Thread: New, Small Workbench

It's not the legs that are undersize. It's the stretcher. The wobbly blade perfectly un-squared the end so to clean it up it had to be shorter. I need a couple of pieces for endcaps as well and I have to go to Newcastle this week so I will drop in on Paul and pick up a few extra pieces.
I will need to machine them though

I decided to use some cross nuts/bench nuts/barrel nuts for the long stretchers. I drilled a test piece which wasn't 100% then I remembered the Stanley 59 doweling jig.
What a great bit of gear.
20180422_094721.jpg20180422_094733.jpg

I also needed some dowel to locate and prevent the stretchers from rotating.
The Veritas dowel cutters are excellent. It took me about 2 mins to make enough dowel for the four ends of the stretchers.
20180422_102732.jpg

Frame is assembled and the top is on. Just sitting there atm. Have cut the slots for some wedges in the top of the legs but didn't get time to make the wedges.

Have you moved again?

Always fun making a workbench. Yours looks very handy.
Good work with the hand tools but I have a spare router if you want to borrow it.
While you are in Newcastle I probably have a spare piece of hardwood if you need some to finish the bench.
Cheers

Thanks Scally but yes, I have moved again. In Katoomba now. I have a stash of timber at Woodnut's house in Clarence Town. I picked up enough to finish the bench last week.
I have a big router but it is in storage. Looking at options to trim the edges square to fit the end caps. Will probably run a router with a spiral bit against a straight edge from either side and make a basic breadboard end. End caps will then be bolted to some more cross/bench bolts.

Tony, build a box that sits inside the frame, on the floor as well and screwed to the rails/stretchers, fill it with sand and put a ply top on it, no overhang stability problems then but if it needs moving it could be an issue. Probably build the box with allowance to put a pallet truck into it if needed I suppose.

You are in a nice part of the world if you like cool winters.

I think I did a similar thing with my bench. Either did the breadboard ends with a track saw or router. Then screwed large coach screw into oversized holes in the end cap.

One of my earlier benches was a similar size but a bit longer. Good to use a compact bench until I tried to put chairs or tables on top of it. The slightest bump and they would fall over the edge. 800mm wide solved most of those problems but it is bigger to walk around.
Have fun getting set up again.

Well... it's pretty much done. Need to put a few coats of BLO on but I didn't have any when I finished it this afternoon.

I spent a bit of time trying to work out how to true up the ends so I could fit the end caps. After devising and rejecting many complicated plans involving jigs and straight edges I just got stuck in with a sharp no. 5 and no.4. Both with HSS blades from a long ago WWF group buy. Was pretty easy in the end. The planes made short work of it.
20180428_173322.jpg20180428_173330.jpg
Three of the bolts go into bench nuts, the other one (next to the vice) is a coach screw. No access for a bench nut.

I then cut the vice face to size and got to work cutting the rebate for the jaw. The Stanley 71 excelled, again, at cleaning this out.
20180428_173313.jpg

I needed to fit the angled stretcher to the vice end. No trouble cutting the angles for a neat fit but was scratching my head a bit on how to drill some holes to fix it in place.
The Stanley No. 59 doweling jig to the rescue. Quickly becoming one of my favourite tools.
20180429_160923.jpg20180429_160932.jpg

I ran the smoother over the top, set very fine, and drilled some holes in the legs for dog hole accessory storage.

20180429_164252.jpg20180429_164352.jpg20180429_164417.jpg

Broke all the edges with a bit of sandpaper, fitted the angled stretcher, which it didn't really need but I had already cut it to fit, and I think that will do.
20180429_164305.jpg20180429_164450.jpg

The new/old vice is fantastic. Thanks A. I also have a retractable planing stop around the same vintage as the vice. I'll fit that next.
20180429_164711.jpg

Cracker!

I've got a fair bit of BLO (~½ litre) unless you want a litre on hand (they have it at HH).

I'm sure I've got some here somewhere. I'm in the Riff tomorrow so I will pick some up if I can't find it. I'll grab a liter as I will redo the finish from time to time.

A quick coat of BLO yesterday. I like the colour.


From this
20180429_164450.jpg

To this.
20180501_215938.jpg

Hi Tony, Finally got around to looking at this post. Nicely done, mate (must be the way the timber was stored - lol) - Congratulations.
Cheers, Paul

I picked up a small engineers vice and a HNT tail vice at the show yesterday so today was vice installation day.
Vice 1.jpgVice 2.jpg
The vice is mounted on a bit of hardwood with a dowel that drops into a doghole. A holdfast secures the back. Only takes a second to grab the vice and secure it in place.

Installing the tail vice is a bit more involved.
Tail 1.jpgTail 2.jpg

After a bit of stuffing around the recess was routed and I used a rebate bit in the router (still mounted in the router lift) to cut the rebate for the cover.
The tail vice sticks out from the edge of the bench but I can't walk around the bench anyway and its pretty small so I wanted to keep as much usable bench space as possible.

Resaw.jpg

Resawing by hand was fun........no it wasn't. I had to have a rest half way.

Tail 3.jpg

The tail vice works great. I needed to thin down the cover to set it flush with the bench top.

Tail 4.jpg

Nearly done. Just needs a sand and some BLO.

Originally Posted by NCArcher

I picked up a small engineers vice and a HNT tail vice at the show yesterday so today was vice installation day.
Vice 1.jpgVice 2.jpg
The vice is mounted on a bit of hardwood with a dowel that drops into a doghole. A holdfast secures the back. Only takes a second to grab the vice and secure it in place.

Installing the tail vice is a bit more involved.
Tail 1.jpgTail 2.jpg

After a bit of stuffing around the recess was routed and I used a rebate bit in the router (still mounted in the router lift) to cut the rebate for the cover.
The tail vice sticks out from the edge of the bench but I can't walk around the bench anyway and its pretty small so I wanted to keep as much usable bench space as possible.

Resaw.jpg

Resawing by hand was fun........no it wasn't. I had to have a rest half way.

Tail 3.jpg

The tail vice works great. I needed to thin down the cover to set it flush with the bench top.

Tail 4.jpg

Nearly done. Just needs a sand and some BLO.

Some of the good vices in life...well done with the pick up

All done.
Tail 5.jpg