Show me your bike storage/shop area!
 

I am moving in three weeks out of this smaller apartment with no real space to work on my bikes into a new house with plenty of space for the hobby/sport/enjoyment of cycling. The house will be plenty big to fit my office, a couple of bedrooms, the usual living space and in the basement it has platform built raised floor for dry storage or workshop area. Due to this, my girlfriend has agreed to relinquish the space in the basement for the bikes as long as she gets the studio on the 3rd floor for her choreography. This made me happy but not surprised as she is cool like that.

To the best of my knowledge this area will be about 20x20 or at least in a pretty closely dimensioned square. I was trying to figure out in my head possibly how I would set this space up. (I believe there is about 6x18 ft wing as well just for storing the bikes. There will be about 6 between my girlfriend and I and the usual assortment of parts, tools, and supplies.

Anybody else have a basement or single room type of workshop for their bikes? How do you have it setup? Scattered, bikes on one said and wrenching on other, or what? Pictures would be fantastic as if I see anything that could be useful I will go out and get it in advance (like hooks, stands or shelves). Who better than to ask than you guys on BF?

Thanks in advance and I promise I will post pictures of before and after of the workspace.

I use a 8'x40' shipping container. The front 12' has been partitioned off into the shop area, it has windows and a door. Bikes are stored in the back along the walls. Currently I am using racks that fold down from the wall for storage, the bike is hung from the top tube and hangs parallel with the wall, then a second bike can be parked underneath. I am getting ready to rework part of the storage area to be able to hang bikes from wall mounted J hooks, alternating front and rear wheels. Tools are mounted on a peg board over the work bench or stored in a tool chest on one end of the work bench. Currently I have about 28 bikes in there along with camping equipment, tools for house repairs and some of the bits and pieces from my Airstream that I am restoring.

Think about parts storage too, that seems to always be an issue. I box many of mine and store them on plastic shelving, I also use large stacking bins for things like pedals, brakes, cranks and such.

I will post pictures when I remember where I put them....

Aaron :)

Thanks Aaron. I believe that the parts will give me the biggest organizational issues and I like the idea of a couple of stack able bins. Anybody out there have a organized wheel section or something? I never know what to do with my spare wheels, hang em? Stores em? Box em? I dunno.

I got a large eye bolt and a J bolt along with a 8' piece of galvanized water pipe (1/2"?) and just strung the wheels on that. One end slides into the eye bolt, the other is hooked in the j bolt. Only bad part is, when you want the wheel closest to the eye bolt you will probably have to unload the whole rack to get to it.

Aaron :)

That is a good idea and can be taken even fruther with individual hooks for each wheels. This way you don't have to put pipe through the wheel, just kind of hang it on the pipe via whatever hook you decide works best. Great idea. Any pictures?

I'll be interested in this thread as I just moved into a house with a substantial basement bike shop and i'm still deciding how to set it up as well.

Here a couple of pictures for starters. I am off until Tuesday so maybe I can get a few more pictures. The one of the bench is older, I have added quite a few more tools since this one was taken.

Aaron :)

http://inlinethumb01.webshots.com/45...500x500Q85.jpg
http://inlinethumb55.webshots.com/44...600x600Q85.jpg

Ok, Now i understand what you were referring to when you say shipping container. Not a bad little setup. I hope my space is wider than that as it should be. But I totally appreciate the pictures as your pegboard setup is fairly interesting. Looks to me like the door to the place opens inwards? Ever cause any problems?

Door opens out. It is a typical mobile home door. Needs to be replaced, it has had the crap beat out of it over the years. This was originally a rental unit used on jobsites. Some idiot office type in my company purchased it thinking it would save money over rental, not realizing that the $75 delivery and pickup fee is subsidized by the rental, once you own it moving costs ~$65 a hour and $1 a mile:rolleyes:. It was given to me with the caveat that I get it off the job site NOW!!!:p Fortunately I have low friends in high places and got it hauled for the cost of fuel.:D ($40)

I need to get the container up on some support slabs in the not too distant future, it is slowly sinking into the ground. It was supposed to be temporary, but you know how that works...:innocent:

Aaron :)

This thread [www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php/698242-Multiple-bike-storage] might give you some ideas.

If you need ideas for tool storage, I have found a cheap & easy was to do this. An over the door shoe organizer. It works great.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...1/DSC_7113.jpg

I like that midschool. Only thing is, I won't really have a door to hang it on.

I'd be embarrassed to show you my space :lol:

I could actually turn part of our basement into a pretty nice workshop and bicycle storage, but we really need to clean it out first. For now I have to work around a lot of junk. I made a similar transition you are about to make. Went from a small apartment with limited room to store bicycles... let alone work on them, to a house with a basement. The only problem is that as we unpacked and settled in, all of the stuff we didn't want (and boxes we didn't have time to go through) ended up in the basement. Now our basement is packed full of junk that we need to get rid of. My plan is to clean it out this Winter and hopefully by Spring I will be able to organize my tools and set up some bicycle storage. We only have 3.5 bikes. I would have more if I hadn't lived in an apartment for so many years :lol:

We just had 2.5 bikes when we moved but I bought a used bike not long ago to become my first project now that I have a space to work on bikes. My main bicycle also needs a good bit of maintenance. I'm curious to see what some of the other workspaces look like. We may actually finish out our basement so there is an extra bedroom, bathroom, and maybe even a kitchenette. That means less space for bicycles and tools.

here is a couple from 6 tears ago. i have some from a year ago but i cant find them. i don't think i have any new pictures since the basement was repaired after the flood. i might try to get a few after i get it a bit more organized and less boxes.
http://lh4.ggpht.com/_u26Z1RDZ_Po/TR...2/IMG_0005.JPG
http://lh6.ggpht.com/_u26Z1RDZ_Po/TH...2/IMG_0007.JPG

I like the home made work bench and table. It looks like your shop is kind of just open space for you to work on the bike.

Sean000- Yes, my cycling inventory is very limited due to space constraints right now. I am thoroughly excited to make this move and give myself the bike shop that my bikes deserve.

Here are two more pics of my workshop / lounge area. It is roughly a 11' x 11' room. With all the bikes leaning or mounted to the wall and the bench (28" x 48"), I have about 7' of free space in the center. This is where I unfold my repair stand and do my damage. I still have not decided on putting a new floor over the concrete. Maybe just a new paint job would be nice. When I ripped up the carpet, that is what it looked like.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...1/DSCN0491.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...1/DSCN0492.jpg

I found this on bicycletutor.com. It's not mine but I REALLY like this.

http://forums.bicycletutor.com/attachment.php?aid=117

i try to keep things to the side so that i have the center area to work on my big projects. right now it is a mess. i am still working on unpacking all my crap that was boxed from the flood that we had. i no longer have the table. i got rid of it after my mom gave me a wooden shelving unit and i found a computer desk for my computer. i only wish i had a bit more money to spend on making my work bench better. my work area is only about 9.5'x10'. it is all about design. if you design your work area good you can fit a lot of stuff and have lots of usable space.

i finally just orginized my 'space' or lack of it. my basement is crowded and ive only been aloud to use a small corner. but i have made it work. O and midschool22 i stole your over the door idea. i used it on our bulkhead inner door. it works great! im hoping to move half of my shop into the shed out back if i can get to cleaning it out, its half storage rite now. ill post pics of my corner shop later.

Bike storage:

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v2...k/534b0a8c.jpg

Tool storage:

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v2...k/0fc3924d.jpg

Needs cleaning, but hey.. It's a garage :)

http://www.tsplace.com/jeep/garage1.jpg
http://www.tsplace.com/jeep/garage2.jpg
http://www.tsplace.com/jeep/garage3.jpg

Yak and CCrew. Very nice setups you have there. I believe I will be aiming something very similar to Yaks, but not as broken in yet of course. :) Very nice shops and I thank you all for some great ideas. I have less than 2 weeks now before the big day. But I will be doing a walk through sometime this week and I'll take pictures of the empty basement. For 'before' pics.

ha. Here's how "broken in" it looks today:

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v293/yakkk/photo.jpg

I see your variety of cleaners including Simple Green. What do you use for cleaning your hands afterwords? I have taking a strong liking to Goop or GoJo. You guys have a particular favorite? I want to make sure I leave the house as clean as I can, without grease prints all ofer the place.

fast orange works good for me along with good old soap and water afterwards.