Above 1200 Sq/FT The Action Sports Garage

A screw compressor would be great for a shop like yours! If you could find one sized for a 5 HP motor, even if 3ph, it probably wouldn't be that hard to replace the motor. Or a rotary phase converter would give you future options.

Never heard of MDO before, that sounds perfect for a steel topped workbench.

For the steel, check out Z recycling... They can order metal new in addition to what they get as scrap, and I've heard their prices tend to be competitive. Not sure if they can form it. I've always heard Carlson does good work but is quite expensive. Not surprised since they have to cover higher costs due to being located in town. But never personally bought metal from either of them, so that's all second hand info.

I do know there used to be a guy who has a sheet metal forming business on his property on the Guide, on the the east side right before you get to Laurel. My roofer told me the guy doesn't advertise, but is the best guy in town as long as you know what you want. Competent and cost effective but doesn't like wasting time on retail customers who don't know what they want. Not sure what gauge his tooling can support. I'd definitely give him a call too. If you can't track down his number you're welcome to DM me and I can ask my roofer for it.

Have you considered the restaurant supply world? There's a few places that sell used stuff, I think there's one in Mt Vernon and I'm sure others in Seattle and they probably have some countertop/prep benches... Probably only make sense if you're flexible on your dimensions though, and net-net might not be worth the hassle even then given that time equals money for you.

I'll be watching with interest to see what you end up learning and who you go with.

zeug said:

I just bought two screw compressors from Kaeser US. I was looking at used as well, but Kaeser had a 2 for 1 special. It seems they run a lot of special deals that don’t get advertised much. I only found out because I called for a spec sheet for a used compressor and the sales guy was awesome. 240V 1P.

If you go with a used piston, see if you can find a Quincy 325 pump. Two stage pistons and lubricated with oil and filter. They have unloaders and start very easy/quiet. Designed for 3-5 hp motors and run well at 400 rpm and up. Slow=quiet. I bought mine for my garage (1968 model) and rebuilt the top end with new parts. I run it at around 800 rpm and it’s quiet enough to have a conversation next to it while running. At that speed, it puts out about 15 cfm @ 200psi. Plenty for me. They still make them and everything is available from Quincy, but the aftermarket is very supportive as well.

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I need to reach out and get a quote from Kaiser. The Atlas cupo unit I was looking at has increased in price by over 3K.

During the summer months it’s not a massive air requirement. Mostly blowing things out and inflating bike tires. 5 months of the year will be the big air usage for the ski machines.

With the open layout of the shop and engineering and landlords office downstairs it needs to be quiet. Not to mention I already can tell all of those hours I spent in helicopters over the years have taken a toll on my hearing. So good to preserve what’s left. The compressor closet should help and a screw would make a big difference too, but trying not to blow a fortune on it either.

Getting this shop going feels like owning a BOAT ( Bring On Another Thousand) except everything is 5K and up! I’m fortunate in that I’ve acquired a lot of it over the years…. And I’m mostly bringing in parts and not a lot of big stock items. I’m learning quickly why it’s pretty rare to see a ski / bike shop open these days and why most fail quickly. Even doing it modestly is a massive capital investment.

I’m fortunate that financially I could say screw it and just retire, but I know damn well I’m not the type to not keep busy so looking at it as a way to build my dream shop and hopefully bringing in some additional funds. And who knows it might end up being a great way to set my son up as he comes of age down the road (at least he seems interested in it now but time will tell) As long as I don’t loose my entire retirement nest egg it will work but that’s a very real risk in any new business. It also feels like I’m doing reverse retirement for 28+ years I made my entire living in only a intense 4 months of the year window doing what I absolutely loved and never felt like I actually worked a single day. This project is definitely a full time job.. ideally that transitions into being a bit more hands off if I can get the right employees down the road. … well at least that’s the plan / long term goal.

Speaking of spending money I decided to rent a modest house for the next year. I have way too much **** to fit in Jamie’s and her place is just too cramped with the kids. So will move the wood working stuff there. Our plan is to see if we can find a larger house that checks all of our wants or find the right property and build exactly what we want. We could either sell two properties and have no mortgage or turn them into rentals to cover the mortgage on the new spot. Or a combination of the two. Lots to consider, but this will give us time to really find the right spot and give the kids input into it too. But that also needs yet more moving of **** the next week.

hampster said:

A screw compressor would be great for a shop like yours! If you could find one sized for a 5 HP motor, even if 3ph, it probably wouldn't be that hard to replace the motor. Or a rotary phase converter would give you future options.

Never heard of MDO before, that sounds perfect for a steel topped workbench.

For the steel, check out Z recycling... They can order metal new in addition to what they get as scrap, and I've heard their prices tend to be competitive. Not sure if they can form it. I've always heard Carlson does good work but is quite expensive. Not surprised since they have to cover higher costs due to being located in town. But never personally bought metal from either of them, so that's all second hand info.

I do know there used to be a guy who has a sheet metal forming business on his property on the Guide, on the the east side right before you get to Laurel. My roofer told me the guy doesn't advertise, but is the best guy in town as long as you know what you want. Competent and cost effective but doesn't like wasting time on retail customers who don't know what they want. Not sure what gauge his tooling can support. I'd definitely give him a call too. If you can't track down his number you're welcome to DM me and I can ask my roofer for it.

Have you considered the restaurant supply world? There's a few places that sell used stuff, I think there's one in Mt Vernon and I'm sure others in Seattle and they probably have some countertop/prep benches... Probably only make sense if you're flexible on your dimensions though, and net-net might not be worth the hassle even then given that time equals money for you.

I'll be watching with interest to see what you end up learning and who you go with.

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I hadn’t heard of MDO before either until I saw it at Windsor.

I was also a bit shocked they can’t get bamboo ply anymore either so need to check out mill work supply. Was hoping to use it for the customer counter.

I’ve mostly just bought drops from Carlson. I’ve found if you bring cash and deal with one of the guys in the back you get a pretty good deal. I’ve heard z recycling is cheaper but I’m never on that side of town so always forget to check them out. That guy off of the guide sounds ideal if I could track him down.

Problem with restaurant supply or any premade bench tops is that the Vidmars / Listas are way too deep. I’m looking at 32-33” deep on all of them. I want an over hang in the front so **** doesn’t drop down into the drawers when dealing with oil. Unfortunately that also means a lot of waist out of a 4x8 sheet. I did find they go up to 10’ lengths tho.

I’m thinking for the tops of the parts storage cabinets to go with a phenolic. Would save me at least $500 over stainless and other than the front edge they are all enough you won’t see the top material.

Carlson also has the powder coat place next door they quoted me $125 a vise. Won’t be as nice of a finish as I did in the Wilton but with other guys in the shop kinda makes more sense then making them 100% perfect only to get beat on.

I need to check the other powder coat place out. I think they use prismatic colors which is the same as what the bike stands im looking at, so would be nice to see how close we get yo matching the rest of the shop. Kinda thinking of doing the Arbor press too. It’s going to be quite visible snd it’s grey is going to stick out like a sore thumb. At home I didn’t mind the color but with this shop being very visible aesthetics matter.

Grant Gunderson said:

During the summer months it’s not a massive air requirement. Mostly blowing things out and inflating bike tires. 5 months of the year will be the big air usage for the ski machines.

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Look at Eastwood, they have Screw and rotary scroll compressors for smaller shops

Grant Gunderson said:

I need to reach out and get a quote from Kaiser. The Atlas cupo unit I was looking at has increased in price by over 3K.

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This is the compressor deal I bought. Came out to a little over $5K for a brand new 7.5 hp scroll compressor. I did get the air treatment package which came with a dryer, tank, auto drain and regulators. That certainly could be had cheaper somewhere else. That deal is gone, but they may have another coming up.


I should mention that the Qunicy 325 piston compressor was dirt cheap. I think I paid $200 and probably put a couple hundy more into the rebuild. It is like the Chevy 350 of compressors. Easy to work on, plentiful parts, and will last longer than I will. Mine is old and gray, but couldn't pass up the price. Bonus- the newer ones come in a blue similar to what you are using

jeffcoll said:

Look at Eastwood, they have Screw and rotary scroll compressors for smaller shops

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Thanks, They do have one that I am looking at, but to be honest, it seems the quality of Eastwood stuff is a bit hit and miss. I'm curious who actually makes that compressor, as there seems to be a lot of Chinese ones rebranded.

zeug said:

This is the compressor deal I bought. Came out to a little over $5K for a brand new 7.5 hp scroll compressor. I did get the air treatment package which came with a dryer, tank, auto drain and regulators. That certainly could be had cheaper somewhere else. That deal is gone, but they may have another coming up.


I should mention that the Qunicy 325 piston compressor was dirt cheap. I think I paid $200 and probably put a couple hundy more into the rebuild. It is like the Chevy 350 of compressors. Easy to work on, plentiful parts, and will last longer than I will. Mine is old and gray, but couldn't pass up the price. Bonus- the newer ones come in a blue similar to what you are using

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I reached out to the local Kaiser dealer this am, we will see what they come back with. Another option is I could rent a store room down bellow, the shop and stick a piton compressor in there, and it would be quiet for me, but not ideal for the office guys downstairs. I may need to rent the storeroom down the line anyways for product storage....

Didn’t get much in today. Bike ride this am with Jamie then the kids got an open house at school.

I did take the Dawn offset, the Starrett and the Reed 3C in to get powder coated today.

Best I can tell this is the closest prisimatic color to what I used on the Wilton, lathe, cabinets etc. they quoted me $125 each plus whatever the costs are to special order the color. Won’t be as perfect / smooth as the Wilton, but given how much work I know painting is I’m happy to pay to get these done. Hopefully it’s the right balance between my OCD and what’s going to get beat on by employees.

Minus two sheets of MDO it’s hard to believe that’s $1k in plywood and that’s after a bulk discount. Going to do 1 layer ¾ birch with one layer of ¾ MDO on top.

One of the Vidmar drawer slides screws was stripped they are ¼-28 couldn’t find a flat head that’s shallow enough.

M6x1 is close enough to not need to redrill.

A long Starrett tap handle is a knuckle saver here.

Back island is all bolted together. Will bolt to floor once bathroom is done. This side will be general bike tools / bearing tools.

Back side is dedicated to ebike motors. Above the garbage can is presently is where the large arbor press will go.

E-bike fixtures will go on rh side.

LH side tooling. Need to figure out exactly how I want to store / set up the electrical tools etc.

Top drawer of bearing tools will be splitters, blind pullers, hand presses etc.

next drawer down will be all of my bearing drifts.

I’m really thinking a 3D printer is in order to organize all of the tooling. I have a bunch of Kaizen foam on hand that I might use to in the meantime but I still want to at least get everything into drawers before I start organizing each drawer.

Grant Gunderson said:

Been making some progress getting small parts put away. That cardboard pile is growing!


Getting closer drawer by drawer.


I decided with all of the new drawers to allocate a few more to the ever growing hardware assortment.

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Ive started down the journey of gridfinity for tool organization &schaller bins for hardware (since they are fast to get)

I started off with an assortment of bin sizes and it seems like my most needed are in the realm of 1.5x3, 2x3, 2x4, 1x2. When you did your bins did you try to stick to the 2" size (2,4,6) or the 1,5 (1.5x3, 3x3, 2x3 etc). The two don't really fit nicely mixed in with each other. It does look like you have piles of the 2x2s.

I need to order another 100$ of bins and was considering trying to stick to the 2" base bins and not order any more 1.5" base (unless you tell me that the 1.5/3 is the best size).

TLDR - I'm trying to figure out which size bins are the most useful for all your smaller hardware. I'm thinking of going to mostly 1x2,2x2,2x4 bins.

Clemson13 said:

Ive started down the journey of gridfinity for tool organization &schaller bins for hardware (since they are fast to get)

I started off with an assortment of bin sizes and it seems like my most needed are in the realm of 1.5x3, 2x3, 2x4, 1x2. When you did your bins did you try to stick to the 2" size (2,4,6) or the 1,5 (1.5x3, 3x3, 2x3 etc). The two don't really fit nicely mixed in with each other. It does look like you have piles of the 2x2s.

I need to order another 100$ of bins and was considering trying to stick to the 2" base bins and not order any more 1.5" base (unless you tell me that the 1.5/3 is the best size).

TLDR - I'm trying to figure out which size bins are the most useful for all your smaller hardware. I'm thinking of going to mostly 1x2,2x2,2x4 bins.

Click to expand...

All of mine are 2” base. It’s nice to also get some 4x4, 4x6 as well. I’ve been happy with all of them. I did try the shallower bins for some tool storage and those are nice but all of my drawers now are 2+” deep.

I’m debating ordering more vs just doing gridfinity. Need to finish moving first before I buy a printer.

Stian can run that 3d printer in the background while you work out the move. Get a parametric gridfinity outlinenfor your drawer sizes and let him be in charge of pulling the grids and pressing print again! Gets him involved in organizing, and learning about the 3d printer. My son runs mine for me and helps keep it going when we are doing shop projects.

Grant Gunderson said:

All of mine are 2” base. It’s nice to also get some 4x4, 4x6 as well. I’ve been happy with all of them. I did try the shallower bins for some tool storage and those are nice but all of my drawers now are 2+” deep.

I’m debating ordering more vs just doing gridfinity. Need to finish moving first before I buy a printer.

Click to expand...

My opinion/decision was that gridfinity was too slow for my simple hardware organization needs vs the low cost & fast delivery of Schaller bins. Then I use solid works/3d printing to make my custom tool specific organizers.

You know who pushed me this way? A guy named Grant G in my Lista cabinet score/ resto thread

Since you're so far down the schaller hardware organization path, id stick with it there and go custom for you myriad of tooling holders. You're in business so time = money

Xti04 said:

Stian can run that 3d printer in the background while you work out the move. Get a parametric gridfinity outlinenfor your drawer sizes and let him be in charge of pulling the grids and pressing print again! Gets him involved in organizing, and learning about the 3d printer. My son runs mine for me and helps keep it going when we are doing shop projects.

Click to expand...

Clemson13 said:

My opinion/decision was that gridfinity was too slow for my simple hardware organization needs vs the low cost & fast delivery of Schaller bins. Then I use solid works/3d printing to make my custom tool specific organizers.

You know who pushed me this way? A guy named Grant G in my Lista cabinet score/ resto thread

Since you're so far down the schaller hardware organization path, id stick with it there and go custom for you myriad of tooling holders. You're in business so time = money

Click to expand...

I’ll probably buy an H2C today. I’m thinking it makes most since to use the Schalller bins for hardware and look at printing custom labels for those. Then focus on tool storage for the printer.

Thinking Petg high flow for the gridfinity stuff. Thoughts? Who makes good aftermarket filament? Bamboo filament seems expensive and mostly out of stock, but the rfid seems to be easy for swapping etc.

For the gridfinity. I’m thinking black with blue tool shadows and then white for text.

I’m thinking 1 AMS2 for the Petg for my gridfinity then load a second up with pla for the kids. Also looking at am AMSHT for doing some TPU / engineering filaments. Thoughts?

Well, ****, after years of resisting, I finally pulled the trigger on my first 3d printer. H2C with 2 AMS, full range of high-speed nozzles etc. they were sold out of the AMS HT, so will picking up once they come back in stock. Ordered a full range of PLA for the kids

and a bunch of high-speed PETG for my gridfinity. I'm going to need to figure out when to make time to learn to use it! Kids are already searching maker world for what they want to print.

Well then!

3D printers are awesome. The kids will love it, you will too. There are endless possibilities, from the ultra practical to the completely whimsical.

Horror Business said:

3D printers are awesome. The kids will love it, you will too. There are endless possibilities, from the ultra practical to the completely whimsical.

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I haven’t used one in 25+ years. That was back when I was getting my plastics engineering degree and that early machine was pretty worthless when we had a full room oh HASS cnc equipment next door. They have obviously come a long ways. It will force me to quickly relearn CAD. We will see how my memory does!

Most of the 3D printed stuff I saw when doing my research on them was a bit of a turn off, mostly toy junk that will just end up in a landfill. I’m sure most of what the kids will print will be the same. I’d love to get them to the point they are designing their own stuff.

I found this Slotfinity system last night that looks damn near identical to the lista dividers I’ve been using for some of my tooling storage. I’ll have to give those a try.

First order tho is deciding what Gridfinity base to go with. That and organize my bearing tool drawer.


In other news I just ordered the first of the ski tunning equipment. This is a Wax Future unit. Wintersteiger / Reichman / Montana all rebrand the same unit. I got a damn good deal on one with very low hours from the personal tech of a very well known US ski team athlete. Not allowed to say who, but you’ve seen her name.

You can pre program standard settings or custom control the heat / speed.

You place the skis / snowboard under it and it runs along this track.

It uses these infrared lamps to heat the ski. It gets damn hot… warm enough to fry an egg or cook a pizza.

When you wax skis with an iron 90% of the wax gets scrapped off as waste. Back in the day you would then put the skis in a hot box for a few hours so the wax would better penetrate the base pours and last long / be way faster. All of the World Cup guys are using this system now. It’s way faster than an iron, no need to scrape after, just buff. And it’s uses 90% less wax. You just crayon the wax on or use a hot wax roller. Plus it gives better penetration than a hot box…. And those guys spend countless hours finding the fastest wax and application techniques. When every single one is using it, it’s obvious the way to go. Only issue is you can’t use it on cheap foam core skis.

With no scraping it’s going to quickly pay for itself in labor / wax savings! Which is good, because at the moment I feel like I’m spending money like a drunk sailor fresh off the boat at a **********, but instead of $100 bills it’s $1k plus at a time!

Grant Gunderson said:

Who makes good aftermarket filament?

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School House Spools is run by a member here, @jeepxj.

Also, check out the 3D printer thread if you haven't already.

Got a few more drawers of suspension parts put away. I really need to move these to a different cabinet soon.

Mill clamp drawer.

Hole saws and extra long drill bits etc.

Spent most of the day ordering a bunch of Italian suspension tools from Andreani not cheap, but they are the sole source for Ohlins tools and make some of the best stuff in the business. Their bushing tools are quite well done. Was on the fence between them and LABA7 for a shaft clamp system but the Italians were ⅓ the cost of the Eastern European option.

For bike stands I decided to go with EVT they are ungodly expensive but are by far the best built bike stands available. I briefly considered various powered options from other manufacturers but the build quality of EVT won me over. I’m going to start with two of their HD single stands. Plus the counter weight system should provide plenty of assistance. They do custom colors as well. So asked about having them done to match the rest of the shop. Evidently a certain not to be mentioned bike tool company has a trademark on blue so they will do anything but blue. I’ve inquired about buying them naked with no paint / clear coat so I can potentially have them powder coated locally. If I can’t do that I’ll guess I’ll have to live with them in black.

I’m going to skip on ordering them with the steel base plates. Either way the car decking floor I can screw them directly to the floor. If that feels less than ideal I can always get some steel plate locally to bolt them to and still save a small fortune.

I’m debating on getting a bench top one as well with a straight clamp to have as a dedicated fork service setup but that’s another $1500 so might hold off on that for a bit.

Long time lurker. You will love the EVT stands and have been using them since Brett came out with them. Only thing that has caught my eye as far as stands in the past few years is a shop in Germany built a motorized one out of 8020. Good luck with getting the shop open!

frannek said:

Long time lurker. You will love the EVT stands and have been using them since Brett came out with them. Only thing that has caught my eye as far as stands in the past few years is a shop in Germany built a motorized one out of 8020. Good luck with getting the shop open!

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Thanks! Been looking at them for years and probably should have bought one sooner to be honest. He’s got a monarch 10ee as well so I already like the guy.


I built the collapsible work table years ago. Has been one of the handiest things I’ve made. Used to have a ¾ mdf top I machined into a festool mft table at 4x8 but finally wore that out. At some point I should make another top.

I picked up a sheet of insulation to use as a sacrificial surface. Damn that stuff has gotten pricey for not that much more I could have and should have bought some mfd. but I’ll have a plan to use this insulation under the wax machine.

I swapped the digital tape measure tape to metric.

I then set the TSO Pharrell guides to 800mm. I had the festool version before but these are way nicer to use.

One thing I hate about festool is that their long guide rail with holes is too short for a 4x8 sheet. But their long rail without holes is a bit too long. Given 4x8 is so damn common how hard is it to make a guide rail with the lr32 holes for it?

Since I haven’t used these in a while I spent some time making sure it’s all square and calibrated.

Perfect.

I then ripped the sheets for all but 1 bench to 800mm this will give me about 95mm of hang over.

That will keep any oil from dripping into closed drawers yet still gives good visibility into them.

I then cut all of them to 800mm width before I switched to 660 for the shallower bench. Doing all the same size at once allows me to leave the setup dialed so doesn’t introduce reference errors when changing the setup

With all of the tops cuts I used a paint roller to apply a coat of tightbond exterior glue.

I then clamped one edge at a time and drilled and counter sunk holes along each edge. Then screwed them together. Afterwords I went back and did 3 rows across the center. Should be overkill with the glue but I want to voids.

Progress. Setting up the drill with the drill/ countersink combined bit and the impact driver for the screws made quick work of a box of grx screws!

Left them overnight to cure then used my festool rotex 90 with 80 grit to sand the sides and break all of the edges. Want to make it easy to handle for the sheet metal guys.


Plan is full wrap on front edge. The cover sides and weld corners. The machinist bench will get the back edge turned up into a back splash.


Everything thing is dimensioned and labeled for the sheet metal guys to make sure it’s how I want it.

If finding it’s really hard to find anyone locally that can do 14 guage and even 16 guage is tricky. Those that can are mostly too busy to get me in without a huge wait. Turns out there is a shop a block over from me that might be able to do it. Hope to get quotes back on Monday.

This is just the first round. I’ll have another batch for the ski side plus need some exhaust hoods made up.

I may need to drop down to 18 gauge. Also learning that most shops really don’t want to do any workbench tops if appearance matters. Would be nice to find some one that care about doing a quality job for a reasonable rate. These are going to get used but I’d rather not see the die

4 F’n 27 hey Pat got any tips if finding a good sheet metal shop? Anything else I should do to prep for stainless countertops?

UPS dropped off my strokeshift order. These guys are based in Poland and make some nice specialty tools. Their nitrogen charging system is the best I’ve found for shocks.

They also dropped off the AMS2 unit too. Just waiting on FedEx to drop off the printer (god I hate FedEx).

While killing time waiting for FedEx decided to tackle another project.
My Bridgeport had been lag bolted to this home made pallet since I got it. It’s been great for moving it and I love the height but not being level annoys me.


Turns out the base is predrilled the perfect size to tap for 3/4-10.

And I already own the taps!

I used a 1” CS to chamfer the holes.

I own a bunch of bottles of tap magic, but anchor lube is so much better it’s pretty much all that I use these days.


My Starrett tap handles are too small so used my pipe tap wrench to do the front holes.

I’m happy with those threads!

I diss like using tap sockets as they unevenly load the tap but sometimes that’s the only option. The rear holes don’t have enough space to use a tap wrench. None of my tap sockets are big enough but I happen to have a square drive socket that fits perfectly.. might be the first time I’ve used that set in the 20 years I’ve owned it!

That worked perfectly.

Ordered the leveling feet from McMaster. Would prefer a dia smaller than 3” to keep the mill close to the floor to keep **** from rolling under it but 3” is the smallest dia for ¾” threads. Regardless it will work. Should still have enough height to get a pallet jack under if I screw them all the way in too.

Have you noticed any staining after using Anchor Lube?

Chris F said:

Have you noticed any staining after using Anchor Lube?

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No, but I usually clean it off soon as I’m done.

This weekend was busy as well with moving. Got fully moved Into the new house, and got the storage unit fully cleared out. That was a big undertaking!


And this guy arrived Friday too! Was anxious to try it out, so despite not having the highflow nozzles I ordered and only have PETGHF material, and knowning im supposed to dry it. first, I said screw it and lets give it a try with some collet holders for the first test print. Turned out surprisingly well.

However the 2nd batch looks like ****. Pretty sure thats moisture issues. I also used their AI optimization on the 2nd print, that did cut the print time down by a lot.

So I let the filament actually do its dry cycle, and while doing that, started playing around with the sliver software and figured out the color tools bit more.


I like the idea. of having shadowing for tool storage so you can quickly see fi a tool is missing, so now that I got that figured out, going to re-print the first batch.

Lots to learn, but the whole H2C seems pretty well thought out. I am learning tho, I'm going to need to order more AMS units when they are back in stock as 2 wont be enough and I really need a good rack system for them! Its surprising how much the entire machine seems to shake a bit when the print head is moving fast.

Grant I know your sons name is Stian, are you also Stian Gunderson? Or are you in a snowboard film called 1997 forever? I may have just seen you on my tv on a commercial!

Xti04 said:

Grant I know your sons name is Stian, are you also Stian Gunderson? Or are you in a snowboard film called 1997 forever? I may have just seen you on my tv on a commercial!

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Haha no, but I do know most of the guys in that film. Terje was one of the hardest working athletes I’ve ever worked with. Id post a pic but all of my images of him are on slide film.

The family is from Norway tho and the Nordic Combined in the Olympics is actually named after it. The Gundersen Method my Grandfather was Gunder Gunderson. The last name somehow got changed from sen to son when my great grandfather moved to America. The Gundersen Method is named after one of my grandfathers younger cousins of the side that stayed in Norway.

Back then the oldest kid got the family farm and the rest needed to fend for themselves so they all headed to America. When they left Norway was one of the poorest countries and now it’s one of the richest.

My first trip over for work I was like why the hell did they leave, it’s amazing (a lot like the PNW) then I bought my first beer and realized how damn expensive the taxes are!

1997 was a special time. I moved to Baker in 98 and that just so happened to be the world record year. Being a kid from White Pass I knew the Cummings family well (Temple and Matt) still good friends and they introduced be to a guy named Craig Kelly who along with Jeff Fulton and others showed me around the mountain and inspired me to start shooting. For the first 5 years of my career I only shot snowboarding before I switched over to mostly shooting skiing (my personal passion).

It’s funny how segregated the snow sports industry is. And how the current generation only thinks of me as shooting skiing, but I had a lot of content published in the hey day of snowboarding.


This shot of Victor De Le Rue was shot from hanging out of a helicopter in Haines AK when I was working for Red Bull Media House. Crazy trip. We showed up to Yukon heli as the owner said he had special permits for us to film in a national park. We got there and he had zero permits and no safety gear etc. I said F this and pulled the plug. He threatened to sue and I told him good luck as the heli contract was with Red Bull Austria. We drive down the pass into Haines. I dropped $20k ( I had a contract with Red Bull to cover any needed expenses) on two private helis to reserve them for the next two weeks. It did nothing but piss rain in town for the next 13 days. On the last day of the heli reservation it went clear and we went to town. Film season in Haines is. Best described as heli wars with all of the best athletes and film crews fighting for the best terrain over the handful of days of good conditions. The airport is a lot like the tv show mash in the am! My athletes on that trip were Victor and Richard Permin two of the craziest skiers / snowboarders ever so we had no problem with the competition as no one else was interested in any of the stuff we were looking at.

I didn’t put my skis on once that trip and was totally ok as I had the best ride there is


( these pics are from a Different trip) but Id take the doors off of the bird and wear a climbing harness then use two
Daisy chains to anchor my self to the heli. That way I could stand on the skids and lean out braced against the Daisy chains. When the athletes were descending at high speed we would fly a corkscrew pattern to chase them down. Let me tell you, no roller coaster On the planet comes close. But if the heli ever crashed there was zero chance of survival Probably similar feeling to what those doorman gunners in Nam got to do, but at least I wasn’t getting shot at!

It’s crazy how in 5 years time that totally feels like a different life. Post covid hangover pretty much killed big marketing budgets for helicopters and drones took over but there way less fun! While I’ve pretty much retired from shooting full time to focus on my new shop my unwritten rule of never saying no to Heliskiing if it’s on someone else’s tab still applies! I’d love to do some more doors off shooting!

Got the quote back in the stainless tops. For 8 tops it’s a $500 difference to go with 14 ga over 16. Pretty reasonable




Bambu’s ai optimization for speed *****. Quality was total ****.

Redoing yet again optimized for surface quality. 15 hour print time but looks way better. I’m learning.

These will work well.

Leveling feet arrived for the Bridgeport. Quick check to make sure they all thread easily.

My US Air Force hoist made damn quick and easy work of living the mill off of the pallet it’s been in the entire time I’ve owned it.

Stacked some boards under it as safety cribbage as I screwed the feet in.

A ¾ nut used as a jam nut with an acorn nut makes the feet easy to adjust. If I want to get a pallet jack under I just need to slot the bolt end and use a flat head to drive it farther in.

Got it damn near perfectly level using my Starrett machinist level.

Both axis’s too. You can quickly check a level calibration by flipping it 180 and see if you still get the same reading. It’s spot on.

Since the floor is wood it may settle a bit with it in the leveling feet vs the pallet and will probably need to get micro adjusted after I install the mill head, but it’s the most level it’s been in the years I’ve owned it. According to Starrett that’s accurate to 80-90 seconds or .005" per foot. Far more precise than I need!

Grant Gunderson said:

Thanks, They do have one that I am looking at, but to be honest, it seems the quality of Eastwood stuff is a bit hit and miss. I'm curious who actually makes that compressor, as there seems to be a lot of Chinese ones rebranded.

I reached out to the local Kaiser dealer this am, we will see what they come back with. Another option is I could rent a store room down bellow, the shop and stick a piton compressor in there, and it would be quiet for me, but not ideal for the office guys downstairs. I may need to rent the storeroom down the line anyways for product storage....

Click to expand...

Kaeser just emailed me with this year's DEAL. Two for one again, but larger 10 and 15hp models. Might be more than you want? If you did want a 10 hp you could easily sell one to offset the cost.

BTW- I have two 5hp 230V 1P models still in box. If you were looking for a smaller one, I could possibly work something out with you and upgrade to 10hp deal.

zeug said:

Kaeser just emailed me with this year's DEAL. Two for one again, but larger 10 and 15hp models. Might be more than you want? If you did want a 10 hp you could easily sell one to offset the cost.

BTW- I have two 5hp 230V 1P models still in box. If you were looking for a smaller one, I could possibly work something out with you and upgrade to 10hp deal.

Click to expand...

Just sent you a DM.

Dropped off the workbench tops at Lynden Sheet metal to get wrapped. Should be ready in 2 weeks.

Need to build a customer counter. Was thinking bamboo ply so I don’t have to finish the edges but it’s $430 a sheet from the local dealer. might have to go with Walnut. Decisions.

Got a bunch of Italian suspension tools today.

When a company takes the time to nicely engrave the wood box they ship in, you know they are going to be quality.




That’s a full range bushing install / removal tool. Plus their full range of burnishing tools to fine tune the bushings to each fork. It’s a big upgrade from my old tool as it’s powered by a drill so higher speed equals better polishing / burnishing. Plus it’s the only system that uses a guide rod to ensure they are actually squared to the fork chassis too.

Also picked up the entire tooling range for Ohlins plus Cane Creek.

The blue tool in the center with the dial indicator is specifically for measuring shim thicknesses when revaluing z/ tuning dampers.

I also picked up their interchangeable shaft clamp system. It’s a way better route than buying shaft clamps specific to each mfg. This will live permanently in my offset vise.

The R8 Gridfinity collet holders turned out great!


I hadn’t used CAD program in 25 years. I was pleasantly surprised how fast it came back to me and how quickly I was able to get going in Fusion 360! It’s very intuitive.

In an afternoon I fully designed Gridfinity inserts for the entire range of Enduro bearing drifts. This is going to be a real time saver in not wasting time looking for the correct drift each job! I still need to decide on a gridfinity base system. Thinking one of the light versions as I’ll most likely be filling most drawers.

With as much priming as I’m going to have I’m already considering a second H2C when they go on sale next.

Grant Gunderson said:

Leveling feet arrived for the Bridgeport. Quick check to make sure they all thread easily.

My US Air Force hoist made damn quick and easy work of living the mill off of the pallet it’s been in the entire time I’ve owned it.

Click to expand...

Now THAT is an engine hoist.

zmotorsports said:

Now THAT is an engine hoist.

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Haha! It’s the beefiest one I seen! When I found it I bought it especially for the task of lifting the mill.


Found this guy on craigslist locally for less than the cost of a Snapon wrench... For scale the legs have a 3' spread between them so it will easily straddle a Bridgeport mill.

Supposedly its only got a 2000LB capacity. I'm calling BS on that when a Horror Freight model is listed for that. This thing is all ½" and ¼" wall tubing.

It's aHydra Hoist Crane made by Valley Craft Products for the USAF. Model H-2XE. They are still around but can’t find anything about the crane when I searched their site.


Found the USAF tag on it and looked up the NSN number
NONTELESCOPINGBOOM OVERHANG LENGTH(CHXN) 3.250 FEET NOMINALBOOM TYPE(CHXM) NONREVOLVINGDESIGN TYPE(APGF) BOOMLIFT MECHANISM TYPE(AGDC) HYDRAULIC RAMOPERATION METHOD(APHE) MANUALOVERALL WIDTH(ABMK) 3.333 FEET NOMINALLOAD POSITION LOCKING METHOD(CHXR) CHECK VALVEMAXIMUM LIFT HEIGHT(AGBP) 9.000 FEETMAXIMUM LIFTING CAPACITY(CGTX) 4000.0 POUNDSSPECIAL FEATURES(FEAT) STRADDLE CLEARANCE ADJUSTABLE 22 TO 47 IN.,ROLL UNDER CLEARANCE 11 IN.MIN,STEEL WHEELS,FLOOR BRAKE,SWIVEL TYPE SAFETY LATCH HOOKIII MAXIMUM LIFTING CAPACITY(CGTX) 4000.0 POUNDS

4000lb lift is more like it but I bet thats conservative! It should easily lift my Bridgeport Mill and even my Monarch 10EE lathe!


Looks like Uncle Sam paid something like $6K for it. When I get time I'' do a full restoration on it, but that will have to wait. For now, I'm going to do the minimum to get it up and running.

The boom has a pivot base, so you can lift and pivot what you are lifting to a new spot. It's got a provision for a 4" square tube to be used as an out rigger. So first thing, I stone the base so it will pivot smoothly.

And give it a good coat f super lube.

Here is the shaft that goes into it. It's 3.5" ¼" wall tube.

It's and Electric over Hydraulic system.

I ended up replacing the sketchy tubing with proper hoses, rebuilt the ram ( main piston seal and back up rings were brittle and cracked, got those from Hercules seals) and added proper bleeder valves to the tank and upper ram port.

For using the pivot feature it’s designed to take a 4x4 steel tube as out riggers.

Grant Gunderson said:

Got a bunch of Italian suspension tools today.

When a company takes the time to nicely engrave the wood box they ship in, you know they are going to be quality.

Click to expand...

When a company takes the time to nicely engrave the wood box they ship in, you know they are going to be EXPENSIVE.

Nice looking tools though.

tweidman said:

When a company takes the time to nicely engrave the wood box they ship in, you know they are going to be EXPENSIVE.

Nice looking tools though.

Click to expand...

Haha. So true. Usually. These guys make many of the tools for Fox and are way cheaper than buying from Fox. Their shaft clamp set was a ⅓ of the costs of the LABA7 set. Granted the LABA7 will do some larger sizes but those are all moto sizes so beyond what I need unless I venture in to the moto side of things.

tweidman said:

When a company takes the time to nicely engrave the wood box they ship in, you know they are going to be EXPENSIVE.

Nice looking tools though.

Click to expand...

Quality suspension isn't cheap either, but it's worth every penny.

Thanks for the additional pictures and information on the engine hoist. That looks amazing. Too bad I just forked over some funds for a new one last year.

"my unwritten rule of never saying no to Heliskiing if it’s on someone else’s tab"

Funny, I have the same rule. I've just never had the opportunity to employ it.

I truly appreciate you sprinkling in some of your career pics through the thread!