Shopsmith Forums

I actually built two of these. Now I can run power cables along the ceiling rather then on the floor. Made out of the cheapest pine I could find and cleaned up with a hand held power plane. It was a quick job and they are now both in use.
I picked up some plugs at Harbor Freight and plan to shorten some of the extension cables I have to eliminate having coils of wire. That sounds like a nice cold weather project. Some of the cords might work be long enough to make two extension cables, will have to see.

Ed

It is nice to not be tripping over cords. Up and out of the way should be a plus a lot of the time.

Can we see them up and in use

Pretty hard to see but here it is:
The other one is even harder to see but runs parallel back behind. The 12GA extension cable drops to a 1 to 3 head short cord. At that location I can plug in the CT26 (vac) which has the miter saw plugged in so when the saw turns on the vac turns on. I can also plug in a shopsmith and a grinder or any hand tools that might be in need of power at that location. Some of the other extension cables are for the LED lighting, they all run to a power strip with individual switches so I can turn on just what I need or do a more general lighting with then all on.

Ed

oh man- i need a cable drop in my tool room.

Thx for the photo, another thing for my to do list.

Ed,

Thanks for sharing. When I saw your first post, I have to admit I wasn't sure where you were going with this. I mean, why not just install a retractable cord reel in the ceiling? My guess is that your ceiling height is low like it is in my shop. Is that the case? This dawned on me after seeing it installed and I have to admit it looks like a great solution for the case of a low ceiling height.

So twice now the cord end and the drop down end have come apart. Today was almost the third time:
So it was time to make an improvement in how they connect. I think these are called "Cord Safe" but I might be wrong. They run less then $5 and seem to work pretty well. They don't seem to be made for 12GA cables so I have drilled out the inserts before and found that works but it easier to just pop the inserts out.
So now it looks like this:
If I were a rich man I might have sprung for the locking cords they sell now but not this time....

Ed

Twist locks on the ends of the tray cords and drops would also solve the problem.

Half hitch knot at the plugs would also solve that problem.