Important Security Warning: This is a historical archive text, not a modern home workshop project. Electrical installations, high voltages, removal or closing of doors, interventions on walls, ventilation, work with coatings and the load capacity of folding furniture require a check of the applicable regulations and the appropriate experts. Do not apply the described measures and procedures without checking the actual construction, installations and products.
This text is not part of the current offer of Savo Kusić, which is focused on windows, doors and associated solutions.
Home workshop and mini-workshop in a flat
If I had the material, if I had a good tool! Aren’t these the familiar sighs of people who want to DIY in their own home? If these wishes somehow become reality, new ones take their place: If I had a place, if I had a small workshop…
Of course, everyone in the family wants something in this area! A housewife usually wants her work utensils to disappear after use, drowning in the house, furniture. A child wants a corner that, when needed, will become a study corner. And the father, “master in the house”, wants a small workshop where he can place his things without endangering anyone’s comfort. He wants that workshop to be solid and strong for assembly, that there is water and electricity nearby, that it is well lit, that it does not require special protection of the walls and floor, etc.
The choice of a place for a home workshop is greatly influenced by the given local conditions. However, it should be borne in mind that this workshop must be well heated and ventilated, especially during painting and varnishing. If there are no windows, artificial lighting should be strong, preferably 220 V, maybe 380 V of mains voltage. In addition, it should have a water supply and drainage system.
A shed, a corner of a garage or a basement is best for this purpose. If we cannot provide these rooms, we can equip the workshop in one corner of the apartment, a window niche, the opening of a closed or walled door. This does not require much work.
Combined workshop cabinet
We can make this practical cabinet ourselves. When it is open, it represents a work table, and when it is folded, we store tools in it (picture 1, upper part)
The picture shows one such workshop that we can install in an unused door opening. First, what needs to be done in that case is the disappearance of the door, i.e. remodeling doors and door openings. This type of door out of use can also be used for other purposes. Which purpose we will decide for depends on the depth of the opening. A shallower opening can be used for a library, and a deeper opening for the workshop in question, as well as for a photo cabinet, a wardrobe or a corner for a TV and tape recorder (picture 1, part 2). In the latter case, it is also possible to install a stereo speaker.
FIGURE 1
Notes on adapting a doorway
If we no longer need the door, and its lack does not disturb the construction of the wall, the next step is to remove it and brick the opening. A suitable wall of 6-10 cm plastered with perlite mortar or other mortar that provides greater thermal insulation should be provided.
If the construction of the wall does not allow the door to be removed, we close the opening with a reed wall, 5-10 cm thick, which we fasten with slats on both sides and plaster with gypsum mortar. The cane board is available in dimensions 100 h 200 h 5 cm, i.e. 10 cm and can be cut with a saw according to the required dimensions. This wall insert is a good thermal insulator, but we must not stress it (e.g. by nailing shelves). We can only load the sides of the door opening or the door frame.
A solution that requires a larger selection of materials is covering the door in accordance with the existing furniture of the given room. We start this work by closing the door, removing protruding hardware (knob, shield) and sealing the gap with sealing strips. Now we lock the door and fasten it to the wood with screws. (The keys should be saved to be able to open the door later!)
The next stage of work is coating. The covering should be in harmony with the room furniture. It can be made of chipboard and plywood, colored decorit board, and stretched jute on which wallpaper is pasted. In advance, we must perform a high-quality substrate at the points of attachment of any cladding material. We perform sound and thermal insulation from a layer of felt, foam sponge or several layers of corrugated paper, by placing them between the door leaf and the lining.
Cladding is done first on the closed part of the opening, and then on the sides. We “remove” the touching inner edges of the lining of the sides and the closed part of the opening in order to make the side linings fit better. The resulting gaps between the side panels and the walls of the outer side are covered with slats. We achieve a better solution by closing these gaps with a wider grooved wooden frame that stiffens the side panels as well. Assembling the parts of the frame is done using a tongue and groove diagonally or plugs. We can make up for the shortcomings of making the corners of the contact surfaces with corner slats. Fastening the paneling to the old door, with a previously drawn layout, is done using thin bicycle nails, wood screws with a lenticular head equipped with decorative washers or caps.
Installation of equipment should be carried out in previously marked places. We will determine these places before the lining. With test drilling, we will make sure of the bearing capacity of the marked places. The load-bearing screws should go into the beams of the wooden door frames, because the decorative boards of the doors of old buildings are not load-bearing. To carry heavier equipment, it is necessary to install dowels in the wall before lining the wall.
Before polishing, we stain the chipboard and plywood panels with the appropriate colors according to the furniture and walls. After the stain has dried, the lining can be polished or varnished. We only put shelves in the door opening that has been converted into a wardrobe, and we attach the outer lining with screws directly to the door.
Workshop cabinet
We will present a cabinet-workshop with a new solution (picture 2). It is made from an old office file cabinet, some new boards and legs from old furniture.
From the drawing it can be seen that this cabinet is not tied to the place, it is an independent unit and it is easy to open when in use.
The material is taken from panel boards or pieces of old furniture. Boards that have a thickness of 3/4“ are best suited“. The inner small shelves, drawer bottoms, as well as the rear inner part of the cabinet are made of plywood and chipboard with a thickness of 4-6 mm.
FIGURE 2
By high-quality and firm fastening of the back panel, we can prevent the cabinet from tilting in the lateral direction.
We connect the flat surfaces with glue, and secure their connection with a wooden plug.
The worktop should be wider than the width of the cabinet (by the thickness of both legs).
The best way to secure the table top to the correct height is with piano hinges, across the entire width of the table. These hinges should be fixed in several places with screws that ensure the strength and load-bearing capacity of the table. The stability of the table in the open state is provided by special hinges. This connection, as can be seen in the picture, on the one hand secures the table, and on the other hand, prevents the table from opening more than intended. It is not possible to fix the legs of the table with crossbars, because they would make it impossible to assemble the legs. That is why we connect the upper ends of the legs to the table with recessed hinges. The depth of the recess should correspond to the thickness of the hinge leaf. The method of closing the table is shown in detail in the picture 2.
Furnishing the interior of the wardrobe should be adapted to the needs of the user. This also applies to determining the number and height of drawers. We can also use the inner side of the door leaf that closes the upper part of the wardrobe. On the small shelves, as shown in the drawing, plastic boxes and sheets for screws and nails can easily be placed, which in this way will always be at hand.
The color of the outer surfaces of the wardrobe should match the surroundings. It can be varnished with colorless varnish, or it can be painted with a suitable color. Whichever processing method we choose, the surfaces must first be cleaned and ironed, and the edges must be dulled with sandpaper. You should also pay attention to the drying time, which according to the instructions we should follow, between applying layers of paint.
It is enough to cover the inner invisible surfaces with an oil stain that preserves the material and enables its easy cleaning.
The desk, which is similar to the previous one, is made from an office cabinet with drawers. The table top is more stable and can withstand work with planers. A workbench made in this way consists of a separate cabinet with drawers for storing tools and a table top that can be easily placed or hung on the wall (picture 1, upper part). Please note that this workbench is used to carry out those works that do not require much space (radio amateur, modeling, electrical, photo amateur, toy repair, etc.). Opening and preparing the workbench is done with several movements. We first move the cabinet with drawers from its place, then push it under the open table top.
For the table top, we can use a larger, old, drawing board. We can make a table top ourselves from boards that we connect to each other with slats from below. By opening the table, these slats, in addition to their main role, prevent the movement of the drawer cabinet because they enclose it on two sides.
We fasten the table top with slats to the supporting slats at the part where the drawers are with two butterfly nuts.
The end of the table top, which is far from the part with the drawers, rests on the support bar hung on the wall. The cross-section of the supporting batten should be in the shape of the letter L. The supporting batten is composed of a board on the underside of which a batten with plugs is nailed. The plugs of the lower arm L should be countersunk into the holes at the end of the table top.
We hang the carrier bar on hooks that we previously screwed into the built-in dowels in the wall, or we support it vertically with a bar placed from the floor.
The cabinet with drawers serves to store tools, but can also be used as a stand. Since we often move it from its place, those parts that touch the floor should be glued with felt or choya tape. We make the sides of the cabinet from panels of old furniture, chipboard or veneer by gluing them with glue (or some more modern glue) to the frame. The frame itself is assembled from slats connected to each other on a flap. On the inner sides of the wardrobe, we install smooth slats for the drawers. If the side is made of a wooden frame, the vertical slats should be connected with a horizontally placed guide slat.
The back panel of the cabinet should be attached carefully so that the cabinet does not tilt to the side. This is best done with screws. If we do not install the back panel, the cabinet can be fixed with slanted slats. We make the front and back legs from one piece each, in such a way that we shape each arch in the middle. We fasten them from below with screws.
We determine the height of the drawer ourselves, but it is recommended that it be increased going from top to bottom. The top drawer can accommodate measuring and drawing accessories. In the next one, we put the most frequently used tool, sorted by size. Below that: rivets, screws and various fasteners. Even lower we place semi-finished work items and at the end, material reserves. We make the sides of the drawers from slats, which we connect with nails and felt, or with appropriate glue. We make the bottom of the drawer from nailed boards of plywood, chipboard or stronger chipboards.
Instead of drawers with partitions, for small parts, we use tin boxes, the edges of which we have to flatten beforehand with a hammer. We install the front panels of the drawers at the end after very careful adjustment, because when the drawers are closed, these panels must cover the entire front side evenly. After this, we attach the handles to the drawers.
We need to mount the precision mechanics vise on a special stand and fasten it using a clamp or a butterfly nut with screws into pre-drilled holes on the table top.
A modern home workshop requires a professional check of electrical installations, ventilation, fire protection, wall construction and furniture load-bearing capacity. Historical measures and solutions from this text are not a project to be implemented.