building a studio

[Rick Rothrock <rothrock@xxxxxxxx>]

Howard,

    My new studio is two years old next month.  Working with water makes
dust a non-issue. I have a 1micron electrostatic air filter
that I bought from a woodshop supply, to take care of the occasional
airborne particle, but I seldom use it. All of the slurry just dries up
and goes to the landfill. A potter friend likes to experiment with some
of the pure dust for glazes and such.
The overhead beam is stationary, in my next studio it will move to cover
more area. Also I built a masonary curb around the edge and put the
outlets high with GFI like Bill suggested. Heavy insulation and sound
deadening channel between the structure and the wall board keeps the
sound in as well as the heat. This all works very well.

    My work station is an old three bowl, 8 foot long stainless steel
restaurant sink that I bought at a salvage yard. The top is covered with
slats of redwood from an old picnic table. Most of the water is recycled
several times directly from the sink bowl to the work with a pump.  I
started out using new water, but began collecting and recycling it
during the recent drought. The water use
has since been cut by two-thirds. Hourly, I squeegee the floor to one
side, daily I scrape up the dried slurry from the floor,and once a week
I pump the water from the sink into buckets for the saw, and empty the
slurry to dry. So little slurry goes into the sump that I only clean it
once every six months or so. Most of it stays in the sink. Add a
de-humidifier, heater, A.C. in summer, and some tunes and life is great.

    By the way, while we're on the subject of slurry, I've been curious
about the chemical content of various stones like red alkaline feldspar
granite, basalt, diabase, gabbro, labradorite, etc.  There must be some
beneficial trace elements in stone that are good for the garden. I'm
afraid to experiment , because I could poison my soil, and I havn't been
able to find much research information. Does anybody have experience
with this that they can share?

 Rick Rothrock
 http://www.rickrothrock.com