Wasting my time?

[delaney001]

Hi, moving into a new house next month. Have a double car garage which has an attic built into it and reasonable stairs to provide access.
It’s not huge up there but it’s just about enough room to put the lathe, would be great to keep all lathe related stuff up there and downstairs for everything else. The floor/ceiling is well built but is just regular timber joists and sheeting (don’t know the name for this type of ceiling construction). It’s not a concrete slab anyway!!
Would I be mad to even bother putting a lathe up there (Jet 1642) considering the vibration that would prob run through it trying to cut a decent sized bowl? Have always had lathe on concrete floor, bolted down up until now. Presume bolting it to a ‘floating’ timber floor would provide little to no resistance?

Any advise or experience of same?

 

[Woodchips2]

My friend has a similar setup and he provided support brackets to the lathe off the brick gable wall to reduce vibration on the floor joists. It worked but it was a small DML24 lathe.

A neighbour had a business making coil springs and he built a mezzanine floor in his workshop with timber joists and chipboard. He put one of the big machines up there but laid a thick steel plate under it to spread the load.
Regards Keith

 

[delaney001]

The steel plate might work if it was thick enough. Suppose there’d be a cut off point in terms of safety that you wouldn’t want to be putting anything too heavy up there

 

[finneyb]

Jet 1642 net weight 440lbs ie 32 stone. Personally, I don't think I would even if I could get it up there

Brian

 

[sunnybob]

I know several people who weigh over 20 stone. I bet a dozen of them would happily stand in that room.
Its all about the condition of the joists. If they are 100 years old (or less than 10 years old, having seen the "quality" of new build timber) I wouldnt do it.

 

[Chris152]

I've no idea about the strength of joists or likelihood of vibration (though I'd imagine that could be a real issue), but given the choice between an attic or a section of a concrete-floor double garage to house a lathe, extractor etc, I would choose the latter. The thought of turning in a small-ish attic worries me (though I've no idea what the layout of the attic is, obvs.). If dust getting on other things is an issue, could you build a timber-frame tent around the area you could site the lathe in, beside the garage door? Open the door and you have a complete change of air in no time. Use the attic for storage?
Just some thoughts that don't really address your question.

 

[delaney001]

Thanks for replies. I think there's no issue with just the lathe being up there. Ceiling is about 10 years old, bone dry and really well built/specc'd. But the vibration will def be an issue.

I'm probably fooling myself going up there, but its a really perfect sized space to cater to all turning requirements. If i was going to go up there, I'd probably build a dust screen around it.

Is there anyway to get an idea whats the max weight should be up there?

 

[finneyb]

Just googling 'floor loading uk ' gets amongst others https://www.huduser.gov/Publications/pdf/res2000_2.pdf table 3.4 Gives attic concentrated load as 250 lbs.

Brian