About three months ago, I found a dumpster full of slatwall behind the Boy Scout store in Loveland. There was a fairly big sheet on top that had been glued and screwed into ply sheathing. It had aluminum reinforcement channels and looked pretty nice, so I hopped up and pulled it out of the dump. It was very heavy with the ply still attached, and unweildy and awkward for me to get in the back of the truck. My six year old was not amused by my dumpster diving antics, so I only grabbed the one sheet.

I removed all the screws, pried off the old ply, and used a router to flush-trim away all the adhesive. I used a circular saw to cut out as large a usable chunk as I could. By this time, I had about three hours work and a sore back into it, and I really thought it wasn't worth the effort. It sat for a month while I figured out what to do with it.

This last weekend, I mounted it to the wall and made up some brackets and shelves out of scrap wood and 5/16" bolts.






I also cleaned all the mag chloride, dirt, grease, oil, and power steering fluid my wife deposited on the garage floor over the last month.


After I had the slatwall up and had secured all the odds and ends to it that had been floating around my shop, I thought "This stuff is awesome". I went online to look up pricing for more of it, and found that for the 4x8 panel, aluminum track reinforcement, and freight, it amounted to nearly $400 a panel. So if I do end up with any more, it will be from more dumpster diving. But next time, I will ignore the whining and the pain and load the truck up.