Thread: work bench ideas

I would use 50x50 Square tube for it all as it will be stronger. If you want to keep it light use 1.6 or 2mm wall thickness.
As for designs there are plenty of benches in the link below, someone is always making one.
Fabrication & Techniques - The Garage Journal Board

I built my main bench out of angle, but it has 3inch angle legs and 2inch heavy angle everywhere else and a 3mm top braced. I placed the bottom shelf so the pallet jack could move it as it needs 3 people to pick it up.

Dave

Originally Posted by WelderMick

My learned colleagues - I was hoping you might throw in some ideas here. I've got a bit of work space sorted out now - finally and I want to put together a central workbench/layout table. I was thinking something reasonably light weight and something I could cut apart easily if I had to move it elsewhere. Looking at 1.8m square.

"Metal work" and "light weight" are not terms that sit together well and even if you say it is only going to be used as a layout table why not build it to do more than that? If you want to be able to move it I would make it with bolt on legs that sit inside short SHS sockets welded to the table top. If you then use two 10 or 12 mm bolts per leg it should be stiff enough.

I'm sort of stuck on the idea in the picture - which would be a square frame made of 50mm angle, into which I'd tack some 50mm gal pipe at (say 150mm spacing), then just sit some plywood or MDF on top for a soft work surface if needed. I don't need to mount vices or anything like that - this table is meant to stop me laying stuff up on the floor - too hard on the knees

Rather than pipe for the top I would used SHS because those slots will be incredibly useful to insert clamps through and to then be able to clamp stuff onto the SHS, but it's not so easy to clamp to round pipe.

My concerns are that the 50mm angle iron would probably bend, so would need some reinforcing and also the legs would need bracing (particular as I was thinking of putting some locking castors underneath) - so then started thinking there might be some cool designs out there that I could borrow.

At 1.8 x1.8 I' d be looking at one cross support piece for the top at the half way mark and then a fifth leg in the middle of the top.

Originally Posted by Dave J

I would use 50x50 Square tube for it all as it will be stronger. If you want to keep it light use 1.6 or 2mm wall thickness.
As for designs there are plenty of benches in the link below, someone is always making one.
Fabrication & Techniques - The Garage Journal Board

I built my main bench out of angle, but it has 3inch angle legs and 2inch heavy angle everywhere else and a 3mm top braced. I placed the bottom shelf so the pallet jack could move it as it needs 3 people to pick it up.

Dave

G'day Dave . Nice idea with the pallet jack. Regarding the SHS vs Angle - what was in the back of my head was that I could simply sit the cross bars in the frame and tack them on, so I could easy take it all apart later. I'd probably stitch the SHS around the outside of the angle. The shed space this is for is actually rented, so I didn't want to have a 1.5 tonne monolith. I've never come across the garage journal site - you aren't kidding - lots of work bench ideas there!

Originally Posted by BobL

"Metal work" and "light weight" are not terms that sit together well and even if you say it is only going to be used as a layout table why not build it to do more than that? If you want to be able to move it I would make it with bolt on legs that sit inside short SHS sockets welded to the table top. If you then use two 10 or 12 mm bolts per leg it should be stiff enough.
Rather than pipe for the top I would used SHS because those slots will be incredibly useful to insert clamps through and to then be able to clamp stuff onto the SHS, but it's not so easy to clamp to round pipe.
At 1.8 x1.8 I' d be looking at one cross support piece for the top at the half way mark and then a fifth leg in the middle of the top.

Thanks Bob, yeah I take your point about having SHS slats. I had round tube in mind just because I think I might have a source for lots of cheap second hand gal tube. Other than that, the more I think about it, the more of a pain the round tube will be. I was trying to avoid having more than the four legs (uneven floors and all that), but I fear that it will be quite saggy otherwise - so I definitely will have to do something more than drawn. This table might be a temporary (1 year) thing, with a view to a long term heavy weight solution after that .

Cheers

- Mick

You can always put diagonal braces in running from the center of the bench to the 4 legs to support the middle. Actually that will make the bench very sturdy as long as the middle point is. Any flex at the point that the braces meet will make the whole bench "floppy".

Thinking about it if you cross the braces at a point under the center of the bench (say 8") to make a sort of inverted pyramid that should sort the flex problem

If you don't follow Uee's idea of the inverted pyramid and go for the 5th leg, it is pretty easy to make adjustable Legs. On my WW lathe bench my adjustable feet look like this. The white stuff is HDPE and it acts as a sort of skid to move the bench around the black stuff is a hard viton rubber like material for grip.

Hi WelderMick,
Here is a picture of a Work Table I recently built, it has 50x50x5mm angle for the top with 40x40mm angle welded inside to form a grid for holding welding jobs jiging etc. The legs and bottom rails are 50x50x2.5mm with casters. I put a shelf with a gal top close to the top of table to catch welding slag etc which leaves the bottom shelf for putting things on to get them out of the way.
The bench is very sturdy and wheels arround easily, you might like to consider some of what I have done in your Table makeup.

Regards,
Keith_W

Originally Posted by Ueee

Thinking about it if you cross the braces at a point under the center of the bench (say 8") to make a sort of inverted pyramid that should sort the flex problem

Ueee, I get what you're saying about the 4 diagonal braces towards the centre, but I cant quite picture what you are suggesting with the 8" overlap, do you mean so that the braces form an "X" pattern (with the top legs of the X being 8" long? )

Originally Posted by BobL

If you don't follow Uee's idea of the inverted pyramid and go for the 5th leg, it is pretty easy to make adjustable Legs. On my WW lathe bench my adjustable feet look like this. The white stuff is HDPE and it acts as a sort of skid to move the bench around the black stuff is a hard viton rubber like material for grip.

I like it

Originally Posted by Keith_W

Here is a picture of a Work Table I recently built

Keith, that is a great looking bench. What's the overall dimensions? Did you have any problems with flatness/warping? Do you find those top pieces of angle rigid enough? I like the idea of the catch tray.

Spot on Mick, it should give great support and remove the need for any other bracing. It does limit the use of a shelf though.

Hi WelderMick,
The Table is 1500mm Long x 900mm Wide x 880mm Heigh, the angle iron is very ridid and I was careful in the welding not to get any warping that I can see. It is flat on top so makes a good Work Table for assembly of stuff etc and the top shelf doubles up as somewhere handy to put things out of the way and easy to get when you want and as I said before works as shelf also works well to catch welding slag etc when useing the grid for welding.

Regards,
Keith.

I offer the following for your consideration.
I visited the pallet rack shop near where I work today. I spotted this sort of racking which with a few modifications , I believe would lend itself to a very strong but
de-mountable work bench. Basically the end panels are braced and the dog bones lock into them.Levelling screws as described can be welded on.

The long rail I saw was an enclosed dog bone shape. It would allow for the parallel pipe system with some fiddling.

No ideas on the $ ,but i believe the components may be purchased as required.

That's dexion racking. Better have a stiff drink before enquiring about prices.......

I bought 5 x 2.5 mtr H x 1.8 mtr L bays of long span with 6 shelves each bay and it was only around $1200, pretty cheap compared to second hand pallet racking on ebay. They have specials on ebay all the time which works out 20% cheaper than in store.
I know you want to work with what you can get cheap, but the prices for this racking is listed below if your thinking of going that way.
They have feet (not adjustable and also wheels (at $45 each) The long span end cross braces are 30mm wide so you could use 30mm square tube to bring it out to width. If you only used 2 beams you would still need bracing because it would rock. I found once I had the 6 installed it was good enough on it's own, but I replaced the locking pins with bolts.

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Dave

Originally Posted by Keith_W

Hi WelderMick,
Here is a picture of a Work Table I recently built, it has 50x50x5mm angle for the top with 40x40mm angle welded inside to form a grid for holding welding jobs jiging etc. The legs and bottom rails are 50x50x2.5mm with casters. I put a shelf with a gal top close to the top of table to catch welding slag etc which leaves the bottom shelf for putting things on to get them out of the way.
The bench is very sturdy and wheels arround easily, you might like to consider some of what I have done in your Table makeup.

Regards,
Keith_W

I saw this table a while back but I will say it again, Nice Table Keith

Dave

Originally Posted by Grahame Collins

I offer the following for your consideration.
I visited the pallet rack shop near where I work today. I spotted this sort of racking which with a few modifications...

That's good thinking Grahame - thanks for bringing it up.

Originally Posted by Dave J

I bought 5 x 2.5 mtr H x 1.8 mtr L bays of long span with 6 shelves each bay and it was only around $1200, pretty cheap compared to second hand pallet racking on ebay. They have specials on ebay all the time which works out 20% cheaper than in store.
I know you want to work with what you can get cheap, but the prices for this racking is listed below if your thinking of going that way.
They have feet (not adjustable and also wheels (at $45 each) The long span end cross braces are 30mm wide so you could use 30mm square tube to bring it out to width. If you only used 2 beams you would still need bracing because it would rock. I found once I had the 6 installed it was good enough on it's own, but I replaced the locking pins with bolts.

Office City - Wholesale Office Furniture, Pallet Racking & More

Ebay listings
wholesale-superstore items - Get great deals on Longspan Racking, Pallet Racking items on eBay Stores!

Dave

Dave, mate it's easy to get distracted, there's a few thing I'm eyeing off on that site already! Actually, Ueee, those prices aren't tooooo bad in my book. I just spent over $500 on wood and bolts, putting together a light workbench (admittedly it is 10m long ) and the next task is some heavy duty free-standing shelves which I might now get on ebay although I reckon the freight might add up quickly. Might have to a bit more research.

And Keith - I'm glad the table is as good as it looks - really nice job. Still might steal a few ideas of this one

- Mick