Project Garage Workshop

It's probably gone flat by now. 😉
Seconds and Co well worth it.

The high level mains sockets at the front of the garage are mirrored by another pair on the rear wall, which are both wired more conventionally as part of the socket ring. One of these sockets is used to power a wall fan. I bought the fan specifically to go in the garage, but when it arrived the fan blades were cheap looking 'smoked' plastic. I had a rattle can of yellow paint in the other garage, so obviously I had to dismantle the fan and spray the blades yellow. Now it looks much more in keeping with its surroundings.

glenanderson

I take full responsibility for causing you to be envious of my posh bolt sockets. If you cannot cope with the envy, and feel the need to spend your money as a consequence, that is all on you! 

The side walls of the garage will be mostly kept clear to maximise the space available for working, but above the workbench and tool cabinets I want to use the end wall for various shelves and other storage. The lining panels are 12mm thick and not intended to be structural, so I had to add some reinforcement behind.

This is the southwest corner. The single horizontal reinforcement to the right of the corner was put in earlier, and supports a TV bracket. The four narrower bits to the left of the corner are for a pegboard. The black cable in this picture is the feed for the TV aerial. I intend to use the TV more as a PC display, but I have run a cable from the aerial distribution amplifier in the house so I can tune-in to Final Score on a Saturday afternoon in the workshop.


In the southeast corner the temporary electrical supply arrangement can be seen here, and to the right of the corner there will be shelves for power tools and suchlike.


In between the windows on the south wall I put in a couple of bits of 4x2. At this point I was not sure exactly what I needed these for, but I was pretty sure they would prove useful. The grey cables here connect the mains sockets, whilst the black one is for the DAB aerial socket.


Previously I always seemed to have tools charging all over the place, and still managed not to have the one I needed charged on a regular basis. In this workshop I was determined to be more organised, so I put in a unit where I can store and charge them all together.

I had not expected my shelf slats to engender so many (or indeed, any) likes! 

Finally it was time for the proper mains supply to go in. The electricity meter and consumer unit in the house were located in a passageway leading to the back door when the house was built, but since then it has been re-modelled including an extension on the back, so the electrical supply comes in more or less in the middle of the house, which is clearly not ideal when it comes to running a new chunky cable out to the workshop. The electrician earned his money getting the cable into a riser to floor level, under the floor to the front wall of the house, and around to the rear corner to go over the cable bridge.

Inside the workshop there is a new consumer unit with separate circuit breakers for the lights and sockets. Getting this in place meant that the final wall lining panel could also go in.


The testing of my wiring did not show up any problems, in fact the electrician said he would be happy to give me a job!

On either end of the roof, at the apex of the fascia boards, the garage had diamond shaped pieces of wood nailed in place. I assume these are a traditional thing, certainly they seem very common, but I wanted a more individual touch. I could have made something out of wood, but I had enough of woodwork inside, so I decided on something else, and that something else was perspex. I could not find anything around 10mm thick, which was what I wanted, so I bought some 5mm sheets and some strong glue, and the woodworking clamps got another outing.


Once the glue had set, I tidied and painted the edges of the shapes I had cut before gluing, cut some eyes from black vinyl, and screwed my new alien sentries to the fascias, using black screw covers sold for number plate fixings. These things serve no useful purpose whatsoever, but they make me smile.

glenanderson

Thanks for that. Hopefully my perspex aliens will do the job no less effectively.

Excellent job but I feel you need more hammers