the other two will be across from this one on the exterior wall. I haven't had the time to work through it, but I'd like to put one of those Onieda Dust Cobras in each one of the benches. It's about the only thing that can service the chop saw, and a DA sander as well. I've got one that I used on the dovetailer, and have been quite happy with it.
http://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-...b7&oe=59C82E1F
No cabinet shop should be without a pop up saw, and a Tigerstop. I bought these almost two years ago and didn't have room in the old shop anywhere for it. I'm looking forward to the speed, accuracy, and the added safety of a pop up saw with an automated stop on it. I still need to go through the pnuematics on this machine. It's got plenty of leaks. For some reason it has multiple regulators mounted on it, I'm not sure why. Behind this saw is where all of the draw machining takes place, and the downdraft table.
http://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-...4b&oe=59CBBC35
Shaper row. This is where all the hardwood machining takes place. The first SAC is for panel raising. The second SAC is just a miscellaneous shaper used for odd ball things so I don't have to tear down a dedicated shaper to do something weird. There's two Powermatic model 27's set up with Reliable cope clamps for coping on the other side of the pass door. The SCMi shaper uses an outboard fence with digital scales, I run an opposite shear straight cutter for sizing and a sticking head on top for doors. Just crank in the height for the cutter, set the fence and run the parts. While that setup on the SCMi has been a game changer for me, I'm anxiously awaiting the time when I can get an S4S machine and do everything in a single pass. Same with the Powermatic shapers setup for coping, I can't wait to replace those with an automated coper.
http://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-...bb&oe=59D1D878
Sheet stock storage in the pallet racks on the left, hardwood storage on the right in the cantilever racks. I figure I currently have about 4000 bd/ft of capacity in the cantilever racking for capacity. I'm looking forward to buying in larger quantities than I was able to in the past. I wish I had a few more sets of beams for the pallet racking. There's plenty of stuff that we don't buy in unit quantities that need better homes than just getting put into one pile. 1/4" sheets for example. At some point I will likely have to chase down some used racking with more beams to make things a little more user friendly in that regard. Otherwise they just end up in an unorganized jumbled pile.
http://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-...b4&oe=5A0C86D9
I finally have a real planer! I picked up this Felder Format4 exact 63 in upstate New York last week end. (Long horrible story with that) It's got the digidrive, and a Tersa head. It's in very nice condition. I even got my 15" four post chiwainese Grizzmatic planer sold quickly. To the left of that is the Diehl SL20 Rip saw I picked up last January. It took some serious time cleaning to get that cleaned up, and there's still some that needs to be done. I got the laser mounted on it and I'm pretty sure I've got that dialed in pretty well. It'll need some use I think to really know how well the laser is dialed in. My electrician was able to pull 120V off of the transformer in the saw to run the laser, so I'm pretty pumped about not having another drop for power there. We also need to add a switch to that machine to kill the power to everything. Right now the VFD that somebody added to the drive motor remains on if it is plugged in. I don't think that is necessary, or good for the VFD.
Next to the SLR up against the wall is the SAC FS305 jointer I picked up right around Christmas last year. I'm still looking for a Tersa head for that, and I still need to get the guard mounted. A jointer with no guard gives me the willys. In front of the jointer is the airlock I picked up last summer. It needs a complete rebuild, basically all that I have is the cases and the impeller. For $200, probably another $2k to rebuild, I won't complain. I think that one is about $4k to buy new.
http://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-...4e&oe=5A088F3A
There's only a handful of American made tools in my shop. The Tannewitz is the closest tablesaw, it's a Type U built in either 1947 or 1948 and will be used for ripping sheetstock. The further grey tablesaw is a Northfield #4 built in 1962 and it will be used as a dado saw. Forrest is apparently a month out on orders, I ordered a 12" Dado King from them, I'm hoping it shows up sooner though. Most of the low end Taiwan made stuff is out finally. Come to think of it, there's a pretty even split between American made and European equipment in the shop. There might be just a few more Europeans than Americans though. Take out my obsession with high end miter saws, (I've got 3 OMGA MEC300ST's in the shop, and one Derda), and it's probably pretty even. So scratch the handful of American Made tools.
The long horrible story of picking up the planer was that I was planning on just running out with my pickup to get it. I figured $250-300 in fuel, and maybe $150 in tolls to go get it. On my way there a semi trailer smashed into my front fender and door doing about $4k in damage. So I hopped on a plane, (free thanks to miles), and rented a Uhaul van for $1k and brought the planer back. What should've take 2-1/2 days and cost maybe $500 ended up costing more than ten times that. I'm a little aggravated yet...
We've still got some outfeed tables that need to get built, but other than that we're going to be back making sawdust this week. It's going to be a PIA for a little bit until we've got everything really dialed in. There's still a lot of work that needs to happen, but we can at least be productive again instead of just burning money.
Incredible, I love this thread.
Won't hurt a vfd to leave it on. Just put a fused disconnect on the slr, solves you issue.
Martin, I know it was a lot of work and some major headaches, but the shop turned out great! Thanks for taking us along for the journey!
I've got a spare 480 disconnect that's on a shaper for no reason. The electrician said to save it, and he'll just order up a switch since it'll be cheaper. We'll just punch a hole in the box that the rest of the switches and vfd are mounted in.
Since I never really had the SLR powered up until recently, I didn't know what the vfd was set at. It bottomed out around 48hz, and topped out at I think 80hz. Diehl told me to run the vfd at the slowest speed, since the saw didn't come with one originally, but if the motor is meant to run at 60hz, I'm just going to set it at 60 and leave it there. I wasn't real impressed with the track speed at the slowest setting, but it's adequate running at it's intended speed.
My eckstrom slr DC drive feed ran from 25 to 175 ft/min.
Can't remember the speeds the 4 position switch on my 404 makes it run at off the top of my head.
I usually run at 75ft min for most things.
I think it's supposed to be at 60 fpm at the standard feed rate. This is Diehl's bottom line rip saw and it wasn't adjustable from the factory. 60 is adequate, but most 4/4 material, especially at 13/16", I should be able to push more at 100 fpm on a bigger saw
60 is just fast enough to justify having someone tail it, but not fast enough to keep them hopping.
YOU'RE FINALLY IN!!!!! Congratulations Martin!
What a relief that must be. Plenty of space, bigger/better machines and the money hemorage should be slowing down at long last. (Well, except for that accident.)
I know you're glad this is (almost) done.
Fred
WHAT A FINE SHOP!
I can't wait to see some of the work you will make in it!
Martin, I've been following this thread for a good while now, and I must admit that I caught myself feeling really excited every time you posted a nice update. Almost as if it was my own shop that I was building! I applaud your desire to build the business. Having built a new workshop for my own business last year, I understand what it feels like when you're investing in a project that's often beyond our comfort zone (both financially and mentally sometimes, too :)).
Keep us updated, please!
P.S. I run an SCM M3 multi blade rip saw. I can get glue line rip joint up to 10 feet long. I think the dedicated glue line saws such as some of the diehls like yours do better than that.
You give my shop work sanity. Love it!
Looks like a well lit and productive space. I am sure you will enjoy it.
Curious in the future to get your feedback on that planer in a production environment. I have a friend who bought the Format saw for a production setting with 3-4 guys, and he is underwhelmed by some of the design and engineering of certain parts. He said it would be perfectly fine for a hobby/low use saw, but hard use shows the gremlins.
Planers, typically are a simpler, more robust build, hopefully with no issues.
Floorplan layout is a hard thing, even more so if you are not specialized, as you appear to be, though I am sure it was still plenty difficult for you. Looks like it will flow nicely.
I'm real curious on that planer myself. As you know, I abhor new, but I was getting serious with the idea of getting a Martin or an L'invincible since I couldn't find what I wanted used, and if I'm going to spend almost $20k on a planer, why not spend a few thousand more and get the best. (It's a viscous cycle) The problem is, you need two planers. Something like a Northfield for hogging, and something like a Martin for the finer things. That ends up being a lot of money sitting there, and we don't use a planer enough to justify the expense, but we still need a nice planer. I am hoping I can be a bit more aggressive with the planer and take some load off the widebelt with drawers at least. Taking a 1/16" off in two passes hammers the belts pretty hard. I should've bought a three head widebelt.... Pounding the abrasives is still cheaper than swapping and two more passes though.
I spent almost two years I'd bet coming up with that layout. I built a scale model of the space and cut outs of all the tools. Every few weeks I'd pull it out after work and play with how things were organized. When I kept coming up with the same ideas, I called it good. Even then, it's just a starting point, some things got shuffled around. We're just a generic cabinet shop, so you build work cells and centralize the equipment that is shared amongst the different departments. That was the second biggest issue with the old shop, so much of the equipment overlapped one another that I couldn't have more than two bodies in there without tripping over each other. If I had to, I could probably run up to eight guys, but it'd be really tight and really tough to coordinate. At least for me, but a good shop foreman can make miracles happen.
Wow! And said in my most Crocodile Dundee voice/accent: "That's not a shop...that's a FACTORY!"
Congrats...you have no reason to ever leave it! hahaha! :)
Thats a great shop. I hope it serves you well for many years. Enormous amount of time, money and worry, etc. Hope your business grows well.
Martin,
Congratulations on getting into your new space, and thanks for showing the process. Large or small, every shop has a hundred details that need to work together. This should serve you well (except that given your ambition you may outgrow it!).
When are you addding On? Lol.
Right?!?
You should've seen when most of that stuff was packed into 2500 sq/ft! It was like working in a phone booth. We'll see when adding on happens. Right now things are about just right, and I've got space to add the things that I really want to add in the short term, (short term being less than five years and hopefully the next two years). After that I don't know. I want to get this paid off before I add on. My goal is to do that in five years. I borrowed for ten, and amortized for 20, but I have no intent of making the minimum payment unless I have to. I like my banker, but not enough to give him $150k in interest. A cnc is going to be a game changer, but that isn't just pocket change to get up and running. I'm figuring $150k to make that happen, but it'll open some doors to work that I'm currently turning away. That work being anything Euro and closet systems, which I'll need another $60k(ish) to pay for. Give me the phone numbers and the capital to do it, and I could make $300k disappear in an hour pretty easily.
I'm still kinda sorta hunting for a real edge sander... Jerk :P
My baghouse is functional. That's a win. It'd had been sitting on it's side for two years in my yard, so I wasn't sure what to expect there. We even got the rotation right. It's funny how a 50/50 proposition, you're only right 1/3 of the time... I still don't have all the pipe up, that has been a massive pain. I just don't have time to hang pipe, but we're dragging around portable dust collectors from machine to machine, I'm far enough behind at this point that I just can't stop to tackle it myself. The HVAC guys are doing what they can, but every time we have a spike in temperature it becomes more of a priority to keep the other zillion customers screaming that their house is too hot, happy. Unfortunately, I get that and I know no level of whining will change it, so I shut up, and give them crap when they're here. "Don't worry, I'm just trying to carve a living out here...."
This was a shocker. I finally pressurized the compressed air system. 1 leak. As in one. Right by the compressor where the main line goes into the after filters. There's around 600' of pipe hanging on the ceiling, and there's no way there's less than 100 connections. This was my first time playing with that aluminum pipe too. I was ready for things to go boom when I opened the valve. Being an anal retentive psychopath about procedure pays dividends once in a while. I can't say enough good things about the Prevost product. It was expensive, but it went easy, it looks good, and I don't expect any reason for it to not perform.