Power tool cabinet.

[scootr]

I built a 12 x 20 ft woodshop inside my new pole barn a few years ago. Just after I finished it, I noticed this big heavy dining room hutch out by the road for garbage pickup, just around the corner from our place.

It works real nice for storing my power tools. The shelf’s are made from thick tempered glass, so I got to be a little careful putting stuff in there, but it’s nice to be able to see that everything is in its place and keep it all dust free. The light inside even worked when I plugged it in.


I keep my sanders in the lower (solid front door) side spaces, and sandpaper in the lower center drawers.

View attachment 871254

Beats the hell out of that thing next to it

 

[wolc123]

Beats the hell out of that thing next to it

That’s part of the metal kitchen cabinets that my grandmother bought in the 1950’s. The old farmhouse caught fire and mostly burned up in 1980. The kitchen fared the best in the fire, which started on the other side of the house.

Grandpa stacked the cabnets out in the barn but never got around to doing anything with them before he passed away from a heart attack the next year. I used them for tool storage in the little workshop I had in the old barn, and moved them over to the new pole barn when I put that up because that’s all I had.

They are pretty well made with heavy duty drawers that can handle quite a bit of tool weight. I keep most of my hand tools in those drawers. Someday, after I retire from my day job, I might get time to clean them up and paint them. They work ok for now, ugly and charred.

I’ve got a repurposed wood tv cabinet on the left of the power tool hutch, with my just restocked fridge on top. I use that to store tractor and truck parts.

 

[FPGT72]

Don't clean and paint them, they are perfect the way they are. Some of the story behind them will be lost if you paint them.

 

[wolc123]

Don't clean and paint them, they are perfect the way they are. Some of the story behind them will be lost if you paint them.

Sounds good to me. My woodshop framing, walls and roofing is made from mostly American chestnut that was salvaged from my great great grandfathers old barns and them cabinets are made from steel salvaged from my grandmas old house. My great great grandfather had built that house also.

 

[FPGT72]

Sounds good to me. My woodshop framing, walls and roofing is made from mostly American chestnut that was salvaged from my great great grandfathers old barns and then cabinets are made from steel salvaged from my grandmas old house. My great great grandfather had built that house also.

I just love that. I have a feeling that time to time those memories come back to the front of your mind, time in the summer spent there, Christmas....whatever, and those memories make you smile. Don't loose them.

 

[wolc123]

I just love that. I have a feeling that time to time those memories come back to the front of your mind, time in the summer spent there, Christmas....whatever, and those memories make you smile. Don't loose them.

One of the neat things about the last of the old barns, that I took down and am still working on cleaning up, was that it had the build date (1883) cut out of the siding up under the front peak.

The older I get, the less I like heights, but I got up on a tall extension ladder and managed to pull the “18” board down in one piece. No luck with the “83” board though, as that one broke right across the numbers as I tried to wiggle it loose from below.

My new pole barn shell went up on the site of a twin to that old barn, that I had dismantled the year prior, in 2018. I repurposed that “18” board inside and up under the peak. I tried to match the font with a jigsaw on another recovered siding board, to make the “20”.

Here is that old barn before I had all the siding off and pulled down the frame:

One fond memory I have is drawing in loose hay and storing it up in the loft of that old barn. We lifted it up with a big set of forks that came down from a trolley that ran along a crane rail up under the peak.

That trolley and forks did not break when I pulled the frame down. I saved the crane rail also. Maybe I’ll try and rig that up inside my pole barn someday. I loved the loose hay.

Of course I was just a little kid when we had that. Grandpa got his baler when I was a teenager and one of my least favorite jobs was stacking them heavy bales up in the loft on the hottest days of the summer.

That’s probably why I preferred the loose hay. Also, the 4 ft beam spacing under the lofts was not really up to the heavier weight of the baled hay. That’s why I spaced them at 2 ft on the loft that I made in my new pole barn.