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It’s not every week you get to work with engineering / inventing / world recording royalty. So when we got an invitation to visit Colin Furze’s giant new workshop we were excited. And we knew we had to come bearing gifts – something suitably impressive. And it just so happened that with our friends at Power Tool Mate we could do just that. So with a monster haul of Milwaukee power tools we arrived ready to tackle his power tool storage. We were going to come up with a tool wall storage system that would rival anything we’ve ever made before.

About Colin Furze

Furze is a British Youtube creator, stuntman and inventor from Stamford, Lincs. He left school to become a plumber, a trade which he pursued until joining the Sky1 programme Gadget Geeks. Furze has used his plumbing and engineering experience to build many unconventional projects. The list includes a hoverbike, a wall of death, a jet-powered motorcycle made with pulsejet engines. Not to mention the world’s fastest mobility scooter, pram and bumper car for the Stig to drive on Top Gear. He recently hit the headlines after building an underground tunnel between his home and shed at the bottom of the garden! Unsurprisingly, given antics like this, at the time of publishing, his Youtube channel has almost 13 million followers!

Colin Furze has been a friend of the Shadow Foam business for many years now. Pretty much since he was first introduced to the product years ago in the shape of a custom biscuit case! Jonathan and Colin have already gone one to work on a couple of videos together. Including, most recently, one helping new Youtubers to get started out.

And what about Power Tool Mate

We really need to shout out the fantastic team at Power Tool Mate. When they heard about the project, and Colin needing a “few” new power tools for his new workshop, they really stepped up. And they absolutely blew any expectations out of the water. This is a tool haul on a massive scale, so huge thanks to them. They’re one of the UK’s biggest stockists and they we pride themselves on providing top tools at rock bottom prices. Better still they offer expert product knowledge and super efficient customer service too.

Amongst the haul of Milwaukee power tools they sent Colin for the project were:

The “beast” angle drill (as it became known)
Jigsaws
Batteries
8 amp hour batteries
3 battery charger
Heat guns
Nibblers
Power silicone gun
Band saw
Sander
Circular saw
Grinders
Reciprocating Saw
Impact driver
Router
Multitool
Slab cutter
Pin nailer

… and that’s to name just some of it!

So from there, it was over to Jona to bring some sort of order to the amazing Muilwaukee chaos with some epic power tool storage. It was time to get everything stored away neatly. Colin Furze

Where to start!?

Colin had already earmarked a couple of spaces in his huge new workshop. One things for sure, there was going to be no shortage of space in there! But what the tool wall will serve to do is bring order to the tool stations, make everything accessible and easy to find. Plus it will also look really cool too. Obviously to make it we will be using our Milwaukee toolbox organiser. This comes in a whole range of sizes (both standard and custom). And it comes in a range of different depths and colours too.

We got a good lead from Colin in terms of what needed to go where from a layout perspective. Drills, impact drivers and grinders were going to be his most frequently used tools. So they needed to be most easily accessible. These, therefore would go in his larger, main tool wall. We would start out on making a separate, slightly smaller section for all the woodworking tools. The aim being to keep tools of a similar type all together. There were some huge items that we needed to come up with a solution for. Plus some items that might be used less frequently, so we saved those for another time.

The workshop is the icing on the cake following his incredible tunnel build. The plan is to add some insulation to the unit in the next week to keep the heat in. Then, Colin tells us, he is all set to start working in there straight away. We’re here to help make it look epic with our Shadow Foam / Milwaukee / Power Tool Mate combo and the ultimate in poer tool storage walls!

The woodworking section

This was always going to be the hardest section to do. Mainly given the size and awkward shape of some of the items. So why not start there, and get it out of the way?! To go into the space we’d been allocated for it, we created a foam wall made of three layers. 70mm 50mm and 50mm, so 170mm in total. The main reason for it needing to be so deep was to house the circular saw. The blade of which had to be housed by cutting down through every layer of the foam. It did make for a really nice secure fit though. Also because of the heft of some of the items, we secured the foam to the wall using 3 deep screws which we concealed behind a cheeky flap of Shadow Foam so they can’t be seen.

And of course, this being another epic Shadow Foam build, we added (with Colin’s permission) a cheeky little Shadow Foam logo on the base of the wall. The foam panel was in the centre of that section of wall. This left space on either side where Colin plans to build two small cubby holes to store other items. Colin Furze

The main tool wall

This was to be the tool wall storage for where the most commonly used items including drills, impact drivers and grinders were going to go. And there was a lot of work needed doing to create it, so we enlisted Colin’s help!

We kept the power tool storage wall looking super sharp and tidy by concealing smaller items beneath the tools. So, for example, with the heat gun, we stored the tips by cutting them deeper into the foam after we’d cut the main tool in itself. We were able to do this as we made the wall depth up to 120mm using a 70mm layer and a 50mm layer. In a throwback to the first project we ever did for him, Colin even suggested we could conceal a pack of biscuits under one of the tools. Maybe something for a future video!? Colin Furze milwaukee power tools power tool storage

Colin is famed for making the most incredible inventions and innovations, but even he was a little apprehensive about cutting the last tool into the wall! But there was no need. After a quick tutorial from Jonathan he was cutting foam like a pro in no time. We employed our new favourite foam smoothing spinners to get a really smooth base to the cuts, and we were done. Of course, apart from adding in the all important Power Tool Mate logo to the wall to really set it off and once more doff our caps to the fantastic team there for helping us out on this amazing project.

The end result

Well, actually, this isn’t the end. We are back working with Colin in a few weeks to bring more organised joy to his new workshop. Next time we’ll be getting his tool drawers kitted out. But as far as this project goes, fair to say he was pretty buzzing with the results. Click here to check out the full, fun project for yourself. Colin Furze Milwaukee Power Tools power tool storage