What kind of flooring for a turning area?

[Bill Wyko]

In my new shop I have a plywood floor over 2x4 joists. I'd like something I can roll tools around on and something that I won't slip on with wood shavings from the lathe. Any suggestions?

[George Tokarev]

Those of us forced to use concrete envy you your resilient floor. We have to use cow mats or similar to take the strain off our backs and arches. Still a good thing to have in front of the lathe.

Lots of people just epoxy coat the plywood to slow splintering and use larger, rubber casters for their machines. All told, I consider it a good idea. You can always add a 1/4 inch of that 5-ply birch later.

[Patrick Taylor]

I'd LOVE to see some shots of your shop as you go, since I'm considering building one in the backyard sometime in the next year or so.

[Bob Opsitos]

Make sure the 2x4 spacing is enough to handle the weight of the equipment on it. Is you've got a heavy lathe supported at 4 points, each of those point share that load, so you could end up with a very heavy point load. It it ends up in the middle of a span, the ply could fail. This might not happen statically, if you've got something big out of balance the effective load from the acceleration of the vibration could be several times the static load.

You might want to add some blocking under the ply where your heavy equipment would be.

Bob

[Jim Stoppleworth]

Tools sit on top of interlocking floor mats of 1/2" foam from HD on top of concrete floor.
(Got them from a friend who did trade shows and no longer had a use for them.)
Very comfortable to stand on. A bear to roll tools around on. Much easier to just pick tools up and move them.

Jim

[Paul Engle]

Bill, I did mine in wood ( cdx ply) as droped stuff does not dent as bad. in 15 yrs has not chiped too bad. ( lots of dripping glue ) machine shop in Long Bech Navy Yard when i learned how to make metal chips .....uses 6x6x6 blocks ( end grain up ) for the floors same result, easy to fix if damaged and remove / replace for concrete pad for machines. next shop will have blocks on grade as this one is on piers / joist to match house grade. Wood is Good choice , concrete hard on feet/legs, droped tools , droped wood projects etc.

[Don Orr]

I have concrete also, but I painted it with a water-borne epoxy paint with a touch of sand mixed in. Definitely non-slip, but also rough on ext. cords, air hoses and such. The paint was a commercial grade epoxy I think by Muralo. Very low VOC, barely an odor at all. Works on most surfaces and easy to apply. I also have foam mats where I stand a lot.

[Bernie Weishapl]

Bill I laid tile in mine. I like it a lot. I also have the anti-fatique mats in front of my lathe so makes standing a lot easier on these old legs. I can roll my other tools around easily and haven't slipped yet.

[Bill Wyko]

As you can see in the picture the pillars are for 4x4 pressure treated beams then the 2x4 joists for the floor will be perpendicular to the 4x4's. The pillars are every 5 feet and are spaced 4 feet apart. This should give me plenty of support. Also even though the kit doesn't come with blocks for the plywood where it meets I'm still going to add blocks for additional support.

[Jamie Donaldson]

... would use some of the new cork composition flooring. It looks great, adds sound absorption, and just feels wonderful to walk on! Won't nick dropped tools either.!

[Jim Becker]

Bob makes a good point...most, if not all shed type setups have only one layer of plywood for flooring. Were it me, I'd put on a second layer of plywood or oak strip flooring for strength since you'll be working with heavy tooling. By itself, that wood floor will be relatively comfortable. At the machine (lathe) I would still use an anti-fatigue mat...I use ones from Uline.com. They are reasonably priced and you can get a 4' x 6' that can be slit and modified to fit around the legs of your machine...making it easy to install and easy to remove for "deep cleaning". That's what I have at my Stubby.

[Mike Turkley]

Bill, My shop has 3/4" tougne and groove flooring which I don't want to damage, so I put down 1/4" luan plywood on top of that with short screws. Then I painted with battleship gray floor paint.

If a section gets damaged enough, I can take the screws out and put a replacement in. So far I haven't damaged it enough yet.

It does get slippery though and if I don't watch the shavings collecting underfoot, I do slide on them. When that happens, I grab the broom and move the shavings out of my way, then back to work.

Being slippery to shavings makes sweeping or blowing with an air hose easy.


MikeT

[Bill Wyko]

I just checked with them and found out that the floor is not T&G so I'll add additional backing to support the seams. I'll also post pics as the thing goes together.