How to Organise New Zealand Garages for Maximum Storage

In New Zealand, we most often use the garage for storage as well as to house vehicles.

This can mean a lot of tripping over things, moving stuff out of the way, and tight spaces for getting in and out of the car, let alone the hassle of moving it all to find something! It’s worth putting a little time into creative storage solutions that let you move freely - and safely - through your garage.

The easiest and most logical storage solution is to use vertical space. We’re letting the pictures tell the story here with some handy and easy solutions from around the web. We’ll throw in a couple of trickier projects for those of you who are handy with all those tools stashed away in that garage of yours.

• Bikes are one of the worst culprits at space hogging. There’s an easy solution, purchase some bike hooks, find the stud and screw them in, then hang those suckers and be done with it.
• Here’s a slick tip to keep partially used caulk tubes well sealed and at hand. Fold a piece of duct tape over the open tube to seal it, leaving a few inches of extra tape. Drive a nail through the tape and hang the tube on pegboard.
• Here’s a simple, no-nonsense way to prevent your recycling or scrap bins from hogging precious floor space or getting kicked around the garage: Hang them on the wall. Use a piece of 1 x 4 for a bottom support, and screw together two pieces as shown, to hook around the top edge of your bins. Stagger them up the wall and Bob’s your uncle.
• For articles that are not in frequent use and are not too heavy to lift up and down, try making a suspended shelf. Use an old door as your base, or some plywood, or a purpose-built shelf as shown, using MDF supported by a basic framework. Hang with chains from the joists using large screw hooks at each end. Just be sure that you have plenty of headroom under the finished shelf and don’t overload it!

 

Below, Upcycling solutions clockwise from top left: lattice as pole storage; an old filing cabinet finding a new life and snazzy paint job; drill holes into a waste length of PVC pipe to corral bungee cords; a piece of pallet and some dowel offcuts makes a great boot keeper; plumbing pipes as storage racks; plastic bottles turned screw caddies; scraps of old hosing being out to use rather than lying dormant in landfill.

• Another take on suspended storage is these bins on sliding rails (see image below top right). This project takes skill, tools and time to get it straight, fitting the bins and well supported from your struts. We can’t help but wonder if it’s worth the hassle, who wants to drag those bins up and down?
• Cordless Drill Charging Station. This clever charging station (see image below, bottom left) makes great sense, not only to keep those power tools ready to roll, but to keep tools accounted for safely. A free PDF of the plans can be downloaded here: http://www.hertoolbelt.com/cordless-drill-storage-charging-station/

Clockwise from top left: Storage gooooals; this project is all over pinterest but might be better in pictures than in practise; wire grid panels are handy and can look pretty funky with a great colour behind; the true handyman project: drill charging station.

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