Repair workshop photos (it'll look funny to most of you)

[LatakiaLover]

Lathes?! We don't need no stinkin' lathes!

(For those of you unfamiliar with the reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stinking_badges )

The fish-stringer looking things on the wall are stem blanks, btw. Kept like that for fast visual matching without having to sort through drawers. (The stems have labels which point to the right drawer.) And before you ask, no, I don't use Italian or Greek vulcanite blanks. Everything I have is NOS pre-WWII through mid-century German and English rubber of stellar quality. All acrylic is also German.

The big green robot is an adjustable speed / adjustable-belt-width knife grinder. The slickest rod stock shaping tool on the planet.

For you sharp-eyed types, the drill press says "JET," but it's not. It's an Arboga. JET just imports and distributes them. There's a "Made in Sweden" badge on the side.

The reason for two Foredom tools is one is a high rpm, reversible rotation model, and the other is a low speed/high torque one. (They look the same, but there's almost no mission overlap)

The adjoining room is two thirds shipping/packing area, and one third business office. There's still another area in an adjoining bedroom that's dedicated to purification processing. No pics of those, though, because 1) It's boring, and 2) they're messy.

Daisy the Shopcat made herself scarce when the camera flash started up, so no kitty.

[The Smoking Yeti]

Holy crap. That's an awesome setup you've got! Add a lathe and you're a proper pipemaker!!!!

Btw, thats a lotta buffing wheels

[Growley]

Oh man, I would love a space like that. At first I couldn't tell if you were showing us your shop or your dentist's office. It's SO clean!

[d.huber]

Holy crap! That's the cleanest and best organized shop I've ever seen!

[scotties22]

I'm digging the cardboard box air intakes at your sanding and buffing wheels....great idea.

[sethile]

Beautiful set up, George! Wish I had your hardwood floors in my shop... I've thought about trying to retrofit my garage conversion workshop with a wood floor, but it would be crazy... Too bad you couldn't keep the fireplace. I'd love to have a wood burning stove in my shop. I ruin a lot of briar, and have a lot of scrap that could help keep me warm in the winter.

[Tyler]

Is that...the living room?

[LatakiaLover]

Is that...the living room?

As defined by me or the builder?

Most people have really strange priorities. Proof: I knew a woman once who didn't like machine tools in a space she insisted on calling "her dining room." Can you even imagine such a thing?

[scotties22]

I knew it was the living room as soon as I saw the floors and trim. I think it's cool. In a perfect world my house would be two huge rooms....kitchen and shop....with a bed stuck in a corner somewhere.

[LatakiaLover]

Btw, thats a lotta buffing wheels

It has to do with why Trever T calls pipe repair work a "deadly trap": You must be equipped to handle whatever lands on your doorstep. If you make pipes, you only need what your designs require in terms of tools, materials, and techniques. If you repair them, you must have on hand what every maker's designs require. (Not literally, of course, but functionally speaking.)

When it comes to buffing wheels, that means wide ones, narrow ones, soft ones, hard ones, large diameter, small diameter, cotton, flannel, loose, sewn, and so on. Whatever it takes to get into the delicate nooks, crannies, and graceful, hard-to-access curves that some of the Danish and German makers use. (Though an American maker holds the single-specimen degree of difficulty record. I once got sent jeff Gracik's "Unicorn" to be refurbed... a pipe whose stem had a one-piece spiral blade that wrapped around the shank, Yes, really. (He made it mostly just to see if he could.) It had been caught in a chemical accident of sorts, and Jeff himself declined to mess with it a second time. )

Expand that example to cover finishes, materials, connectors, fitments, and etc., and soon walls lined with eight foot high shelves won't hold it all.

[Alden]

Sorry I quit reading everything thing after "No Kitty".
Joking. I know now where to send people for repairs. Sweet shop!

[Charl]

Neat! I see pipe repairmen need 2 pairs of spectacles.

[LatakiaLover]

Neat! I see pipe repairmen need 2 pairs of spectacles.

Three if you count the visor. Close, closer, and closest.

Some tasks when working with collectables require stupid precision. The other day I had to drill out a badly discolored ivory dot on an old Dunhill stem to replace it with a new one. It was an early specimen from the Tiny Dot era, meaning only 58 thousandths in diameter. Being off by virtually any amount would make the hole egg-shaped as well as leave a sliver of the old dot material on one side. The hard part (with the right tools) isn't mechanical accuracy, but alignment accuracy, and that means being able to see what you're doing. In my case, bright work lights, a head lamp to eliminate shadows, and two stages of magnification are the only way my old desert-cooked eyes can mange it.

[bikedoctor]

Pure OCD George....and I love it.

[caskwith]

Pretty kick ass shop and fantastic tools, makes me ashamed to show my workshop now. While I am sure I would love the challenges of pipe repair having seen how much stuff and work goes into it, I think I'll stick to pipe making

[LatakiaLover]

Pure OCD George....and I love it.

Only selectively. (Is selective OCD even medically possible?) If something doesn't factor into, or contribute to, achieving excellence, I care little about it. If it does, it receives my maximum effort. Been that way since I was a kid. It's a common profile for craftsmen and artists, I think.

[billiard]

That is a very impressive workshop, thanks for sharing it George.

[UncleDraken]

I think I spot a recycled Laphroaig container in that first picture.

The question is though,


Are you sure you have enough lamps?

[LatakiaLover]

I think I spot a recycled Laphroaig container in that first picture.

Aye, you have a good eye.

I no longer drink at all---and never did much or often---but when I did it was Laphroaig, Lagavulin, or Ardbeg.

The tube now holds something far less noble and interesting: extra-long pipe cleaners.

The question is though,

Are you sure you have enough lamps?

Actually, I've been meaning to install another on the Green Robot, so there's light hitting the work from each side.

One day I finally had enough of chasing myself from station to station with a desk lamp, is all, so mounted one near each machine. No more cords to tangle, bases to tip over, or wattage limits to deal with. Having bright light instantly where its needed both speeds things up and reduces stress. Should have done it years ago.

[ajpl]

Damn. That is a beautiful shop. Thanks for the photos!

If you don't mind, what models are those benchtop buffers?