My first real Bench

**BobL** · 20th February 2006, 12:34 AM

Greetings all, Yep another lurker comes out of the woodwork.

My workbench for the last 20 years has been a $29 cardboard core door on a couple of homemade saw horses. Recently I noticed a lot of my woodwork coming out a bit wonky and on closer inspection of the door I noticed it was falling apart internally and so thought it was time to build a better bench. Not wishing to spend too much I’ve tried to make use of many smallish bits of timber I already had around the house which included,
- pieces of rough sawn and painted 40 by 200 mm jarrah,
- some rather bent, dressed to size 50 x 100 pieces of Jarrah,
- left over pieces of 135 mm wide jarrah floor boards
- some 95 x 95 treated pine poles that looked like candidate legs.
Unfortunately I did not have enough planking to make a solid top but I figured I had enough to make a largely hardwood frame (at least the top anyway) that would incorporate supports for several lines of dog holes and then use a thinner top.

Photos one and two shows the basic bench frame. The photos are sort of self explanatory.
There are several possible lines of dog holes,
- all the way along the front edge.
- One line perpendicular to the centre of the side-vice (see photo 3)
- Several lines perpendicular to the front vice.

The only timber I had to buy was the longer bits of 90 x 45 and 70 x 45 pine, and the 19mm plywood for the top. The vice jaws and front and RHS side apron covers are made from bits of jarrah floor boards.

The PVC vice handles are temporary while I get a couple of handles machined up at work. Actually the PVC works pretty well especially the handle on the big front vice which has a second PVC “C” shaped sleeve over the top of the standard PVC.

Photo 4 shows the bench with added top and oiled up, probably it wont look this good ever again. Doh!!! the router slipped at the corner – never mind, 6 months in the thing is going to be covered in dings and paint anyway!

Actually it was fun to frame it up in a basic fashion so that it would support the front vice. From there I made great use of that vice to build the rest .

I have several mods in mind, cupboards underneath etc, but these might have to wait a while as I do have a busy day job.
Cheers
BobL

**NewLou** · 20th February 2006, 12:44 AM

Gidday Bob

Great job on the new Bench .......Well Done!!!!

Looks like she's solid n built to last

REgards Lou

**BobL** · 20th February 2006, 12:45 AM

A couple of other things that this bench has are
- adjustable height legs/feet (see Photo1). Each leg has a 19 mm nut set into the base and a 19mm bolt acts as a foot and another locking nut holds it at a predetermined height. I really needed this feature as my shed floor is quite uneven. So far it seems to sit quite squarely in place but imagine on a polished concrete floor it might skid around and some extra grip would be needed.
- A classical high-school woodwork bench stop up against the LHS front leg. I only added this out of nostalgia as I already have an bench wide end stop board made up ready for the LHS.

Photo 2 shows a close up of the side vice. The triple layer jarrah floor board jaws will enable me to put a 19mm stop in the middle layer.

I have made a couple of small repairs to some garden furniture this afternoon and am enjoying used these vices soooooo much.

Cheers

**Lignum** · 20th February 2006, 12:48 AM

Welcom to the forum Bob

Now that is a great work bench. Built to use and last a life time. Well done. Now you will have to show us some pics of the furniture you make on it

**BobL** · 20th February 2006, 01:14 AM

Originally Posted by Lignum

Welcom to the forum Bob

Now that is a great work bench. Built to use and last a life time. Well done. Now you will have to show us some pics of the furniture you make on it

Thanks Lignum. I've been following your most informative posts as well.

I'll be most glad to share pics of what I do.

Here's a couple of things I made with my old bench ( $29 door and the crappy home made saw horses).

Photo 1 is a 360 degree shot of my loft project I did last year. It started out as filthy under roof cavity. It's all done bar the double triangular window.

Photo 2 is frame I made out of skirting and moulding. I also took the photo and processed it. My real hobby is actually photography, or maybe its beer drinking.

Maybe I didn't need that bench after all??? Actually what I really need is a new table saw. My current one is really a 8", 30 year old toy. The slide angle is fixed at around 85o, the fence is broken in half, the blade height is either up - or down and the saw blade angle is never quite a right angle. You would think after building my wife a loft and creating all that space for her to store her "stuff" I would be allowed to get a new one. But she says - look at all the good stuff you build with the old one!!!!

Cheers
Bob L

**timberpassion** · 20th February 2006, 08:10 AM

Thats a brilliant bench mate! Love the framed top rather than the traditional solid one, would be alot cheaper if you had to buy the stock yourself but still very solid. Also what brand are the vices youve used?

Love how you had all that Jarrah just lying around hahaha!!

Great job mate!

**Andy Mac** · 20th February 2006, 08:57 AM

Welcome Bob,
Nice solid bench!

Cheers,

**zenwood** · 20th February 2006, 09:28 AM

Holey moley, that's a terrific bench. If photography is your real hobby, you must take pretty good pictures.

You've got to stop making stuff for the house though. Tell SWMBO you *need* a tablesaw before you can possibly make that next coffee table.

**RufflyRustic** · 20th February 2006, 09:34 AM

Hiya Bobl, Welcome to the forum!

Love the bench!

Looking forward to seeing what else you do.

Cheers
RufflyRustic

**BobL** · 20th February 2006, 09:58 AM

Originally Posted by timberpassion

Thats a brilliant bench mate! Love the framed top rather than the traditional solid one, would be alot cheaper if you had to buy the stock yourself but still very solid. Also what brand are the vices youve used?

Love how you had all that Jarrah just lying around hahaha!!

Great job mate!

Thanks for the complements.
The vice brand is torquata, big one on the side, smaller one on the end.

The jarrah floorboards "just laying around" was a cummulative result of the reflooring of the front veranda project and a largish home extension we did about 10 years ago. I collected every board offcut longer than about 6 inches and have made heaps of things from them.

**Jill** · 20th February 2006, 10:06 AM

Great bench, Bob! Loft conversion looks neat, too! Hope you get that new saw one day soon - you sure deserve it!

Cheers,

Jill

**BobL** · 20th February 2006, 10:08 AM

Originally Posted by zenwood

Holey moley, that's a terrific bench. If photography is your real hobby, you must take pretty good pictures.

Photo 1: Here's one of my favourite photos - Circus Beach, South coast WA. 180 degree panorama, 13 portrait photos stitched together. The original photo is 102 cm long and 20 cm wide.

Photo 2: I made the frame from pieces of River Gum I grew in my back yard (inner city suburb of Perth) and had milled on the spot. Oil finished. Sorry this is not such a good photo of the frame.

Cheers

**timberpassion** · 20th February 2006, 10:11 AM

Originally Posted by BobL

The jarrah floorboards "just laying around" was a cummulative result of the reflooring of the front veranda project and a largish home extension we did about 10 years ago. I collected every board offcut longer than about 6 inches and have made heaps of things from them.

lucky bástard

**BobL** · 20th February 2006, 10:37 AM

Originally Posted by timberpassion

lucky bástard

"timberpassion" - I really like that name.

How's this for sort of luck. The tread timber (30 mm thick) for the all Jarrah staircases for our extension produced about a dozen, 300 - 400 mm long offcuts. Over the years I have slowly turned them all into cutting boards and given most of them away as gifts. I only recently discovered hard burnishing oil and I polished one up the other day - magic!

**timberpassion** · 20th February 2006, 10:59 AM

cheers bob! my fiancé thinks its sounds gay but i dont trust her oppinion, only got her around to wash my work cloths for me haha!

That frame and photo is stunning mate, youve inspired me to do something similar yet alittle different as to not totally steal your idea

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