Rearranging the Shop

I spent most of the weekend moving machines around to find space for the Southbend lathe.  I gave up my workbench site by the window so the lathe would be next to the mill, facilitating the 3 phase power requirement.

I liberated the bench and cabinets that had been the home of various planting implements and lawn chemicals for my new workbench.  Ultimately, this is going to work much better, as I can get the gardening stuff all together in the large mobile cabinet that already has fuels, chainsaws, shovels, and other unpleasantries.  I built this cabinet to be somewhat fireproof, having made it from steel panels, unistrut, and fire rated doors left over from a construction project.  I don't imagine my insurance agent would approve storing fertilizers and accelerants together, but having them at least in a semi-resistant cabinet is probably better than in most households.

I still need to add some shelving above the workbench, so I can add a work light below and have space to store projects in-process (because I tend to get side tracked, if you haven't noticed).  The lamp I spent a bit of time working on (haven't posted anything on this yet), and put aside because I didn't like the way it was turning out, eventually needs to be finished; I am not ready to re-purpose the cherry wood, which I spent quite a bit of time milling down from rough lumber for which I traded a pretty nice Delta compound miter-saw.  So, I have a pile of parts that need a temporary home and I suspect that even when the lamp is finished, there will always be something in que.  Even Yoda needs a place to rest between my attacks.

Next on the agenda is to wire up the lathe, then get back to Yoda.  I fab'd a bracket to mount to the wall and extend out 24" as a mounting post for the VFD and the disconnect for the mill and lathe.  This will put the VFD in arms reach of both machines, which is much more handy than mounted flat on the wall next to the mill (where I had it originally).  Reason being that I can use the VFD to control motor speed of both machines without messing with belts and gearing.  You can see the bracket mounted in the first picture.  But the VFD cannot run both machines simultaneously, so as a precaution, I have been searching for, and I think I have found, a 3 pole, 3 position switch, so I can select either machine with only one powered at any given time, but both powered from the VFD.  I bought more wire and some AC conduit (and made it out of Lowes for under 50 bucks--Woohoo!) to make the connections and I am eager to get this done.  But I ran out of time this weekend, so it will probably be next weekend before I get to it.