"I had nothing," Dean Ahlbrecht recalls of his Hector, Minn., farm shop that was about the size of a one-car garage -- a couple hundred square feet, maybe. "We fixed everything outside," he says. "We sat in the snow. The combine sat out in the field; one time it froze up."

That was no fun. His repair and maintenance work was inefficient. That was two years ago.

Today, Ahlbrecht works out of a shop boasting a 16-foot ceiling and 8,400 square feet of heated workspace.

Ahlbrecht uses the long Minnesota winter to bring in equipment out of the cold for repairs. Previously, he had fought a season-round battle with the maintenance of his equipment.

"Day-to-day repairs got to be a handful," he says. "Now we use the winter to tear things down and repair them." That combine moves inside for maintenance.

Ahlbrecht will admit his shop was a work in progress, a good deal of it planned on a napkin. But isn't that where dreams and farm shops are born? He did learn a couple of things about energy use along the way.

Ahlbrecht hung 26, six-lamp T5 fluorescent light sets. They were not a cheap installation, but they are highly efficient, put out great light, and, because they hug the ceiling, the lights preserve almost all his floor-to-ceiling clearance.

Ahlbrecht installed quality windows and thick insulation and added a geothermal heating system.

While the lights, windows and geothermal are pricey upfront, they help hold his electricity costs to about $250 a month.

Modern shops are big and decidedly more sophisticated than in years past. Over his 30 years in the business, Jim Rollins, vice president of operations for the Eastern Division of Walters Buildings, has seen the average shop grow from 40 feet wide to 60 feet and now to 70 and 80 feet wide.

Space grew right along with the equipment. A 12-row planter needs room in the shop of at least 24 feet wide and 32 feet long.

Shops have also grown because their supporting systems (heating, insulation, lighting and electrical) have added greatly to the efficiency of work performed in the shop and, therefore, the efficiency of the farming operation.

Insulation is one example. "Farmers have become a lot more knowledgeable about insulation," Rollins says. "With it, they get a better heating pattern even in large buildings. The heat is all over." That makes the shop comfortably useable all year.

Shop design begins with two questions. What works now? What doesn't? Look for answers in your own shop. But also look for answers in shops you visit. And be sure to look for flexibility.

Paul Butler, of Macon, Ill., added flexibility to his shop with a Google search. Butler was working out of a 60-x-80-foot machinery building. He wanted to build a shop inside that building -- a space with a concrete floor, extra lights, power, compressed air and more. But he didn't want to build two permanent interior walls to section off that space.

This is where imagination came into play as he built a 30-x-40-foot shop inside his storage building. Butler discovered a Canadian company that sells concrete curing blankets, a material used to cure concrete in cold weather.

The blankets form the two interior walls to his shop. They hang from rollers and hooks so they can be pushed aside when not in use. The two outside walls of the shop are insulated to R15, while the shop's ceiling is insulated to R30. The blankets, by the way, have an R value of seven. When closed, the curtains keep the temperature in the shop about 60 degrees. Also, because they are white, they are good reflectors of light.

When designing a shop, you must address three primary challenges -- size, workflow and repair capabilities.

Size. You will hear salesmen say, "I've never seen a shop built too big." While they have a personal interest in selling you a shop that would never be too large, that adage isn't one to entirely ignore.

A well-designed shop fits the needs of the future. If the farm grows, what about the equipment line? What about the size of the equipment, not only how it spreads out laterally but also its height?

The building width should be twice the size of the main equipment door. That's up to 50 feet. After that, the main entry door should be located in the sidewall to keep the space on either side of this bay from becoming too large. (This, and some of the following ideas for shop construction, come from a shop-planning paper published by Purdue University's Ag Engineering Department, AE-104, Planning Farm Shops for Work and Energy Efficiency, www.ces.purdue.edu/extmedia/ae/AE-104.html).

Consider the need for exterior space around the building for future expansion. The shop should be close to the main traffic patterns of the yard, near machinery storage and near parking areas to ease maintenance flows. There's another idea to consider, as well. Instead of just pouring approach aprons, a large outside concrete pad can be created. This provides handy, additional maintenance space in good weather. A roof-only structure can be built over the pad to create a product-handling area outside the main shop, or to increase the area for maintenance, even in inclement weather.

When considering your square-footage needs, take one day to conduct the following exercise. Park your equipment on a space the size of the shop you hope to build. Account for traffic patterns, repair and storage spaces, office space, bathrooms and kitchen and meeting areas. Is the shop you want to build too big now?

WorkFlow

Think of your shop as built around two repair bays that form a "T."

One space, the vertical leg of the "T" and the larger of the two bays, is serviced by the largest door opening in the building. The door, perhaps a single-hinge hydraulic door or full-clearance bi-fold, is mounted at the lower end of the leg. A single-hinge hydraulic door lifts out and up. When opened, this door also creates a useful feature -- a covered place outside. A 16-x-50-foot single-hinge door, for example, creates a 16- x 50-foot covered space. A bi-fold door is hinged horizontally across the center of the door and folds in half as it is lifted upward.

This larger bay is space used to service the largest pieces of equipment. The tools, workbenches and racks needed to do the work are arrayed around the outside edges of the space. Purdue engineers suggest setting aside 8 to 12 feet on either side of the leg for work. While the main workbenches are likely static, flexibility is maintained in this area by keeping most of the tools and service supplies portable on rolling carts, racks and tables.

The top of the "T" is for the service bay. This is where routine maintenance is performed. This area is serviced by an overhead door. Near the door opening is access to water, power, compressed air and supplies of oil and grease. Long, narrow materials can be stored along the long wall of the service bay. At the end opposite the door, a space at least 4 feet wide should be left for a workbench and tool area.

Don't forget service doors. Three-foot-wide doors serve both people traffic and movement of supplies and parts without opening the larger shop doors.

Repair Capabilities

The basic shop is a box waiting for a design. What work is going to be performed in that box? How about business meetings? Seasonal and permanent storage? What are the permanent structures? Offices? Utilities? Compressor room? Lofts? Dedicated work areas?

Access to electrical service and outlets are a key to workflow. Ahlbrecht has 400-amp service to his shop. Butler has 200 amps. Place outlets by permanently mounted equipment, every 4 feet along a workbench and several outlets overhead for pull-down electrical cords, drop lights and tools. Place outlets every 10 feet, 4 feet off the floor along open walls. Install 120-volt service at all doors. Run 220-volt service to the main door, the welding area and any other place where 220-volt work may be performed.

It's a good idea to mount compressed airdrops at regular intervals around the shop and near the main service doors. Do not use PVC to distribute compressed air. Retractable compressed air hoses are convenient ways to disperse compressed air.

Consider, too, needs for inside infrastructure to support future capabilities. For example, if a jib crane is in your plans, you might want to build the concrete and steel structure needed to support that tool.

If electrical service, water and other shop functions are going to run under the floor, add empty runs of conduit or PVC to accommodate future needs, such as installation of digital and cable services.

Purdue offers some rules of thumb regarding the space required for certain shop functions:

Welding: 10 feet long by 8 to 12 feet wide

Machining: 8 to 24 feet long by 8 to 12 feet wide

General: 8 feet long and a mounted workbench

Lubrication: 8 feet long-plus for at least three barrels of lubricants dispersal and recovery, tire service and common mechanical repair supplies

There is a way to get a lot more use out of floor space: Roll it out on wheels. That was the idea in the shop built by the Whites of McKenzie, Tenn. With the exception of a huge welding table, "anything that could be put on wheels, we put on wheels," Jeff White says.

Let the Sun Shine In

There is one more source of shop lighting -- daylight. Using daylight to illuminate areas of the shop is called "daylight harvesting." The practice is enhanced when the shop's inside walls are coated white.

It is not entirely free because it requires the well-planned placement of windows. But Walmart and other chains use "daylighting" to reduce energy costs, and they have found natural light keeps customers shopping longer. Similarly, researchers find that daylighting can make you more productive. Here's how windows harvest daylight.

South-facing windows -- Maximum source of wintertime sunlight. With shades, a useful source of summer lighting.

North-facing windows -- Natural light with little glare. Total glassed area should be limited to prevent winter heat loss.

East and west windows -- Early and late source of daylight. Limit windows to reduce glare and heat gain. Low-E windows let light in, but keep summer heat out and winter heat in.

Clerestory windows -- Vertical windows high on the wall. Good source of ceiling and high-level lighting.

Skylights -- High-level light, but not critical to an efficient daylighting plan.

Solar tubes -- Skylight that delivers daylight through a reflective tube to shop interior. Lighting for offices, small work areas.

Brighter Ideas

"If you are hiring an electrician, and he can't tell you why he is placing your lights where he is," says Scott Sanford, an energy conservation expert at the University of Wisconsin, "hire a new electrician. Otherwise, he will cost you plenty of money."

Good lighting design makes work productive, the lighting bill smaller, and, according to a Walmart study, good lighting makes you feel more like shopping—or, in this case -- more like working. Electricians have a good amount of lighting technology in their quiver. Here's a sample:

CFLs -- Cut the electric bill by replacing all incandescent bulbs with compact fluorescent lights (CFL). CFLs use 25% of the power incandescents use. Compact fluorescents are compatible with mechanical timers but not all electronically controlled timers. There are dimmable-style CFLs.

Fluorescents -- Fluorescent light tubes have wide shop applications. For example, T8 fluorescent tubes are a cost-effective stand-in for those old, workhorse T12s. "T" is for tubular. T8s can save 40% of the energy used by T12s. There is little cost difference for the tubes, and T8s work in T12 fixtures after a ballast change. Newer T5 lamps, only 5/8 inch in diameter, are 50% more efficient than T12s. T5s shed more light than T8s. But that advantage does not overcome the higher cost for T5 tubes and the new fixtures they require.

HIDs -- Metal halides, or high-intensity discharge lights (HIDs), dominate the high bay market. A few HID fixtures can replace many incandescent bulbs (they are 90% more efficient) or old fluorescents. But HIDs need several minutes to fully light. "Pulse-start" HID lamps address some of the "full-light" problem. Increasingly, T8 and T5 fluorescents give HIDs a run for the money. They light instantly -- even in cold weather -- and produce less glare.

LEDs -- A coming challenger to fluorescents and HIDs in high bay applications, some say, is light emitting diodes (LEDs). They are lightweight and compact, and are said to last 10 times longer than compact fluorescents. They are dimmable and may prove to use a third less energy than fluorescents.

(SK)

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