I found there is a significant difference between having a space to work in, versus having a space that is ready to work in. My wife and I have been remodeling our home, and the project resulted in my being displaced from work area. Now we are down to one remaining room, and we decided it could be set up as a combination gun/computer room in a way that wouldn’t detract from the eventual sale of the home.
The room definitely had some things working in it’s favor. It had been home to 7 – 8 Internet servers and had several circuits and upgraded electrical service. It was well ventilated and central air cleaning, humidifying and air conditioning service. The area was only 10.5′ x 10.5′, but it also had a wide 5′ x 2′ closet with sliding doors and shelves to hold systems and several wall mounted T1 circuits and routers. What needed to be done was the same combination of refurbishment we had done in other rooms in the house:
- Strip room including baseboard molding and trim
- Repair, resurface and paint all walls
- Resurface and refinish hardwood floor
- Install new molding, trim and doors
The only difference in this case was an opportunity to install some prefab and custom work surfaces and storage areas, lighting and a small local area network for systems. I thought I’d post a couple of installments of getting the area set up as opposed to a dead web site for the next couple of weeks.
| Systems |
| Closet |
| Counter Space |
The plan is to use 2 – 3 24″ wide base cabinets under each section of the surrounding counter tops (green) and leave at least one knee well at each wall. The cabinets are 20″ deep and have adjustable shelves. I will use one steel lock up for guns some number of overhead cabinets for storage. I think I will run 2 x 6 lumber through the planer and biscuit join and glue them. Should make a good sturdy top for mounting a couple of presses and a clean smooth work surface.
This time I’d like more permanent counter space to leave covered scales and trimmers out. I thought I might try to set up a central electric motor power source for tumblers, trimmers, case prep tools etc. Depends how compact and quiet of a gear head motor I can come up with. Not sure yet.
I plan on setting up my system data base for load info so it can be accessed through the web site. Should make it a little easier to keep current and make more load data available. Hopefully, the site will be running on a local server before the room is complete.
This has been my work area for the past couple of months while construction was underway. There is room for one monitor and a single piece of paper, if I place it perfectly perpendicular to the front edge of the keyboard.
It wouldn’t be too bad, but it’s portable enough for people to occasionally move it to another location and they don’t always wait until I’m not seated at the desk. Fortunately, the chair has wheels.
The floor’s in pretty bad shape, mostly from the wall to wall carpet that had been in place for what must have been a very long time. The duct tape covers a network line that ran along the floor through the active construction work areas. The mess of boxes and power outlets is actually a closet that acted as a systems rack mount. Because it’s well ventilated, it will be used for the same purpose.
This pretty much represents the future. The pile of boxes of yet to be assembled cabinets will eventually make up most of the new area. The Right to Bear Arms poster will remain in a prominent spot on this anti-gun environment California wall. Albert E on a bicycle – well, now there’s a guy who knew the value of things that go really fast. Hopefully I’ll be back in a week with an update and maybe some useful information on setting up a work area.
Thanks,
Joe
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