Thread: Small bench

We've made some more progress with the bench.
Given that this is my friends first major WW project I think we've done OK.
Basically I showed him how to do a process and then he or we did it together for a bit after that. Once I thought he had a process under control I'd leave him to mostly finish those bits.

The top came out at 580 x 1600 mm, so not that big.
Legs are nominally 95 x 95 mm.
Cross pieces are nominally 35 x 95mm
Top is connected to base by 20 Z-clips.

It's all SG except for the apron and the front lower cross pieces which are WA redgum
Bench1.jpg

Heres how the frame was bolted together.
The bolts we used for through legs and into cross pieces were 150mm M8.
Two of the bolts thru Apron, Leg and into cross pieces needed to be 200mm but these weren't available at Bunnings so we used M8 all thread for these.
I suggested using SS CS socket head bolts - I know that would give it a bit of an IKEA look but I think its neater looking the CS HEX head bolts. Mate though that they were too exxy but given the timber cost my mate nothing I thought he might have gone for it,

Thrubolts.jpg
It's not fully tightened yet but it's already very solid.

Mistakes - we made a few.
The cross pieces on one side were cut 10mm too short and we didn't notice until we assembled the bench but we had quite a bit of dressed to size timber for cross pieces left over to make new ones. If push came to shove there is heaps more SG slabs down at the tree loppers yard.

One counter sunk hole was drilled into the wrong side of a leg but fortunately this was hidden by the attached cross piece.

The silliest think we did was attached the frame base to the "top of the top" instead of the "underside of the top" My mate spent about 2 hours getting the top flat with the belt sander but I told him only to worry about getting the edges of underside of the top flat - the bits where the frame would sit.

Never fear - about 20 minutes with a 40 grit belt on the sander fixed that.
This is after the 40 grit and then an 80 grit run over the top to see where the remaining divots are.
I'm leaving it to my mate to finish this to his liking.
top2.jpg


Remaining to do, a few cracks to fill, vice to add.
Mate also wants a small backboard added along the back edge of the top.

One small scale industrial accident. While mate was flattening the top with the belt sander I left him to it and went to have coffee with ahother mate for an hour. When I got back the lower side of his T-shirt was in tatters - it was flapping about and had got caught in the belt sander . It then took him about 20 minutes to disentangle his T-shirt. No claret was lost but he admits he was lucky as it all happened so quickly.

and full flow through ventilation was used along with 150mm dust hose on the belt sander...sorry I cant see these in your pics

Bob.
Excellent little bench an a great cause,
But I must say I’m concerned to see there’s no 150 mm ducting on the Belt sander [emoji6].

Looking forward to more progress.

Cheers Matt.

The belt sander was connected to the DC via that 50mm hose.

I had the particle counter running about 1.2 - 1.5m away from the bench and over about 5 min of sanding the detector recorded dust levels rose by about 2x background which was about ~9µg/m^3. I then turned on one of my roof ventilators (1200CFM) direct above the sanding operation and within 2 minutes the dust levels were back to background and stayed around background way for the remainder of the sanding.

My experience is that for power tools that use a fan, its the fan in the power tool that determines the level of restriction so provided whatever is sucking on the tool can exceed what the fan outputs, that's all the dust extraction you can get. That's why a vac is not needed because it's possible to use a DC for this operation.

When we cut the slots for the Z-clips we used a biscuit cutter (BC) and as that thing is noisy we both put on muffs. I was doing the cutting and mate was going to be in charge of dust control ie hold the floor sweep (100 mm ducting connected to a length of stormwater duct) up against the dust outlet of the BC. After cutting just 2 slots the air was full of dust and looking over at the DC switch saw mate had forgot to turn the DC on. Looking over to the particle counter it read 50 µg/m^3 ie not good. I then switched on the roof ventilator and it tool about 5minutes to get back to shed background. Then when we used the floor sweep with the DC running - no problems cutting the remaining 18 Z-clip slots.

My contribution to the bench was completed to the point where it could be moved to mates place for him to complete the sanding and finishing.

The small figurine on top of the bench is the sort of carving my mate does. He's only been doing this for a couple of months.

Vice handle is a branch from a Tea Tree.
Bench2.jpg

Bench3.jpg
The outboard face of the vice is a single piece of SG, 400 x 150 x 60 mm.
The Crubber pieces ion top of the bench are to cover the vice faces after its finished.
Final weight has come in at a whisker over 90kg.

That will fit its purpose perfectly, well done Bob and mate.

Cheers Matt.

My friend finally got round to completing the sanding, crack filling, and finish on his bench.
It still needs a backboard fitted but we ran out of timber so yesterday we finally got down to the milling yard to pick up another slab of spotted gum.
He's given it his first accidental cut so he's already over keeping it pristine.
FinishedBench1.jpg
FinishedBench2.jpg
FinishedBench3.jpg

Hi,

That is beautiful. I need to build one a bout 5.5 meters long. I was going to use mortice and tendon joints but a friend advised me to make a bolt together prototype and try it out first before I commit the timber to a final design. I am going to buy a under bench vise like the one shown and drill a parallel series of holes for dogs along the length on both sides. Do any of you have some advice regarding this procedure? I thought about countersinking the holes and inlaying metal washers for the holes. What is the general opinion on that?

Regards

Brian

Originally Posted by V Restrorations

Hi,

That is beautiful. I need to build one a bout 5.5 meters long. I was going to use mortice and tendon joints but a friend advised me to make a bolt together prototype and try it out first before I commit the timber to a final design. I am going to buy a under bench vise like the one shown and drill a parallel series of holes for dogs along the length on both sides. Do any of you have some advice regarding this procedure?

Firstly a 5.5m long work bench is going to be tricky for a bunch of reasons.
Just getting straight solid timbers this long will be near impossible and even if you can get then the cost will be
Then it will be extremely heavy and near impossible to move.
As a guide, the bench described in this thread is only 1.6m long and it weighs all up with the vice more than 100kg.
I guess if you build it using bolts at least it can be dismantled and move but what a right PITA that would be.

If you need 5.5m of bench space I would suggest designing and building it in 2 or 3 sections.
The actual workbench section can be extra sturdy/heavy but other sections might use a lighter weight frame and top, and maybe have cupboards and/or drawers for storage.

A 1.8 or 2m long workbench is more than adequate for most wood working especially for luthier work. The benches we used at the Thomas Lloyd Guitar making school were either steel or wooden framed tables with sacrificial chip board or MDF tops. Most were only about 2m long. Perhaps if you have the space of more value than a long bench would be something like a 1.8m square bench that you can get at from all sides.
Here's a photo from the Guitar Room website showing part of their workshop.
Screen Shot 2022-02-14 at 3.53.41 pm.jpg

I thought about countersinking the holes and inlaying metal washers for the holes. What is the general opinion on that?

Countersinking leaves a cone shaped recess. Better is a flat bottomed recess which is pre drilled with something like a Forstner bit, the the thru hole is drilled using the small central pit produced by the Forstner bit as a guide.

Hi Bob,

Thank you for that advice. I was only really considering having a bench that long because I can and figured that it would be handy in that I could have multiple jobs on the bench at the same time. You are spot on with the weight issue, It is a concern as the workshop is a raised construction and I frankly don't trust the strength of the timbers (I didn't build it). If it was on a ground slab It would be fine. The photos are great I was going to use hardwood for the frame, mainly for the purposes of stability but I suppose that I could fix it to the floor to avoid movement. In regards to the top material I was thinking of yellow tongue flooring or form ply with joyce's every 500mmm. Yes I need to be able to access the bench from all sides. A single bench would server my purposes but I could make it modular as long as they were no longer that 1.5 meters. I have been looking at Forstner bit sets which I need for many purposes. Thanks for the advice, that has given me a lot to think about.

Regards

Brian