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6 Ways to Make Progress on Your Project Without Leaving the Living Room
Deep in the throes of winter, just about every car person wishes for days of clear roads and warm weather that enable driving and comfortable wrenching. Even those lucky enough to have a garage or shop workspace are often still feeling just enough of a chill to prefer in the house instead of spending an evening working on a car or project in the garage. While you can’t get everything done on your project without going into the shop (or writing a huge check), you can get more done from the couch or kitchen table than you might think. Here are six examples.
Clean assembly
One of my personal favorite winter projects is building motorcycle wheels on the kitchen table. It’s a process and procedure that requires only quiet hand tools and patience. Even my lovely wife is fine with the process, so long as I don’t take over the dining table until after dinner. A fair compromise.
This highlights that some projects and tasks can be done in places other than on your workbench. It can be annoying to make an extra trip or two from inside to outside for a tool or piece, but that small amount of extra effort is far better than saving a few steps and freezing in the shop. Take a look at your to-do list, and find something small and clean that might be able to be crossed off—once the dishes are done.
Wiring
Similar to building wheels, diagnosing or repairing wiring is a favorite to-do at the dining table this time of year. A lot of projects that enter my shop have questionable wiring patches, fixes, or problems. Sitting with a multimeter and checking all the electrical parts of a motorcycle can get tedious, so it makes it a little easier to be extra comfortable. This is often a very clean task as well, though having a little Scotchbrite or fine sandpaper can be handy for cleaning up contacts. It’s easy enough to do that over a towel or baking sheet.
Parts ordering or finding
Does it feel obvious? Of course, but it’s worth bringing up because using the extra time we have now is great for running down parts we know will require extra effort—even if we don’t need them right away. Creating a stockpile of parts can be a blessing and curse, so be careful to keep yourself from needing a liquid-cooled credit card. I’m guilty of putting off projects and focusing effort elsewhere when parts finding takes too much time, so the days when I just don’t want to go out and pick up the tools are the ones where I instead pick up the laptop to bring those stalled projects back around.
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Research
In the same vein as parts shopping, reading up from your shop manual or favorite online forum is often best done under a blanket on the couch. Doing a little research to check the next process and procedure in a restoration takes up time—why not knock that work out now? Personally, I like to study the shop manuals for what I expect to drive most this year, focusing on the ignition, fuel, and oiling systems. This primes one’s brain for potential roadside repairs. Understanding how the system is designed to work is the easiest way to figure out what can commonly go wrong and how one might be able to rectify the problem—in ideal and less-than-ideal conditions.
Documenting the process
Jokes about keeping receipts aside, do you document your projects at all? For a lot of years I didn’t, but since then I’ve found that even an un-labeled photo album has proved helpful in solving odd issues and internal process questions. Cataloging these things takes time and definitely doesn’t need to happen in the garage. Start with a simple three-ring binder to easily compile a reference point for what work you’ve done, are doing, and have planned. A separate folder inside is great for catching any unique manuals or reference documents you might need. I enjoy still having the user manual for the electronic ignition I put in my Corvair seven years ago just in case. It’s even better that I know exactly where it is.
Not working on your project
Let’s be real, if you feel like being inside and not working on your project, then do that. Cars should be enjoyable, and sometimes it takes stepping away a little to make sure your pride and joy doesn’t become a chore. Distance makes the heart grow fonder, even if it’s a shell perched on jack stands. Let a break from the shop recharge your mental batteries so that when the conditions are more in your favor, you are itching to get out and get your work done.
Is new gear oil in the house better than used. Asking for a friend
Amateur night guys! Before marriage I had the entire engine in the living room. After marriage (a few years of spending “quality time” with her and the TV ) I just put the TV and radio in the workshop; saves having to lug parts and tools in and out, and makes my wife happy (my being out of sight while staying out of trouble at the same time.) When she first met me my apartment had a mattress on the floor, a folding card table in the dining area and a cinder block-plywood sheet desk. And an upright piano. And there was the engine in the “living” room. Granted, a 4 cylinder twin OHC Fiat engine being rebuilt, but an engine none the less. Hey; she could of walked then and there! No Facebook catfishing; she knew exactly what she was getting. Granted, I showered and shaved beforehand which was deceptive, but in my defense I was goal-driven that evening .
When I met my first wife, I kept a Ducati Scrambler in my apartment.
It’s really necessary sometimes to bring a small project into your living space & all those little projects as mentioned, small wiring fixes, a Old Ford radio to get working but, I pushed the limit when I bought my first powder coating kit from Eaatwood. I know, I know I should have put more thought into using the oven, but, the directions called for a 420 degrees to cure my bumper mounts.
Unfortunately, that evenings homemade pizza tasted a bit “off”.
That’s when I read the dos & don’t off powder coating.
SHE has never forgiven me, I’m told by friends even a year later!
That picture of that table looks like mine right now.
A half century ago, when in my early twenties, I was single and lived in a studio apartment in a nice part of town. I ended up pulling the engine out of my pick up in the parking lot (soon to be told that was against the rules). I got a short block so I still needed to clean up the head and other peripheral components. Hmmm. It turns out the shower in the apartment did a fine job of degreasing all those parts. Now married to a wonderfully supportive woman for many years, and blessed with a garage, all car parts stay there.
It’s very easy to overlook the smells that come along with lots of these tasks. Glue smells, paint smells, sometimes rubbery parts smell, epoxies stink. Penetrating oil smells, all lubricants smell a lot. And almost every effective solvent smells terrible. These are not minor issues in my house because they are major issues in my wife’s house, which happens to be the same house for both of us.
When I was 18 and single, I had the entire interior of my AMX laid out in my living room. I kept telling my friend to “walk around the perimeter. Instead, he jumped over and broke one of the quarter trim pieces (the most fragile and irreplaceable interior part!).
I did successfully restore a set of SS Malibu wheel covers on my kitchen floor, without incident>