Try to remove all places that may hide things. Paint floor with a pale colour – pale grey floor paint is good ! Be it wood or concrete. Noel.

Kevan – what you need is a pair of nylon tights!

Cut the foot off one leg and pull it over the vacuum hose end and hold it in place with a rubber band (if you are on the other side of the pond that is most definitely an elastic band!). Push the toe of the tight into the vac tube turn on and hoover away. All tiny little hidden bits will collect inside and can be rescued by switching off and emptying the temporary 'bag'. Done this many times particularly with tiny photo etched parts that have disappeared off the end of a pair of tweezers but it works very well with 12BA nuts too. Success rate is about 80-90 % on average I'd say.

Highly recommended from my perspective

Regards – Tug

My workshop is on a concrete base but the floor is wooden boards with insulation underneath. I covered the whole floor with plywood then gave it a few coats of floor paint. It’s the most comfortable flooring I’ve ever had in a workshop. It’s also very easy to sweep clean, hasn’t damaged any parts I’ve dropped to date and is generally easy to find stuff unless it rolls under something! I chose a pale green paint from B&Q I think.