Thread: cheapy workbench WiP.

Originally Posted by thompy

*Pro-Tip* - Have your missus come hold the legs for ya each time you need stability and mention you might not have needed it if you had sash clamps, utter things like "yeah honey hold it there....like if you were a sash clamp" its a positive comment. And i do hope it works as i'll absolutly need a pair to do the bench top.

Or break a dining room chair!. We hard the mortise work loose on one and I couldn't get enough pressure to reglue it with what I had. Chair got fixed and I got a pair of sash clamps

After drooling over so many different traditional style benches that I would probably never use, I ended up building 2 benches like these ones from the plans on Woodgears aswell.

I since added the drawers underneath 1 of them.

They are very simple and quite strong benches

Good going,
John

Good eye John, I Emailed Mathias and thanked him for the ideas and basic plans and principals a while back, sent him a few pics as well, he replied and was happy someone got something out of them, and a really cool guy to correspond with as well. Mathias used a wooden door top for his top, i'm laminating, but i did borrow his leg and stringer construction. I'll be adding pipe clamp vises as well soon i hope.

Its great to know theyre as solid finished as i hoped mine to be when done, its gotta hold a wobbly out of balance lathe while i sort it out.

Neal.

Yay got em done. Soon as i finish some house painting i can put em to use. $100.00 for the 4. They're 1100mm long. Gotta find some protective caps for the far end threads but otherwise ready to go. Might get the joiners and use those as the caps.

Neal.

going well thompy. I've loving the story of your journey

I've got six of these and found the acme threads tend to bind a little, but I haven't bothered to do anything about it yet. Otherwise they're very good. If you bother to do anything with the threads let me know, I'm interested to know the solution.

Watching with interest.

Some progress finally, got the biscuitting done, never used one before.

Here's a tip for the new players at home. The ozito was not adjusted correctly out of the box, so i had to make the fine depth adjustment of the blade to suit the 12.5mm #20 biscuits, on my first row it didn't matter as i cut it to max depth (oops) however i compensated by using a lot of pva, i figure that because the biscuit operates on expansion within the blades kerf cut width whitch never changes, its not a massive mistake for one row.

Its at that point i realised the max blade plunge was not in fact in relation to the largest biscuit i had, so i switched the setting, #3 on the depth adjuster for the ozito to suit #20 biscuits, plunged another row and dry fitted a biscuit, it prodruded too far out, popped the blade out while off and measured, not 12.5 more like 10, unlocked the fine adjuster reset it and recut the row and the rest of the job.

As i was dry fitting it all as i went i found keeping a small flat blade screwdriver to clear chips left behind in the kerfed slots made for a quick and accurate dry fit. And another tip, my missus has been keeping the small glass coffee jars with the plasic sealed lids, i stored my biscuits in those to avoid them expanding in humid air.

The ozito was pretty straight forward to use, didn't have a horrible kick like some old angle grinders, and the cast ally base and adjustments were very solid and easy to adjust and hold while plunging, i think i made 54 cuts with it for the benchtop and after i started using my air blower every few cuts to clear debris off the board to ensure each cut remained level under the depth plate, it went smooth as silk.

Sat down and prepped the pipe clamps for the glue up and as i was a thought occurred to me that i could use a timber block to protect the far end unused threads and give it a stable platform to work from as well. That got me back to thinking about the front end of the clamps and i have two idea's for those as well, one for a matching height block to match the back end blocks when in use and the other for how i can use them as a vise in the bench and control the jaw. More on those later.

Neal.

pic1; ozito.
pic2; biscuit holes cut @ 200mm distance 2m lengths.
pic3; preglue test fitting clamp setting.
pic4; glued and clamped. cuppatime.

Forgot to add, Thanks Ruffly and Kman i am going to play around with my router and i am going to explore a small fitted woodblock for the thread ends in the next few days, if they don't cut the mustard i'll look into the joiners as caps. My BIL the thread cutter suggested i really make sure to protect them in some way as a few cement floor hits will render them unuseable, an ya wont know till ya need em. So i'll be sure to find a solution for em soon after i get em off tomorrow.

As for the acme threads they were free for me today on their first use but i'll use some Castrol EPL (its a lithium based grease used as a chassis lube and non disc bearings) to protect and lube them, 'ol school solution to an 'ol school thread i rekon.

Neal.

Took the top out of the clamps, picked it up and laid it out on the bench. It appears to be quite solid held together very well, given it is what it is, it's as flat as i can expect. Neither end is really square and will need to be trimmed from the flat underside and a clamped block to guide the circular, i did think about that aspect of that. While over the last few days i've been focussed on the making of the top i didn't put much thought in as to how i was going to secure it down.

Batten screws through the top into the rails and leg stretchers, can use a lot downside is the heads on the benchtop, corner blocks inside the corners of the bench and batten screws up into the underside of it (will 4 be enough), screw a pair of rails to the underside of the top and then screw from those into the stretcher and rail sides. Thinking i'll start with 4 fixing points and add more if i need to.

Neal.

Well descided to bite the bullet and go with the 4 screws and get it working and see how it holds up, trimmed up one end with the circular, a bit unweildly, but it worked, slight digin one end but it'll be hidden eventually when i do the end caps. The other end i trimmed with the router for an experiment, plunged half depth or so with a straight bit and a straight edge clamped to guide, flipped it and used a trimmer bit with bearing to finish it off. I think a bit better than the circular.

Wish i had a table saw to do this but i will just be patient and do what i can, and make do.

Then fixed it down with 4 x 75mm i think batten screws. seemed quite sturdy and no racking, bonus, quite surprised really.

I think i got a bit overzealous and impatient and mounted and reassembled the lathe on it, and after a belt tighten i was off and running. I didn't manage to turn anything constructive but radiata pine sawdust. Kind of dissapointed, i checked the centre against the tailstock and its like 15mm out up and to the rear, it'll never be accurate, however the bench solidly stood its ground while i played the whole day.

Next week i'll get some more timber and do the mitred frame for the top and work on the pipe clamp vises.

Neal.

Originally Posted by thompy

Some progress finally, got the biscuitting done, never used one before.

Here's a tip for the new players at home. The ozito was not adjusted correctly out of the box, so i had to make the fine depth adjustment of the blade to suit the 12.5mm #20 biscuits......

Another tip - that I'm sure you've worked out now.... test cuts on scrap timber with any new setting on tools - router bits, biscuit joiners, circular/mitre saws etc etc

Liking what I see so far! I never facter in tool costs of my projects; I just explain to the Minister for War and Finance that in order to make this item (for her) I specifically need to buy something shiny first......

I had the previous model of Ozito biscuit cutter and found the same adjustment snags as you have. It served me well for a few years until it finally rooted itself. It turns out the top end of the arbor runs in a bare aluminium bushing with only a bit of grease sitting in the gearbox to lubricate it, so it definately has a set "working life". Saying that though, I reckon I must have cut around a thousand biscuits with it.

Originally Posted by Chief Tiff

I had the previous model of Ozito biscuit cutter ........ It served me well for a few years until it finally rooted itself. .........it definately has a set "working life". Saying that though, I reckon I must have cut around a thousand biscuits with it.

How much for each biscuit?

Hi Everyone

Being new to this forum and to the fine art of woodworking I am going to go right ahead and assume this is a safe place to ask dumb questions. Why is the centre of all your workbenches sunken compared to the front and back edges?

To date I'm more the framer and builder where the bench is just somewhere to put the dropsaw.

Danny