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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Jul 2011
    Location
    In between houses
    Posts
    1,784

    Default My take on a bench build

    After 45 years of various workbenches and stools with planks and sheets of board and various other incarnations, I decided before Christmas that I might build a "proper" bench that will see me out. I drew design inspiration from a lot of posts on this forum, as well as the internet and youtube. I constructed this bench in the living room of a large house that has been in construction here on the river for Seven years, I've been working on this house for about 2 and a half, the first builder decided to retire 2 weeks after my arrival. I probably should have built this bench 18 months ago when the owners realised I was actually a detail joiner as well as a carpenter, and it was then that they commissioned me to build all the joinery items, and furniture, on site.

    I used New Guinea Rosewood for the whole thing, except the perimeter apron which is Qld. Spotted Gum. I chose rosewood because we have bought a big pack of it for the house, and it looks exceptional when polished.

    When this house is completed, the bench and machines I have there will be craned out through the big front doors, onto a barge, and taken to my off-river workshop on the central coast.

    I wanted several things in the design; A wide top, to allow two people to work on each side concurrently.
    a low platform, for power tools. An upper shelf, for hand tools and such. And finally, it had to have wheels.

    Here's some photos of the first few days, machining and gluing up the top. (sorry there's not many of each stage, I'm not normally writing blogs and pictures of my work)

    Everything is glued with Epoxy, theres an alternating plywood tongue in between the timbers,to keep them fairly aligned.

    Then I made a router sled and used that big bottom cutter to flatten it.
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  3. #2
    Join Date
    Jul 2011
    Location
    In between houses
    Posts
    1,784

    Default Legs

    The legs are BIG, I won't say why yet, you'll have to read through and see why. they are about 180mm square, but they are a hollow box. I machined them with the lock mitre bit, which works well, and is really easy to assemble when using epoxy.
    I made a plywood gluing jig to keep them square.
    Then I cut them to length on the tablesaw using a neat trick that the old man used,(he was a master joiner) but I didn't take photos.

    After trimming the top to size on the tablesaw, I then marked the position of the legs on the underside of the top, and used the festool adjustable router guide to machine a 25mm deep recess for the legs to sit into,I used a cutter the same diameter as the thickness of the leg timber (approx.22mm)

    Then I rounded the long corners of the legs with the corresponding round over bit to fit into the recess. The legs were then glued in and screwed from the top with countersunk and plugged stainless bugle batten screws.
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  4. #3
    Join Date
    Jul 2011
    Location
    In between houses
    Posts
    1,784

    Default Bottom shelf

    The bottom shelf is just a simple frame which for some unknown reason I decided to dovetail the corners and hand cut them. It's been years since I've done any apart from using the dovetail jigs for the router. Then I made a jig to cut the dovetail housings for the slats into the top of the frame.
    The pin dovetails on the slats were cut o the router table using the sliding fence.
    Once this was assembled the edges were rounded over and it was sanded before fitting to the legs.
    In the last photo you can also see the holes and slots machined in the legs.
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  5. #4
    Join Date
    Jul 2011
    Location
    In between houses
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    Default Top tool trays

    The trays directly below the top are for hand tools and such (but will probably just be overloaded with crap) I made them on a 15 degree angle so that it would be easier to access. I also ended up angling the bottoms inside the frame, which was a bit of a fiddle and I wouldn't do it again, but they look ok. They are just screwed to the legs so we can move them if needed after using it for a while.
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  6. #5
    Join Date
    Sep 2002
    Location
    Minbun, FNQ, Australia
    Age
    66
    Posts
    12,881

    Default

    Nice shed furniture.

    Looks like it is cyclone proof.
    Cliff.
    If you find a post of mine that is missing a pic that you'd like to see, let me know & I'll see if I can find a copy.

  7. #6
    Join Date
    Jul 2011
    Location
    In between houses
    Posts
    1,784

    Default Apron to edge of top

    After discussion with my workmate, we decided that the rosewood was a trifle soft for the edges of the top, so I machined and fitted a 140 x 40 section of spotted gum for around it. First I fitted and drilled the holes for the ridiculously heavy cast iron vise I bought from a member of this forum.


    Then I mitred and glued the apron on, using a few dominos to keep everything flush. I made the apron wider and projecting below the bottom face of the top to allow clamping of vertical workpieces.

    when this was done and set, I decided to put some embellishment on the corners, so made a jig and routed them out and glued them in.


    with the woodwork done, it was time to start thinking about the wheels.
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  8. #7
    Join Date
    Jul 2011
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    In between houses
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    Default The wheels

    I looked at lots of Youtube videos for ideas for bench wheels, and some were just plain horrible, so I thought that I could possibly conceal the wheels, and then push them down to lift the bench and use them, so I played around with some plywood mock ups ,to get the geometry right, and came up with a cam lever system, which did all I wanted it to do. Then I just found the right wheels and made the legs about 8 mm bigger internally to allow them to swing inside. The wheels were welded to a piece of 100 x 100 SHS tube which was the perfect size for their base. Then the tube needed 4 small packing lugs on each side to allow it to slide up and down inside the leg.
    On the top of the tube I welded two bars with a 10mm pin through them to take two 30 mm diameter ball bearings, side by side.

    The lever bar was made from 12 mm flat bar, I made a template from ply and then cut them out on the metal bandsaw. The recesses for the bearings to ride in were drilled with a 30mm broach cutter, which was actually really easy and neat. Then the bars were cleaned up on the linisher.

    I wanted a nice bevelled edge on the bars, as they would be visible. I bought an air powered chamfering tool online and it turned out to be a brilliant tool, kind of like a trimmer router, for steel.

    The bars pivot on a 20mm steel pin, which is fitted into the legs and the end is capped with a timber plug.
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  9. #8
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    Jul 2011
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    In between houses
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    Default So it turned out pretty good.

    Once everything was assembled, and tested!, I made a timber bar to join the two lever bars at the ends together, so it could be operated by foot, and it works well. Just have to mount the vise when the paint finally goes hard after respraying it.

    I have a video of it operating and moving but am having trouble uploading it. YouTube I hope that works.

    Thanks for taking the time to read my build thread and view the photos, I wish you all the best with your projects.
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  10. #9
    Join Date
    Jul 2011
    Location
    In between houses
    Posts
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    Default

    YouTube

    link to YouTube now operating, my first one I’ve done, thanks to poundy for giving me the tip

  11. #10
    Join Date
    Mar 2018
    Location
    Sydney
    Posts
    1,166

    Default

    The wheel assembly is quite a novel approach. If I've understood the images, essentially your hollow section for the leg actually becomes the guide for the wheel assy, and the cam simply pushes it down. How did you mount the pivot - massive big dowels, judging by the holes on the earlier pictures?

    PS: I reckon part of the reason why you got so many fewer views on this build log was the short elapsed duration between additions to the story. Kuffy has a particular style of narrative which I find great because I learn so much stuff as he goes through the processes and thinking that he puts into a particular part of the build, and that makes it span over a long time. Longer time between posts means there's more forum visits where someone may see an update to a thread they're interested in (or someone like me, who a few times a day will look at the "new posts" search results will see). Not saying there was anything bad about this thread, but just that the engagement level will always be different when there's a metered content trickling out. I'm assuming a reasonable amount of that approach, trickling the content out with much more detail, is about driving engagement and therefore revenue on YT, which I know isn't your goal (or the coffee machine vid would have been longer and have much more content ).

  12. #11
    Join Date
    Jul 2011
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    In between houses
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    Default

    [QUOTE=poundy;2171909]The wheel assembly is quite a novel approach. If I've understood the images, essentially your hollow section for the leg actually becomes the guide for the wheel assy, and the cam simply pushes it down. How did you mount the pivot - massive big dowels,

    yes I made pivot pins or dowels from 20 mm round bar and put strengthening blocks inside the legs then drilled through the whole lot and stopped short on one side. Then inserted the pins and capped them with a timber plug. It’s pretty neat compared to most of the setups I saw on YouTube with hinges snd pivoting boards and other nonsense. The bench weighs 148 kgs and you can push it around with one hand easily.

  13. #12
    Join Date
    Mar 2018
    Location
    Sydney
    Posts
    1,166

    Default

    oh, metal pins and timber caps.

    No wonder it's 148kg

    I agree, it seems an elegant solution. Much better than my dodgy half-arsed attempts for my table saw - but it works, for me, for now

  14. #13
    Join Date
    May 2010
    Location
    Not far enough away from Melbourne
    Posts
    4,200

    Default

    Really nice bench, Riverbuilder. Many interesting and practical ideas there.

    I like the retractable casters up the middle of the legs and the angled tool tray under the top although I would not have either in my own bench. We all work differently and I love seeing how others personalize their benches to suit their own work methods.
    I got sick of sitting around doing nothing - so I took up meditation.

  15. #14
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    blue mountains
    Posts
    4,882

    Default

    A great build and a very unique bench. The hidden wheels are a great feature and I also liked the sloped tool shelves.
    Regards
    John

  16. #15
    Join Date
    May 2012
    Location
    Woodstock (Cowra)
    Age
    74
    Posts
    3,372

    Default

    If you don't mind is it possible to post a drawing of the wheel assembly, I'm sure there are a few of us who would appreciate it but also understand if you don't want to
    The person who never made a mistake never made anything

    Cheers
    Ray

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