workbench pictures!

I ve jsut moved and need to setup a new workbench area, i dont have a lot of space and trying to find inspiration is hard on the net, so i thought id put it out to the crowd, if you have a picture of your general etup that would be great as well as words of wisdom in the setup or changes you would make if you where buil,ding a new one


call it workbench porn of you will,
(i dont mind messy porn either )


ill have pics up after some work over the next bit after setting it up

I recently moved house and in setting up my new workshop area I wanted a good solution for using my laptop but keeping it relatively clear from harm. I also wanted to be able to access it from either of two bench areas. Turns out now that everyone is buying big flat panel TV's, hardware stores and the like are practically giving away wall-mount TV stands! If like me you store all your schematics/layouts/whatever on a laptop, it's a great thing to have mounted above your bench:

I'm a big fan of the Ikea Jerker desk, but they discontinued it.  Since the picture was taken, I added another riser and two more side shelves.

heres my workbench for inspiration. Tidy eh?

/J

Here's mine. I'm an electroacoustics engineer, so the work area is set up for that. The last couple years I have been designing microphones. Right now I am also building up a bank of mic pres I "designed" (meaning tieing together THAT corp apnotes....

Les
L M Watts Technology

Hey boys this thread belongs in "The Lab" but of course you know that don't you?

Nothing too special, except for me......my happy place ;D




-Casey

analag said:

Hey boys this thread belongs in "The Lab" but of course you know that don't you?

Click to expand...

done

I'm enjoying seeing these lab pictures.

So far I like Jonkans best. Everything in its place and all in an arc within arm's reach. Very ergonomic.
But what's in that big plastic jug? Water? Lighter fluid? Skol?
I like the special microphone holding paper bowl. I must get some of those.

I also note that emporer and I have a common problem....we both put random stuff on the shelf holding parts drawers...so we can't open anything on the bottom row!

Les
L M Watts Technology

This is my working area: Small, polluted, ineffective (all the tools and parts are 1 - 4m behind me - you maybe see just a tenth of all my tools...) and between my bed and my computer...  :-\ It's not funny sleeping on metal swarf!!
Since I got into working on all of these audio projects everything just grew and grew and now I have to make a stop.
Since I will build  a loft bed this/next week, I will move the working bench to another place in my (then full of empty space) room, where I can leave the stuff and put everything together.

My words of wisdom: Try to make it easy to clean up and keep everything in one place. Especially if you work on different projects it's great not having lying them around at different places in your room.

The greatest problem I always have is searching for tools/parts. And cleaning up takes me a long time since everything has to be put somewhere else and everything's dirty and the dirt is everywhere.
I really admire some of your above desks, they're great!

PS: Lying there: A backpanel of my second GSSL...  

Nothing special... just built this bench recently and mounted my drill press to it. Very nice to have a dedicated work space now. The open chassis is a prototype of a low power guitar amp I'm working.

Note: this picture was taken two weeks ago and the surface of the bench doesn't look anywhere near as neat now...

Mason

leswatts said:

I'm enjoying seeing these lab pictures.

So far I like Jonkans best. Everything in its place and all in an arc within arm's reach. Very ergonomic.
But what's in that big plastic jug? Water? Lighter fluid? Skol?
I like the special microphone holding paper bowl. I must get some of those.

I also note that emporer and I have a common problem....we both put random stuff on the shelf holding parts drawers...so we can't open anything on the bottom row!

Les
L M Watts Technology

Click to expand...

The paper bowl is an absolute must if you are serious about DIY, which i am. I should show you guys where i keep my electronic parts also (in cardboard boxes, and plastic bags)

Its isopropanol in the plastic container, which i used to clean the pcbs of these badboys.
Yes, I actually get things done on this bench
/J

;D
Is this the messiest desk contest?
Here's mine - at the bottom you can see the pultec i'm building...

@ Jackies: Whats the big green pcb on the near the top picture?
Thanks...

wow, this is awesome, thank you all so much! keep em coming. mine is going to be much smaller than many here but ill still post once im done.

i was wondering the same thing Jackies, there are a serious number of pots attached to it

3nity said:

Whats the big green pcb on the near the top picture?

Click to expand...

That's a modular synth I'm building, it's like, 30% working, smoke came out of a couple chips, so I'm waiting for replacements to arrive...

I got this pcb from ebay - some dude did a run of maybe 100 around 2001 or something..
It's a very difficult build - pcb has errors, pcb part numbers don't match those on schematic, neither match boms, etc, but I decided if I ever finish this, there will be no projects too large

Here's mine!

That's the tidiest it's ever been!
GSSL on the bench, with a FETboy on stripboard to the left. Out of shot to the right is a big shiny 3u case for my midi controlled line mixer. It's my final project at uni, and I'm stuck doing the write-up when I want to be laying out PCBs! The case was purchased a little prematurely, but it meant that the department paid for it instead of me!  ;D

Matt

Butterylicious: I saw your tube proto board on Hoffman boards in your bass preamp thread. I want one!! 

(parts of) my mess at the moment: