A New Studio Space

This summer I began building out a detached garage studio to move my work into.  It’s hard not to look at the monthly lease I was paying as an overhead cost that may be avoided if I were to utilize space that I already have.  Every time I walked into the space I could envision the CNC setup but it felt like such a long journey to get there.  Here’s what I did. 

Kids are like goats, they love standing on things. My daughter Elle.

First off, noise proofing.  My CNC equipment is really loud.  Some amount of woodworking noise is to be expected from a garage but not the type of noise my machines makes.  I researched the best route to go and ended up building a insulated second wall inside the space that has two layers of drywall and noiseproofing green glue.  I also built a false ceiling for the CNC portion and a huge set of bifolding doors.  Now when I run the machine I can close the doors to its space and significantly reduce the racket. 

Second, I had to move the CNC, which is always an adventure.  I used a uhaul and two big sheets of 1-1/8” plywood as a ramp.  The machine weighs 1000? lbs or so and my brother and I pushed with all our strength to get it up even a small incline into the truck.  Some electronics were jostled in the move and when I set it back up I had to open the control box and troubleshoot the error lights. 

Finally setting up everything else, router table, dust collection, curing area for finished goods.  It all had to be figured out again.  At this point I’m back up and running but it isn’t really optimized yet. Unlike the spaces I’ve leased in the past having this as my own means I can put more work and care into customizing it exactly to my workflow.  I’ve done the first few programs and the machine is working well so far.  Looking forward to replenishing my stock and getting inventory back to available.