Thread: How Often do you clean your shed?

Whenever it needs it...and that, by definition, is when there is no longer a bit of vacant flat surface to put something on. Then I put everything away, clean high and low, and start again. Usually, about 10 minutes into the next job, I trip over the vacuum cleaner that i forgot to put away.

I voted for as often as it needs it but really I clean up after each project and put all the tools away that I have scattered all over the shed as I need them.

The only problem with that is, because I've got tools every where I sometimes have to spend ages looking for one that I have forgotten where I put it down.

Bit of a cross between Barry & Alex, only when there is no room left, when the piles of "stuff" are tetering and I can't find that thing I only just put down.

:eek: Clean? :eek: The shed? :eek:

Please define "clean".

If there is enough uncluttered space to do the job at hand, then the shed is clean.

Rob.

My "shed" is always immaculately clean. I have a nice glossy epoxy floor and white painted walls, with half built laminated cupboards.

No one can actually tell how clean it is, cause it's impossibly bloody untidy. There is not one square millimetre of horizontal space that isn't holding something till I can build/design/finish building something to put it in.

As soon as a space develops, I start a new project which won't be able to be finished because I'll need some half finished project as a jig or bench or something.

I'm in don't finish things hell!!

The only good thing about all of that is that no-one can actually tell how many unfinished projects I have, cause they are buried under each other, and therefore it is impossible for the shed itself to get dirty.

I don't think we'll ever have a "clean up", maybe an archaelogical dig.

Cheers,

P

I voted "as often as it needs", I would have liked to have voted "a place for everything and everything in its place" but unfortunately I've run out of space. Also as the shed layout and usage is still evolving things are still getting moved around. Until I get the extension(s) done I won't really be completely organised (and by then, no doubt I'll have bought more machinery and still be short of space). I find that the more I work in there the more I clean it. When I was doing a lot of boat fitout work I would just have piles of gear on the floor. I'd work marathon hours to finish a job and then all the offcuts, excess materials, fasteners, glue etc etc would get dumped on the floor, then a few months later after another job there would be a new pile. Occassionaly the piles would get picked over if I needed something and then every so often I would get the sh!ts with the mess and have a big clean up. But I always end up with a stack of stuff I can't find a space for and it's just too good to throw away.

Mick the messy

Every Sunday evening if I have been doing a project SWMBO helps me vacuum and clean up. We have a drink or two, a bit of a laugh and a game with the four legged monster so it has become an enjoyable ritual.
Down side is that new purchases are noticed.

Sounds like domestic bliss, Rod My missus is usually busy polishing her golf clubs Sunday evening.

I try to keep it clean. This is infinitely easier now that I have a DC. I used to wade around in waist high sawdust all the time because I'd just used the thicknesser and hadn't had time to sweep it up.

I'm like Midge, I've got several half finished projects cluttering the place up. I spend the first 15-20 minutes of every day in the shed thinking about which of them to attack first. When I can't make my mind up, I just start a new one.

I know I should clean my shed more regularly but unfortunately I don't.

- Wood Borer

I know I should but I never seem to have the time. I only ever get to the shed once or twice a week nowadays and only for a couple of hours at best each time. THEREFORE, cleaning is the last thing on my mind when I'm out there.

If I lose something in the shavings I clean till I find it then back to whatever I was doing. If I can't find it after five minutes, I consider it lost.

Dan

I found that the easiest way to clean my shed was just build more on to it.... it started as a 40 x 20 then it got to be a 40 x 40 and a few years ago it stretched again to a 60 x 40..... trouble is I'm nearly out into the North paddock so, as my Dad shares part of the shed nowadys I shall have to put a contract out on the old bugger so I can have his bit back.... at a suitable interval after the funeral of course!

I only clean the floor. If I clean the benches I have to spend half an hour getting out all the things I just put away.
Kind regards
Termite

I share my shed with the old bloke too. When I moved in, he had his stuff all over the place. I've managed to squeeze him into one little corner 6ft square but he keeps trying to spread himself out, leaving stuff on the bench, parking the lawn mower where I park my pushy, things like that.

He's over in the Flinder's Ranges at the moment, so I told him on the phone I was packing all his stuff into cardboard boxes and having a garage sale. He muttered something about nasty things he'd done to the last bloke who tried that sort of thing.

Honestly, just because these people bring you into the world, feed you, clothe you and put you through school they think that gives them some kind of authority