Jim Cricket
Member
Like many professional woodworkers, I was usually too busy with jobs to spend much time on a good workbench, making do with plywood assembly tables, laminate outfeed machine tables, and maybe a bench with a couple of steel vises and power tool storage. When I closed my commercial shop, I decided to finally make a top end bench for myself. In fact, I made two. One for myself, and another, different bench, for the boat shop. I?d like to show my benches here, with the various ideas for work holding, and I?d love to see your benches as well. What kind of cool vises for carving do you use? Show us your shavehorses and specialty fixtures. Work benches have become something of a fad in recent years, sometimes and end in themselves, but I?m interested in the real work horses.
I?ll start with the boat shop bench, which is simpler than my hand tool bench. We needed a sturdy, loooong bench for our 20? x 35? dirt floor work space. The shop itself is just a steel quonset roof over a space between two shipping containers, with framed end walls. We eventually also cut a doorway from the shop into the container that serves as our tool room. When I closed my shop, I sold the big 3 phase stuff, but moved the smaller jointer, planer, and contractor type saw out to the tool room, and set up there.
The bench is set up along one wall of the container. It is 22? deep, and 15 1/2 feet long. I made the top from 2 thicknesses of 1? multiply (baltic birch) vacuum bagged together, with a big half lap to join the two 7-1/2 foot sections together. There is a 2? x 4? ash skirt on the front and two ends, dovetailed at the corners. The legs are fir 4x4 posts, set on concrete footings, and carefully leveled. Here?s how we did it-
A spacer is used to set the post distance from the steel frame of the shipping container, and the footing is poured.
I used a laser to set up the leg heights and wall support at the back.
After marking the heights, I cut the legs to length and notched them to fit the ash apron on the bench. I also cut dog holes in each leg.
The apron front is dovetailed to both ends. I used half blind DT's painful though they were, to avoid end grain at the tail vise. Looks good too. I cut the tails on the bandsaw, and the pins with handsaw, router, and chisel.
As you can see above, the ash skirt is dominoed to the plywood top. Below is the half lap of the two halves of the bench.
And the skirt boards are epoxy glued and clamped.
We installed two steel vises, one on the face, and one on the end as a tail vise. We then drilled dog holes in the top. Below, the bench in use, before dog holes.
Planing a scarf, with dog holes and steel holdfast.
And gluing up 25 foot long chines and sheer clamps, for the Point Comfort 23. That long bench is great!
I'll show my hand tool bench next time. Thanks for looking!
Jim
I?ll start with the boat shop bench, which is simpler than my hand tool bench. We needed a sturdy, loooong bench for our 20? x 35? dirt floor work space. The shop itself is just a steel quonset roof over a space between two shipping containers, with framed end walls. We eventually also cut a doorway from the shop into the container that serves as our tool room. When I closed my shop, I sold the big 3 phase stuff, but moved the smaller jointer, planer, and contractor type saw out to the tool room, and set up there.
The bench is set up along one wall of the container. It is 22? deep, and 15 1/2 feet long. I made the top from 2 thicknesses of 1? multiply (baltic birch) vacuum bagged together, with a big half lap to join the two 7-1/2 foot sections together. There is a 2? x 4? ash skirt on the front and two ends, dovetailed at the corners. The legs are fir 4x4 posts, set on concrete footings, and carefully leveled. Here?s how we did it-
A spacer is used to set the post distance from the steel frame of the shipping container, and the footing is poured.
I used a laser to set up the leg heights and wall support at the back.
After marking the heights, I cut the legs to length and notched them to fit the ash apron on the bench. I also cut dog holes in each leg.
The apron front is dovetailed to both ends. I used half blind DT's painful though they were, to avoid end grain at the tail vise. Looks good too. I cut the tails on the bandsaw, and the pins with handsaw, router, and chisel.
As you can see above, the ash skirt is dominoed to the plywood top. Below is the half lap of the two halves of the bench.
And the skirt boards are epoxy glued and clamped.
We installed two steel vises, one on the face, and one on the end as a tail vise. We then drilled dog holes in the top. Below, the bench in use, before dog holes.
Planing a scarf, with dog holes and steel holdfast.
And gluing up 25 foot long chines and sheer clamps, for the Point Comfort 23. That long bench is great!
I'll show my hand tool bench next time. Thanks for looking!
Jim
