anniesboy wrote: ....All very anal I know but having order does save time....
some people remember where they put a given tool down when they are working and others don't; fundamentally I think this makes the difference between those who can work well in 'untidy' conditions and those who cannot. If more than one person uses a workshop/set of tools they must be stored in an orderly fashion, else one or more of the users will lose their sanity in short order.
Tool boards are all very well but unless you have a big shop and/or few tools you quickly run out of space for them. I have made more space on tool boards by fitting longer pegs so that (say) several spanners go on one peg. Trouble with this is that you do end up moving the front tools around to get at the back ones. I plan to make 'door' panels that are mounted on hinges onto battens on the wall; these will have tools on both sides (on hooks so that they won't fall off). This can double the amount of space for tools on the wall, and may (if the panels are 'closed' when not in use) help to prevent rusting (through condensation) in unheated workshops.
You can buy colour-coded wrench sets BTW.
I have multiple socket sets; between full hex, bi-hex, 1/4", 3/8", 1/2", 3/4" drives, shallow, medium, deep, impact, metric, AF, whit, BA sizes, it is a lot to keep track of, probably upwards of 500 sockets in total, plus inevitable duplicates. ( I still find I don't have the right ones for some jobs, too...). The smaller sockets are stored on rails, and the rails are hung up on a board. Sockets are small and easily mislaid; I can see immediately if there is one missing from a rail.
Dirty tools are a problem; use the same (rusty) socket on (say) an engine part that you last used on a chassis part and you have just introduced a load of dirt/rust inside a delicate assembly; good job...
! To help with identification and cleanliness, I have (taking my cue from my old 'Williams Superslim' sets) gone through many of my sockets, cleaned and lightly painted the inside of each one. Red for Whit/BSF, Blue for AF, and White (or just unpainted chrome) for metric. That way there is much less chance of using a rusty or dirty socket on a delicate part, and the worst that will happen is that a little paint will come off (which is usually obvious, and anyway not as harmful as dirt or rust). Surprisingly much of the paint survives in use, so they don't need redoing that often; besides this the sets always have little-used ones in them, so the type of set is readily identified even when the paint is worn in the most-used sockets.
It is worth being careful about what you do and where you do it, too; some processes are incredibly dirty or messy. Obvious ones are (in metals) sand blasting, grinding, polishing, welding, spraying and (in wood) planing, sawing, sanding, turning. Any of these processes can make a workshop a complete mess in just a few minutes, and cover everything in a layer of crud.
My advice is (if occasional) to do these jobs in a separate area, even outdoors (e.g. under an awning) if you don't have the shop space, else you will be cleaning the mess up (or living with the consequences) for months. The better ventilation outdoors can only be a good thing, too, in many cases.
cheers
not wrong 
