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My Collection/Work Space


deutscheben

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With more time around the house than usual these days, I decided to finally take some pictures of my fossil storage solution and workspace. My space is towards the back of our attached garage, which manages to stay fairly temperate year round, only dropping into the mid-40 degrees Fahrenheit through most of the winter, and I have a space heater too if needed. 

 

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An old Ikea table serves as my general work table for fossil prepping and other projects.

 

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My other prep tool is a chest freezer, purchased last summer for the primary purpose of freeze-thawing Mazon Creek concretions year round. If needed we could keep some food in there too, but so far it has just been my "rocks" as my wife calls them. :P I am currently working my way through my bucket of Chowder Flats concretions from 2018. 

 

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My primary storage solution was also acquired last summer- this vintage steel card cabinet was purchased from an Illinois state government surplus auction. It needed a little clean up, but it is very solid and the drawers are designed to hold a great amount of weight. And I love the way it looks! The library I work at is full of this style of mid-century steel furniture and office equipment, and I have developed a great fondness for it. 

 

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The top drawer contains Mazon Creek concretions from Pit 11, the Mazon River, and Chowder Flats, along with concretions from the Chieftain no.20 mine site in Vigo County, Indiana. 

 

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The next drawer is mostly full of Pennsylvanian compression flora and a few concretions from Vermilion County, Illinois- I am working on reorganizing it right now. 

 

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The third drawer is my finds from the Oglesby, IL roadcut that has been well-documented on this site- Pennsylvanian marine fossils, especially brachiopods and fish/shark material. 

 

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Next is a mostly empty drawer- so far it just has more Mazon Creek finds collected with ESCONI from the Braceville spoil pile. 

 

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Finally, the bottom drawer has a mixture- SilurIan fossils from Kankakee County, IL, Pennsylvanian black shale fossils from La Salle County, a few Ordovician and Pennsylvanian fossils from Indiana, and a large Favosites coral I found on a family trip somewhere when I was a kid. 

 

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I have a few smaller containers with other fossils- one box with all of the other fossils from various sites I collected up through college, and a plastic tote with small shell fossils from a new Pennsylvanian marine site I found last year, but every thing else is in the cabinet. I also have some paleo-themed decorations up too, including my favorite childhood toy, the Playskool Definitely Dinosaurs Ultrasaurus. 

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Very nice, I love getting a look in people's fossil drawers. I got partway through photoing all mine, but stopped. I need to get back at it.

I would not pass up any of those kinds of metal cabinets if I ever had a chance at any. Most of my units are wood, mostly home-built, but I do have one metal printer's cabinet that we fixed up (some drawers were missing).

What is the poster on the wall... something to do with Illinois fossils?

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Very nice setup, and fossils, and cabinet! :) 

 

The good thing about science is that it's true whether or not you believe in it.  -Neil deGrasse Tyson

 

Everyone you will ever meet knows something you don't. -Bill Nye (The Science Guy)

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31 minutes ago, deutscheben said:

The poster is indeed about Illinois fossils.

I love it! :wub: 

 

Hmmm...Wonder if there is one for Kentucky? :zzzzscratchchin:


Off I go to find out! 
 

The good thing about science is that it's true whether or not you believe in it.  -Neil deGrasse Tyson

 

Everyone you will ever meet knows something you don't. -Bill Nye (The Science Guy)

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That's a fine setup and a very well organized work area, I'm jealous!  I especially like the shallow depth, metal drawer cabinet.  Can't seem to find them any more.  Oh, a very nice collection as well.  

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I love seeing how other people organize their specimens and work area. I'm so jealous of your chest freezer, @deutscheben, but not for long - we have a freezer for our basement being delivered Tuesday. Here are a few pics of my big purchase last summer. I stopped by a local office furniture resale store to see if they had any blueprint flat files, and I got lucky because they had 2 (they stack). These are perfect for my Mazon Creek fossils as each of my 10 drawers is just a tad shy of 3 inches deep. The whole unit measures about 54 inches by 41 inches. I can fit a lot on these shelves. I'm thinking I may still at some point buy another set to put on the top of these.

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I absolutely LOVE those types of file cabinets, that's a great idea.  You can bet I'll be checking our local office supply store for some (or at least one) of them.  They look perfect for flat, low weight fossils.  Thanks for sharing your innovative idea.

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@Ruger9a I wish I could claim it as my own idea, but I stole it from someone else on The Fossil Forum a while ago. I wish I remembered who should get the credit!

 

One piece of advice - I think you probably need a truck to get these home. I don't have a truck so I had to pay for delivery. I just had them deliver it into our attached garage, then I brought all the shelves into the basement separately before my wife helped me carry the frame down. Without the shelves it was pretty manageable for us.

 

I say this also because originally I was going to buy some of these on Craigslist but I never would have been able to pick them up! As it goes, I got a much cheaper price than what I was seeing on Craigslist, but the delivery fee meant my total cost was about the same as I was seeing on Craigslist (roughly $200 for a 5-shelf unit).

 

Good luck! Chris

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It's still a good idea, no matter who had it first.  Look at how many fossils you can fit into each drawer.  It seems like it's still a good deal to me.

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6 hours ago, bigred97 said:

I say this also because originally I was going to buy some of these on Craigslist but I never would have been able to pick them up! As it goes, I got a much cheaper price than what I was seeing on Craigslist, but the delivery fee meant my total cost was about the same as I was seeing on Craigslist (roughly $200 for a 5-shelf unit).

 

Seems like a good deal. Was that a 'new' (retail) price? They're usually more expensive around here. There is a 10-drawer unit, like your two combined into one, for sale right now on craigslist over on the Mainland for $650Cdn. A little steep for me...

The proper search term has always eluded me... flat file cabinet? map cabinet? blueprint..? Maybe they go by several names, but if the company that makes them has a specific name it might help a person to know it.

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I always searched for "blueprint flat file" on craigslist. I just looked and near me in Milwaukee there aren't any, but there is one listed in Chicago, 10 drawers for USD $550. So $275 for 5 drawers. That is a touch higher than I remembered seeing, but I remember thinking $200 for 5 shelves was a good price. I then just searched on "blueprint" and found a wood file cabinet that is very similar for $175. I think you should just try a bunch of different search terms periodically and maybe something will eventually pop up.

 

I bought mine from a reconditioned office furniture store. When I went in the salesperson showed them to me and I asked what the price would be. He was new and had never sold something like that before so he went to his desk and looked them up. He came back and said they would be $75 each. I almost jumped for joy but I played it cool and told him he had a deal. When I realized I would need to pay for delivery, my price went up $150, but still $300 for 10 drawers was a steal in my book. 

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9 hours ago, bigred97 said:

I love seeing how other people organize their specimens and work area. I'm so jealous of your chest freezer, @deutscheben, but not for long - we have a freezer for our basement being delivered Tuesday. Here are a few pics of my big purchase last summer. I stopped by a local office furniture resale store to see if they had any blueprint flat files, and I got lucky because they had 2 (they stack). These are perfect for my Mazon Creek fossils as each of my 10 drawers is just a tad shy of 3 inches deep. The whole unit measures about 54 inches by 41 inches. I can fit a lot on these shelves. I'm thinking I may still at some point buy another set to put on the top of these.

IMG_5351.thumb.jpg.9b719adf76b5b7637d05679021fae16d.jpg

IMG_5352.thumb.jpg.8296522a3054d05ee0ab1ee1932eb897.jpg

Nice! Those look perfect for Mazon Creek fossils, and seem to have plenty of space for a growing collection. We have a small house and garage so I am very limited in the square footage I can use- my cabinet is about 20×30 inches and I don't think I could fit anything bigger (although maybe taller... I have seen a 7 drawer model of my cabinet...) 

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1 hour ago, bigred97 said:

I always searched for "blueprint flat file" on craigslist. I just looked and near me in Milwaukee there aren't any, but there is one listed in Chicago, 10 drawers for USD $550. So $275 for 5 drawers. That is a touch higher than I remembered seeing, but I remember thinking $200 for 5 shelves was a good price. I then just searched on "blueprint" and found a wood file cabinet that is very similar for $175. I think you should just try a bunch of different search terms periodically and maybe something will eventually pop up.

 

I bought mine from a reconditioned office furniture store. When I went in the salesperson showed them to me and I asked what the price would be. He was new and had never sold something like that before so he went to his desk and looked them up. He came back and said they would be $75 each. I almost jumped for joy but I played it cool and told him he had a deal. When I realized I would need to pay for delivery, my price went up $150, but still $300 for 10 drawers was a steal in my book. 

Yes, that seems like a decent deal. The wood ones are good too, assuming they're well-built, not the really broad, flimsy ones that could only ever hold paper. But in general, if I had not built any, and just waited until they appeared for sale somewhere (craigslist or local used furniture stores), I would still be waiting, and having nowhere near what I needed.

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