Workbench construction wip

[Woodlee]

Still building my work bench but I have it to the stage where I can actually use it .I have a few things still to do until I can say its actually finished .
I want to add an end vice and put some dog holes in the top.

The main end frames are steel RHS 65 X 65 x 4mm joined by 2 x 100mm x 50mm x4mm rails. I made four adjustable swivel footed feet to go on each corner for leveling and adjusting the height if needed.
The top is a solid door with 5" x 50mm jarrah skirts dovetailed on the corners.These are screwed into the edge of the door and also bolted to plates welded onto the end frame cross members
The vice is a quick action record I picked up at auction earler in the year. I also installed an adjustable bench stop made from 3/4 x 100mm hardwood into the top ,there is a bracket under the bench with a machined brass knob for holding it in place.

I made some jarrah dowelling with my router and cut plugs to plug up the bolt holes ,I still have some to do.The smaller plugs are more like a cup so they fit down over the hex head of the lag bolts.
Hardest job was chiselling out the waste from the dovetails.
My father was here at the time and kept mumbling some thing about why the hell I needed dovetailed joints.

[Pops]

Hi Woodlee,

Nice bench there mate, and the dovetails look great. Pretty quick to put together, no messing about with glue-ups. Well done.

What sort of finish are you intending for the top or is it going to be 'as is' natural ? What sort of tail vice did you have in mind ? There has been much talk about tail vices on the forum, lots of opinions.

Oh. I do believe it is Coach Screws young man, coach screws, lag bolts is the American term I think. :)

Do keep us posted.

Cheers
Pops

[Woodlee]

Hi Woodlee,

Nice bench there mate, and the dovetails look great. Pretty quick to put together, no messing about with glue-ups. Well done.

What sort of finish are you intending for the top or is it going to be 'as is' natural ? What sort of tail vice did you have in mind ? There has been much talk about tail vices on the forum, lots of opinions.

Oh. I do believe it is Coach Screws young man, coach screws, lag bolts is the American term I think. :)

Do keep us posted.

Cheers
Pops

Thanks
I built it that way so in years to come I can replace the top if need be ,just have to dig the plugs out from over the screws

Basically its built from material I had laying around left over from jobs .The door came from a demolition auction along with four others I got for $50.00 . They were longer than a normal house door and very heavy 2330x 820 IIRC.
I did have to buy the Jarrah for the sides and the all thread for the adjusters .All up so far $400.00 for materials ,vice etc.

I'm still thinking about the finish ,but am leaning towards a boiled linseed oil finish ,or maybe tung oil . The top has a couple of nasty oil stains on it ( spilt honing oil .)'
I've tried soaking them out with thinner but it looks like they are going to be hard to remove
The end vice will probably be the Veritas twin screw vice as I beleive its the only option available at the moment .Expensive ,but very good quality I beleive.
When the time comes I will do a search on the forum and get some more info on the vice before I leap .

Was also thinking I could buy two Dawn vice screws and make my own adptation.
Couple of bicycle sprockets and some chain maybe.

Excuse my slippage to the Americanisms seeping into our language .
Yes ,I meant coach screws ,but couldn't get my brain working .

[Pops]

Hi Woodlee,

I know what you mean about those doors, I had one some time ago and could hardy lift it. Don't know what I have done with it now.

One solid bench on the cheap, I like that. Will last you quite a while, and take some bashing too. Just saw a bench here on the forum with one of those Veritas end vices. It did look good and worth it as you say. Would leave the bike chain on the bike, I'm too lazy for that sort of mucking about.

You won't know how you did without a decent bench once this one is finished with an end vice I reckon.

Was just joshing you on the lingo mate. With all these beaut benches about I might just be shamed into replacing my old wobbly bench. :)

Cheers
Pops

[BrettC]

Woodlee, looks great, the dovetails are very nice. I had the same problem agonised over the Veritas but unfortunately had to part with my saved bikkies because there didn't seem to be an effective option. I've also looked at the dawn, I think in the end I'll just get one of the plain carbatec front vices that I can turn a beech handle on and fit to match my tail vice. Will also make matching beech front vice jaw.

The idea for the replaceable door is a good one. Keep posting a pic or two as ya go...

Cheers

[artme]

Lookin' really good from where I sit.:2tsup::2tsup:

[Woodlee]

Today I glued in the rest of the plugs to cover the bolts and then cut them flush .I bought a flush cut saw from Carbatec just for the job.
Planed them flat with the Stanley 60 1/2 , and lightly sanded.
Just have to mark the pattern for the dog holes (might wait until I get the end vice) not sure where to place them just yet.
Im going to use Jarrah for the end vice jaw face ,and make it full width of the bench.
I also have to fix up the front vice jaw face its only a temporary job in there at the moment.
Lots of sanding to do now ,then the oil finish .

I like to mess about making things ,both in metal and wood , Dawn have just the vice screws available so I was thing of buying two and making my own twin screw end vice and using a bike chain to mate them together.
My end frames are just 12" or 14 " in from the end of the bench so I'm wondering how far back the Veritas screws go .Maybe I won't have the room for the Veritas vice.

Kev.

[wheelinround]

Looking forward to seeing the finished bench Kev :2tsup: