I've been doing woodwork for almost 10 years. Throughout that period, I've tried just about every option imaginable for organizing hand tools. There has been a plethora of portable toolboxes. I've had rolling tool chests similar to those used by mechanics. I've used those plastic drawer thingies from the large box store's container section. For a while, I tried every baby boomer's favorite pegboard. None of these options was ideal for me, but they were enough for my needs at the time.
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Plastic Drawers
The majority of people do not equate plastic household containers with hand-tool woodworking. Aside from the pure satisfaction we receive from building things out of wood, many of us do it to lessen the quantity of plastic in our life. Therefore, why would someone store hand tools used for woodworking in plastic containers?
The key reasons in my case were money and convenience. Like many other young woodworkers, I had no tools and little money when I set up my first studio. I was around two years out of college and a new homeowner at the time. My fiancé and I were not only renovating our crumbling new home, but we were also saving for a wedding.
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I wanted a workshop for both woodworking and house improvement. Not only did I require woodworking instruments, but also for improvement. There was little money for anything other than food and home improvement work. I did manage to save enough money for a few carpentry hand tools and a basic workbench. But I didn't have a place to keep my tools while they weren't in use. Thus, rather than storing my tools on the garage floor, I purchased a set of plastic drawers.
While most people would not consider these containers to be the best solution for keeping woodworking hand tools, they did the job. The tools are elevated from the ground. Because the container was a closed system, it kept the majority of the flying dust off the tools. Bigger tools, such as my jointer plane, that could not fit inside a drawer could be placed on top. It was also very affordable.
Of course, there were some drawbacks as well. Certainly, the drawers did not open and close smoothly. As the weight of the instruments inside the drawer increased, so did the problem. Tools would roll around and collide with one another. There was very little true organization. Plus, it was made of plastic! The plastic drawers finally cracked. The plastic frame snapped. The entire unit was rendered entirely worthless. It served its purpose for the brief period that it was required. Nonetheless, I would not advocate this approach for long-term use.
Portable Toolboxes
Portable toolboxes have been in use for centuries. On medieval sailing ships, we were used. Preindustrial joiners and cabinet makers made crates to protect and transport their tools when they changed businesses. Almost every barn, shed, garage, and basement has a portable toolbox. They are available in wood, metal, or plastic. They come in a variety of forms and sizes. I've had a lot of those throughout the years.
The biggest advantage of portable toolboxes is, well, their portability. They are often tiny enough to be picked up and transported from work to job. Some are stackable or even rackable, allowing for greater organization and transit flexibility. They're also closed containers, which helps to keep dust off the tools within.
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Portable toolboxes are one of my favourite home improvement storage ideas. I have one for carpentry tools, another for electrical tools, another for hand-held power tools, and yet another for plumbing supplies. This makes it simple for me to grab the box I require and transport all of the tools to the task.
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Portable toolboxes, on the other hand, are poorly built for the tools I use for fine woodworking. Most are far too small to accommodate anything larger than a jack plane or tenon saw. The trays, if they exist at all, allow the tools to roll around and collide with one another. When you have a lot of sharp edges, this is not a smart idea.
I also find them difficult to work out of on the bench. I prefer to be able to find the tool I need and then return it when I'm through. Nevertheless, keeping these bins organized necessitates a lot of tool movement. Not to mention the fact that I'd need many boxes to contain all of my tools. Portable toolboxes like these are ideal for tiny kits of specialist home improvement tools, in my opinion. However, they are not suitable for my fine woodworking tools.
Mechanic’s Rolling Tool Chests
For the past 20 years, I've had a mechanic's rolling tool chest. My wife gave me the cabinet for my birthday shortly after we moved into our first house. For many years, I kept all of my tools, including my woodworking tools, in this cabinet. The cabinet now only houses the tools I need to service our vehicles, as well as some metalworking tools and a few larger home improvement tools that don't fit in portable toolboxes.
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These chests are still appealing to me. They're not the first thing that comes to mind when thinking about woodworking tool storage, but they're perfect enough. The drawers are simple to organize, simple to use, and simple to find what you need. They keep dust off the instruments, and sharp edges can be properly protected with the right drawer lining.
If I didn't have a place to store my woodworking hand tools and didn't want to design a more elegant solution, I'd seriously consider utilizing a chest like this. The best ones are not cheap. These chests, on the other hand, check all the boxes for my organizing tastes.
Pegboard Tool Walls
You've probably heard about pegboard if you grew up in the United States between the 1950s and the 1980s. Every suburban American handyman has a pegboard tool wall in their garage or basement, replete with tool outlines. Every hang hole you see bored into the sole of an ancient hand plane is due to pegboard. I have an ambivalent connection with it.
A variety of hand tools were hung on its pegboard. Crescent wrenches, Vise Grips, Snap-on ratchets and sockets, screwdrivers, pliers, and whatever else a tinkerer would need were available. I recall spending many evenings in the basement with my friend and his father, just messing around with whatever was on our minds at the time. I'll never forget his pegboard tool wall. I wish I had a photo of the space to put here. But that was before cell phones and the internet.
My own experience with a pegboard tool wall isn't particularly sentimental. In one of the houses we owned, a prior owner installed a pegboard on the garage wall. That garage, too, was not a woodshop, but rather a place to mend mowers, change oil, and perform other dirty tasks. The tools I mounted on the wall were likewise not carpentry tools, but rather tinkering tools.
What I remember most about the wall is how frequently the tool holders simply fell off. Every time I grabbed a tool, the tool holder seemed to appear. The plastic "keepers" that were designed to keep the tool holders in place initially worked. Yet they, too, failed quickly. I wouldn't want to go for a chisel only to have the entire rack fall to the concrete floor as the holder detaches from the wall.
Furthermore, because this is an open storage method, tools tend to accumulate a layer of dust on them. If the shop is climate regulated, this may not be an issue. Yet, in a humid climate with no temperature control, open storage invites rust. To keep rust at bay, additional tool care is required.
Aside from the rust and pathetic tool holders, I just don't like the look of the pegboard anymore. It's a workable solution if you don't mind the aesthetic and come up with some better tool holders. But pegboard isn't for me anymore. See you in part two of my story.
