Work Benches
I glued up this top over 2 years ago. It is a little twisted, but not as bad as I remember it. I thought it would be fun to set it on the leg set I just made to see how it looked. Pretty cool I think! This might get me motivated to get going on the bench again. The hard maple top pieces are 1 3/4" wide and 2 1/2" tall. The length is 96" x 27" wide. There will be an apron 5" wide x 1 1/2" thick around the whole perimeter. The Veritas® Twin-Screw Vise will be at one end with bench dog holes matching up with the ones in the Purpleheart inlay. The other end will have a shoulder vise like the one below except I am going to use a threaded wooden screw 1 1/2" diameter.
09/11/05
Well I decided to get started on flattening the bottom of the workbench top. I shimmed it level and sturdy on my out feed table, brad nailed a set of runners to the sides and built a sled to hold the router. I think I need to remove about 3/8" on the bottom to get it flat. I will then take it to The Hardwood Store and have them run it through their wide belt sander to flatten the top parallel to the bottom. This is first on the list. I will buy the lumber for the legs and the apron around the top while I am there.
10/04/05
I have glued up 8 of the 9 sets I need for the leg sets: 2 tops, 2 bottoms, 4 uprights, & 1 thinner upright to support the shoulder vise. It is really nice finally having enough clamps to do more then one glue up at a time.
10/10/05
I have cut all the mortises in the legs and shaped the top and bottom pieces. I also made the cheek cuts in the leg uprights.
10/12/05
I finished cutting the tenons marked out and drilled out the mortises for the stretchers on one leg set. There will be 4 stretchers 1 3/4" wide x 3" tall. I will build a cabinet someday to fit in between the stretchers. I will design it to hold all my hand working tools (planes, chisels, mallets, etc...)
10/13/05
As you can see by the dates I am working on the bench almost every night, from 9: pm till my eyes go cross-eyed. The last 2 pictures before the page break show the bottoms drilled for dowels that will help strengthen the joint. The holes in the tenon are drilled 1/32" high, so when I drive the pin in the mortise it will pull the tenon in very tight. The dowel holes are 7/16" diameter and will be facing out.
The pictures below are before flattening the top.
I need to make 2 temporary work benches. Frank Klausz is doing a weekend class on hand cut dovetails in my workshop the end of October. There will be about 15 people taking the class. I need to a have work benches. I am borrowing 2 tops from the local Woodcraft. The frames are all 1x4's glued together. The stretchers are 2x4's. I will drill through the side frames to bolt the stretchers to the frames. The stretchers are mortised in and the bolts will pull it in tight , but I can take it apart and store the leg sets when I am done. The last picture shows the top I am borrowing . It is 60" x 29.5" x 1.5" thick and 34.5" tall All the pieces are just glued and brad nailed together. The up rights are 3 pieces glued with the middle one longer top and bottom, which forms the tenon that fits in the top and bottoms. The top and bottom are formed with full size outsides, but the middle is 3 different pieces, leaving room as the mortise. This way I did not have to cut M&T joints.
