Scrap storage ideas?

R

RickNoyes

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Mar 4, 2021
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Location
Newcastle, NSW, Australia
After a number of years of modelling the size of my scrap heaps as grown exponentially in relation to the number of boats/ships I have made. I currently have larger lengths stored horizontally and smaller bits in several drawers.

Both of these methods are not very satisfactory. I was thinking of vertical storage, perhaps assorted lengths/diameters of pvc tube glued together? (Sort of a panpipe arrangement). Or maybe fabricate something from thin ply with various vertical storage compartments.

Does anybody out there have a similar problem or have you experienced guys’ got a design you could share.

I’m a bit of a hoarder and can’t bring myself to chuck out wood irrespective of size.
 
I've made a pan pipe arrangement- it worked well but took up a lot of floor space. Just a crate built around 2" HDPE gas line the utility company left behind on the street, capped with jam jar lids on the bottom. PVC and ABS pipe are insanely cheap (at least in the US) if you want to build one and it really is a better solution. I replaced that with an old, long (32") carpenters tool box that fits on a seldom used high shelf. Not nearly as organized, but the strip stock is there when I need it.
 
If you have access to table saw you can make a strip rack from scrap plywood. Just cut piece of 1/2” ply about 24” wide and 12” to 18” tall. Make two and cut grooves to fit 1/16 fiber board. Then cut fiber board about 1” to 3” wide to make dividers to glue in. Add 1/2” ply on outside to help firm up box and add ply to bottom.

You can adjust all measurements to fit scrap on hand or make tall or short height as needed.
 
Kurt Konrath said:
If you have access to table saw you can make a strip rack from scrap plywood. Just cut piece of 1/2” ply about 24” wide and 12” to 18” tall. Make two and cut grooves to fit 1/16 fiber board. Then cut fiber board about 1” to 3” wide to make dividers to glue in. Add 1/2” ply on outside to help firm up box and add ply to bottom.

You can adjust all measurements to fit scrap on hand or make tall or short height as needed.
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pebbleworm said:
I've made a pan pipe arrangement- it worked well but took up a lot of floor space. Just a crate built around 2" HDPE gas line the utility company left behind on the street, capped with jam jar lids on the bottom. PVC and ABS pipe are insanely cheap (at least in the US) if you want to build one and it really is a better solution. I replaced that with an old, long (32") carpenters tool box that fits on a seldom used high shelf. Not nearly as organized, but the strip stock is there when I need it.
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Thanks for the replys Gents.

I have a tiny hobby room.(1.6m x 2.5m...as large as the Admiral would allow) so. leaning toward the ply option.

Cheers
Ric
 
I have all my wood in a couple of old kit boxes. I am thinking of putting dividers in the boxes and sort out my stuff. It is stored in a closet and stacked. I can then put labels on the side of the boxes and that way I 'll know what is in them...
 
Jack Sparrow said:
I have all my wood in a couple of old kit boxes. I am thinking of putting dividers in the boxes and sort out my stuff. It is stored in a closet and stacked. I can then put labels on the side of the boxes and that way I 'll know what is in them...
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That's what I do, with different boxes containing strips, ply, dowels etc. Every time I think I should chuck it all out, I end up finding just the right piece for my current build.
 
For strip wood, I have bundled together 16 cores from aluminum foil packages and stand them up in a closet. All other types of scrap wood goes in a couple of cardboard boxes.
 
If you have leftover material from 50 years ago, it probably means that you will never use it. I know from experience that I like to collect too many "good to have" materials, so nowadays I save very little of old building materials. When I'm done with a project, I throw away everything that's left over. If you have limited space, this is my recommendation
 
As an American, I had to 'translate' meters to feet though really knew approximately the the room size. That means you have about a 5 foot by 8 foot space. Assuming it's a standard height room at 8 feet (2.5m) height and you are 6 feet tall (183cm) you would have about 20" (a half m) of overhead storage area potential if you partitioned with a shelf/shelves, some PVC piping for lengths of wood strips and some plastic storage containers for the rest of the miscellaneous items. I'm facing a bit of the same sort of problem after moving from a large and owned home to a rented duplex that's 1/4 the size.
 
Ok, stop right there. Why are you saving so much wood? Oh, in case you might need it, right? BUILD A BOAT with the scrap. I got fed up with all the junk wood laying around and never finding what I wanted when I went looking for something. I got all the wood out and put it all together by length and width and built a river push boat for a string of barges. Three decks on it with lot of windows in the bridge and twin engines for pushing and lots of room for RC equipment. Invented a custom internal jet drive so no props and shafts hanging down and the thing ran like a scalded dog. Made four, four foot long barges to push and the boat did very well. I only made the push boat from my scrap and used up most of the extra wood I had. Sure cleaned the place up a bunch.
 
I have accumulated a lot of strip wood over the years of modeling…leftovers from kits mostly…yes it does come in handy when one needs a few inches to fix or replace something. Anyway…I got a box and a bunch of cardboard tubes…mailing tubes…the tubes were three feet long…cut them in half and packed them into the box upright. Then I separated the strip wood into types and sizes and stood them up in the tubes. I can quickly and easily find a type and size piece to use. You can adjust the lengths of your tubes for shorter stock pieces. I have used this storage method for several years now…as you can tell by the accumulation of extras! :)

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