Looking at photos of a shop in a recent issue of Hop Up magazine reminded me of how nearly all shops used to look. They had bare wood walls with studs and rafters open. With years of use the wood had a "patina" and a warmth to it that made a shop a comfortable place to work. All manner of car parts, signs, posters etc. could be hung from the rafters and walls. "Stuff" could be layed over the rafters. Long pieces of steel could be stood on end and reach up into the rafter area. Shelves were easy to put up with open wall studs to work from. Those shops were great places to work. Today's construction regulations prohibit any open walls or ceilings. In spite of my complaints the last two shops I had built along with the houses are of the new order. All sheetrocked and painted white. No shop atmosphere at all. I have managed to cover lots of it with "stuff" as mentioned but the white walls are just too damned sterile. I miss the bare well-worn and patinad wood. Just an old fart reminiscing................
Sounds like my garage. It's bare 2" + 4" rough sawn redwood studs with 60 years of standing dust layers of overspray and exhaust residue. wrapped with wire and black tar paper with the stucco on the outside of that. Several old kitchen cabinets are nailed up holding everything from carburetors, gaskets and model car and Star trek space ship models waiting to be built some day. With bicycles, a few Model T body parts, and a few grill shells hanging around between the hubcaps and an old cracked, bald for the second time WWW recap that the trash can just never has room for. There's an 11' sailboat up there somewhere too. And the '60 ElCamino and '57 Schwinn Corvette in the middle. Oh, and on the far wall the blue metal sign with the gold crest that says "Cadillac Certified Craftsman" with my dad's name screen printed in at the bottom of the sign. That's the best thing in the garage.
I have seen what you are talking about, not old enough to have experienced it, but while reading I had an idea, what if a shop was built or was already built, with both sides encapsulated, and then put up the studs and everything over that, so you would have just studs but on the outside would be up to code with both sides covered. Just my .02
3bytheknee--- I know the feeling In a city, ( Fredrikstad), close by where I live there is a large old ship building factory/plant. Ship building stopped loooong ago. Almost like a complete ghost town. Everything is to be teared down in a year or two. There is one mechanical shop still running. We use them a lot at work for supsuplied services like maching of mech parts, custom production of parts etc that demnads large mech equipment. Large parts of the floor is wood, sticks/logs on end, and it has approx a 100 years of history. Bad lumination and quite dirty like an old style shop often is. This is the coolest place to be. For a mechanical guy like myself it's like walking into a cathedral. Mars 2006 it's gone. Moving to new sterile facillities. Kinda sad and off topic, but definately nostalgic. Paul
3bytheknee--- I know the feeling In a city, ( Fredrikstad), close by where I live there is a large old ship building factory/plant. Ship building stopped loooong ago. Almost like a complete ghost town. Everything is to be teared down in a year or two. There is one mechanical shop still running. We use them a lot at work for supsuplied services like maching of mech parts, custom production of parts etc that demnads large mech equipment. Large parts of the floor is wood, sticks/logs on end, and it has approx a 100 years of history. Bad lumination and quite dirty like an old style shop often is. This is the coolest place to be. For a mechanical guy like myself it's like walking into a cathedral filled with devoutness. Mars 2006 it's gone. Moving to new sterile facillities. Kinda sad and off topic, but definately nostalgic. Paul
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