# Newbies workshop tour - WIP - Ideas welcome



## smokey (10 Jun 2008)

Hi all,

I have been very lucky and managed to bag myself a great little workshop for my new hopefully succesful business.

Lets get the boring stuff out of the way, then I will post up 1 or 2....okay a dozen or so pictures :lol: 

My names Erran Jenkins i am 29yo and I am currently forming a company called St Ives Joinery Ltd
I left school at the tender age of 16yo and went straight to work for my step dads company Epoch Interiors as an aprentice carpenter and joiner. I worked with my step dad for 6 years before getting a job working for David Smiths Ltd building wooden staircases.
Here I worked for the following 3 years before embarking on a career in I.T as a network administrator for the Ministry Of Defence (Dont ask, its dung and I regret it lol)

Anyway, i currently work part time fo rthe MOD while I am setting up my workshop and the rest of the business.

2 weeks ago, the other half went to the village shop to grab a loaf of bread and came back with a card advertising 2 units on a little industrial estate a couple of villages away for the bargain price of £150 per month + rates. Workshop dimensions are 43ft x 19ft 

I rang the guy straight away and arranged a viewing for that afternoon.

Well after my visit I spoke to the mrs and we decided to go for it......St Ives Joinery was born!

I have been up there the last couple of days and made a very small improvement.
The old tennant was evicted and it was left in a right state. The old fridge and 16 x 2ltr milk cartons half full of milk, some of which went out of date in October (wheres the puking smiley?).

Anyway, immediate plans are clean the walls and roof up, paint in brilliant white, Sort the electrical points, lighting, compressor and dust extraction lines, storage for my timber and sheets, a 5m workbench, sort machine location's and fit out the office.

Am looking into purchasing a combination machine (Spindle moulder, Planer thicknesser, table saw), a band saw, morticer, pillar drill and twin dust/chipping extractor unit.

I only have an approx £4k budget so any advice on machinery would be great..................I think ebay it is for bargains 

Right now for some pictures and any advice, critism and suggestions are more then welcome.












Oooooerrrrrrrrrrrrr :? 






Am I right in thinking that I can have 2 x 3ph 415v machines and 6 x 240v?






This will become a loackable storage unit for my power and hand tools






The small but perfectly formed office area











As said, your opinions are more then welcome, constructive or otherwise

I hope to make some good friends over the coming months and will offer help and assistance as and when i can.

I look forward to your replies

Regards

Erran

St. Ives Joinery Ltd


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## Slim (10 Jun 2008)

Welcome Erran, Your pics have been caught by the spam trap. This will go away after a couple more posts. In the mean time here they are:



smokey":3b43asi2 said:


> Hi all,
> 
> I have been very lucky and managed to bag myself a great little workshop for my new hopefully succesful business.
> 
> ...



Looks like a great space you have there. This forum is an exclent resource and you are bound to make some great friends here.


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## NeilO (10 Jun 2008)

Welcome Erran, to UKW Forums....

like Slim said "nice space you have there"..not envious at all  :^o :mrgreen: 

hope you do well in your new venture..

not really up on the electrics, but I`m sure you`ll get a reply sooner rather than later about it..


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## Waka (10 Jun 2008)

Erran

Welcome to the forum and good luck with the new venture.


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## Raggy (10 Jun 2008)

Welcome to the forum and good luck. No useful advice here tho


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## filsgreen (10 Jun 2008)

Good luck in your new venture Smokey, hope it works out for you  

Phil


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## OLD (10 Jun 2008)

Not a electrician but the dist. box has the capacity to feed 4 three phase supplys extendable and as one 3 phase is three single(240v) lots of 240v. At the moment looks like switches for 2x3 phase and 2x240v it needs sorting out lots of safety issues i would make it a priority.Money to be saved on s/h machinery due to having the three phase.


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## woodbloke (10 Jun 2008)

Can't see the pics at the mo' but welcome to the forum - Rob


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## Paul Chapman (10 Jun 2008)

Welcome and good luck.

Cheers :wink: 

Paul


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## smokey (10 Jun 2008)

Well, where do I start!

1st off i'd like to say many thanks for all the good luck in my venture....what a friendly bunch you all are ccasion5: 

Also i'd like to thank Slim for sorting out my post so you are all able to see my pictures, hopefully the said spam trap will dissappear soon as I will be posting lots of pictures as I go along.

OLD - Cheers for your advice, the electrics are 2nd on my list after cleaning and painting the walls. I am going to be pre-planning the electrical side of things this weekend, but dont expect to make a start on them till the following weekend. I think I will almost certainly need to extend the CU to 8 x 3ph supplies as 3 of these will be 240v for the lighting, alarm and power sockets.
Are machines really that much cheaper? when ever I seem to look they seem to be pretty much the same price from new, however Ebay is likely to produce some 415v bargains \/ 

Does anyone have any suggestions on lighting? The ws currently has 6 x flourescent strip lights. I was going to add one more each side half way down the walls so will have 12 in total. Do you think this will be adequate? Also I will be getting 6ft 70w lighting, should i go for a diffused unit or just a naked bulb?

Thanks again for all your help

Erran


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## big soft moose (13 Jun 2008)

the only thing i'd add is to put in plenty of sockets - you always need more than you think ( my shop at work only has two which leads to some ultra safe... not... trailing of extension leads), my own shop has ten which seemed like overkill but all but one are occupied

alternately you might want to look at air power - its quiter and the individual machinery is cheaper but you will need a decent compressor.

on other things - whats that roof made of ? - if its metal/concrete you are going to have damp/condensation issues - get a dehumidifier and set it running on a time switch so that it runs at night when power is cheap. On the other hand if is abspestos you need to be careful re cutting, drilling etc.

lighting wise - strips are generally fine , but you might want to get some halogen/led spots put in as well so that you can direct light where you need it most - also old stripl lights flicker which is a so and so for headaches - get new ones fitted if this is a problem

the only other thing that occurs to me is that ventelation doesnt look great so you need to be on the ball re dust extraction - plus possibly fit an extractor fan if you are going to be doing a lot of chemical stuff (such as stripping or turps polishing)

hope that helps and good luck with the venture.

Pete

(btw you have a pm from me re some s/h equipment)


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## Guy Forks (15 Jun 2008)

Erran.

That looks like a nice place you have there.

With regard to the lighting. My shop is only 24’x 10’ (Now).
When I had it extended by 1/3 I over doubled the amount of 5’ tubes I had in there now I have 4 double 5’ tubes because before it was too dark to see fine work and that includes two large windows which don’t do much at 5o/c in the middle of winter.

A 4k budget is that just for tools?

You said you used to work for your step dad. Will he be able to give you advice on the running of the business?

One of the best things I did when I set up my own business was get in touch with Business Link it’s free advice for people setting up or running a business. I was on the phone twice a week to them at the start. 

Do you know what your customer base will be and what you’re going to produce?

Best of British to you.

Glynn.


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## BradNaylor (15 Jun 2008)

Hi Erran,

Good luck with the new enterprise - It looks like you've got things right so far; namely cheap premises of the right size with 3-phase power!

What work are you intending doing? General joinery, or fitted furniture? I can't help thinking that there's more money in the latter.

Personally, I would think again about going down the combi route. You've plenty of space for seperates, and you get more for your money second-hand. My panel saw, P/T, and spindle moulder came to about £1200 in total. For an idea of what you can fit into a similar space (36' x 20') have a look at my shop.
https://www.ukworkshop.co.uk/forums/view ... hp?t=23818

Getting the workshop fitted out is the fun bit, though.

Your main challenge, and what you should be spending time on, is bringing work in.

Once again, good luck.

So long as you have the support of her indoors, self employment is a marvellous thing. If you lose that support however, it can wreck your life! Don't take her for granted.

Feel free to ask as many questions as you like.

Cheers
Dan


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## shim20 (15 Jun 2008)

good workshop there, same as what i work in at work the curvedwalls can be a pain sometimesbut you get used to them. good luck with it all, and keep up posted


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## LarryS. (15 Jun 2008)

Erran,

Welcome to the forum. Main bits of advice I'd give :

Generally everyone recommends going for separate machines, espicially so when you are running a business becauee you lose time changing between modes (and its a pain).

On electrics, run a ring main with loads of sockets, have a look at my thread, Plug offered a great solution to runing a ring main which I copied (and its worked a treat), provides all the capacity you could ever need : 
https://www.ukworkshop.co.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?t=23414&highlight=

Good luck with the venture


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## big soft moose (16 Jun 2008)

LarryS":2yogy2fh said:


> On electrics, run a ring main with loads of sockets, have a look at my thread, Plug offered a great solution to runing a ring main which I copied (and its worked a treat), provides all the capacity you could ever need :
> https://www.ukworkshop.co.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?t=23414&highlight=
> 
> Good luck with the venture



with regard to running the ring main - if you do indeed have a damp issue (see my post above) i'd stronglt reccomend using the sort of sockets designed for outdoor use which are damp resistant - ditto light fittings. We didnt do this when fitting the shop at work which has a serious lack of weather tightness and regret it every time one or the other of our lights our sockets fritzes out due to damp/spiders/dust etc.

BTW an electrician recently told me that the use of ring mains is being phased out with everything moving to the continental spur system on new fit outs - I have no idea whether this is true or if he was talking out of his fundamental orifice but it might be worth checking.


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## smokey (18 Jun 2008)

I'd like to apologise for the lack of updates so far.

To date the workshop has been cleaned, dried, walls have been sealed and painted brilliant white as has most of the curved roofing. It took 2 coats in all and many hours but its lookign much better. Will hopefully get pics up weekend.

Van was sold and collected last night, so now have roughly £4000 to get me started 

I will now try to answer some of your questions and will reply to points raised..............sorry if I miss anything or anyone out!

Big Soft Moose: 

Sockets are hopefully being fitted this weekend, I am off to screwfix tomorrow afternoon for lots of bits and pieces. Am going to have approx 10 doubles fitted to the workshop area, 3 doubles in the office and probably another half a dozen inbuilt into my work bench and a few in the UTS i will be building...............hopefully this will be plenty as like you mentioned, I will be going for air tools.

What would you class as a 'decent compressor'?

I believe the roof is asbestos, but cannot clarify this for certain. However I wont should not be doing any drilling into it.

Strip lights it will be then, I will also have halogen spots above the workbench like you suggested......Thanks

I have plans for dust extractors and will make sure there is adequate ventilation.

I will chek your PM and get back to you Pete.......Thanks again

*edit* just read your final post Pete. I am hoping the damp is not going to be too much of an issue. The pics on the 1st page are from 20odd years of build up. plus the workshop used to be from growing mushrooms  so was supposed to be damp.

Now the walls are sealed and I have used Santex exterior masonary paint, I am hoping this will stay dry.
If it continues to let damp in I will run a 4" strip of bitumen paint round the bottom of the brickwork as this is where it looks like it is coming from.

I will take a picture at the weekend of the exterior and you will see why there is damp issues. I am hoping it can be sorted no problem anyway.

Guy Forks: 

I think to start with I am going to go for a total of 12 single 6' tubes with 70w bulbs, I will always be able to add more if needed. I will be fitting lights above the workbench also

Well to be honest i'd like to get what I can for the £4k but realise this probably isnt going to be possible, so that needs to go as far as I can to start making me some money. I am happy to buy 2nd hand on certain items and know that many bargains can be had on ebay and with a bit research.

With regards to my stepdad, he will be able to give me some advice, but he isnt very business orintated, he's just a self employed guy who advetisers on yell.com and has an accountant take care of the finances.

We have an appointment with the local business enterprise place on Friday morning to see what is avaliable to us and the best way to approach running your own business and anything else I have forgotten about.

As for my customers, I have not got a particular type in mind. 
I will initially be making gates, garage doors, decking, household and garden furniture, bird box's, shed's, stairs and bird feeders/tables (have you seen the price of these in your local garden centre? £149 for a bird table made of half a dozen pieces of off cut's) basically anything I can sell to make a living from.

Dan Tovey:

I was chuffed the unit has 3phase, but to be honest I do not know what the advantage of having 3ph is over 1ph.

See my reply above regarding the work I intend to do, however this is only for starters to get me up and running.
Ideally I would like to make pieces of contemporary furniture, manily. Beds, bedroom furniture, av units, pc workstations, garden furniture, shelving solutions etc

I have read many arguments for and against combi machines and to be honest, at this time I am still undecided which route I want to take.

I am currently watching a Kity BestCombi 2000 and a Felder CF731 on ebay. Ideally if I do decide to go Combi, I want the Felder without a doubt. it just kinda depends on the guys reserve price.

I have seen your workshop and it is amazing what you have got in there, but to be totally honest, i like to have space to work on the shop floor etc. Gates, garage doors & stairs will be almost impossible to build on a bench comfortably I should imagine. I have attached an image of the layout I was thinking of..............any comments or suggestions more then welcome.

This is still only at the ideas stage and more 240v points will be added






It has not been fun so far Dan, just very dusty and back breaking lol. The fun part is gonna start happening this weekend mind!

Jo is my rock and she will stand by me and encourage no matter what  

LarryS:

I understand and have read many gripes with the changing the machines main functions, however I will only buy a 3 x motor machine, I would not even entertain the idea of one that needs the belts changing any more!

I have seen your thread and plugs idea looks great, i will certainly bare this in mind. 
I had only considered buying a 90m roll of white 20mm conduit and plenty of above wall mounted sockets.

Thanks alot for all the well wishes and I will make sure I post a new update over the weekend.

I am about to go and spam the 'Buying Advice' now for all my questions regarding machinery, tooling, fitting out etc, or will it be a better read if I keep it all within this thread?


Thanks again for all your help, advice and pearls of wisdom

Erran


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## andycorleone (19 Jun 2008)

Hi, good luck in your business. Have you ever think in a setu up like this:







You can add Router table as well


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## CWatters (19 Jun 2008)

Don't forget to change the locks and get insurance.


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## big soft moose (19 Jun 2008)

CWatters":275kkgid said:


> Don't forget to change the locks and get insurance.



good point - and fit a decent alarm (preferably one that calls the police/security co. rather than just a siren) - depending on the value of your tools it may also be worth fitting a smoke cloak to the alarm (this is a device which when activated fills the workshop with nontoxic dry ice smoke - making the removal of tools etc much more dificult for an intruder) - all more outlay at the begining but will significantly reduce your insurance premium.


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## BradNaylor (19 Jun 2008)

CWatters":fjhlltsr said:


> Don't forget to change the locks and get insurance.



Oh boy, this is a can of worms...

Agree with the locks; get really good ones and make sure that the doors are sound. Get roller shutters fitted too.

Insurance...

Insurance companies basically are bookmakers. They assess the odds of you having a mishap and charge you a premium accordingly - with a profit for themselves built in. This means that the odds are stacked in their favour - the insurance company always wins in the long run. Just like a bookmaker.

Certain things you've got to insure; you've got to have public liability insurance and employers liability if you have staff. You've also got to insure motor vehicles by law.

It makes sense to insure your workshop for fire. A fire could clean you out competely and you might never recover financially from it.

Insurance against theft however, is a bit of a grey area. You could well be asked to pay £500 - £1000 per year for this. Think about it.

Even if someone got into your workshop in the middle of the night what are they going to nick?

A few power tools? Possibly even your mitre saw?

It's difficult to imagine how a couple of scrotes could get away with much more than a grand's worth of gear. This is not going to bankrupt you.

Say the chances of this happening are once every five years. It's actually cheaper to take the risk yourself!

There is a very good case for spending your money on extra security rather than theft insurance.

Oh, and about alarms...

The type that phone the police are a waste of time IMHO. By the time the police respond the scrotes will be well away. Better by far are sirens that will make their ears bleed. Literally. They will be on their toes in seconds.

Just my twopennerth...

Dan


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## Tusses (19 Jun 2008)

Dan Tovey":r16679dm said:


> CWatters":r16679dm said:
> 
> 
> > Don't forget to change the locks and get insurance.
> ...



agreed with the insurance thing !

plus - if you were insured and claimed - you would pay it all back with increased premiums !


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## big soft moose (19 Jun 2008)

imo it very much depends where you are - if you are on a secluded small industrial estate with no residents arround to call the police....

well this happened to a mate of mine

they broke in - put a hammer through the alarm which abrutly stopped the siren (he didnt have a police calling type).

then brought up their transit van - so soco said later - and made more than one trip to take literally everything in the workshop (including his table saw, planer thicknesser, dust extractor, bandsaw, even the lathe plus several completed pieces which we awaiting client collection.

total loss about £8K, fortunately he was insured for theft - had he not been he would have been out of luck and out of buisness - had he had a police alerting alarm there would have been a good chance of the area car catching the scrotes in midtheft - as it was they had all night to rob the place.

the other benefit of the police alerting type is that insurance companies like them and thus they get your policy cost down.

at the end of the day its your decision , but i know which route i'd take.

Of course if you are right near houses - or on an industrial estate which has its own security patrols or similar (another mate of mine has a workshop that backs onto the local police station - he has only a modest siren type alarm) then a more modest set up would suit your needs.


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## the_g_ster (20 Jun 2008)

Great thread.

Be good to hear your prgress.

Watch that 3 phase though, could give you a nasty spiky haircut in seconds!!!!


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## BradNaylor (20 Jun 2008)

big soft moose":gbugu2np said:


> imo it very much depends where you are - if you are on a secluded small industrial estate with no residents arround to call the police....



Fair comment.

I guess I was thinking of my own situation - A busy high street position with houses all around - and a mate who lives over the road!

I wouldn't fancy being on a remote estate in the sticks - better all round to be in town!

Cheers
Dan


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## kityuser (20 Jun 2008)

of course there are more um"practical" ways of detering the scrotes.
I know of a place where break ins were a problem, a suspended "market stall holders weight" sorted that situation, came in the next day to an open door, suspended weight but no problems ever again.

Also door design can be very effective, a lad I know runs a car manufacturing company, kept having issues with break ins (they kept cutting the doors open) so constructed a door with some suspended "secret " ingredients sandwiched inside (falling plates, large bolts etc).
He went to work one morning to find somebody had "had a go" at one of the doors witha grinder, lots of mess (some blood also) but the door held out.

why not get a bloody great big workshop mascot!
good insurance and cheaper too!

Steve


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## big soft moose (23 Jun 2008)

smokey":1e0vbgr6 said:


> hopefully this will be plenty as like you mentioned, I will be going for air tools.
> 
> What would you class as a 'decent compressor'?



apologies for the delay on this - ive been asking arround my mates ( as i'm basically a turner i no longer have an air set up myself)

the word is that the hose should be rated to 600psi and at least 3/8in (10mm) - a smaller dia hose will reduce tool power. 

most tools will require 12cubic ft/min (80-100psi) also remember that this is cumulative if you are using more than one tool at once

and thirdly remember that the compressor will be noisy as hell - so if you cant site it outside the work unit you need to make a sound insulated box (if you go the latter route it might be an idea to put your dust extractor in the box as well)


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## TheTiddles (24 Jun 2008)

kityuser":der5dyqo said:


> of course there are more um"practical" ways of detering the scrotes.
> I know of a place where break ins were a problem, a suspended "market stall holders weight" sorted that situation, came in the next day to an open door, suspended weight but no problems ever again.



When I was 5 I caught father christmas that way, I made a two stage lever system so that it primed once the blighter checked I was asleep then the next time he came in it deposited the contents (lego) on him, daddy was so proud...

Aidan


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## DaveL (24 Jun 2008)

TheTiddles":nyv3qozu said:


> When I was 5 I caught father christmas that way


That is a really good one, should be on your CV. :lol: :lol: :lol: :twisted: 8)


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