Hardwood storage

Storing wood is always a pain, it doesn’t matter if the pieces are long or short. Trying to figure out what to do with all that wood is a pain because it there is usually a bunch and they run from tiny chunks a few inches long to full sheets of plywood.

Here is what I decided to do:

• small chunks went into a plastic bin
• short-medium stuff went into the cavities between the wall studs
• long stuff goes on a rack above the workbench
• full and partial sheet goods go on a new rack

With a plan decided I just needed to go ahead and put it into action. I had the bin, so as I found small hardwood chunks I put them in it. It just lives on a shelf. Easy.

The plan was to hide the medium chunks behind the sheet goods. I screwed some 1×3 on the wall and bam! Also hid back there are the sides of our garden cold frame.

Long board rack above workbench.

The long item rack above the workbench was already made, it just needed some clearing out. I had put random stuff up there and a few things that needed to be returned. The front edge has a lip that can hold a few boards that I am working on close and out of the way.

Sheet goods rack opened showing short board storage.

My sheet goods rack was like ones I had seen in magazines and online. Simple, easy, and cheap. A couple of pieces of 2×8, a sheet plywood, caster, and hinges. I loaded up the kids one Saturday morning to get the lumber, and it was built, installed, and filled by 11am. I think that painting it might look nice. Right now all that is in there are some partial sheets of MDF, ¹/₂ and 3/₄ Oak ply, and 1 ¹/₂ Foam board I use for cutting sheet goods. My 4 year old son is able to open and close it, so it should work out fine.

Right now I have some ⁸/₄ and ⁴/₄ ash boards and some machined gunwales in the rafters of my garage and parents barn. It would be nice to put them somewhere else, but for now they are out-of-the-way and will stay put.

Getting random boards out-of-the-way has really helped get the garage cleaned up. The workbenches are still covered with stuff and there are some small things to finish up. I am not totally cleaned up, but I feel like I am in the home stretch.

This article is one in a series of articles entitled: The Garage. To see all the parts so far CLICK HERE.

Yakima has a cool iterative fit guide, but it is flash based and really aimed at selling the things that attach to the rack on the car you already have. I like to use the Dealer Fit Tool. It is much quicker than the regular guide and gives you all the measurements and even pictures for most cars. It also allows you to see options for older Yakima hardware, and can tell you what you can carry.

Most cars only have minor changes most years and big updates every few years. The Dealer tool groups the years so you can help narrow down options. For example: the Chevy Malibu 1997-2004 only has 25″ between the bars, which isn’t enough (in my opinion)  for a canoe.  However, the 2004-2007 and the 2008-2011 models both have 32″ between the bars, so they could work. It can also tell you quickly that the 2008-2011 models are rated for 25 more pounds than previous models so my be better if you want to carry two canoes.