Inside The Secret Underground Laboratory

Hope you don't have to move Bruce, If nothing else, to save you the pain of finding stuff you forgot you had, and later replaced. :D I do this every time I clean out my garage, and it's a one-car.

Oh yeah.....In the scramble over the last month to begin planning to move, I realized how much stuff I have which I packed up ten years ago, when I moved in here. And I have barely even opened those boxes in those ten years. Not highly sentimental old things (which I have plenty of) but just excess stuff from the shop. Tools that I wasn't using much, partially completed R & D projects, useful chunks of materials, etc. Things that were valuable enough that I didn't want to throw them away. So, I packed them up in boxes and moved them here. And the boxes sat in my shop here for ten years.

When I look in those boxes now, most of that stuff is still valuable enough that I don't really want to throw it away. I find a few tools or parts that I pull out and put into use. But most of it stays in the box. Packing it back away, because I might need it someday.

I need to deal with that. In the realities of commercial real estate, I'm paying rent every month for every square foot of space to store those boxes indefinitely. It's a growing, continuous financial burden. Is the stuff in that room full of boxes valuable enough to be worth paying a few hundred bucks per month, for the rest of my life?

And the same with some of my beloved antique machines. Some of them, I've gotten running and they are very useful parts of my shop. But I have others which I've had for 20-40 years, paying rent for their space that whole time. And they are still effectively a pile of junk cast iron that most people would have sent to the scrap yard. A quick calculation on my beloved 1907 LeBlond #0 Milling Machine is that I've spent $3400 storing it over the years. And it still doesn't run. It's a dusty conversation piece over in the corner. And that's just one of my many machines, waiting for my attention. I quite literally have a whole shop bay full of them.

Of course, there are other machines that are success stories. Maybe you've seen the MGPR (Medium Green Pin Router) over on the pin routers thread. I was given that machine for free nearly 20 years ago. An old Onsrud pin router, disassembled and not running. In Burbank, I had it outdoors under a tarp for ten years. Then I hauled it up here to Fillmore and stored in a corner for ten more years. But this year, 2023, I pulled it out of the corner and rebuilt it. I made up a new custom spindle head for it. It really didn't take that long, once I got at it. And now it's a very useful machine and an important part of my Scroll Bass Factory.

That's my justification for keeping all those other machines. They, too, have the potential to become handsome and functional and useful. If I ever get around to them.

This current shop space scramble has made me think deeply about all this. The accumulation of Stuff is a big burden.
 
I'm not your lawyer, but as somebody who's witnessed this saga taking a few turns over the past couple years, I'm suspecting you might want to keep a regularly updated relocation strategy in your ready-bag. It sucks and it's anxiety-inducing to move, but also sucks to keep getting yanked around like this.

Yes, exactly. We may have found peace for now......But I don't have a lot of confidence in them. The whole project may still collapse on them. A year or two from now, they may run out of money and patience and put the building up for sale. To another developer who decides to tear the building down and build apartments. That's the nature of commercial buildings in small cities. They are very risky investments. There are so many rules and regulations and costs and crazy turns of the market. I would never want to own a building or a property that's within an incorporated city.
 
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Yes, exactly. We may have found peace for now......But I don't have a lot of confidence in them. The whole project may still collapse on them. A year or two from now, they may run out of money and patience and put the building up for sale. To another developer who decides to tear the building down and build apartments. That's the nature of commercial buildings in small cities. They are very risky investments. There are so many rules and regulations and costs and crazy turns of the market. I would never want to own a building or a property that's within an incorporated city.
We've got a kinda-similar situation to yours happening in the town next door. There's a beloved stripmall complex full of minority-owned businesses -- fishmongers, grocers, bakeries making breads and pastries, many of these items not otherwise available hereabouts, and the landlord was well-respected by the folks running shops there, even in recent years holding the rent prices well below market rates because he wanted to foster the community. The landlord got old, his kids didn't want to inherit the business, he couldn't find a buyer willing to maintain the property in its current form, so he ended up selling it off to a developer who's going to drop in yet another mixed use complex of condos and boutiques catering to the same crowd of people as the forty or fifty other mixed use complexes within five miles of it. Nobody knows what's going to happen to the businesses there now, there's probably not anywhere within 20 miles that could match their rents, and of course since they're retail businesses their current pool of customers would dry right up. It's depressing as hell.
 
I can’t like your post.
I hope the underground laboratory can be saved.
This cookie cutter, textbook, developer model set up by absentee owners and uninvolved management teams is short sighted and irritating.
I’ve seen it happen, my daughter’s neighborhood in LA recently went through it and lost all its character and coolness and resident parking. She moved away. So did many long term residents. Independent shops that had been there for decades replaced with chains. Now it’s not a neighborhood anymore, just another part of the city.
Sorry. I’ve been having a rough run and I’m in a mood.
 
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[...] The accumulation of Stuff is a big burden.

This is an eloquently outlined case-study in the sunk cost fallacy. When I sold my place in Oldsmar, I made a lot of tough decisions around what I was going to keep through the move. I hope things work out in whatever way works best for your long-term happiness @Bruce Johnson. You have earned the right to enjoy this time in your life. :)
 
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Things have quieted down here in the Secret Underground Lab, at least for now. But it's still crazy and uncertain overall. About half of the other Tenants in the basement, my friends, have moved out in disgust. Several more will be moving out soon. Everyone, including me, is looking at other buildings to move to. I'm committed to staying here until the end of my lease in July 2025. Whether I'm going to stay after that is uncertain. It depends how things are looking here by next summer.

It's getting quieter here. The construction crews have stepped up the pace and are getting some of the work done. They are finishing up most of the safety things. I'm thankful for that.

The management company has ordered me to vacate four of the other spaces that I had expanded into over the last two years. No sensible reason why. I was paying rent on them, and there's no one else coming in. They are off doing some mysterious planning, and won't even talk to us, the Tenants. Whatever. I'm convinced that they have no idea what they are doing.

So, I'm losing about 1000 sq ft of space here. Initially, I looked at renting some storage space at some other location nearby. Then I thought, nah, I really should just shrink down. I need to stop expanding my rental area to house loosely organized junk. Now I'm in the middle of a big cleanup, compression, reorganization of my stuff into a smaller area. It's a lot of work, but it's actually a good thing for me to do right now. Mentally, physically, financially. Get rid of junk, get everything I'm keeping more organized, lower my monthly rent. It puts me in a better position to move, if/when I decide to. Do it now.

I'm shuffling shelving units, boxes and machines. A logistical puzzle to squeeze it all in. As part of it, I'm moving some of my antique project machines out of their storage corners and into the working shop area. These are the machines that don't need very much work to become operational. And I can use them. So, I may as well get them running now. Let them earn their square footage in my shop.

Here's the first example:

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I moved the Big Green Buffalo into the woodworking shop. This is a Buffalo Forge Company 20" Drill Press from the 1930's. It's kinda grimy, but it's actually in nice condition. Nothing broken, everything spins and moves as it should. All it really needs is to build a motor mount on the back, hook up a motor and switch, and fit it with a new flat belt. And I'll clean it up a little bit.

I found this drill press ten years ago. Or it found me. A friend called me and said that a friend of his needed to get rid of a big old drill press. He said that it was a Buffalo, and stood about 6' tall. He called me because he knew that I was kinda into old machines. And he didn't want to see it go to the scrap yard. Over the phone, he said to bring a trailer and $100 and take it away......How could I refuse?

It was in North Hollywood, about 45 miles from here. I was surprised at the condition it was in. He had been using it fairly recently, but had needed the motor for something else. I brought it home, and it's been parked in the back room for ten years. Waiting its turn to be brought into service again.

You may have seen on other places in this thread that I have four of these big "camelback" drill presses. Two Buffalos and two Royersfords. They were competing companies back in those days, 1910 to 1960, and their drill presses are similar in design and specifications. My 1945 Royersford 21 is in beautiful condition. It's right down the aisle in the machine shop, and I use it all the time. It's a wonderful machine. I sometimes use it for woodworking jobs, but I don't like to, because it's usually slimy with cutting oil.

So, my plan for the Green Buffalo is to place it in the woodworking shop and keep it clean and dry of oil. Ready for woodworking only. Set up for slow speed, high torque. Perfect for big Forstner bits through maple.

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This Buffalo is a basic model, with just a standard bar quill handle, plus the geared crank downfeed. The crank handle and shaft are missing from the geared downfeed, but I don't think I'd ever use it for woodworking.

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Here's the upper shaft assembly. It has 8 speeds; four steps on the flat pulleys. The thing in the middle is the back gear drive. The upper shaft is actually two halves. With the knob/pin engaged, the halves are connected together in direct drive for the four high speeds. Pull the knob and swing that side gear up into engagement, and it goes into Back Gear for the four lower speeds. Depending on how I set up the motor drive, the working speed range will be from about 430 rpm top speed down to 15 rpm at the bottom. I'll probably normally keep this drill press set up on the 2nd step in High range, about 170 rpm. That's the speed I normally have the Royersford set at, and I've found that it works well for, like, a 2" Forstner bit through maple.

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Here's the countershaft. A 2" wide flat belt runs between this step pulley and the one up on top. It originally had a leather belt, but these days they make composite fiber and rubber flat belts that have much better traction and power. And they are brown and even look almost like leather. Available from McMasters for $4 per foot. Cut to length and join with Alligator clips. I need to order some. The Royersford needs a new belt too.

That large V-belt pulley on the end of the countershaft is not original. Back in the 1930's, when this machine entered service, it would have had a pair of fast/loose 2" wide x 10" diameter flat belt pulleys on there. A 2" wide leather belt would run up to the lineshaft on the ceiling for power. Somewhere back in its history, it was given its own electric motor and a modern V-belt drive.

For the motor drive, I need to build a wooden bracket shelf thing above and off to the side of the countershaft. It'll be attached right to the wooden base frame. I'll pick out a nice old-looking 1 HP motor for it. That's all it really needs for woodworking duty. And I'll wire it up with a dust-tight NEMA 3 drum switch.

That's about all this machine needs.

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It's going to be a very useful machine. And it just looks so cool being there.

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It just so happens that the two medium size drill presses that I use for woodworking are also Buffalos! Same company, Buffalo Forge, but from different eras. The one on the left is from the 1940's and the one on the right is from the 1960's, I believe. A herd of three Buffalos. By the way, I have 6 more Buffalo Forge drill presses of various sizes over in the other bay.

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They are both wonderful lifetime machines. I use these two daily.

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While I was shuffling benches around, I also moved this bench over into the machine shop and set the Avey Sensitive Drill and the small tapping drill press on it. Before, they were on a cabinet. I like to use the Avey sitting down, and I was straining my back and neck leaning forward to see what I was drilling tiny holes in. This bench has knee clearance. Much more comfortable.
 
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Things have quieted down here in the Secret Underground Lab, at least for now. But it's still crazy and uncertain overall. About half of the other Tenants in the basement, my friends, have moved out in disgust. Several more will be moving out soon. Everyone, including me, is looking at other buildings to move to. I'm committed to staying here until the end of my lease in July 2025. Whether I'm going to stay after that is uncertain. It depends how things are looking here by next summer.

Bruce, Thank you so much for giving us a peak behind the curtain to see where the magic happens. I hope things work out well for you very soon. I can't wait for the next episode of "Old Tool Talk". Happy Holidays.
 
Bruce, Thank you so much for giving us a peak behind the curtain to see where the magic happens. I hope things work out well for you very soon. I can't wait for the next episode of "Old Tool Talk". Happy Holidays.

Okay, here you are....Here's a genuine peek behind the curtain of the Secret Underground Lab. The reality of what I've been doing for the last week....

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I've got about 3000 sq ft of space filled with shelving units of stuff, work areas, machines, materials and random stuff piled up on the floor. And I have to cut it down by about 1000 sq ft. And, unfortunately, I need to stop doing productive work and do this now. I'm spending most of December back here, cleaning up, rearranging the shelving and workbenches, repacking good stuff more compactly, and throwing out a lot of junk. I can't afford to keep paying rent for storage space for all of this stuff. I have to shrink down.

Please excuse Jessica for hiding behind that cardboard.....Her gown is coming unglued. I need to do some work on her.....

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This area is being rearranged, and the spray booth and finish buffing benches will go in there. It's going to be a little crowded, but I think it'll work....

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I have to clear completely out of this back area, by orders of Management. For no rational reason. I have been renting it for two years, and wanted to continue. Most of that stuff piled up is just placed there while I'm moving shelving.....

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This shelving unit is now moved into its new location. I was reloading boxes of stuff back into it at 4am Sunday night shift.

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This shelving unit mostly contains misc musical equipment. Random guitars, basses, banjos, keyboards, amps..Old projects that need work but are worth saving. My good stuff, like my Scroll Bass collection and my good amps, are secured away over in another room.

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The assembly/setup area, with some things roughly positioned. That's my infamous Philco radio test amp.

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The electronics bench, completely cluttered with project debris. It needs a thorough cleaning and reorganizing. That's my pickup winding machine on the right, under the towel.

I should have this area sorted out in the next few days, and the spray booth up and running again. Jeremy needs it. Then I have to clear out some junk at the other end of this space, and move my antique machinery collection in there. It's going to be crowded, but I think it's all going to fit.

I'll be spending most of my time in December doing this big cleanup. Unfortunately, that's my big priority at the moment. Doing this now will reduce my rent by over $1000 per month. From here on out. That will greatly improve my life and stress level. And it's also better preparing me, if I have to move out.

But I will get some time in December on a few machine repairs, one small repair job (Alex's Wal neck), and some long-overdue Scroll Basses.

That's the glorious life here in the Lab. I'm sitting here typing this, physically sore and covered with dust.
 
Speaking of the holidays, last week I took a break from my duties here in the Lab and did my Christmas duty. I was Santa for the city of Fillmore's big pre-Christmas event and tree-lighting ceremony. I was decked out in full costume, in a chair inside a 12' diameter electric ornament orb, in the middle of the park in front of City Hall. And I spent an actual 3 hours Ho-Hoing talking to kids and parents and teenagers, and posing for hundreds of pictures. That's what it was all about. Everyone wants pictures of their kids or themselves with Santa. They were literally lined up. I was smiling and posing saying Merry Christmas continuously for 3 hours. It was fun, but it got kind of tiring.

My regular band, the Bakery Boys, was also set up nearby playing and singing Christmas songs. I was supposed to sing a few with them, but didn't get a chance.

I'll try to find a picture and post it here for your amusement.

Edit: I found a few pictures:

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Not much snow. It was about 45 degrees. This is winter in Fillmore. I didn't hear the crowd estimates, but it was probably 1000-2000.
 
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Speaking of the holidays, last week I took a break from my duties here in the Lab and did my Christmas duty. I was Santa for the city of Fillmore's big pre-Christmas event and tree-lighting ceremony. I was decked out in full costume, in a chair inside a 12' diameter electric ornament orb, in the middle of the park in front of City Hall. And I spent an actual 3 hours Ho-Hoing talking to kids and parents and teenagers, and posing for hundreds of pictures. That's what it was all about. Everyone wants pictures of their kids or themselves with Santa. They were literally lined up. I was smiling and posing saying Merry Christmas continuously for 3 hours. It was fun, but it got kind of tiring.

My regular band, the Bakery Boys, was also set up nearby playing and singing Christmas songs. I was supposed to sing a few with them, but didn't get a chance.

I'll try to find a picture and post it here for your amusement.
I can't wait to see Santa pictures. The shop pictures are wonderful. You really have your hands full. I wish I could come over and help. It's a heck of a project, but you will be much better situated for the future when it's all over. Take care of yourself and your shop first, then you will be able to relax and get back to working on other people's projects. I'll stay tuned for updates. And give Jessica a hug for me...
 
And give Jessica a hug for me...

Since that goofy rabbit left her, Jessica's been tight with Banjozilla.

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They make a nice couple. I sometimes swear I can hear them playing Patty-Cake softly over in the music room. With an interesting low banjo twang.....
 
The last place I worked had something similar happen. The site had been a car factory until it closed in 2005. The government gave a grant to a developer to build an 'innovation centre' One corner of the site had been a car park and they built three office buildings - suites of small offices for start up firms, medium sized offices for start-ups to move into as they grew and a larger office block. There was a 15 year tie in period with the grant

15 years to the day, the management company came to us and asked us to move out. We had 18 months left on the lease of one suite and a rolling monthly contract on another. They offered a deal where we could stay in the monthly office for 6 months if we sold them the remaining year's lease on the main office. The people next door had it bad though.

They had a rolling 12 month lease - either side had to give 12 months notice to leave. The management company offered to renegotiate. The tenant could have anything they wanted. All the management company asked for was to go to a rolling 1 month notice period. At the same meeting where the new lease was signed, the 1 months notice was given to the tenant. The tenant just closed up the business and went home.
 
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The last place I worked had something similar happen. The site had been a car factory until it closed in 2005. The government gave a grant to a developer to build an 'innovation centre' One corner of the site had been a car park and they built three office buildings - suites of small offices for start up firms, medium sized offices for start-ups to move into as they grew and a larger office block. There was a 15 year tie in period with the grant

15 years to the day, the management company came to us and asked us to move out. We had 18 months left on the lease of one suite and a rolling monthly contract on another. They offered a deal where we could stay in the monthly office for 6 months if we sold them the remaining year's lease on the main office. The people next door had it bad though.

They had a rolling 12 month lease - either side had to give 12 months notice to leave. The management company offered to renegotiate. The tenant could have anything they wanted. All the management company asked for was to go to a rolling 1 month notice period. At the same meeting where the new lease was signed, the 1 months notice was given to the tenant. The tenant just closed up the business and went home.

Yeah, unfortunately, that's the nature of commercial/industrial real estate. The owners of the building are always looking for a better Tenant. And they would prefer a single larger Tenant who leases the whole building, or just buys it. But those big Tenants are harder to find. If one shows up and is interested, the owners want to be prepared to offer being able to clear out the existing Tenants quickly. So, they would like to keep the little Tenants on floating monthly leases.

Likewise, if they are preparing the building, thinking of selling it, the owners don't want to have it full of Tenants on long leases. That's a negative to most potential buyers. Most buyers will pay more for a clean building that's empty, or could be emptied out quickly.

In our case, we were hoping that these owners were planning to hold the building long term, using the rent from the existing Tenants to pay off the mortgage and cover general maintenance and cleaning it up somewhat. Not trying to turn it into a big money-making development project, but a low-maintenance long term investment. That's what they told us when they bought the building 3 years ago.

But now they seem to be getting impatient and greedy.....
 
I found this drill press ten years ago. Or it found me. A friend called me and said that a friend of his needed to get rid of a big old drill press. He said that it was a Buffalo, and stood about 6' tall. He called me because he knew that I was kinda into old machines. And he didn't want to see it go to the scrap yard. Over the phone, he said to bring a trailer and $100 and take it away......How could I refuse?
I bought another of that same drill press 25 years ago, also for $100 if I remember correctly. It had been a fire but could have been restored easily. I didn't have a place for it at the time, so I stored it an old industrial building for a couple of years and then the building was re-purposed and it disappeared. Gentrification is a bummer; there's almost nothing left here for people who want to make art, music, or their own little industries. Hope you manage to find a stable place to work in.
 
Hey Bruce, how was Santa Sunday?? Any pictures?

It went well. Four hours of riding up and down the streets of Fillmore in a trailer, waving and wishing everyone a Merry Christmas. We stopped at about 40 places, swarmed by kids and parents. My helpers passed out free toys and candy canes, while I stood up, talked, and made eye contact with every kid. One of my helpers on board was Fillmore's Mayor. With these two events this season, I'm pretty well locked in as the Boss Santa of Fillmore. Ho Ho.

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Hanging my Christmas lights! This is what I did on Christmas Eve and Christmas day; I finished up the electrical wiring in the third bay in my main shop, and hung new LED lamps.

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Here are the LED lights over the area that will now contain the spray booth and finish buffing bench. Next to it are the Assembly and Electronics/Pickups benches.

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These LED lamps are 4' long each, and I have them mounted to lengths of 1" PVC pipe. The pipes are suspended from the ceiling on 2' lengths of light link chain, which puts the lamps at 8' off the floor. I've found that this is the best working height for them. The long one on the right is 12' long (3 lamps) and the other two are 8' long (2 lamps).

The power cords connecting them are hanging loose and sloppy right now. Now that I've worked out the positions of the lamps, I'm going to splice up some new power cords which will be the right length to fit neatly and be tied up to the ceiling.

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Making up another of the 12' lamps. That's a standard 10' length of 1" PVC pipe with 3 of the LED lamps attached to it. The two end ones overhang the ends by a foot. The three lamps are coupled together with small connectors that are included with them.

The lamps I'm using are Barrina T5 4ft 5000K 20W model with the frosted cover. These are my favorites. The 5000K color with the frosted cover give plenty of light for shop work, but they aren't blinding. You can look at them. They're cheap, $65 for a pack of 8. They are very light weight, very safe in a wood shop. They are supposed to last 5 years if left on continuously.

I installed these lamps in most of my main shop several years ago, and I really like them. I still have to put them in my machine shop and my storage room.

https://www.amazon.com/Barrina-Inte...x=barrina+led+shop+light,aps,398&sr=8-10&th=1

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I attach them to the PVC pipe with two wraps of clear packing tape. These things are so lightweight, that's all it needs.

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I attach the chain to the PVC pipe by drilling a 3/16" hole crosswise through the pipe and tying the chain on with a twist of electrical wire.

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And there's that 12' lamp mounted in the aisle. I'll be adding another 2 lamps down at the other end as I get it cleaned out.

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And there's the rough arrangement of the spray booth. The bench with the swinging holder is on casters and rolls around easily. I'm going to build a better shroud thing behind it, probably from white painters' cloth.

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The mixing bench has the air plumbing and regulator. I'll be adding another rack on top of it to hold another row of spray guns. We have a lot of spray guns here. The shelving unit holds the paints and tints and masking plates and all the accessories. I'm going to try to squeeze a sink in there too. That's Jeremy's turbine unit down on the floor. I don't use it.

Coming up: Clearing a space and rolling in some tonnage of antique machines. They are two spaces down the hall right now. After the machines have moved through, I'll bring in the buffing bench and the assembly bench. It's going to be a little crowded in here, but I think it'll all work.
 
There's some good news from the Lab.....some....

This week, the management company finally assigned a Manager to our building, to do some, you know, management stuff. He's been very cooperative and helpful in sorting out the mess of Tenants and Leases. And he appreciated my help working with him. Those of us (who are still here) actually have Leases and Rent Roll Accounts now that are sensible and up to date. At higher rent, of course. But, this is good progress.

So, I'm secure here until at least July 2025. I just have the three Units, totaling about 3400 sq ft. That's down from the 4400 sq ft that I was occupying. I'm just finishing up rearranging, sorting and compacting my shop down into the smaller space. I hope to have that almost all done over this weekend, by January 1st. I'm just going to hunker down and stay that way for now.

The Owners' plans and designs for the building are still mysterious and uncertain. Through the fall, they had a construction crew working. They made some progress....but mostly on external cosmetic stuff that is of no value to us Tenants. Meanwhile, the roof leaks like crazy, there are windows broken and missing everywhere, the exterior paint is badly peeling off, stairways aren't finished, our downstairs bathroom still isn't finished, etc. The stuff that matters.

And now things have gone quiet. Because the whole construction crew is gone. The workers got laid off and the boss quit in frustration. All this stuff is sitting unfinished and barely functional. The building is still a wreck from the outside. But, they did sweep up pretty well before they left, so the basement is fairly clean.

The future is uncertain. I'm going to hunker down and concentrate on building basses and see what happens in 2024. Then decide whether to stay or look for another home.