Hey All. Member’s storage is a disaster, and has been for too long, so we are looking at putting proper rules in place regarding how this area should work, and actually enforcing them.
The current proposed ruleset is as follows. Any comments gratefully received:
Project Storage
The Project storage area is an area of the space for use by members only, and is intended for storing projects you are currently working on, along with raw materials. We have limited space, so carefully consider if something needs to be in the space before storing it there.
Each member is entitled to either a cube or half a shelf of storage in the project storage area.
You should use a box to stop your items falling out of your storage space and getting lost.
Your box must be clearly labelled with your full name or a unique nickname.
If you use a box make sure to label both ends.
Stored Items Disposal
Any unlabelled items in project storage may be put into the three-week boxes, starting in the “Box Of Shame”. Ideally the membership should be informed via the forum when this happens, and a photo should be supplied.
Any oversized items in project storage may be moved to large project storage.
Unlabelled large items in project storage or large project storage may be moved directly to the ‘free stuff’ area, and may just vanish without warning!
Items in large project storage with an expired “Do Not Hack” label may be moved directly to the ‘free stuff’ area, and may just vanish without warning!
Occasional sweeps of members storage boxes will be performed for former member’s boxes. Anything found that belongs to a person whose membership has ended more than a week beforehand will be put into the three-week boxes, and their box reclaimed for general use.
Boxes
64L Really useful boxes fit exactly on half a blue shelf
If you’re going to take up a lot of space with a project you should ask on the forum to get consensus from the membership for permission to store your items.
Oversized items should be stored in the large project storage area in the outer corridor.
Oversized items need to be clearly labelled with a Do Not Hack sticker and your name / unique nickname, and an estimated finish date. If you are going to overshoot this finish date, replace the Do Not Hack sticker with an updated estimate.
Things you SHOULD NOT store in the hackspace
Dangerous / Flammable Chemicals.
Lithium batteries must be in a safe charging-bag Lithium charging bags are cheap. http://bit.ly/1H9qTq9
Regarding action:
At the last monthly meeting, we discussed a hack the space day / bin the space day.
Before we do this, we need to mark all the things that violate the above. A label, with date and reason why it is breaking the rules. Then a full month for people to sort it out. People should be made aware as much as possible in the mean time.
Then after that month, start sorting, creating a “to-bin” pile and tidying up.
It’s gotten as bad as it is because we as a community/board implicitly allowed it to happen. We need to give people a chance to follow the suggested /formal rules above before using hammers and skips.
The project storage area is available for members to store projects they are currently working on along with raw materials. We have limited space, so please consider if something needs to be in the space before storing it.
Each member is entitled to either a cube or half a shelf of storage in the project storage area.
You must use put your items in a clearly labelled box. The label should state your full name or unique nickname and a way of contacting you e.g. Telegram username or email address. Labels should be placed on all 4 sides of the box.
Stored Items Disposal
Any unlabelled items found in project storage will be put into the three-week boxes, starting in the “Box Of Shame”. If you do this please make sure you post a picture of the item on the mailing list at the same time.
Any oversized items left in project storage will be moved to large project storage.
Unlabelled large items in either of the storage areas will be moved to the ‘free stuff’ area, and may just vanish without warning!
Items in large project storage with an expired “Do Not Hack” label will be moved directly to the ‘free stuff’ area, and may just vanish without warning! (You may contact the board or the mailing list if you are unable to come in to to stop this happening.)
Occasional sweeps of members storage boxes will be performed for former member’s boxes. Anything found that belongs to a person whose membership has ended more than a week beforehand will be put into the three-week boxes, and their box reclaimed for general use.
Boxes
64L Really useful boxes fit exactly on half a blue shelf
If you’re going to take up a lot of space with a project you MUST ask on the forum to get consensus from the membership for permission to store your items. It may help if you also link the post in the telegram chat.
Oversized items must be stored in the large project storage area in the outer corridor NOT in members storage.
Oversized items need to be clearly labelled with a Do Not Hack sticker including your name / unique nickname, a method of contacting you and an estimated finish date. If you are going to overshoot this finish date, replace the Do Not Hack sticker with an updated estimate.
Things you MUST NOT store in the hackspace
Dangerous / Flammable Chemicals.
Lithium batteries must be in a safe charging-bag Lithium charging bags are cheap. http://bit.ly/1H9qTq9
We should also add “things must be contained within your box and not likely to fall/stab people in the face” (maybe not in quite those terms) to the first set of bullet points under members storage.
Now that I’m back somewhere with a lists login – I approve @NotQuiteHere’s updated text too. It’s an excellent policy, thanks @thinkl33t and @NotQuiteHere for your work. Regarding the “not stab people in the face” bit, simply change “…items in a clearly…” to “…items fully inside a clearly…” and I think that covers it well enough.
With or without an ammendment for no-face-stabbings-plox I approve and this we should implement forthwith.
The only issue I have is that 600x400mm material doesn’t fit inside the Really Useful Box - it would have to sit on top (as my material, and oddly enough, my lab coat for accessibility) does. Considering we have a fair few members who use 600x400mm material on the laser, we might need to allow people to tag it with a label and masking tape, or a similar solution.
There’s been some discussion over the use of the wood lathe recently
part of that is a proposal that we add a lock to the main door for woody dusty and have people enter in through the 2nd door when the lathe is in use
For that to work, may require a couple of things
a big sign on the 2nd door saying that the door must be kept clear
possibly a rule that if the door is blocked with crap, then said crap will be located outside in the corridor
A point was raised at the latest Member Meeting to discuss how we go actually implementing these rules.
We’re planning a “mark the space day” where we mark things in violation with some sort of notice, tidy up what we can, move things around to make some more space and bin any rubbish.
Obviously this won’t happen if noone shows up, so I’ve created a doodle of people who fancy a few hours sorting stuff out: https://doodle.com/poll/zn7i98wm3qnc9q8a - please attend if you can.
The gist I got from the discussion is the following:
A month or so later, anything that still violates these rules will be dealt with either by being moved to a corner of shame or stuffed somewhere else so the main part of members storage is actually safe and mostly compliant.
We also discussed introducing a more formal “permit to store” system, which is like a DNH but requires filling in a form that has to be approved by people rather than self-certifying that your massive item is okay to exist in the corridor for ages.
I have a lathe sitting in the corridor, I’d be more than happy to fill in a form for it
I’ve just been slowly de-rusting little bits at a time.
Although I got a bit waylaid with other things recently.
There’s quite a lot of large bits of wood in members storage that needs a sticker slapping on it though
stuff near where the ladders. and some large wood sheets which I think is taking the mick a bit.
I suspect most of Ben’s stuff is in a box, if it’s in a box then I don’t really have a problem about it
since it’s easy to move around
I think the large sheet or wood material that’s taking up all the space / anything not in a box with loose bits that ether trips people up or blocks access I think should be the first focus.
Large projects are not meant to be self certified. In the rules it states that consensus must be obtained via the forum for storing huge things in the space.
However, I would agree that that doesn’t appear to be working so maybe a more formal system whereby large storage requests have to be accepted at a Members Meeting rather than via a list post might work better.
Equally Bens stuff has been subject to numerous requests over the last two years to be cleared. That said for personal reasons (his) I don’t feel that now is necessarily the moment to force the issue.
