Building My Basement Shop

[Bruce Page]

Jay, great write-up! All your hard work clearly shows in your beautiful shop!

Let me know when you come up with a good solution to sheet storage, it the bane of my shop!

[Frank Pellow]

Jay, thanks for the information and advise re the closet. I do plan to do as you suggest and install the dust controller first, then build a closet around it (if there is room -3 x 4 would be about the maximum I could accomodate and that is more than I would like to use).

[Nathan Hoffman]

I appreciate the time you took to explain everything you did to make your basement shop, as I am in the process of doing the same. We moved into our new house in April and right now my machines are scattered around the basement making plenty of noise and dust. I did have our electrician give me 3 110V and 2 220v circuits in the section of basement where my shop will be. Have you had any trouble running 2 big machines on one 220V circuit? Right now my TS and DC are my only 220v machines and I have them on different circuits, but my panel is about maxed out and I could get 2 110v circuits for the price of a 220v...
What would you reccommend for lighitng since you are unhappy with what you have? I do have 2 large windows in the east side of my shop are, since we have a walk out basement. Again, thanks for the timely information!

[JayStPeter]

Bruce,
Thanks. Let me know if YOU come up with a good idea for plywood storage as well . My current thought is to build a fake wall of sorts behind the planer where I can stash some sheet goods. Cutoffs are also going to be a problem.

Frank,
The 2HP Commercial is bigger than I expected. Even after looking at the diagrams and holding my arms out. The smaller filter they now offer may help. Building the closet definitely helps regarding noise. But, I have to admit that I could probably live without it. The ducting provides enough noise to drown out the stereo at all but ear-bleeding levels.
I enjoy following your shop progress. Even with this shop, I still dream of a separate shop building. Your comprehensive planning is impressive. I am enjoying watching it come to life.

Nathan,
I have no electrical issues. My DC and air compressor are 220, as are my table saw, bandsaw, and jointer. The DC, air compressor and one of the others are the max load. I don't think I'll ever have to deal with more than 1 of the machines running at the same time.
As far as lighting goes. Just don't get the cheap fixtures. As I said, I don't really regret it because I would just be further in debt now. As it stands, I have over $700 in lights and bulbs in the shop. I used T-8 fixtures with 91CRI 6000 K bulbs. That, I'm happy with. The fixtures themselves buzz and one bulb tends to be brighter than the other in some of them. That's the part I don't like.
Anyone that plans on using 8' T-8 should locate a source of bulbs before going that direction. All of the electric/borg places within 45 minutes of me sell Sylvania bulbs exclusively. They don't have a >90 CRI 8' t-8 bulb. They do have a 4 footer though, and a t-12. As it stands, I still have to order bulbs to get the closer to daylight versions. Getting eight footers would've allowed me to buy nicer fixtures for the same money.

Jay

[Rob Russell]

Originally Posted by Nathan Hoffman

I appreciate the time you took to explain everything you did to make your basement shop, as I am in the process of doing the same. We moved into our new house in April and right now my machines are scattered around the basement making plenty of noise and dust. I did have our electrician give me 3 110V and 2 220v circuits in the section of basement where my shop will be. Have you had any trouble running 2 big machines on one 220V circuit? Right now my TS and DC are my only 220v machines and I have them on different circuits, but my panel is about maxed out and I could get 2 110v circuits for the price of a 220v...
What would you reccommend for lighitng since you are unhappy with what you have? I do have 2 large windows in the east side of my shop are, since we have a walk out basement. Again, thanks for the timely information!

Nathan,

If your panel is maxed out, pull out one of the 240v machine circuit breakers and use it to feed a subpanel. That way you can add another 20 to 40 slots for circuits.

Rob

[Rob Russell]

Jay,

Nice job on the shop!! I'd give up a lot to get that sort of ceiling height in the basement. I'm stuck with 6'6" to the bottom of the floor trusses.

Rob

[Todd Burch]

Hey Jay - nice thorough post! That shop sure is clean and uncluttered.

Todd

[Gary Whitt]

Awesome details and photos!
Good luck in your new shop!

[Alan Tolchinsky]

Hi Jay,

It's great to see what you have done; it's an inspiration to all of us. I have a basement shop myself and just love it. It's cool in the summer and warm in the winter and just a stairway away.

You have done a fantastic job; I like the brightness with all the light colors you used.

I'm sure you will enjoy it for years to come. And yes you made a good move getting out of Montgomery Cnty. It's too crowded here!

Regards, Alan in Md.

Originally Posted by JayStPeter

Bob,

Thanks. I doubt it'll ever actually be done. But, the construction part is done.

Frank,
My closet is around 5.5' wide by just under 4' deep. The cyclone is pretty streched out in there and includes the first 2' of pipe to get to the outside of the closet. I also have the sump in there, plus around 2'x4' of open floor space in the front for a shop vac. If I was you, I would get the unit and build the closet around it. That's what I did. I reconfigured the intake vs. filter relation a bunch of times before ultimately deciding on the final layout. I would say that 3x4+ would be the smallest closet it could fit in. BTW, if you saw my shop today you would know that I'm not in the running for cleanest shop

Michael,
It's 580 sqft. including the closet. It's L-shaped overall 32'x24' with a 10'x17' cutout.

Jay

[Chris Padilla]

Originally Posted by JayStPeter

Phase 3 – Soundproofing

I actually don’t call what I did soundproofing. I call it noise reduction. I didn’t really use the practices that a studio would use as it would be ridiculously expensive. My goal is to keep the noise upstairs such that someone directly above can reasonably watch TV. The noise should also be quiet enough that my family can sleep two floors up no matter what I’m doing downstairs. Soundproofing would have involved keeping noise from going outside the house also. I wasn’t worried about that at all.
I installed 6” insulation in the joists overhead. I installed resilient channel (RC) to mount the drywall. Since the joists are 8”, that leaves some airspace, which is important. The RC keeps the vibrations in the drywall from getting to the joists.
I insulated all the walls that lead to other areas of the basement. I also put some insulation in the closet to keep DC noise down both upstairs and in the shop.
I wrapped all ductwork with insulation to keep the thin sheet metal from vibrating and transmitting the sound upstairs through the vents.

PIC – Resilient Channel Overhead
PIC2- Insulation in Staggered Stud Wall

Jay,

Fantastic job...you must be quite proud...and relieved! As you can see, I just started gutting my garage and I am anxious to hear more detail about the soundproofing steps you did. Where might one pick up some of this resilient channel and how does it work?

Half of my garage's ceiling is the floor for two bedrooms on the second story and I'd like to take steps to minimize sound travel up there. I certainly appreciate any help you can give me in that respect and if you wouldn't mind checking in on my thread as I'm sure I'll post questions in regard to sound travel there.

Once again, very nice job!

[JayStPeter]

Thanks for all the comments guys.

Alan,
During construction I took out the one vent that fed that part of the basement (not good for soundproofing). It has been reasonably comfortable down there all winter and summer. I like it.
The stress level is super low compared to when I lived in F'fax and Montgomery counties. I start to tense up as soon as I get north of Waldorf.

Chris,
http://soundproofing.org/infopages/channel.htm
I had found the website for Unimast and searched for a nearby dealer. They sell it in 12' lengths and it was around $0.12/ft if I recall correctly. There's RC1 and RC2. For the walls along your house you would definitely want RC1. You can use either for ceilings. I used RC2 because it was all they had in stock. RC1 is 'Z' shaped and RC2 is 'U' shaped.
I chose to use staggered stud walls instead of RC1 so I could have studs to hang cabinets on. I didn't use multiple layers of drywall. The cost was just getting too high for me. I figured if the soundproofing didn't work out, I could add another layer later. The drywallers did use 4.5'x12' sheets of drywall, so there are very few seams in the ceiling drywall (which is the reason they suggest multiple layers instead of just using thicker drywall). Fortunately, it's OK. The combination of overkill suggested by soundproofing.org and the FWW tools and shops issue should give you all the knowledge you need. I did tons more research, but these two were the best/most useful. There's plenty of misinformation and bogus products out there also, so it took a while to sort out the truth from myth.
Taking a week off to get the construction done is a good idea. The dragging on from month to month was the worst part. Have fun. It's good once you're done. When I'm kicked back having a beer I'll think about you bustin' butt in your garage

Jay

Jay

[Christopher Stahl]

Jay,
Excellent write up! I'm actually in a similar position of moving into my new house at the end of July. I bought new equipment last fall and early this year, but have not been able to use them because we were buying a new house. We were to be in early this year, but the sellers backed out of the deal. In June, we found a new house and I'm anxiously awating the closing.

Anyway, the covenants of the neighborhood are going to prevent me from building a workshop, so I must build one in the basement. Luckily, they are 9' ceilings and the basement is 2100sf, so I won't have many problems.

Your article has made more anxious to get my new workshop up and running and I plan to incorporate your ideas for soundproofing.

thanks for the great article,
chris

[Jerry Olexa]

Outstanding work and results AND your write up and reporting was also SUPERIOR! Great work!! Now , build something!! Seriously great job!!

[Bob Hovde]

Thanks for the great writeup and pics. It's a great help to those of us in the beginning throes of shop conversion!

Bob

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Jay, excellent work and write up! I wished my shop were that far a long! Congrats on a good job!