Thread: Sort of a Workbench WIP - Slow...

G'day Christos,

I did pick up one of the cheap metal detectors from Aldi but as you mention it doesn't really work too well for the smaller nails. The little Ozito power planer was purchased with the sole intention of knocking off all the crap from the recycled timber before it makes it to the machines and so far has performed a sterling job. I try to avoid running it over nails but it's much better to find them with the little planer than the jointer / thicknesser. Even so the thicknesser blades have already been knocked about a bit by the hardwood so I do have some ridges showing up on the machined timber. Nothing a bit of sanding won't overcome.

I machined up the timber for the cross members today and now have all that is needed for the bench frame.

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The next step is to do a little bit of tuning on the SCMS so that I can get a decent square cut out of it or build myself a cross cut sled for the table saw. Once either of these tasks is completed the frame pieces can all be cut to length and assembly begun.

Defiantly. Seems that we are the recyclers group.

I also have similar problem with a good square cut on the SCMS as the one that I have is a GMC. So when they made this one I think the term square was used loosely.

Slowly progressing on this one.

I decided to avoid the SCMS for now and wait till it's in the bench before spending any time on tuning it. So I put together a basic cross cut sled yesterday and got all the timber trimmed to length with the exception of the long bottom rails. I don't think these will fit in the sled.

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I've got a week off work now so I'm hoping to get the frame all together by the end of the week.

I split the timber up into a front and rear set today, trying to keep the better looking pieces for the front. I started out with the back side of the bench first up having destroyed a few "first attempts" at projects recently. Laying it out and marking up the joins was actually quite straightforward and didn't present any major problems apart from lack of space.

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It all went together ok and a dry fit came up nice and square and pretty much ready to be glued.

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There's still a mid rail to be fitted in the saw gap on this back side of the bench. The front side will not have a top or mid rail in this gap but I was considering using a temporary one during the glue up to make it a bit easier.

One thing I was thinking of doing was gluing up each end of each side separately as I'm sure I'd run out of time if was to try glue the whole side up in one go. Can't think of any negative impact this may have so that's the plan for now.

Some good progress. Looking forward to how you do the glue up.

Another productive day in the shed and the timber is starting to take some form. Spent the first few hours this morning finishing off the mortices. I did manage to make a couple of mistakes in this department and if you look closely at the two long bottom rails you can see that I'd made two identical pieces...

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Luckily enough it was the rear rail that I stuffed and it was pretty much the last piece that I'd cut so all was not lost. I just re-cut them from the other side and if I find looking at the mistake annoys me sufficiently then I'll plug the original holes.

The glue up was done in two stages, first the smaller end was glued up and left to set. I'm using Titebond II for the bench and am a little surprised it only requires 30 minutes clamp time. I gave it about an hour, just in case.

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After de-clamping the smaller end I glued up and clamped the larger end including the saw gap mid rail. It was only 6 joints but probably took me about 15 minutes between applying the first bit of glue to actually having it clamped up. Admittedly, a couple of minutes were wasted directing a number of choice words towards an ugly splinter that lodged itself in my finger... I could hear a bit of popping as the joints were tightened up so I guess I was getting pretty close to the usable open time of the glue.

It all came together though and a little tap with the mallet here and there got it nice and square.

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I'm a bit concerned with the working time of the glue when it comes to joining the two sides as this step will involve 16 joints at once. I might have to get some help with glue application at that stage.

Coming together well Steve.

Got the front side glued up today, no photo cos it just looks like the rear side. It kinda matches up to the rear side too so I'm pretty happy with the results.

Putting some further consideration into the bench top today my original thoughts were to use 32mm of MDF, just two 16mm panels glued. I've recently seen the use of a Masonite layer on top of the MDF with a hardwood skirting around the outside which I kind of liked.

A quick question about the Masonite top though, will it be suitable and stable enough for use around the router insert or would I just be better off with the MDF top surface?

That is coming along very well Steve.

As to your question about the router and the masonite, I wouldn´t use masonite of plain MDF. I built a router table based on Roger Giffkins´design. The Tabletop is made by laminating a couple of pieces of MDF together and then laminating each side with 3mm laminex. Simple, stable and durable.

Thanks Artme.

I thought that would be the response but I was really hoping not to have to use the laminex top... I just don't like it but I can see why it is the preferred material in this instance. I'll have to convince myself to do it.

Joined up the two halves today to complete the frame.

My concerns regarding the open working time of the glue were pretty much spot on but I thought I'd come up with an appropriate gluing regime. I couldn't find a helper so I meticulously laid everything out as needed in the hope that this would help.

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First off, I glued all the tenons into the front and back without using any glue on the faces of these parts. This worked ok however I did manage to damage the feet of the rear side while banging in the tenons. As the workpiece slid along the floor with the hits it pulled a number of slivers off the feet. Looking back I probably should have beveled the feet prior to the glueup to prevent this chipping.

Once complete I applied some glue to the crossmembers and set them into the front side. It was fairly obvious once I started attaching the crossmembers that the workpiece would not remain upright during this stage so I laid it down and made the job a great deal easier. I even felt happy enough to grab a pic.

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The rear side went on with many hits from the mallet and minimal problems. It was probably about 30 - 40 minutes between the first application of glue and getting the clamps on and there was quite a bit of cracking and popping as I tightened it up so I think there was definitely some breaking of initial bonds.

Couldn't get the darn thing square unfortunately. Loosened off the clamps, hammered here, hammered there and finally just gave up and retightened. It's square vertically from the sides and also from the front but is about 2.5 - 3mm out of square across the depth of the bench front to back. Oh well...

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The final result doesn't look too bad and once sanded up should be pretty good.

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I'm still waiting for my router lift / insert to arrive so I won't bother with the top until I've had a look at that and decided what it requires. The mitre saw table will also need to wait until I've sorted out the top as it's depth is dependent on the top surface depth also.

One thing I can work on at the moment is the mobility of the unit. I had originally planned on putting it on lockable casters full time but gave up that idea when I had a look at what was available. I'm now thinking of some sort of raising and lowering mechanism so it can be dropped back onto it's legs for stability when in use.

You have done well with the glue up. I guess you did not gett the help needed?

Thanks Christos, unfortunately had to do it all on my own. Could be just cos I'm an impatient bugger...

Looks like it come up alright though so now some big decisions to be made on the next stages.

Heads or Tails.

Not much progress this week.

As mentioned earlier I decided to ditch the lockable casters idea. This is the reason the bench frame looks a lot taller than it did in the initial Sketchup views as I had factored in about 100 - 150mm worth of wheels at the start.

I got hold of a set of normal casters that should do the job and now plan on using the hinged lowering and raising mechanism that can be found on an assembly table somewhere on the site. I've seen a few different versions so am just trying a bit of trial and error to see if I get something usable. The third pic shows the wheel set in place and indicates where they should sit when lowered.

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I'm told my router lift has arrived in the country and should be close to reaching my shed by the end of next week. Still haven't convinced myself on the laminex top.