Shopsmith Forums

stumpbuster wrote:I spent 20 winters in Cedar Rapids & it is cold in the winter. You are correct it would prohibit shop activity. My Iowa shop is heated and air conditioned. I intend to use the shed beside our home in Boulder City NV. All of the homes in the neighborhood have tall cement block fences and iron gates. I was thinking about lining it with ridged foam & whatever paneling or plywood I could pick up on CL.

Some years ago I had a wood shop in an unlined corrugated steel building about 18' X 20' it had a very high ceiling (just the metal roof) and concrete floor. The walk door in the east wall opened into a big tool shed but the overhead door in the west wall (full brunt of the wind) was an all steel door one layer thick. I would have hated to paid to keep it heated full time but at zero degrees a nice fire in a small pot-bellied stove would get it decent in about a half hour and keep it quite comfortable as long as the fire was going. The answer of course was "radiant" heat. A smallish sized hot air unit would have not have done the job.

I too have looked into using an old camper for a workshop. There is many drawbacks and advantages. the drawbacks include that campers tend to be built lightweight. So the floors are not strong enough to support the wieght of heavy tools. the walls are not thick enough to hang heavy cabinets on them. They are not well insulated. and the inverter-charger that you use is only 110 and your lucky if its 30amp 110. (thats only 15amp 220). and when you gut them youre left patching up holes where there was storage doors, water heaters, fridge access panels and different access areas. The old camper cabinets are junk. they are only face frames with light weight shelf attached to the wall behind it. you cant reuse them. There are many good points to useing an old trailer. One is that you are recycling an old trailer.(less in a landfill). They can be picked up pritty cheep. sometimes free if you watch local classified ads. they come with heat a/c, electric and even a beer fridge. they can be moved(carefully) around your yard. and they are considered a non-perminent structure in your yard(no excise tax atleast where I live)

if you really want an outside platform. then get a 30+ foot trailer. cut the back half of the box off and build a deck on the frame rails.

dmedas615 mentioned what I see is the biggest drawback of using a trailer as a workshop. Most have barely miminal flooring. I can't not begin to tell you how many double wides, campers and such I have seen that needed new floors.

I did a pastorial visit to a young mother of three. I was greeted by the dirtiest dogs I have ever seen. I was eager to get inside away from the dogs.
But to my horror once inside I found the dogs could come in also through the hole in the floor. Needless to say I did everything I could to find another place for this mother and her children to live. Got her a nice apartment where she paid less rent than she was paying for the double wide with dog entrances in the floor.