Keepin' it clean

This is the place for information on various types of permanent and temporary boat shops and other project shelters.
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Tony
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Keepin' it clean

Post by Tony »

Tim,

In all your pics, I see this beautiful squeeky clean shop, with tools nicely organized and hung on pegs, materials layed out and ready, nice white plastic sheeting on the walls.....Are you a magician?

With all of the sanding and such that you do, how the heck to you keep it all clean? Since you paint in there, I know that you can't have all that sanding dust all over. At first I though maybe you just hosed everything off, but there's too many electrical tools around to do that, I'd think. I've not seen any evidence of airtight containment around your projects. What gives? :-)
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Tim
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Post by Tim »

Yes, I do keep a clean shop. Funny you bring this up now; I was sort of thinking about the whole process a little while ago while I cleaned up from a couple days' work out there.

I hate stumbling around in a messy shop. And up in the boat, when working, the debris and dust can be downright dangerous, particularly inside the bare hull with its slippery slopes and angles. The worst seems to be the Meranti plywood dust from sawing, which takes on an almost spherical shape that is very slip-worthy underfoot. I've slipped a number of times on this stuff--fortunately with no injurous results. But it could easily go the other way, too.

Therefore, I work hard to keep ahead of the mess. During larger projects, things can get out of hand in a hurry. I might leave things for a day or two, while in the midst of a large portion of the project when it makes little sense to go nuts cleaning each day. B ut beyond that, I clean up messes when they occur, or at least at the end of the day as required.

Take today, for example. Between yesterday and today, I installed all the top layer of plywood on the Daysailor deck. This generated plenty of scrap and dust, particularly after I routed the excess off today. Therefore, with the completion of the major part of this job today, I spent 45 minutes or so cleaning the shop and the boat itself to get rid of the debris. I also cleaned up the tools I had been using, and put them back where they belong. Now, obviously the shop will get messed up again next time I go out, but I prefer to stay ahead of it as much as possible.

Big, messy projects--serious grinding, or (the worst) bulk planing, need to get cleaned up immediately. Sometimes the mess is so bad there's just nothing you can do till its cleaned.

When I paint in the shop, I spend more time cleaning beforehand. For Awlgrip, for example, I very thoroughly clean the whole shop, and even blow the dust off the walls, windows, and fixtures (with the big doors open). Then, when that settles, I sweep first and then vacuum everything. I also wet down the floor before spraying Awlgrip.

I guess it just comes naturally to me. It takes some extra work sometimes, but it's always worth it. At the end of a long day, sometimes cleaning up doesn't seem to appealing--but I find that if I spend just a little time, even just picking up the scraps and doing a quick sweep, I'm always happier the next day.

And yes, I tend to put tools away almost before I should, making for extra trips, and sometimes I even annoy myself in this way. But I'd rather make extra trips back and forth to the bench for some tool (where I know it to be) rather than search fruitlessly all over the place for a tool that was left somewhere it didn't belong.

I love my shop, and keeping it clean and organized is satisfying for me--and helps with productivity and efficiency as well, and I hope is reflective of the quality of work produced therein.
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Post by dasein668 »

I have to say, I'm not nearly as neat as Tim, and I'm always conscious of striving to be more neat, organized, and clean when I'm working over there. But I have to say it is a downright pleasure to work in a shop that is so clean and organized?always knowing where things are going to be and not stumbling over piles of crap. Lovely!

I'm hoping that Tim's good work habits will start to rub off one of these days! hehe
LastMango

Post by LastMango »

I don't have a nifty barn so I'm stuck working in a boat yard, which forces me to pack up my tools and clean up every day I'm working.

Unfortunately I have to work around weather, sand bugs out of awlgrip, and all the other nasty stuff that comes with boatyard work.

I keep all my tools and supplies in milk crates sorted by category, which makes for easy transport from the house to the truck before and after work days.

And anything that goes into the house, even if it is the workshop in the basement, has to be cleaned or the wife goes balistic :)
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Post by Tim »

dasein668 wrote:I'm hoping that Tim's good work habits will start to rub off one of these days! hehe
That makes two of us! hehe

Seriously, though, Nathan does a good job working to keep the shop clean during his projects. So those habits are rubbing off, bit by bit, whether he likes it or not!

That said, Dasein, now that she's inside the shop, is akin to an embassy in a foreign land. On deck and below, she represents the laws of the homeland, but beyond those borders, laws of the host country preside! Ne'er the border shall be breached.

Anyway, I just add liberal extra cleaning costs (my time and labor are highly valuable, after all) to Nathan's running boatshop tab. When he eventually makes payment on this hypothetical, all-in-fun tab, I'll be able to fully retire. Kind of like Norm's unpaid Cheers tab.
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Post by Tim »

Oh, and I should add that I have made a conscious effort with the new shop to keep things extra clean and free from dust and debris accumulation. In my old shop, located in my garage, there were too many dark corners, open shelves, and the like that would collect sawdust, cobwebs, and other fun stuff, and pawing through the dust-covered shelves for a tool or part was always irritating.

Therefore, I made a self-pledge that the new shop would be different. I've avoided, in large part, the open shelving, and the bright light and white walls make keeping everything clean much easier--and more desirable, too. So some of the cleanliness is the result of the learned experiences of doing it the other way. After a year now, I'm very pleased with how it's all worked out--and continues to work out.
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Post by Figment »

...and here I am opening this thread expecting it to be about the girlie calendars pinned to the wall above the workbench!

;p
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Post by Tim »

I could hear your crest falling all the way from here!
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Post by dasein668 »

No girlie calendars... but there is a nice Heavy Equipment calendar... backhoes, dumptrucks, and the like!
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Post by dasein668 »

Tim wrote:That said, Dasein, now that she's inside the shop, is akin to an embassy in a foreign land. On deck and below, she represents the laws of the homeland, but beyond those borders, laws of the host country preside! Ne'er the border shall be breached.
Yeah, and when Tim is on my boat he develops my bad habits... The other day after helping me remove some of the less convenient hardware from the decks I had to make 4 trips loaded down with tools that he had accumulated over the course of the morning.... Sloppy, sloppy...

hehe
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Post by Figment »

dasein668 wrote:No girlie calendars... but there is a nice Heavy Equipment calendar... backhoes, dumptrucks, and the like!
Hey, man, whatever lights your fire....
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Post by Tim »

dasein668 wrote:I had to make 4 trips loaded down with tools that he had accumulated over the course of the morning
Sorry for the inconvenience, man! Next time, I'll scurry around the boat collecting each tool as I have to leave--even ones you're using-- saying "mine...mine...mine" each time!
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Post by dasein668 »

Not complaining?simply observing! hehe
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Post by Tim »

Too little, too late! thbbbbbbbt! :<P hehe
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Post by Figment »

Tim wrote:
dasein668 wrote:I had to make 4 trips loaded down with tools that he had accumulated over the course of the morning
Sorry for the inconvenience, man! Next time, I'll scurry around the boat collecting each tool as I have to leave--even ones you're using-- saying "mine...mine...mine" each time!
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Post by Tim »

Perfect!
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Post by JetStream »

I'll also vouch for the clean shop. I had a chance to see it today - Thanks Tim! It really is as clean or cleaner than you see in the pictures. What an awesome shop! I wish your habits would rub off on me. I guess it's something like a kitchen: nothing is quite as depressing as coming into a kitchen in the morning to see dishes piled high. Coming into Tim's shop just makes you want to get started on something.
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Post by Tony »

"I'm hoping that Tim's good work habits will start to rub off ..."

Yea, I could use some of that too....except I'm on the other coast, so I suppose there's no hope ;-)

Thanks for the info, Tim.
Tony
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