Thread: WIP - Groggy's Workbench

Originally Posted by rsser

Groggy, you are remarkably courageous and good-humoured in sharing this long WIP with the forum. Admirable.

FWIW, your best bet with soft tissue injuries is a physio IME, and there are clinics that specialise in arms and hands.

The bench is my spare time activity. As you can see, I don't get much spare time.

Since starting the bench I have rebuilt a network, rewired the house, made a few things, done some renovating, ran two projects and travelled a fair bit. I am happy with the progress of the bench and that is all that concerns me really. I know you guys will continue to drop in occasionally and that is good too, I get some good ideas from the discussions here.

Tomorrow I am off to the airport to see the son off to the USA for a month or so, then (maybe) I can dust off the bench.

Got back to the bench today after an extended absence. First thing I did was clean it up and take stock of where I am up to. While cleaning the top off I noticed that cracks were beginning to appear in the timber. Since the other day was 41 deg and the shed was closed I suspect most of the movement occurred then.

First job was to give the underside of the benchtop a wipe down with some BLO to re-introduce some moisture to the top. Nice to see the grain pop but there is little I can do today until the top sucks the BLO in. Tomorrow the final endcap will be fitted then the dovetails can be cut.

Funny, I was just wondering about this while looking at a crack in one of my laminated legs. Wasn't there three days ago, but this morning... \/ !

I need to trim the end again where the end cap is going due to the end not being exactly square (out by about 1-1.5mm over 600mm). However, looking at it today I noticed the top has swollen marginally which means I will introduce a slight bow in the breadboard end if I rout it. So, spent the afternoon making a little jig and tomorrow will do the routing.

This vacation time is getting sucked up into all sorts of jobs and errands that were never planned, now I only have a few days left before work starts again.

bugga, bugga, bugga, bugga, bugga...

I bought two of these Bessey clamps as I thought they may be useful, unfortunately they move

Pic #1 - How the original jig was clamped.

Pic #2 - movement of the jig

Pic #3&4 - setting back up again for a square cut

Pics 5,6 & 7 - second attempt.

Now the top has to be flipped and another pass made from the other side. My son is in San Francisco at present so this is going to be fun. The dimple created by the slip I guess I'll have to remove after the end cap is ready.

I got 4 of those clamps on special 'cos I thought they would be good for one handed work.
They are not marvelous, 2 of them keep going into neutral on the open/close knob while you are trying to use them one handed, the soft jaw covers fall off just when you are at the top of a ladder, when/if you get them done tight enough so that they don't slip they require 2 hands or a hammer to make them let go.

I only use them to hold stuff while I get a screw in place now & I still check twice before I put the screw in.

I think I agree with you Cliff. I won't be using these for this type of work again. Partly my fault I guess for not getting decent clamps when a critical task is underway. I have some cheap adhesive backed sandpaper and I intend to attach that to the back of the jig. Hindsight is a wonderful thing isn't it?

Originally Posted by Groggy

...Hindsight is a wonderful thing isn't it?

Often more accurate that foresight.

'We learn more from our mistakes than from our successes' - quote from some sententious b*gger.

I can drop over and help you with a lift Groggy.

Thank you very much for the offer Ern, I have managed it with the assistance of the boss. She is now inside and can't be found I've done some more routing so the top and bottom edges are parallel and am now just using chisels to pare the sections together. It seems to have jumped 10 degrees and 20% humidity in the last two hours.

Yeah, the humidity here is something shocking.

I can hear the rust blooming on all my cast iron.

Yer? - you think youse blokes has got humidity?

We'll send you some from Brissy, if you like - how about a couple of harbours'-worth!?

(or shoud I say for all of us.....)

Ah well, we were all sent home, & now my workplace is isolated, nothing for it but to head for the shed.....

Cheers,

Good luck Ian.

Heard on the news this arvo that Maroochydore got 120mm in 3 hours today.

The mind boggles.

Originally Posted by rsser

Good luck Ian.

Heard on the news this arvo that Maroochydore got 120mm in 3 hours today.

The mind boggles.

And the toes squelch!

I went through the '74 flood, and that was supposed to be a once/100 years thing - didn't think I'd gotten so old, so quickly.

We are high & wet, luckily - I feel for the poor sods facing certain inundation - it's not a nice feeling watching that water creep closer & closer to the house. Think we should chip in & send a few cartons of Lanotec to the woodies in the low spots!

With 3 months of the wet to run, still, I better stock up myself..
Cheers,