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Nothing Floats Away: Spacewalk Habits for Shared Workshops
Astronauts tether every tool and follow a checklist for every step, and a few of their habits translate neatly to a shared workshop.
After a long call with Sarah Rahimi about how her makerspaces keep track of shared tools, I fell down a rabbit hole reading about spacewalks. The attached photo is a public image of two astronauts working outside the space station. Look closely and every tool is tied to something.
The problems turn out to be surprisingly similar. In orbit, a dropped tool floats away forever. In a shared workshop, a borrowed tool floats away to someone's garage. Here's what I think tool libraries can borrow from spacewalks.
Every tool has a home
Astronauts check every tool against a list before and after a spacewalk. The workshop version is a shadow board: an outline of each tool painted on the wall. A missing tool is obvious at a glance, no spreadsheet needed.
Tether the risky stuff
Not literally, though some makerspaces do chain their best scissors to the bench. The point is to decide which tools need extra care. Expensive, dangerous or easily lost items get a sign-out sheet and an induction. Everything else stays easy to grab.
Checklists before and after
Spacewalks follow a written checklist for every step. A one-page "before you leave" list by the door (unplug, sweep, return tools to the board, note anything broken) does a lot of quiet work in a busy space.
The buddy system
Nobody goes out alone. The workshop equivalent: no solo use of the big machines, and new members get paired with a regular for their first few sessions.
Sarah tells me most of this is already standard practice in the Makers Network, so I'm mostly writing it down for the rest of us. Corrections and photos of your shadow boards are very welcome.
Comments (6)
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Step one: lay all the tools out on the board first and move them around until the most-used ones are at eye height. Only then draw round them.
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Step two: use a bright colour for the outlines. Red or yellow on a dark board shows up from across the room.
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Step three: label each outline with the tool's name. New volunteers don't always know what a countersink bit looks like. I certainly didn't.
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Update a week later: two makerspaces in the group have posted photos of their new shadow boards. One added a small hook under each outline for a "who has it" tag, which is clever.
Things people said they'd do differently next time:
- leave space for tools you'll buy later
- paint the board before drawing the outlines
- photograph the full board so you can redo it after a move
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And one more from the thread: put the tool library rules next to the board, not in a folder. Rules nobody can see aren't really rules.
