Smallest Shop Possible

[John Clay]

All,

My FB shop is 15’ x 21’, in/in. From my perspective, relative to what I do and how I do it , that’s enormous. For various reasons, including simply the attraction of cleverness of design, I frequently imagine a smaller shop. I could make 12’x12’ work without sacrificing terribly much that’s necessary or pretty important, well worth having. I couldn’t store a bunch of bicycles, or the tablesaw that needs a new owner, or a fair bit of crap that I don't need; but, much like a surfboard shapers shaping shack, I could damn sure build bicycle frames, hang my two personal rides and frames/forks in progress, and all of the tooling I have and stuff I actually need, and build frames. I neither have nor want a mill or lathe (other than occasionally beamed in/out as needed, Star Trek style). Not sure I’d want my bench grinder but I’d probably keep it, at least initially.

With that bit of idea-framing, what do y’all with pretty small shops have? How did you set them up, make it work? I’m fascinated with other people’s workshops, moreso with small ones that are cleverly designed. And I don’t mean so micro that turning around, never mind building a frame, becomes a challenge, but...you know...as small as a person can reasonably work in; I'm not going to stand on my head or straddle a stairway to build things.

Post your shop pics, even large ones, but especially small ones! I’m curious how folks address that particular challenge.

John Clay

Tallahassee, Florida

[M-gineering]

the bigger the shop, the more air you have and the easier it is to keep
pollution levels low enough. Build a tandem and you'll know very soon
where the ceiling is ;)

--
mvg

Marten Gerritsen



Gerritsen & Meijers, Ingenieurs
Framebuilding & Imports

Dorpsstraat 132
9605 PD Kiel Windeweer
Netherlands

Tel: +31 598 491865


www.m-gineering.nl

[John Clay]

Hi Marten,

Apologies to The Graduate, I have just five words to say to you: Better living through forced induction.

No tandems in my future.

You and I have the luxury of plenty of space.

I can imagine alternatives where, by choice or changing circumstances, I wouldn't!

And it's an interesting puzzle involving, attractive-to-me, notions of "reduce, reduce, reduce".

Cheers,

John

[Jim G]

Hi John,

Interesting question/discussion, as I've been thinking a lot about shop space recently.  My work space is the front area of a single-width garage stall, in a two-car garage I share with my neighbor (I live in a 2-unit condo building).  It's roughly 10' x 6'.  My workbench is 40" x 24" inches.  I've built a 10" deep shelf above the main work surface, that's where my little Sherline lathe and drill stand live.  Above the bench is obviously frame storage, and my fork jig hangs there too.  Below the bench are 3 toolboxes (one in front with usual tools in easy reach, two behind that with seldom-used tools).  I've built a rolling drawer-box at the very bottom of the bench that holds random stuff.  To the left of the bench is a thing that started life as a two-bike storage stand, but the bottom rack now holds my folded-up frame jig, a saw-horse-style bike workstand that I primarily use for building racks, and metal storage for longer sections of rack tubing.  I keep my city-commuter on the top rack.  On the floor beneath are my oxygen concentrator w/attached torch (I keep the propane tank out in the back yard, and only bring it inside when I'm using it), a mini shop vacuum, and my floor pump.  Between the bench and the storage rack is a narrow hallway that leads to laundry and the building's rear door to the backyard, which is where I do any rattlecan painting.  My motorcycle gets parked opposite the work bench, in front of our parked car.  Before I got the motorcycle, I had enough floor space that I used to keep the bike workstand set up there semi-permanently.  I barely have enough space to turn around, so I've had to go vertical as much as possible.

You can get more of an idea from this video - https://youtu.be/CUaowmVQUJ0

That said, I am currently working towards a machine technology certificate at Laney College in Oakland, CA, and now I really want to get a bigger lathe and a mill (and drill press and band saw and and and)!  So I am on the hunt for more workshop space -- but this seems nearly impossible to get in San Francisco, where they want $1000/month to even rent a shipping container as a workshop!  If anyone has any leads on SF Bay Area workshop space, please let me know!  :)

.      

-Jim Gourgoutis

jimgracks.com

[Jim G]

I just remembered -- Mone Bikes are built in the back of a converted bread van.  I think he wins any smallest-shop contest.

Lots more detail photos at:

https://theradavist.com/2018/12/dont-fake-that-funk-with-cjell-mone-spencer-harding/

https://www.instagram.com/monebikes/

-Jim G

[Alistair Spence]

Hey John,

I think that if your building process doesn't involve machine tools then your goal of a smaller footprint shop is a lot more doable. Everyone has their own minimum threshold I guess when it comes to workspace requirements, depending on many variables of course, but when machine tools become involved the working space envelopes of the machines, plus the storage space required for the tooling, really start to increase the need for more square feet.

For reference sake I've had two shops that were in single car garages (each around 200 sq. ft. iirc) and found those to be adequate, but I did have to store my bicycles in a separate area in both cases. In 2018 I moved into a smaller shop (167 sq. ft., 14.5' x 11.5') and was little concerned about the loss of space. Fortunately I had the luxury of some time to really think through and optimize the layout so it ended up working out quite nicely. Here's an example pic, https://www.flickr.com/photos/duncancycles/43036679114

I should mention that I did build an attached storage shed/shack where I stored bikes, tubing, spare oxy acetylene tanks, bike components etc. That shed was of a similar size as the shop, so the total square footage of the two structures was around 320 sq. ft. That was about as compact and optimized a space as I would personally be able to work in and still be productive and not too frustrated with having to continually move things out of the way every time I needed to do something.

I can't give you a long term review of how it was to live with that set up for any real length of time because it was (as you know) unfortunately destroyed in a wildfire three months after I finished building it. No shop is perfect, but I think this set up would have served me well, at least for a few years, so I do at least have a template for what I would do in the future if I was ever to try and put another shop together, square footage wise, and layout wise.

Here's a flickr set showing more details of the shop, shed, and the general layout of it all, https://www.flickr.com/photos/duncancycles/albums/72157690431006923, just in case it gives you, or anyone else reading this, an idea or two.

Alistair Spence,

Seattle, WA

P.S. There was a builder in NYC, Seth Rosko, who built bikes in an Airstream for some years. I don't know any of the details of how that worked out for him (maybe some of the NY area builders can chime in on that) but he did make it work, to some extent at least. I don't think he's building any more (moved to Australia I think?).

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Alistair Spence,

Seattle, WA.

[James Nachlin]

I work out of a 6x10 shed.  However my brazing setup is at a friend's shop, so I do my thinking and filing and prep there, then bring the metal bits over there to braze together. There's probably someone working in an even smaller space, though.

I don't have room for any power tools or a jig.

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