After moving over to the new shop, I was surprised how fast I was able to go to work. The only thing I really had to get out of my way was the lumber, so building a lumber rack was my first major task. I've have various racks in the past, but in the end I decided to build a rack almost identical to the one Andy Beasley described in Fine Woodworking # 181: http://www.taunton.com/finewoodworking/Workshop/WorkshopPDF.aspx?id=25188
It works like this: each upright is made of two 1x4s that sandwich 2x4 arms and spacer blocks. To compensate for an uneven floor, I built all the upright supports on the floor, and then leveled them one by one as I lag-bolted them to the wall studs. Working from the top down, I slid each arm into place, leveled it (for safety's sake, I canted the arms about 2 degrees toward the wall), and ran bolts though both the arm and the upright. The support arm braces were tacked into place before any weight was put on the racks. Adding the braces last also gave me a way to tweak the angle of the support arm, making sure everything stayed level. Beneath the racks, I still haven't decided whether I'll add cabinets, stow mobile tool workstations or build various carts for offcuts.
The uprights--a 2x4 sandwiched by two 1x4s--were built on the floor before being secured to the wall.
Each upright was attached to the wall stud using 6 in. lag bolts.
Over about 11 ft. of wall I placed 5 uprights running the 10 ft. height from floor to ceiling.
Once the uprights were on the wall, I decided on the positioning of the support arms. Between each arm, spacers were glued into place on the uprights.
Working from the top down, I added the 2x4 support arms. I'd start at the center of each set of arms, then level and attach the ends. The intermediate supports went up last.
The support arms are bolted into place through the 1x4s. Plywood braces abut the uprights and were attached to the support arms after the bolt was tightened down. If the angle of the arm needed tweaking, the braces were adjusted accordingly.
The finished racks handled all the long stock I had on hand--quite a load of weight--without even a creak.
