Build your rack taller so that it's easy to grab the cold end; but you can still see the shape of the bits. Store other things lower, like swages or other hardy tooling.

After burning myself several times (I'm a slow learner) I trained myself to automaticaly quench the tong jaws before putting them down regardless of whether they got hot or not. To me that seems easier than finding another way to store them. Storing tongs hanging on a rack about waist high is simple and natural. It's probably not a good idea to quench spring fuller jaws this way if they get really hot unless they are made of MS.

NOT my shop. No shop, not even a carport. Pics I downloaded from the web for reference/inspiration when I do have a shop. Everything I own would fit on half of one of those racks with daylight showing.

That's good John. You know what they say about organization; "....sign of a sick mind!" Now, I recently got my shop organized after many years of disarray. I may have a sick mind but its nice being able to find a tool without having to go out and buy a new one to replace it first. My tool inventory doesn't increase as fast anymore, but its much more efficient. Trouble is, I'm expected to get more work out the door now. See; almost a plague, really!! :lol:

Hey Scott. My wife told me, not long ago, "I could have sworn that this place had a floor in it when you moved into it!" So I showed her!! I swept about a 3" circle and said that it's still there. LOL. She just rolled her eyes and went back in the house. :D

I put this up last month. It's close to the hammers and the forge , at a good height to be out of the way but in easy reach and I am going to add another row soon. thought I'd share.

That's a really good idea, John. I like it. :D

My problem with most of these ideas is the problem with grabbing the hot end as the handle dangles down.

Never put a hot tool back in the rack! This was one of the very first safety protocols I was taught.

What about a clothesrack design?

I watched a girl in the department store move a rack of clothes through a maze of displays and thought that such a thing might be handy for the shop because wall space is always at a premium.

Take a standard clothes rack and fill the middle with some expanded metal that you could hang your dies from. Or, do your two-bar system between the uprights. Basically, you've created a mobile section of wall.

The dimensions would depend on your shop, but you wouldn't want to go too high or you'll risk getting top-heavy.

Did that make sense?