Will tools and materials deteriorate?

[Jacob]

Just keep them in poly bags. Pack them on a dry day, cold if possible. Seal by turning over the tops and holding with clothes pegs or similar.

 

[Triggaaar]

I am still thinking of building a large insulated box inside the lock up.
Would I want to keep a through flow of air or seal it up? Kris

You'd want to seal it up if you could - but that might be more difficult to do than sealing tools inside individual boxes. This is one instance where ventilation is not desirable (assuming you put your tools away dry and not even slightly damp!) as ventilation brings in outside air at it's ambient temperature and it is temperature changes that cause moisture to condense out on metal objects.

I'm not quite understanding the logic behind insulation boxes. This is my thinking (which I assume is missing an important point) - if the tools are air sealed, and the air inside is dry, then there's no moisture inside to condense, so it doesn't need to be insulated. If it's not air sealed and fully dry, insulating it will just slow down the speed at which the air and objects inside change temperature, it won't actually stop the contents going below 0. So any moisture inside should still condense on the metal. Is the idea that the insulation slows down the cooling enough that during a cold night the contents haven't fully cooled before morning, at which point the ambient temperature increases again? So while the contents will get cold, the peak won't be quite as low as if uninsulated?

 

[tekno.mage]

I'm not quite understanding the logic behind insulation boxes. This is my thinking (which I assume is missing an important point) - if the tools are air sealed, and the air inside is dry, then there's no moisture inside to condense, so it doesn't need to be insulated. If it's not air sealed and fully dry, insulating it will just slow down the speed at which the air and objects inside change temperature, it won't actually stop the contents going below 0. So any moisture inside should still condense on the metal. Is the idea that the insulation slows down the cooling enough that during a cold night the contents haven't fully cooled before morning, at which point the ambient temperature increases again? So while the contents will get cold, the peak won't be quite as low as if uninsulated?

If all the air is excluded from the container, or if only dry air (0% humidity) is in the container then the insulation is not required as there is no moisture to condense out onto the metal. However, in practise this would be very difficult to achieve. The purpose of the insulation is to slow down the rate of change of temperature of the air & objects inside the container and hence avoid the condensation. If the metal object inside is the same temperature as the air around it (ie the insulation has providede a nice little microclimate inside the box) no condensation should occur.

 

[Triggaaar]

The purpose of the insulation is to slow down the rate of change of temperature of the air & objects inside the container and hence avoid the condensation. If the metal object inside is the same temperature as the air around it (ie the insulation has providede a nice little microclimate inside the box) no condensation should occur.

I'm thinking stopping warm air getting in is the most important thing. If it's been cold, the contents will all be cold (even with insulation), and if warm air gets in the moisture in it can condense on the still cold metal. I'm not sure how much insulation will prevent that :duno:

Buildings require insulation, heating and ventilation, so I'm not sure why a storage box can get away with just insulation. Sealing them with a silica gel pack seems like a good idea to me.

 

[tekno.mage]

Buildings require insulation, heating and ventilation, so I'm not sure why a storage box can get away with just insulation. Sealing them with a silica gel pack seems like a good idea to me.

True - but we are talking about metal objects in a sealed box here (or as sealed as you can sensibly get - like a tupperware box with well fitting lid), rather than a building which is not sealed and has objects in (people, washing, bathrooms etc) which generate moisture - hence the need for ventilation to remove that generated moisture, and insulation & heating to keep the people inside warm.

An insulated box that is sealed as well as you can and containing non-moisture generating metal things will have it's own microclimate inside - the insulation will slow down temperature changes from the outside climate and keep both the objects and the air in the box at roughly the same temperature, hence no condensation. If your box was hermetically sealed and the air inside at 0% humidity the insulation would not be needed - but in the real world, it won't be a real hermetic seal and the air inside the box will contain some moisture, so the insulation will help by keeping the air & objects in the box at roughly the same temperature and sheilding both from temperature extremes outside the box. Tiny amounts of moist air that do get in from outside will be so small as to not really affect the micro climate in the box - and some silica gel packs inside will definitely help, as will wrapping things in anti-rust paper or an oily rag.

 

[krismusic]

Kym, you have obviously given this subject a lot of thought and have a lot of experience.
I will definitely take what you say on board.
One problem is finding large enough airtight boxes for the machines.
I prefer this idea to greasing the machines as there will be areas that it won't be possible to get to and then there's the motors...

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Get the tubs of silica gel and put them with your stuff in an old chest freezer on a nice dry day.

 

[tekno.mage]

Kym, you have obviously given this subject a lot of thought and have a lot of experience.
I will definitely take what you say on board.
One problem is finding large enough airtight boxes for the machines.
I prefer this idea to greasing the machines as there will be areas that it won't be possible to get to and then there's the motors...

It comes from having a large, unheatable workshop and in some cases finding these things out the hard way

Regarding larger machines - are you meaning items like bandsaws, tablesaws etc? If so, I'd recommend oiling/greasing all the parts you *can* get at, then wrapping the entire machine in polythene sheeting (the heavy-duty stuff builders use - thinner stuff tears too easily) and sealing all the joins in the sheet with something like gaffer tape. If you can't get the polythene to wrap underneath the machines as they are rather heavy, wrap what you can and gaffer-tape the edges to the machine body.

Will this work? Probably - and it's certainly better than nothing. As an example of this method - when I moved house 7 years ago, I had some leaded stained glass panels I needed to move (long story) and laid them between wodges of newspaper, hardboard & polystyrene sheet to prevent breakage, then wrapped the whole package round several times in thick polythene and gaffer-taped it up all the joins, mainly to prevent the panels from sliding out in transit. When the package arrived at this end, it got stowed against a wall in a damp brick shed and forgotten about with a metal shelving unit in front of it. We found the package this year as a friend makes stained glass and was interested to see them. It was a really damp day when we moved the metal shelving (now quite badly rusted anywhere the paint had been scratch off) and pulled out the package (now covered in swallow guano and other undesirable stains). On opening the package, the contents were bone dry - neither the newspaper or hardboard showed signs of ever being damp, despite being stored for 7 years in a damp shed.

 

[krismusic]

Nice one Kym. That case is very encouraging. Radial arm saw and half size bandsaw are the main items that I prefer not to live with and need to store.
Those and a lot of odd hand tools that I rarely use but would be sad to see go rusty.
I'm intrigued. What kind of stuff do you make in your spartan workshop?
There's a bit of my stuff on my website. kriswatson.co.uk. It's a long time since I updated it though...

 

[tekno.mage]

I'm a woodturner, although I do make some flatwork too.

I should perhaps explain that I live in a rented farmhouse in Wales and have the use of the old farm workshop - which is half a barn, hence the problem! The workshop is basically a huge tin shed with very high ceilings, good ventilation (it's well draughty) and water drives in under the doors and leaks down one wall when the wind & rain are in a certain direction. Being in Wales, there is a lot of rain

My machines (lathes, bandsaw, pillar drill etc) are all in the driest part (ie no actual leaks here), but sometimes there can be drips anywhere from condensation forming on the inside of the roof!

All the machines are frequently oiled, greased, sprayed with WD40 to keep corrosion at bay, and power tools kept in sealed plastic tubs when not in use. I do keep my few vintage hand planes indoors (having spent a long time restoring them and making a nice wooden box to keep them in!)

Swallows also nest & roost in the workshop in the summer, so plastic sheets over some machines can sometimes be necessary. One year they nested on a beam above the bandsaw, which was a little inconvenient - although we managed to hang up a sheet of plastic above the machine as a poo-catcher! What was really funny was when the fledglings left the nest and perched on the top of the bandsaw, watching with interest while my partner was cutting some bowl blanks. Every time he stopped and looked up from the cutting, there were three young swallows peering at him from the top of the saw.

 

[krismusic]

Hi Kym, Sounds like you are pretty committed, or should be :lol: for working in such spartan conditions. I assume that you don't make your living form your work and can choose when you feel keen enough to work out there. I guess there are probably quite a lot of more rural workshops belonging to people on here. Being in London I don't have a need for a poo catcher. Mind you a shi9t stopper might be handy! :twisted: Neither do I have the compensation of sharing my workshop with wildlife. Sounds positively Disney.:deer
I know that I am going to miss my workshop when I leave. Just finishing the last two jobs that I will do there and then need to get busy with getting out by the end of October.
Thanks for all the advice. I'll keep you posted of progress.
Kris ccasion5:

 

[tekno.mage]

Hi Kris,
Actually my partner & are trying to make a living from woodturning - it's not easy and it's unlikely we'll ever get rich! We do, however have the benefit of living and working somewhere very beautiful and getting most of our materials (ie wood) for nothing. I quite like sharing the workshop with the wildlife - well the swallows & sparrows are nice, but rats are another matter and don't get a friendly welcome at all!

Although the workshop is a big unheated space, we have made small electrical heaters to warm the metal parts of the lathe when working in the winter! You can mostly wrap up warm, but cold metal on cold fingers is not good!

 

[krismusic]

I don't know why I assumed that your woodturning was a hobby. Where do you sell?
It seems to me that it is increasingly hard for an individual to make a living from making.
Craft will always have an appeal. Maybe even more so in our techno world but whether people will have disposable income to spend...
What I laughingly refer to as my career has been spent in the commercial world and in that environment it is very tough to make a living.
I think it is all going to the big guys with economy of scale.
Everybody wants a deal and I only get the jobs that I under quote for. I don't get the ones that I over quote!
Basically I am not a good business person. You need to be as well as having the skills.
I'm quite looking forward to bowing out of all that.

 

[tekno.mage]

We mostly sell our work in the local area - in local shops and also at local craft events - one of our selling points is that our work is hand made and uses local, sustainably produced, named woods. For some reason our hand made crochet hooks, giant knitting pins and drop spindles are very popular! We also have some customers further afield that we do production turnings with special paint finishes for - again these customers like the fact we are using local wood and are based in Wales. We definitely need more outlets & clients but so far all our business has come via word of mouth and I'd really like to keep it that way to avoid time-wasters & non-payers.

We don't try and compete with cheap machine-made imports - there is no way we can - we are aiming for the premium end of the market in craft tools. We also make decorated bowls and boxes with threaded lids which are more the art end of the market, and light pulls in named local woods, which is the cheaper end of the gift market. All our products are labelled with the woods used - in English and in Welsh (even though we are not native Welsh speakers).

We both had proper jobs once - myself in IT management and my partner in electronics design, but a combination of redundacy and other factors led us to Wales - supposedly to retire, but the pensions didn't work out as expected We have to do something to make a living, & there are very few jobs around here in the current financial climate, so we decided to turn what started out as a hobby into something more - and so far it's turned out just slightly more lucrative than being on the dole!

 

[MrA]

Hmmm. Thanks for the replies. I like the idea of treating my tools like swords! :twisted:
Basically if it is likely to require fairly extreme measures to stop my tools deterioraHmting I don't think I wl put em in there in the first place. :| some of those ideas could be very practical for fixing and fittings though. Maybe cool boxes as they seal... Thank you very much for your thoughts. K ccasion5:

Use silica gel packs, we use them at work for the more specialised workshop tools that are stored in a pretty basic store, if you can box them and pop a couple of silica packs in there then your tools will be fine. If you're local to me I could get you some packs, just let me know how many you'd need.

 

[krismusic]

Hmmm. Thanks for the replies. I like the idea of treating my tools like swords! :twisted:
Basically if it is likely to require fairly extreme measures to stop my tools deterioraHmting I don't think I wl put em in there in the first place. :| some of those ideas could be very practical for fixing and fittings though. Maybe cool boxes as they seal... Thank you very much for your thoughts. K ccasion5:

Use silica gel packs, we use them at work for the more specialised workshop tools that are stored in a pretty basic store, if you can box them and pop a couple of silica packs in there then your tools will be fine. If you're local to me I could get you some packs, just let me know how many you'd need.

That's brilliant. I am in London so not local but thanks very much for the offer. Presumably I will find silica packs online. One thing about silica packs. How long do they remain effective and how do you know to replace them? OK. That's two things. :deer

 

[krismusic]

We mostly sell our work in the local area - in local shops and also at local craft events - one of our selling points is that our work is hand made and uses local, sustainably produced, named woods. For some reason our hand made crochet hooks, giant knitting pins and drop spindles are very popular! We also have some customers further afield that we do production turnings with special paint finishes for - again these customers like the fact we are using local wood and are based in Wales. We definitely need more outlets & clients but so far all our business has come via word of mouth and I'd really like to keep it that way to avoid time-wasters & non-payers.

We don't try and compete with cheap machine-made imports - there is no way we can - we are aiming for the premium end of the market in craft tools. We also make decorated bowls and boxes with threaded lids which are more the art end of the market, and light pulls in named local woods, which is the cheaper end of the gift market. All our products are labelled with the woods used - in English and in Welsh (even though we are not native Welsh speakers).

We both had proper jobs once - myself in IT management and my partner in electronics design, but a combination of redundacy and other factors led us to Wales - supposedly to retire, but the pensions didn't work out as expected We have to do something to make a living, & there are very few jobs around here in the current financial climate, so we decided to turn what started out as a hobby into something more - and so far it's turned out just slightly more lucrative than being on the dole!

That's spooky! My wife is madly into hand spinning with drop spindles. She's always at it! It's like living with a bloody spider! Do you have a website? All the very best. If you are managing to stay out of the clutches of the benefit system then you are doing well in my book. From what I hear the dole is run as a penal rather than supportive department these days. :evil:

 

[MrA]

That's brilliant. I am in London so not local but thanks very much for the offer. Presumably I will find silica packs online. One thing about silica packs. How long do they remain effective and how do you know to replace them? OK. That's two things. :deer

Silica gel packs can be bought online, buy twice as many as you need, use half in your tool storage and keep the other half in a dry sealed container. Every week or so swap them out and put the "used" packs in your airing cupboard to dry out. They'll absorb about 40% of their own weight in moisture and when drying out you'll probably not get them 100% dry so a week before swapping would be about right.

 

[tekno.mage]

[q
That's spooky! My wife is madly into hand spinning with drop spindles. She's always at it! It's like living with a bloody spider! Do you have a website? All the very best. If you are managing to stay out of the clutches of the benefit system then you are doing well in my book. From what I hear the dole is run as a penal rather than supportive department these days. :evil:

Spinning with a drop spindle is very addictive! I had to learn to do it when we decided to make drop spindles (so I could test the spindles my partner was designing) and I still do it while watching TV in the evening & living in Wales means I have access to fleeces from various types of sheep

We don't have a website as yet - if your wife is interested in our drop spindles, I could PM you some photos?

 

[andersonec]

this stuff was developed by Boeing as a rust preventer for their planes. Expensive yes, but so are your tools.

http://www.rutlands.co.uk/cgi-bin/psPro ... &submit=Go

Andy