Shop Tour M Scott Morton Part II

Pickup up where we left (Part I) off in Mortons shop at the sliding compound miter saw corner, if you then turn left, and run along the wall opposite the door, you’ll find his SawStop Cabinet Saw and his dust collector. While the saw stays set there against the wall, the dust collector does occasionally move, as it’s not permanently connected to most of the stationary equipment.

The router table, OSS, storage cabinet and bench lumber.

Moving passed the saw, the next corner is occupied by Morton’s Ridgid oscillating spindle sander (OSS) and Bench Dog router table. A storage cabinet of small draws rests next to the OSS and the lumber for Morton’s future bench lays next to the router table. On the walls above, a very small window frame and adjacent former window frame serve as cubbies to store toolboxes and other small items.

Notice how Morton takes advantage of the recess in the wall to
achieve a great deal of storage with no floor footprint.

Rounding the OSS and router table corner brings us along Morton’s storage wall. He took advantage of a recess in the the middle of this wall section to build a storage rack for his Festool collection (bigger than mine, I’m pretty sure) and clamp racks. Because of the the recess in the wall, none of these racks steal valuable floor space.

Storage on the back of the shelves in the "dead end" section of the shop.

If we stay along this wall and follow it to the end opposite the OSS, we’ll find a dead end created with the installation of shelves between a column and the wall between the shop and family room. Both sides of this “dead end” are used for storage. Some of it (like his utility and sharping bench) is kind-of organized. Some of it is not.

As we all do, Morton has shelves in his shop that hold a bit of everything.

The kind-of organization also extends to the opposite side of the shelves. They house old tools, light fixtures, wine and all sorts of others, miscellaneous stuff. Moving passed the shelves brings us back to the shop entry door and through it, the family room.

As I mentioned above, Morton has the lumber for his new bench acclimating in his shop now. Like many of us, he’s caught the winter 2011/2012 workbench building bug. For now, he makes his torsion box assembly table serve double duty as a bench. It’s a fairly function bench, with a typical metal face vise and plenty of storage beneath that dead flat work surface.

The existing, torsion box bench.

Between his lumber storage, equipment, assembly table and future bench, Morton’s shop is a high functioning woodwork space that’s proofing perfect for producing his high quality custom furniture.

p.s. - since my visit in November, Morton has added a small child’s bench area to the shop for his kids. You can check out his post about it here.