Suspended workbench

I've recently made out work bench top with a subframe of 70x35 pine and 6mm plywood top, it's 3m long and 1.2m wide and about weighs 100kg maybe.

So here's my dilemma. I will be using occasionally when setting big epoxy river tables. So it's taking up way to much valuable space.

So I need to suspend it from my tin shed roof haha. How would you safely and affordably achieve this?

I've already got 4 eye bolts in each corner of the workbench. I've experimented with 2 dual pulleys (attached to shed cross beams at each end) and ropes. It was extremely difficult and strenuous to say the least haha.

Has anyone done or thought about doing this that could give me some insight?

Cheers Brady!

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Lets start with your roof, is it trusses, better still, can you post a couple of photos of the inside of your shed showing roof construction and walls.
If you have eye bolts then that's approx 25kg each eye bolt and 50kg each "'beam'" providing your estimate of weight is accurate.
Subject to roof construction, you could purchase a boat winch and mount to a wall and using the pulleys winch up with that, just make sure you either padlock the handle or remove and lock away so there is no chance of someone either child or nosey friend plays with it.

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Originally Posted by bradyofdoom

I've recently made out work bench top with a subframe of 70x35 pine and 6mm plywood top, it's 3m long and 1.2m wide and about weighs 100kg maybe.

So here's my dilemma. I will be using occasionally when setting big epoxy river tables. So it's taking up way to much valuable space.

Has anyone done or thought about doing this that could give me some insight?

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Hi Brady

some years ago I built something similar as a kayak building table.
In my case the "bench" is about 10 mm thick, 4.5 metres long and 800 wide and it's supported by just screwing the top to 2, 4x2s. For a 1200 wide bench I would have used 3, 4x2s, and 2 x 1.5m sheets of ply. In turn the 4x2s are supported by 3 portal frames stiffened with 10 mm ply gussets. The ply gussets were salvaged from the off cuts from the top. All up the top weighs less than 50 kg.

So based on that experience, I suggest you
1. re-make the "bench" so that table top is removable.
2. you only need 3 portal frames to support the top.
3. the stiffness comes from the braced portal frames placed under the bench top, not the top itself.

I can dismantle / reassemble my boat bench in about 30 mins.

As Ray says it all depends on the roof structure being up to the task. Hinged against the wall may be a better option.
Regards
John

Hi Brady,
I recently purchased a canopy for my ute which I have suspended from the roof of my shed for the same reason as you, I don't want to use it all the time. I measured the distance between trusses = 4 meters and using a bevel guage measured the angle on the apex of the truss. A piece of 32 x 3mm square tube was cut to just over 4m and the ends were modified so that when two pieces of 50 x 50 x 3 mm angle were welded on, the tube was perpendicular to the vertical. Photo 3 might give you the idea. Laying the tube on its back I welded a length of 6mm round bar either end to the underside then forced a short piece of 25 x 25 square between the rod and tube at the centre point and welded it to the tube. This is to limit the sag under load. Photo 2 shows this. I'll now refer to this as a beam.
The next part you need a helper because the roof is higher than the beam is long. Tying a rope on either end and passing over each truss I put one end of the beam up as far as possible and got helper to hold it up while I went up the ladder and tied it off. Then pulled the other end of the beam up as high as possible and tied that rope off. Back up the ladder and lifted and slid the beam over the apex of the truss and retied the rope. Then up the ladder at the other truss and lifted and slipped the beam over the apex. Clear as mud?
My son gave me a 1 tonne chain block he wasn't using but you can pick them up for very little on gumtree, rigged to the beam as photo 2 shows and all works well. The ute canopy is no where near as heavy as your bench but I'd have no qualms with swinging 100kgs off this rig. Having said that it did take me a day or two to get used to walking underneath it.
Cheers,
Geoff.

Thanks for all your replies. Here's some photos to give you a better understanding.

There's not enough room to hinge off a wall. I can't make it dismantable because it's got I thin layer of HDPE plastic over the whole thing.

The distance between trusses is exactly 3m which is very handy! I've thought about using a manual boat winch and same pulley and rope system modified so all four ropes meet a central steel cable but when lowering the table I'm lead to believe the gear ratio changes to 1:1.https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...0a23e417a6.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...1a52a624cb.jpg

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Thanks for photos, no problem for that roof to hold max 100kg, the bloke that screwed the roof down and fitted the ridge cap was probably 75-80kg point load on the roof, I assume you also have 2 pulleys on the opposite side of the roof so an average boat winch will work very well.

Being a trafficable roof gives you some extra load capacity. Mind you, too much load and it becomes a non trafficable roof. May be a good idea to lower bench top to the floor if you need to go onto the roof for any reason.