Arts and craft Style work bench WIP...

**Brown Dog** · 4th October 2006, 10:15 PM

Those of you following NewLou's thread bout his work bench in progress may be interested in checking out my attempt at a bench. In his tread Lou mentioned an article in Woodworkers Journal about an arts and crafts bench that gave him some inspiration. That is the bench I am going to build.

Ive been planning to build this for a while now and finally started it about about 4 weeks ago.

Its a simple bench with a top made of 16 laminated strips (about 45mmx70)of Vic ash. This should make a top roughly 700mm wide, 1500mm long and 68mm thick. The Base will be made from Jarrah with wedged mortise and tennon joints for the bottom rails (long and short) and a bridle type joint on the top rail on the short side.

progress so far:
*Milled all stock to rough dimensions and allow to settle for a couple of weeks.
*Started glueing laminations for bench top (pic 1). as the top has already got so heavy i cant move it by mysef so I have to glue one at a time. So to pass the time while glue is drying i knocked up a couple of tools (see other pics)from the off cuts.
The first is a mortise guage I needed to mark the moritises for my bench. Second is a dead blow mallet (head is hollow filled with lead shot) and third is a shooting board.

**NewLou** · 4th October 2006, 10:26 PM

Great to see you get a start on it Brown Dog

Buy the look of the quality of your work she should be a cracker. Am watching your progress with interest!!!

Very nice tools you've made there too...................did you melt the lead for your mallet ???

Regards Lou

**Groggy** · 4th October 2006, 10:30 PM

Great work there, another WIP to watch!

**Brown Dog** · 4th October 2006, 10:33 PM

Originally Posted by NewLou

Great to see you get a start on it Brown Dog

Very nice tools you've made there too...................did you melt the lead for your mallet ???

Regards Lou

Thanks Lou.

The lead is just lead shot it rattles around inside. The idea is to transfer more force to the object as the lead moves. It also deadens the blow so the mallet doesnt bounce..used mainly for persuading joints such as dovetails together.

**AlexS** · 5th October 2006, 09:53 AM

nice tools.

Originally Posted by Brown Dog

...used mainly for persuading joints such as dovetails together.

Don't force it, use a bigger hammer.

**floobyduster** · 5th October 2006, 10:08 AM

I'm looking forward to seeing the rest of the bench come together. How about putting up the costs and time spent as you go.

Love the tools - how long did it take you to make them? How did you go about it - any tips or trick you learned? What is the bench the shooting board is sitting on made of?

**Brown Dog** · 5th October 2006, 11:51 AM

Originally Posted by floobyduster

. How about putting up the costs and time spent as you go.

Love the tools - how long did it take you to make them? How did you go about it - any tips or trick you learned? What is the bench the shooting board is sitting on made of?

Thanks alex and floobyduster

As far as costs go... the timber cost from memory around $750 . The vice which is the large generic front style vice from timbecon I bought at the Wood working show and was about $60-70 I think. Other costs are a couple of veritas bench dogs ($34 a pair)and a couple of wonder dogs ($ 43 each, instead of a tail vise).

So all up when finished, it should come in just under $1000 most of which was funded by selling old gear and some of the accesories were gifts from my generous girlfriend.

Time spent so far...
1/2 day to mill stock to rough dimensions ( all stock was 200mm x 50mm boards) at this stage stock was stacked and left to settle for about 4 weeks
1/2 day to mill stock for top to final dimensions.
2 hours a day for glue up of top over a few days couple of glue ups a day.

The guage took me about 2 1/2 days, The first one I made i stuffed up

(got a bit over zealous with the drum sander).

The dead blow I did in one day while waiting for glue to dry.

the shooting board also took about one day

The ideas for all three were borrowed from various people. The guage I got the idea from the latest woodsmith magazine. I pretty much copied the way that was made and just adapted it slightly to a mortise guage.

The mallet I down loaded some plans from somewhere. I have the PDF if anyone is interested.

The shooting board is my attempt at the ones Micheal O'connor makes http://www.michealconnorwoodwork.com...ccessories.htm
pretty straight forward. The tapered pieces were cut using a jig on the table saw. then they are glued to the top part, then planed flush when glue set, then that assembly is glued to the base. Screw on a couple of stops and yar done

The Bench that the shooting board is sitting on is the the side extension table for the table saw. Its made from KD hardwood (frame) with a MDF top with laminex glued to the top. The steel legs come with the saw

regards
Paul

**Waldo** · 5th October 2006, 12:12 PM

G'day Brown Dog,

As others have posted, another bench to watch

Your work on the mortise guage is really smick, a few others have been posting with their creations of mortise guages, and I'm very impressed with them all.

Top stuff.

**Brown Dog** · 10th October 2006, 05:45 PM

Heres where Im at.

I have finished glueing up the top. It has been planed flat on both sides (photo 1). I had a little more planing than I would have liked, as the top developed a little bit of a cup. I should have checked with a straight edge earlier in the glue up

.

Photo 2 shows the ends being trimmed. I had too cut as deep as I could with the my little 185mm circular saw (just sold my 235mm saw, mabey I should have waited

). Then it was cleaned it up with a flush trim bit.

Next job was to mount the vice. A front and 1/2 rear jaw were made from the vic ash and a handle was turned from jarrah. Photo 3 shows the handle ready to be parted off. One knob was parted off then had a 28mm hole drilled to fit the handle shaft. The knob can then be held on with a screw.

Photo 4 shows all vice parts ready to be attached

cheers Paul

**Brown Dog** · 22nd October 2006, 08:19 PM

hello all
since my last post I have milled all the stock for the base to final dimensions and begun to cut the mortice and tennon joints for the base.

photo one...trimming short rails to final length

photo two... glueing short blocks to long rails

photo three...cutting mortices for long rails

photo four...cutting tenon cheeks on long rails

photo five...trimming tennon height...

**Brown Dog** · 22nd October 2006, 08:24 PM

this photo shows the setup I used to cut the wedge shape in the mortise. Never tried it before but I thought it worked quite well. Only needed a little bit of a tidy up with a chisel.

**Brown Dog** · 22nd October 2006, 08:33 PM

today while cutting the bridle joint in the top of the leg for short rails. I had a mild brain fade

and cut the joint in the wrong face on the leg. The photos show the rapair I had too make. Luckily I realised before I went to far and just had to glue in a couple of thin strips(photo 1). Photo 2 and 3 show before and after a bit of a scrape. Good as new

cheers Paul

**NewLou** · 22nd October 2006, 08:42 PM

Great work Dog

Is fantastic to see her evolving. Is it my eys or does your slab look unusually short??

Lookin Sweeeeeet

REGards Lou

**Brown Dog** · 23rd October 2006, 12:15 PM

Originally Posted by NewLou

Is fantastic to see her evolving. Is it my eys or does your slab look unusually short??

REGards Lou

Thanks Lou

By slab Im assuming you mean the bench top?... cause I dont see any half empty cases of beer in any of the pics

. The top is 1500mm long which is how I planned it

. I think its just an optical illusion... and it wont be a monster of a bench when finished anyway.

cheers Paul

**Poppa** · 23rd October 2006, 01:49 PM

I'm following this with avid interest Brown Dog. My bench is still in the planning stage - I've drawn up scale plans from all sides, but haven't chosen wood etc yet. And the plans are still subject to change (right up to and past completion I reckon!). I'm a fan of the Arts and Craft movement, so I'm very interested to see yours completed.

Oh, and I love the mortise guage. Like to do that myself as well but not sure I have the skills yet. Only one way to find out I suppose....

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