Trying to make a comeback to woodworking...new shop pics inside...

[Terry Hatfield]

I've been away from woodworking for a couple of years and I finally have some help at my work so hopefully I can get back into the swing of woodworking very soon. I've not seriously woodworked in so long that I may not even remember how. I wanted to get my shop in shape before resuming my projects so I began by redoing all of the mats in my shop. I've had horse some stall mats on the floor for years but thay are a pain to clean and are really to hard to give my aching feet and back much relief and as I obviously plan to begin spending more time in the shop, it seemed a natural to try and make it more comfortable.

Harbor Freight has their shop mats on sale right now so I took the plunge big time. I bought 32 packs of mats which were $9.99 each. I had a 20% off coupon so tax and all I spent $279.33 for 512 sq.ft. of mats. That seemed like a pretty good deal to me.

Here's some pics of the shop and the finished floor mat project.......

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Kind of a pain to cut and fit around all of the tools, benches and such but I think it was worth it. I tried to get everything to fit as well as I could.

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Here is a shot of the outside for those that haven't seen it before. I built this shop when we bought our house and I've been woodworking in it on and off for 12 years. It is 30 x 40 with 10' ceilings. It has A/C and a wood stove for those cold days and nights. My shop hs been a great source of relaxation for me and I hope it will again be just that.

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Hope to be posting pipcs of some actual work going on in the shop very soon. I stopped in the middle of building 10 dining chairs so I'll go back and post on that thread as soon as I acctually do some work.

There a ton more pictures of the shop on my website of anyone is interested in seeing more. Scroll down to the "Shop 2012" photos for the latest...

Thanks for looking!!! Hope you enjoy the tour.

[Thomas Hotchkin]

Terry
Very nice shop, great pictures. Chairs can be fun to build, but production runs of 10 each is too much like work. Tom

[Kerry Adams]

Welcome back Terry!

[Terry Hatfield]

Terry
Very nice shop, great pictures. Chairs can be fun to build, but production runs of 10 each is too much like work. Tom

In all hoesty, that was one of the issues for me. It is a daunting task to build this many. I have a mission style chair plan that is pretty simple but there is still a ton of work involved in 10 of them. I'm template routing the back legs which helps to speed things up and the rest of the pieces are pretty straigh forward other than the curved back rails but it's all these mortises and tenons that eat up the time. I hope to be done with the first one in the next couple of weekends then the real work begins!

[Terry Hatfield]

Welcome back Terry!

Thanks! I really enjoyed working in the shop the last couple of evenings.

[Jerome Hanby]

I read the test of your post and my first thought is that is going to be a mess, but I was way off base. Those mats (and the job you did installing them) look good. And you certainly spent less on that solution than any I've researched would cost!

Did you make multiple trips through the line or was your 20% coupon good for the entire purchase? The ones I've actually looked at were 20% off one item, but I definitely don't closely examine all their coupons, I just assumed that they were all like that...

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Welcome back Terry! We have missed your presence here!

[Bruce Seidner]

I have every confidence you feel grateful and blessed to have created such a well laid out and safe workspace. For those who don't have the space or resources for non fatigue safe flooring I have found that Crocs are a shoe that makes every step cushioned. Thanks for your inspiring web page. Back to work for you!crocs.jpgcrocs.jpg

[Jeff Monson]

Terry that is really nice, I'd like to get some mats for my shop. I tend to move tools around as needed, so I dont think they would work? Nice clean layout, I bet workflow is greatly improved.

[Todd Burch]

Welcome back Terry - I too recently started making saw dust again.
Todd

[Terry Hatfield]

I read the test of your post and my first thought is that is going to be a mess, but I was way off base. Those mats (and the job you did installing them) look good. And you certainly spent less on that solution than any I've researched would cost!

Did you make multiple trips through the line or was your 20% coupon good for the entire purchase? The ones I've actually looked at were 20% off one item, but I definitely don't closely examine all their coupons, I just assumed that they were all like that...

I actually began thinking that I was just going to fill in some gaps with a few mats. I had a coupon for $7.99 with a limit of 8 sets so I bought those first. After seeing how nice they looked and how much more cushiony they were I decided to go all the way. I had another coupon that was good for 20% off any purchase more than $120.00 so it worked out for me to go back yesterday and get 25 more for the discounted price.

[Terry Hatfield]

Welcome back Terry! We have missed your presence here!

Thanks Ken!!! I hope to be able to hang around more.

[Sam Layton]

Hi Terry,

Welcome back, it is good to see you again. Your shop looks great, I like the mats.

Sam

[Ted Calver]

Welcome back Terry! Good to see you back in the saddle

[Don Jarvie]

Nice shop. How big is it? It looks huge.