timber top for steel bench

Has any one have details/pictures of making a timber top with a decent vice attached for a steel frame bench.

Prefer a removable top to allow metalwork to continue.

Gday Eskimo,

You'll find them very hard to find if you mean a woodworking vice for hand work, because for woodworking you don't just need strength but weight on a heavy bench because planing, chopping and even sawing can introduce a lot of lateral force. You also want to minimise vibrations, particularly for sawing and fine work. Wooden joints, particularly if you use a softer wood, will effectively absorb vibrations well. A steel frame which is relatively light, even if very strong and able to handle downward pressure from heavy workloads and drilling, won't be able to stop lateral movement as the whole table will move. If you mentally picture giving a bench a moderate whack with a hammer on the side, a useable bench won't move.

In addition, any top light enough to be removeable is also going to be incompatible with these objectives, because with a quality vice that can hold anything decent, it's going to be either so light it will move around a lot or ****ing heavy!

I'd recommend a style of Stanton Bench - if you google it. Promoted by a good bloke.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Cgcc

Gday Eskimo,

You'll find them very hard to find if you mean a woodworking vice for hand work, because for woodworking you don't just need strength but weight on a heavy bench because planing, chopping and even sawing can introduce a lot of lateral force. You also want to minimise vibrations, particularly for sawing and fine work. Wooden joints, particularly if you use a softer wood, will effectively absorb vibrations well. A steel frame which is relatively light, even if very strong and able to handle downward pressure from heavy workloads and drilling, won't be able to stop lateral movement as the whole table will move. If you mentally picture giving a bench a moderate whack with a hammer on the side, a useable bench won't move.

In addition, any top light enough to be removeable is also going to be incompatible with these objectives, because with a quality vice that can hold anything decent, it's going to be either so light it will move around a lot or ****ing heavy!

I'd recommend a style of Stanton Bench - if you google it. Promoted by a good bloke.

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my steel bench is heavy..made from 4" x 4mm rhs rails top and bottom and 6 legs 50x20 solid bar with supports across the ends... not to mention the crap underneath the top....

I realise the wooden top would need to be heavy but was considering using permanent lifting devices to lift it high above bench when not required....

also didnt want to build a Rubou style only for it to get wrecked or even burnt down when welding and other stuff like that...also didnt really want to toss out a good steel bench...
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I need a bigger shed...did I win lotto last night...I am pretty sure she will let me add on if I did.