Thread: Sawhorse plans?

I had a set that I found on the web. I think the site was called American woodworker. if I can find them I will scan and send them on to you Waldo.

G'day Bluegum,

That would be excellent.

I've been looking at sawhorse plans. All have their advantages but these are dead simple and get you up and running quick:

How To Build The Best Saw Horses | Jays Custom Creations

I would make a change though. Instead of making both top and bottom of the I beam longer I'd shorten the bottom. You can still clamp on the ends but it means you can nail or screw a ply brace across the end to stiffen the legs.

So 12 pieces at 30" and 2 pieces at 32" and add 4 bits of ply 6" x 8" cut to a trapezoid to brace the ends.

I absolutely love how the I beams sets the angle for the legs so there are no compound cuts.

chambezio very kindly made me a pair a few years ago, and I subsequently took one apart and copied it. The compound angle was 10/10 which was easy enough to cut, and not too tricky to rebate in the top. O'course, a Compound mitre saw makes that somewhat easier.

I would definitely hang the top past the legs by 100mm, and bring the bottom in flush with the legs, to add bracing like you suggested.

By not having the second 10° angle on the legs it will make them less stable (particularly with an overhung top) but maybe you can live with that.

Question (without having watched the vid): are the tops of the legs cut square or with one 10° angle? If they are square (which is my suspicion) then you could cut the "second" 10° that would allow the legs to kick out to support the overhang. I'm assuming your saw can cut one angle only.



Whatever you do, don't make my mistake: I wanted a wider top (150mm) which is fine but I used a piece of pine that had the heart offset to the centre and the bloody thing keeps on twisting and so the legs refuse to match a flat surface (until a weight is on it).

You know what Damian - I like this design because it makes it dead simple to replace the top (no rebates in it). With the traditional design a separate sacrificial top has to be added. You can also vary the width of the top if you want to (and 150mm does have it uses) - you could have a couple of different tops for each horse.....

There are no angled cuts at all. He just buys a bunch of 2x4x8' cuts them into lengths and screws them together. I spotted the compromised stability, the horses are far from perfect, but if you need a basic support you could bang those up incredibly quickly with virtually no skill no special tools nothing.

I don't have a miter saw, I do have a very good table saw with router wing incra fence and incra miter.

I could make a jig to make double angle cuts, but I was posting the link specifically for anyone needing a quick solution.

Yes you do need to pay attention to grain even when your knocking up something rough

Originally Posted by damian

if you need a basic support you could bang those up incredibly quickly with virtually no skill no special tools nothing.

Yes indeed.

I just did some calcs in Excel, and if you used 75x45 timber for the middle and bottom of the I-beam, then your legs would be at 11.5° which I reckon would be quite ok. In other words the middle part of the I (75mm) is 5x the size of the lower ledge 15mm (which is 75-45 and then divided by 2. I dunno if I made that very clear or not!

70x45 timber will give almost precisely 10°.

Using timber in a 2:1 profile ratio (like 4x2") results in an angle of 14° which may well be ok, but will certainly have a higher stress than 10°. So ideally the profile ratio would be 14:9 (like 70x45) which could also be 3:2 so an imperial measurement of 3x2" would be best for the middle & bottom part of the I.

Paul sellers has a few great videos of how to build the classic/traditional style.

Originally Posted by FenceFurniture

Yes indeed.

I just did some calcs in Excel, and if you used 75x45 timber for the middle and bottom of the I-beam, then your legs would be at 11.5° which I reckon would be quite ok. In other words the middle part of the I (75mm) is 5x the size of the lower ledge 15mm (which is 75-45 and then divided by 2. I dunno if I made that very clear or not!

70x45 timber will give almost precisely 10°.

Using timber in a 2:1 profile ratio (like 4x2") results in an angle of 14° which may well be ok, but will certainly have a higher stress than 10°. So ideally the profile ratio would be 14:9 (like 70x45) which could also be 3:2 so an imperial measurement of 3x2" would be best for the middle & bottom part of the I.

I understood what you were saying. I was thinking I might grab a handful of those non structural studs from bunnings if they still have them and a box of screws. I'm thinking 3x 1 1/2 might want shorter than 3" screws though... maybe 2"

I just need some reasonable stands nothing too heavy duty or flash. It's just my saw horses keep getting stuck under sheets of ply etc as table legs every time I need a flat surface but somehow those tables never get cleared and broken down again

I was thinking if you add a tad of complexity to the design and cut the legs at 10 degrees you could just screw them on at that angle letting the cut end determine the angle. You could still screw the ply across the end to brace it, you could even add some ply across the inside faces of the legs to brace against racking. They should still stack ok.

I just made one using 70x35, but the "I" parts thicknessed to 52x34 to get that 3:2 ratio. At this point I haven't put the top or end caps on.

Pretty simple process:
1. Thickness to 52x34
2. Glue and screw the bottom of the I to the middle, so it's a ┴
3. Using the mitre saw I cut the ends of the "almost" I with a 10° bevel so the legs will be flush with it. So when you look at it side-on it's a parallelogram where the top is 450mm wide, and the bottom is, uhhh, more than 450mm (prolly about 480mm).
4. Legs left at 74x34 just to plane off the grooves (it was "groovy" pine)
5. 10/10° compound cut on one end (only because I can), measure off 600m, cut the other end 10/10
6. Clamp first leg in pozzie, letting the I determine the angle, and the flushness of the leg/face determine that angle
7. 3 screws at the top of each leg: 2x 62mm screws into the middle of the I, and a 75mm into the base.


Using the 52x34 worked really well because I could lay the I on it's side and a piece of 9mm MDF under the | part of the I gave perfect centring.

I happened to have lots of 75x35 from a scabbing that I did a couple of years ago.

So when I stand it up the legs are only slightly out of whack, and a bit of weight sorts that out. The end caps will correct it a bit (I'll put them on when I'm sitting on it).

I'll make the other 3 tomorrow and then I'll have to make the tops out of something else a bit wider. 120mm by about 25+mm should be good. (although the wider the top the higher the stack of horses)

Waldo

There may be a few ideas for you in this thread, although some of them are verging on the extreme.

That's not a saw-horse ...

Regards
Paul

I went to bunnings today and bought 5 non structural studs. They have put the price up to $3.50 which makes them a bit marginal. I needed to take the car for a run to find an oil leak so that was as good a destination as any.

I also surveyed the situation at home. There are some old fence rails and other bits of hardwood 2x4 1 1/2x3 etc. I'mgoing to make a pair to plan and then start changing, except I'm going to shorten the legs and lengthen the I beam. The horses I have are about 650 high and 850 long and I think that's better for me. The gentleman from the web page might be a lot taller than I am, most people are

Waldo, good fun but I'm not wasting that much timber on horses, besides I need to carry them around!

I finished my four today, and took some progress pics which I'll post tomorrow. I'm actually going the extra yards and painting them - only because there are enough occasions when they are left out in the weather.

Fortunately all I had to purchase was the 90x45 for the tops, and some 75mm screws.

The legs are 600mm long, so about 550 high, plus thetop will make them around 600mm high. I'm average height, but a 600 height suits me most of the time. I'll probably make another pair that are higher for certain tasks - maybe 750mm.

The bottom part of the I with 10° ends.




Showing leg attachment of the first one. I found that three screws in a line like this still had a bit of flex in the leg, so I changed it to four screws in a square pattern (2x 50mm screws at the top, counterbored in, and 2x 14g 75mm screws at the bottom). That is now much stronger. The extra holes you can see below the screws are from nail removal, not cockups!




A dozen legs ready to go:




Clamped for screwing. I started using a piece of MDF to flush things up but found it was just as easy without it (and sighting the legs to check they were in line). Remarkably, two of them have legs where all four sit on the floor without any weight on them!










I painted the tops and bases separately, and today will fit the caps.