Storing Small Parts and Hardware - Plastic Jars or Parts Bins

[Mike Cecil]

I use a variety of storage arrangements, depending upon item size:

(1) Small stuff, like fuzes, connectors, clips, globes, nomenclature plates etc are in labelled plastic butter containers with a lid and a label, on purpose built shelves, and in a plastic drawer system. Easy to see the labels.

(2) Nuts, bolts, screws, rivets, washers: plastic compartmentalized storage boxes with hinged lids, stacked in purpose-built shelving.

(3) medium-large parts: plastic heavy duty tubs with lids, labelled with a number. The part description and tub number are entered on the database on the workshop laptop as I store them, making locating a restored or new part later quite simple. Amazing how you forget where a part is when you have put it away a year or so before.

(4) Large finished parts such as seats, windscreen frame, etc: wrapped in plastic sheet, bound with tape and hung on hooks secured to the workshop wall high up near the ceiling: out of the way, safe from damage prior to use, and sealed against dust and dirt.

Don't like or use the open-topped storage containers as they inevitably collect dirt and dust.

Mike

[maple_leaf_eh]

For simple organizing of small non perishable things I use 4-litre windshield washer fluid bottles with the side cut off. They are free at the service stations, especially in bad weather times, are moderately durable plastic, and have a ready made handle.

I put my spare trailer lighting rig in one. I have jumper cables in another. Sometimes I put cargo straps and the like in one.

A fairly new arrival on the scrounge market are diesel exhaust fluid (DEF) bottles. They have a cardboard box around, and are about 3 times the capacity of washer fluid bottles. The compound is water soluable and I suppose very mildly irritating. I rinsed some out and chucked in lead bullet casting supplies. They have a top handle and seem to be durable enough for a decade or so.

[Jacques Reed]

Hi Lionel,

Another good source of storage containers are plastic screw top jars that many foodstuffs come in. Peanut butter jars are a good example. Clear, so you can see what you have inside it and airtight to keep moisture and dirt out.

Many companies have gotten away from glass jars. Years ago magazines like Popular Mechanics suggested screwing the lid of glass containers to a shelf then screwing the parts jars into it. All well and good if you never drop a jar and have to separate hundreds of glass shards from screws etc.

The plastic jars have a long life too. Some of my containers are 25 or more years old and if you drop them at least they usually just crack.

Cheers,