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Had a discussion with my wife this morning about moving my shop upstairs into the old garage turned bedroom. Followed by creating a basement entertainment space. I love it. It has windows and heat!

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Hutch

Get the heck off the couch and go build a guitar!!!!

Where to put the shop is always a balancing of goods and bads. Putting it in the finished living space (with insulation, and part of the house's HVAC system) makes it a more pleasant environment, but dust migration can be an issue if you don't capture dust well at the source, and if your woodworking RH control needs are more stringent than what you apply to your home, isolating the shop and getting the RH right can be a challenge. Putting the shop in a separate space stops the dust migration, and you can control the RH better with an isolated space, but then you need to separately heat, cool, and control RH in that space, which can be expensive.

I've done it both ways. I currently have my shop in a walkout basement where the door to the rest of the house is always open. The HVAC system serves the whole house, including the walkout basement. I humidify and dehumidify the whole house through good quality whole house units attached to the HVAC system, but due to living in Appalachia (super humid summers), I supplement the dehumidifier with a second stand alone dehumidifier in the basement. Dust migration is not a problem, because I capture it well at the source. It is not a perfect shop setup, but it works within the context of my life overall.

For a good decade or so my shop was in a 'bedroom' but we had a big wrap around porch and on the side I had my dust making machines protected from the elements but still outside. Even now with a dedicated outbuilding shop and point source dust collection I still have the planer, resaw and sanding stations in a garage breezeway. If it's real cold in the winter I will use a portable downdraft table indoors.

In fact my shop is slightly the opposite. The shop is on the first floor and the loft above is the music studio and hang out place.

Might be easier to control temp and RH too up there.

Absolutely. I really hope we make this happen. I miss windows.

_________________
Hutch

Get the heck off the couch and go build a guitar!!!!