So far October has been a blur of activity. All of the construction going on here at the complex has finally wound down. We had new railings installed throughout August and all of the windows replace in September. The windows actually drug on into the first weeks of October.

I have been studying for my commercial radio license off and on for a few months but really dug in last week. Today I took the Element 3 exam and thankfully passed with flying colors. While I may now exercise the privileges of a General Radio Operator’s License (GROL), I am looking forward to the FCC issuing my first commercial call sign. Once I get the commercial call sign I will begin working towards my RADAR endorsement.

Along with studying for the exam I started reconfiguring my shop layout. With such a small space it is difficult to keep a ‘general’ layout that works well. Tammy and I are developing some new business ideas and I need a shop space that is more conducive to those ends.

I have been reinvigorating my jewelry skills along with other small-object metal-work skills. Mostly copper, brass, and some silver work. The new bench and shop layout is set up for smaller woodworking pieces, metal work, small mechanical, and restoration work.

The new layout moves the bench into a corner and consolidates the tools from the French Cleat layout onto a piece of 1/2″ plywood that takes up much less wall space. I need the wall space because we picked up a couple of large rolling cabinets to help get tools and supplies all accessible without having to roll stuff around. This layout also gets all of the toolboxes in a place where they are reachable from the bench and I can have all of them open at the same time, also without having to move anything out of the way. Configuring small spaces is a bugger sometimes.

I’m sure there will be changes here and there as I start to work in the space and get used to the new layout but the biggest hurdle, accessibility, seems to be held at bay for now. With the shop configured, I can get back to working on projects.

One thing that is going to be difficult is figuring out a space for doing some small scale foundry work. I need to build a small smelting furnace and small casting frames. I want to start setting aside recovered aluminum and copper ingots for casting projects. It’s time to take recycling to the next level. 🙂

Until next time,
~FlyBoyJon