Shop talk...

When I get supplies in the mail it often makes me chuckle, after all, I make miniatures!  Small things which mostly fit in the palm of my hand.  OK, and a few roomboxes here and there.  But still...

Look at the size of this box!  A person would fit in there easily. Hmm, cheap holiday???

Back to the box...it contained a rolled up sheet of very thin plywood.  I used to get it from another supplier who sold smaller pieces, but the shop has closed so now I have to buy whole sheets.  

Here's another photo from a few years ago.  I know some of the packages contained wood, and the square one I think had my bandsaw in it, but I can't remember what else was in there.  All related to miniature making though.  

The problem for me when buying these supplies is getting them down to the size I need them.  Most of my shop tools are for miniature making.  Another problem is space.  I don't have the room or the machines cut a 150 x 150 cm sheet of plywood.  My initial cutting up of supplies is very crude and requires quite a bit of creative thinking.  

Over the years I have acquired a nice collection of tools for my workshop.  But with all the cutting, sanding, drilling, routing etc. that goes on in my workshop, I create a lot of dust.  Not good for my miniatures (which are in the same room) and certainly not good for me either!  

So, after nearly killing my regular vacuum cleaner, I finally invested in a shop vac.  I bought the Record Power DX1000 and wow, what a difference that makes!  Even the thickness sander, a machine I only ever used outside because of the incredible mess it makes, can now live in my shop and be used regularly without problems.   

The shop vac comes with a huge hose, far too big for my workshop machines.  Online I did see rubber attachment pieces which stepped down to the size of my regular vacuum hose, but the prices with shipping were rather steep.  

I worked out a simple solution:  I cut a piece off the existing hose to be able to attach it to the shop vac.  I then cut a circle of plywood the size of the hose, cut another circle in the middle the size of my  vacuum cleaner hose and glued that inside the big hose with a two part adhesive to create a seal.  

It doesn't look pretty but it works!  

I would recommend anyone using machines in their workshop to buy a shop vac.  I should have done this years ago.  It does make a bit of noise  (I must say I am somewhat sensitive to noise), but I wear my ear defenders when I use my machines anyway so it's not a problem.  

Even though the shop vac eliminates a lot of dust, I have opted for another way to improve air quality in my workshop.  So about a month later, with a little pressure from my loved ones who said one can never be too careful when it comes to health, I also bought the Record Power AC400 Air Cleaner.  

This remote controlled device filters airborne particles up to 1 micron.  It runs fairly quietly in the background and as an unexpected bonus distributes the hot air from my heater around the room.  

The effects of this machine are less obvious than those of the shop vac, but when the sun hits my workshop, there are no more dust particles dancing in the sun.  

Not all my supplies are so big they create a problem trying to use them or store them.  Just look at this glass I was given.  It is the thinnest glass I have ever seen.  It is only 0.15mm thick!  (See the photo with the callipers below).

Isn't that incredible?  I had no idea glass this thin existed.  And given its thickness it is still fairly strong.  I don't know what I'll be making with this yet, but given that the box of glass is small I won't have a problem storing it until I need it.

I leave you with this gravity defying photo of a room I have been working on.  It is a drying attic,  a room at the top of a house where all the washing was dried and ironed.  More on this room in my next post!