Garage workbench Build: Day Two

Today was Saturday so I worked on the workbench off and on all day in between playing with the kids.

This afternoon we went shopping at Menards for supplies for this project. I re-learned two lessons from this trip but I doubt they will stick. :-)

Lesson One: Always make sure you bring a shopping list when you go shopping, when you don't you will forget things you meant to buy and buy things you didn't intend to.

Lesson Two: (Made worse by forgetting lesson one) Things always cost more than you expect.

In particular I decided at the last minute to go ahead and buy the metal insert for the slatwall, I might not have if Menards had any of the Melamine Covered slatwall instead of just the white painted stuff, as I think from the description that the Melamine covered stuff might be a better particle board. These inserts cost almost a hundred dollars and the 4 by 8 sheet of slatwall was only 40 something, so the inserts to strenghen the slatwall cost twice what the slatwall itself did. I don't think I will regret this decision though as with the metal inserts I will be able to hang just about anything I might want to on that wall without worrying about breaking the slatwall.

On the forgetting things side I forgot to buy electrical wire the first time I went shopping, which was in many ways the whole reason for this trip as I needed to work on the wiring for the electrical outlets next. I went by Home Depot later since it is closer to my house and picked up a hundred foot roll.

So at this point I have outlet boxes in the wall, and have all the suplies I need to build the actual workbench. Getting a light to go above it and a bench vise will have to wait for later.

I think I am going to really like having a workbench for all kinds of small projects. I can't tell you how many times today while working on building the workbench I wished I had a workbench to work on. :-)

I ended up using a microphone case I have sitting in the garage from my time working backstage in music theatre productions as a basic work table.

I had to cut 4.5 inches of the slatwall to have it line up on a stud, so I am going to have to cut that much off the end of all the metal inserts from one side. Ugh. Oh well, its going to be worth it in the end.

Garage Workbench Build: Day One

I started working on my garage workbench today.

Before I started I stopped by the Sears two blocks from where I worked to pick up the bench vice I have decided I want for my workbench Craftsman Proffessional 4 and 1/2-inch bench vise and the shop vac I want craftsman-xsp-12-gallon-5.5-peak-hp-wet-dry however they had just sold the last of these shop vacs they had in stock and didn't carry that vise in store. (Small town Sears.) I will have to go by the Sears in the mall near where I live. (I work in a mid size city and commute to a smaller town to work, backwards I know.)

Anyway, when I got home I started on the project. Like so often happens with this kind of project the fist step was to clean out the corner in the opposite side of the garage. 

(I don't have a before picture, but this corner was full of stuff before I started.)

Then I cleaned out the corner where I want to build the workbench.

Finished insulating in that corner.

And started putting up drywall.

Thats all I accomplished for day one. 

Garage Workbench Plans

While I shop for the right classic mustang to restore I am working on getting ready to do the restoration. This week that meant planning to install a workbench in my garage to store tools and do small project stuff during the restoration.

I am planning to put the workbench in the front corner of my garage farthest from the door into the house because that seems like it would work best with my garage layout.

This is the corner of my garage I plan to build the workbench in. 

I spent a bunch of time time looking at pictures of garage workbenches online and finally came up with these rough plans. 

I will let you all know how it turns out.

First Purchase

I made my first tool purchase for the restoration on my way home from work earlier this week. I still haven't found a car to buy, so don't know what kind of issues the car I end up buying will have, so I am resisting the urge to buy a bunch of tools until I know what I actually need. However, I needed some jack stands to rotate the tires on my daily driver so I decided to buy a pair since I do know I will eventually need these for the restoration and I don't currently own any.

I bought a pair of Craftsman High Lift jack stands. Link I will post a review after I actually open the box, put these together and use them for the first time.

I chose these because they have the highest maximum height of any of the basic affordable jack stands I found after some basic googling and they were available at the Sears store just a few blocks from where I work, which was a bonus.

These have a maximum height of 21 inches, and a lot of the other  jack stands I saw maxed out in the 16 inch range. I want to have plenty of room to work under my car and these should give me that. I figure when/if I do actually buy the car I will need to get another pair. But these are all I need right now and are enough to serve as a sort of promise to myself that I really am serious about this.

Mustang Dreams

The first car I owned was a red 1988 Ford Mustang convertible. That car was a gift from my brother and l owned it until it started having engine problems right around the time I got engaged and had other places my money needed to go.

Ever since I gave that car to some family friends to use for parts fixing up their fox body mustang there has been a piece of me that missed that car. Well, three kids, multiple pets, and eight plus years later I am finally at a place in my life where I can start to seriously think about getting another mustang.

This blog is going to be a record of my quest to acquire and restore a classic mustang to use as a daily driver. Will I succeed? Will I fail? Who knows, but you can journey with me here as we find out together.