# Workbench - some assembly required.



## frugal (14 May 2015)

I have been away from here for a number of years, in fact I have been away from most forums and social media, but in the meantime I have still been woodworking. One of my problems is that whilst I have a nice big garage for all of the tools and machines, the only surface I have for working with handtools is a Workmate. Which is fine for somethings, but does tend to skitter across the floor as soon as it sees a handplane. Whilst we were on holiday in France last year, we went to a Broconte (French town fair / tractor show / car boot sale) and my wife convinced me to get a hold fast that was going cheap with the comment "now you have to build the bench to go with it".

Well, 6 months later I finally decided to go for it. I had read all of the books (The Workbench by Tolpin; all of Chris Schwarz workbench books), I had watched any number of videos and blogs on workbench builds, I had chosen the size, the shape and the vises that were going to go on it. All I had to do was to summon up the courage to start.

I had decided to go for a Roubo style bench with just a shelf at the bottom. Leg vise on the front and a wagon vise on the end. As I am left handed and as the only feasible spot in the garage is under the window with a wall to the right, I decided to be awkward and put the wagon vise on the left hand side near the front and the leg vise to the right hand end of the front. I am going to break some other rules whilst I am at it: The height will be 36" or so, as I have a bad back and I do not want to bend over too much. I will also be making it 30" deep and 8' long. I am going for 30" deep as I am going to be having cabinets on the walls above the bench, and even shallow cabinets are going to take up some of the depth.

One rule I am going to follow is "make it solid", boy am I following that rule. So the top is going to be 8' long, 30" wide and 4" thick ash, made from 17 1.75" thick boards laminated together. The legs are going to be 6"x5", made up of three boards laminated together. I only intend to make one bench, so I am going to do it right.

So bonus time rolled around this year and I got ready. I knew that my little DW733 thicknesser was not going to cut it, and I would also need a planer, so I splashed out on a AW106PT2 planer/thicknesser from Axminster, and a AT3202FDP floor standing pillar drill. I also ordered a wagon vise and a wooden vise screw from Richard Maguire. The wood was all english ash apart from the vise chop, deadman and breadboards which are Cherry. All of the wood was from Interesting Timbers. 31cu.ft of Ash and 2cu.ft cherry. That hurt the wallet.







I have to say, after picking up most of my stash from auction, the wood from Interesting Timbers was gorgeous. They asked for my cut list and pulled the boards themselves (their yard is only open Mon-Fri and I work full time so I could not go to see them). For reference in the photo, the ruler is 24" long. Most of the ash boards were 16-18" wide, and they were all 12' long. So from each board I was able to get a couple of the 8' bench top pieces, and a couple of the leg pieces.

In fact the wood was so clean and so wide and I recalculated how much I would need. I was expecting to get 2" boards that would be thicknessed down to 1.75", however all of the 2" thick stock was actually 2.25" and so flat that after thicknessing it was still 2 1/8" thick. It was also so wide that I was able to thicken the top from 4" to 5.5", and still have a full board left over as well as a large number of good sized off cuts.

As these boards were all too big to move by myself, I roughed them out with the circular saw on the driveway and moved the smaller planks into the garage.

So now I have 15 8'x5.5"x2" boards for the top; 9 3'x9"x1" board for the bottom shelf; 12 3'x6"x2" boards to laminate up into legs, and some 3" thick stock for the stretchers between the legs.

Unfortunately I also worked out how much this is going to weigh, and it comes in at something over 300lbs...


----------



## frugal (14 May 2015)

First thing to do after roughing everything to size was to sticker and stack it whilst I went off and made up some sawhorses / trestles. Otherwise I was going to have nothing to build this behemoth on. Chris Schwarz has a nice plan for his $5.87 saw horse which is strong and simple to build. Obviously Americans get their wood much cheaper than we do, because even with cheap construction grade pine, they came in at a lot more than $5.87 each...

However I now have a work surface to start on. The planks for the benchtop have been stacked on top, and the rest has been put away underneath. I know have room to move around in the garage again.






The planks have been sorted for quality, with the best reserved for the front of the bench, and the least nice looking ones consigned to the back. Each board was then numbered on the end to keep track of them. 

As each board is 8'x5.5"x2" they weight a considerable amount, so I am afraid here is where I cheated for the first time: Ash bends nicely (it is used for longbows after all), so I was not as worried about making the boards completely flat along their 8' length, so long as they were reasonably flat and the two 5" faces were parallel then I could get away with it. Especially if I used all of the currently glued up boards as a former. This is after all a workbench, not a piece of fine furniture. I do not care if all of the boards are flat, just that the top and the final front edge of the bench is flat and true.

I did go to quite a bit of trouble to ensure that the top edge was 90 degrees to the two faces however and that it was flat along it's length. Otherwise I would have far too much clean up to do at the end. Each board got it's number written on the face, along with an arrow indicating which way as up and 'wall' written on the side that was to face the wall. I need as many clues as possible to stop getting confused during glue ups 





I also decided to use splines to help strengthen the laminations and also to help alignment. I used 22m thick pine battens that were salvaged from the wall our plumber needed to take out earlier in the year. ripped into 8mmx22mm splines (because I had an 8mm straight bit for the router). The Axminster thicknesser was a godsend for this, as the readout gauge is accurate to 0.1mm, so I was able to get a nice snug fit for the splines.

I laminated boards 1 and 2 together, and then 3 and 4 (but I also had 1 and 2 in the clamps to ensure that the new pair aligned with the first pair). Then I glued the two pairs together. Then I realised that a lamination of 4 boards gave me something 8'x5.5"x8", which is heavy, really heavy. I managed to lift it to get it through the thicknesser, but I decided that I would restrict myself to 3 board laminations from then on.

So 5,6 and 7 got laminated (using the first 4 in the clamps as well as a former), then thicknessed to the same 138mm thick as 1-4 (yes I chop and change between metric and imperial as the mood suits me, I know I am weird). Then 8, 9, and 10. 






It is a bit difficult to see in the image, but the board "11 wall" has the splines placed into the grooves, and board "10" has the matching grooves as these boards await dry fitting. All of the routing was done with the edge guide for the router referenced off of the top edge. Oh yeah, I might have also accidently bought a new Makita 1/2" router to do this project as my little 15 year old Trend T5 was not going to be able to keep up.

At this point I am still waiting for the vise hardware. I have the instructions that they kindly emailed me in advance, but as I need to put the wagon vise on the wrong end of the bench I am not sure how far back from the front I need to put the handle, so I am loathe to do any more laminations until I can look at the actual hardware.

So the current state of play is that I have one lamination of boards 1-4, one lamination of boards 5-7, one larger lamination of 8-12 (which has been made up of two smaller laminations that were individually thicknessed to the same 138mm). I have three more planks to laminate. One of them I know needs to be taken down to 41-43mm thick from it's current 53mm based on the vise instructions, however I do not know if it needs to be the second or third board back from the front at the moment...

I have also realised that I need much more glue, as I have already gone through nearly 2 litres of the stuff do to the large surface area.


----------



## dzj (14 May 2015)

That's going to be one well made bench. And good looking too!
It is commendable that you chose to laminate the top and not make it out of a single slab (like some people out there).
I imagine the breadboards will be more of an aesthetic thing, as I doubt that such a thick benchtop will need
any help staying flat.
Keep the photos coming!


----------



## Ed Bray (14 May 2015)

Very enjoyable WIP to date. Keep the images coming, looking forward to seeing the end result.


----------



## Woodmonkey (14 May 2015)

Blimey let's hope you never have to move it once it's built!


----------



## frugal (14 May 2015)

dzj":3vpkw10v said:


> That's going to be one well made bench. And good looking too!
> It is commendable that you chose to laminate the top and not make it out of a single slab (like some people out there).
> I imagine the breadboards will be more of an aesthetic thing, as I doubt that such a thick benchtop will need
> any help staying flat.



I can only imagine the laughter that would come from the timber yard if I asked for a 30" wide 5" thick single slab  You could probably get away with 2 15" wide slabs, but you would need to yard to cut it to order from the trunk as I doubt they would ever cut 5" thick stock as standard. Plus 5 years waiting for it to dry is more time than I am willing to wait 

The other advantage of laminating up the top is that I can use quartersawn stock. As the planks were so wide and were mainly from the centre of the tree, once I ripped them into 5" wide planks, they were pretty much quartersawn.

I am not sure how much effect the breadboards will have on the flatness of the top, but they will at least stop me from chipping bits out of the end grain. I am also going to have the breadboards in Cherry, mainly because I can, and it will add an accent to the bench. Plus I really like cherry, but I could not justify the cost of making the whole thing from cherry ;(


----------



## frugal (14 May 2015)

Woodmonkey":bd5delbd said:


> Blimey let's hope you never have to move it once it's built!



The removal men were less than impressed when I demanded they move the 7' long 18" diameter yew trunk when we moved in 7 years ago  It is still stood up in one corner of the workshop waiting for me to figure out what I am going to do with it...

If we ever move, then with the lathe, planer/thicknesser, flood standing pillar drill, bandsaw, wall full of wood stash etc, the garage removal may cost as much as the rest of the house


----------



## dzj (14 May 2015)

frugal":18pujkar said:


> I can only imagine the laughter that would come from the timber yard if I asked for a 30" wide 5" thick single slab  You could probably get away with 2 15" wide slabs, but you would need to yard to cut it to order from the trunk as I doubt they would ever cut 5" thick stock as standard. Plus 5 years waiting for it to dry is more time than I am willing to wait



I was poking a bit of fun at the crazy Americans who made such benches from single oak slabs. 
5 years for it to dry? Maybe more. Some people argue that such slabs never really dry.


----------



## Strap (14 May 2015)

Most benches seem to have laminate top which has many advantage. Because of timber cost, I use a 1 inch laminate layer on top of three layers of mdf. It works great but is definitely not to be moved to offen.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


----------



## frugal (14 May 2015)

The legs for this bench will be 6"x6", and will be laminated up from 3 6"x2" planks. Where they need to attach to the bench top I am going to use mortice and tenon joints that are pegged through from the front for added support. 

1 - Given that I will be laminating the leg, should I just make the middle lamination 2" longer and declare that to be my tenon:





2 - Or is a single 2" tenon not a great option for a 6" wide leg, and should I use the inner edge of the outer laminates as a twin tenon:





3 - Or should I just make a massive tenon from the whole piece:





Or does it really not matter given the weight of the top and the fact that they are going to be pegged?


----------



## marcros (14 May 2015)

i would do the first option.


----------



## Sgian Dubh (14 May 2015)

frugal":1qa48vwi said:


> The legs for this bench will be 6"x6", and will be laminated up from 3 6"x2" planks. Where they need to attach to the bench top I am going to use mortice and tenon joints that are pegged through from the front for added support.
> 
> 1 - ... should I just make the middle lamination 2" longer and declare that to be my tenon:
> 
> ...


None of the above. The top is heavy enough on its own, and with the leg structure an integral part of the whole it makes it all rather cumbersome to manoeuvre in and out of spaces, which could be a challenge for moving in the future. I think you'd be better off making the under-frame a separate item to which the top drops on, perhaps located onto the frame with a couple of dowels, and maybe a screw or two to lock it in place.

I suggest two end frames that comprise the two legs M&Td into a front to back spanning foot with a similar top rail, reminiscent of refectory tables. Then connect the two end frames with a wide stretcher (150 - 180 mm wide) front and back, set about knee height or a bit lower. You could make these KD with a stub tenon or similar at either end. Near the top and bottom edge of each stretcher run a groove for two pieces of 6 or 8 mm rod threaded at either end to accept a large washer and nuts. The rod passes through holes bored into the leg so the whole shebang can be locked together. I think that arrangement would be more than sturdy enough, and I suspect you could also reduce the leg size to about 90 - 100 mm square too. Slainte.


----------



## frugal (14 May 2015)

Richard, 

The legs are not going to be all that supports the top, there will be a pair of long and short stretchers about 4-6" off the ground. The theory being that when the top swells and shrinks it makes the H frame more of an A frame which should tighten up the joinery. The stretchers will also support the shelf at the bottom.






I was going to use M&T joinery throughout, but also drawbore the joints for added strength. I am not planning for this bench to come apart at any point. If we ever need to move house then I will pay some strong blokes with a big truck to move it


----------



## condeesteso (14 May 2015)

Excellent... not frugal but a great bench. You will enjoy the RM bits, the wagon vice is a gem. Pleased to see flush front.
Very deep at 30", everything is personal taste though. Are you left-handed? I ask because the norm is face vice to left end. But a while ago I did a bench that happened to have a Record 52 (7") as the tail vice, and I found myself using that a lot as a sub for the face vice. I'm sure I'd be happy with the face vice at right-hand end (I'm right-handed).
Also, the planing stop - I put one in my current bench (quite like yours except 20" deep) and never use it. Chris Schwarz said to put one in so I did - it seems to me it would be more useful placed somewhere else. For long boards (6' say) I place the stock against a dog. It's the only bit I don't use - i put a deadman in thinking I may as well, and I use it a lot - really good.
I'm may be missing the trick about planing stops, but I manage  
I'll look forward to seeing progress.


----------



## Phil Pascoe (14 May 2015)

I've got eight steel brackets holding the two pieces on the top down. Saved a load of time and effort and works perfectly well. I screwed the brackets to the frame with the frame upside down on top of the two 11" x 3"s with a piece of thick card between the wood and the bracket so as to ensure they pulled down dead. As long as the top is fixed down dead, why do all the work? It's easy to dismantle, as well, which is good because it's been moved four times.


----------



## Roughcut (15 May 2015)

I would go for option number 1.
As this offers simplicity in creating and laminating the tenon without the extra work of actually having to cut the joint.
It will also make the mortice easy to create in the bench top by using the same laminating process.


----------



## frugal (15 May 2015)

Dougals, 

I agree that 30" is deeper than normally advised, but I am planning to have some cabinets on the walls above the bench which will effectively bring the wall in by 6" or so. You can just see the bottom of the window in the second photo, I have been using the window sill as tool storage whilst I work and I have not had any issues reaching over to the window to pick up items, so I think I will be OK with the width.

The vise configuration was driven partly by being left handed, but also by the fact that the only feasible location for the bench is under the window, which means that it has a wall behind it, and a wall to the right. Being left handed give me an advantage in this particular case as I can plane towards the wall. There will be an 18" overhang at either end of the bench, so I will have plenty of room to stop before I run into the wall.

I was not planning on putting a planing stop in as it look like something to bang my hip on  Based on the feedback about the holding strength of a wood screw leg vise I am not anticipating the work piece moving in the vise. If I do find it to be a problem then I could always retrofit one at a later date.


----------



## wcndave (15 May 2015)

By the way, the Maguire leg vice does not use a pin mechanism, rather a steel rod at a slight angle. (At least the wooden leg vice screw that I got from Richard did)

I built almost the exact same thing, split top.

wip-another-roubo-t80579-45.html

Pictures there of leg vice.

I did mortice and tenon on the legs, however as I managed to make each from two pieces, I did sort of the 3rd option. Again there are photos somewhere in my thread.


----------



## frugal (15 May 2015)

Very nice looking bench!

Unfortunately Richard no longer sells the steel rod and bushing as part of a leg vise kit, you can only buy the vise screw by itself. I am going to try to make my own and I have a 20mm stainless steel linear shaft and a 20mm linear bearing that I will fit into the leg to act as the bottom pin. If it all goes horribly wrong I can still make a cut out for a standard sliding pinned board instead.


----------



## Sgian Dubh (15 May 2015)

frugal":3jtq7z39 said:


> If we ever need to move house then I will pay some strong blokes with a big truck to move it)


I guess you'll need those strong blokes if ever you move it! I recognise the bench type now, having seen the style elsewhere, mostly on American forums and the like. The design isn't one I'd replicate exactly if I wanted to make that style of bench, along with the various vises and other accessories. I can see a way to adapt the design into a two part construction, a top and a leg set, which would make it easier to move about if required; and there'd be no loss of functionality either, as far as I can tell.

I'm sure the end result will be a fine bench to work on, so I hope the construction goes well, even if shifting the darned thing from time to time is rather, er, challenging, ha, ha. Slainte.


----------



## wcndave (15 May 2015)

Even with the mortise and tenon you can still separate the top. The mortises help hold it very square, with no racking, however I screwed the rails to the top with carriage bolts so I can take it off. I also made the end cap with doevtails, again not glued. The idea is I can remove the end cap, take the top off, and pass the two pieces through a planer / thicknesser if I ever need to. Granted you'd need big machines, but I know some wooden house building companies here that have them. To be fair, I actually flattened the top by hand anyway at the end, as it was less trouble, however I have the option. The mortises in the legs do add a lot, even unglued in terms of preventing any racking.

Frugal, do you know why Richard no longer sells the bar? You may struggle to make one as good, as the shaft is extremely smooth with about 200 ball bearings, and has very tight tolerances indeed.

Even so I found it a struggle to get it to run smoothly like in Richard's video. I can get it smooth, however then tightening the garter on the wooden screw makes the action rather stiff. The vice does the job perfectly, just quite stiff to wind it.

If he stopped making because it was too difficult to get working, you may want to rethink. However I do enjoy not having to move a pin around.

Have you seen Mark Spagnolo's Roubo build? very detailed videos, a good 4-5 hours in total I'd say.


----------



## frugal (15 May 2015)

I am not sure why Rickard is no longer selling the whole leg vise any more. It might have been that he was getting too many questions about the fitting. He does seem to still fit them to the workbenches that he sells, so he must still get on with the concept. I know that he was experimenting with a St Peters Cross type arrangement according to his blog in 2013, but nothing seems to have come of it.

The kind of linear bearing I am using is one of these: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/121162005472? ... EBIDX%3AIT which sounds very similar to the kind you have.


----------



## wcndave (15 May 2015)

frugal":392fdf1z said:


> The kind of linear bearing I am using is one of these: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/121162005472? ... EBIDX%3AIT which sounds very similar to the kind you have.



Looks right!


----------



## DTR (15 May 2015)

I do enjoy a good bench build, keep it up 

For what it's worth, I put a leg vice on my bench with the traditional pinned guide, and I don't find moving the pin an inconvenience in the slightest.


----------



## wcndave (15 May 2015)

DTR":2sxe3tg3 said:


> I do enjoy a good bench build, keep it up
> 
> For what it's worth, I put a leg vice on my bench with the traditional pinned guide, and I don't find moving the pin an inconvenience in the slightest.



It's a first world problem for sure ;-)

Try a bench where you don't have to though, and you quickly get used to it!

I still need to do the sliding deadman on mine, and the centre strip, however now it's usable, I am using it, kitchen build still ongoing!


----------



## frugal (16 May 2015)

What I will be doing this weekend is ordering some new planer blades, and sending these ones off to be sharpened. Who knew that planing 320' of kiln dried hardwood would dull a set of blades  I also have to take the 11 sacks of shavings to the tip (I have already taken 5 sacks). 

When I was cleaning up the planks for the legs the planer started to really struggle, whereas before it would plow through the wood with ease. There was a noticeable point last night where it tipped over from sharp to blunt.

I still have my venerable old DW733 to pick up the slack in the meantime for thicknessing duties. I am also going to have to work away for a couple of days this week which will cut into my garage time severely ;(


----------



## frugal (16 May 2015)

Why is it always on Friday evening that you need something by mail order. Anyway, the blades are ordered, and as Axminster are still doing their £1 delivery I did not feel the need to top up the order to £50 (I know I am going to crack need to try waterstones for sharpening at some point, but not today).

Whilst I am waiting for the vise hardware to arrive so that I can finish the top, I decided to start on the undercarriage. First thing is the legs as they need laminating. I have decided to go with Option 1 above as it makes my life easier. 

Each of the 12 pieces (4 legs @ 3 pieces each) had one face and one edge planed true. Then the other wide face was thicknessed to take it down to 50mm thick. On on end of the board I trued it up by scribing around with a marking knife and a square and then planing it down with a block plane. Most of the ends were only a mm or 2 out so it was not too bad. The knife line gave a crisp place to stop. For a couple of the boards that were really out, I scribed the line 1/4" down the leg and put it through the bandsaw first to get it roughly right, otherwise I was going to be there all night with a block plane 

Even though the bench top is not yet complete, it already makes a much better work surface and clamping surface than the workmate:






I am going to break another workbench "rule" and have the bench height at 36". I am going to be doing a mixture of power and hand tools so I do not need to have the bench low to take advantage of body weight as much. Plus I have a bad back, so bending over that much will probably do me more harm than good. If I ever decide to I can always lower the bench by cutting an inch or so off the bottom of the legs.

I am never quite convinced that the bandsaw I have is not going to wander, or make a curved cut on thick pieces. So when it came to cutting the leg to the 31" length, I used this as an excuse to try the technique of sawing a joint by keeping an eye on two faces at all times and rotating the piece. It turned out pretty well for my first attempt, it is certainly good enough for something that is going to be stood on the floor. (the photo is straight off of the saw cut).






I did also have to take a trip to the tip today to get rid of the next 11 bags of shavings (making it 16 in total for this project):





I ran out of the clear Axminster bags, so I had to resort to bin bags  I am also glad that I have modded my chip extractor into the FrankenExtractor by raising it up and sticking a black bin as a pre-filter. It was supposed to be a Phein-baffle, but I didn't make it very well, and I was spending all of my time unclogging the pre-filter (which kind of invalidates having it somewhat). I removed the bottom plate from the filter and it is a lot better behaved. It does not do a graceful circular vortex to drop the shavings all around the edges, rather it dumps then straight down, but there is still very little getting into the actual extractor bag (ignore the full bag in the photo, it was almost that full when I started:






The last two of the legs are now clamped up to cure overnight. Then I need to trim them to length and ensure that they are still true to the front show face. I will leave that until I get the new planer knives as it will be a lot easier to use the planer fence than it will be to get a 3' long 6" wide face exactly 90 degrees to the front face.

Next will be the long and short stretchers, which will need to be roughed out and cut to length.


----------



## marcros (16 May 2015)

i found the suggested heights in the books way too low too, so you are not alone.

It all depends on what works for you. On the odd occasion you do need a low bench, you can always make a step


----------



## DTR (17 May 2015)

+1, my last bench was 34" high, but I built the Mk2 at 36"


----------



## Graham Orm (17 May 2015)

Wow, it's looking superb. I've seen ocean going ships built on smaller benches! That thing won't skitter anywhere!


----------



## DiscoStu (17 May 2015)

I worked out that 105cm was an ideal height for me. I came to the by standing up and putting my hands at a comfortable working position and then measured the height.


----------



## Phil Pascoe (17 May 2015)

I made mine 3" higher than the maximum I thought I needed and left room enough under the bottom rail to cut them down if need be. I never did.


----------



## frugal (17 May 2015)

Work has stopped today as we need to take down the shed before the wallers turn up next week to backfill the slope under it. And by take down I mean push gently until it falls over.

In the mean time i have been looking at the cherry that i am going to be using for breadboards and the vise chop. It was intended to provide a nice contrast to the ash, but at the moment it is very pale. I have been reading how to darken cherry. The general consensus is to leave it in the sun for a day or two, so I am trying a sample with one of the breadboards. I will compare it at the end of the day with a control board that has been kept in the garage.






I just need to remember to take it in tonight


----------



## John15 (17 May 2015)

I recently raised my bench height from 880mm to 920mm and now find it easier to work at (I'm 5' 10"). I may even raise it a bit more.

John


----------



## DiscoStu (17 May 2015)

I'm 6'2" and found 105cm to be good. It did also mean txt my table saw fitted under the bench on its casters so I just wheel it out when required.


----------



## frugal (17 May 2015)

The cherry was out for 6 hours or so in weather that alternated between sun and clouds. When I took it back into the garage there was no noticeable difference to the control board.


----------



## wcndave (18 May 2015)

I think it needs to be in sun for quite a while, it changes colour over months rather than a day...

I did my bench at 90cm which is perfect for me for sanding, routing etc, and still good for planing (I'm 6'2"), i tried 105 with a 1" board on top and it seemed like I would be holding tools in mid air, very high indeed. (seem to be mixing imperial and metric at will now!)

One thing to note, is the height of other tools, I was planning to make my table same height as table saw, as it's position means any board longer than 1.5m will go over the bench. In the end I decided that it was just too low, however it does mean that now I can't cut anything longer than 1.5m on table saw. I generally use track saw for large pieces anyway, however I had to do some 2m boards and it was a pain having the bench "in the way".

Final note, as you're doing your undercarriage first, make sure you assemble the rails/stretchers before you make and cut the mortises in the top, and make sure you work out whether the second leg will impact nay dog hole. The leg vice is kind of fixed position, but I ended up with the other end impacting 2 dogs that had already been cut into the laminated top, as it was being laminated. So I had to make cut outs in leg to access dog hole to pop dogs out.

Kind if thing I tend not to think about until too late, and one only builds one of these!


----------



## Woodmonkey (20 May 2015)

These bits of cherry are from the same board, one piece freshly planed and the other has been sat in the workshop for a couple of months


----------



## nathandavies (20 May 2015)

a week or two and cherry will change considerably, I found out by leaning half a veneered sheet against a full sheet. pipper


----------



## frugal (23 May 2015)

Not much progress this week. The new planer knives arrived, so I fitted them last night, and then spent ages getting the out feed table at the right height. Obviously the jig they give you with the planer to set the knife height is different to the one they use in the factory, so the knife height was slightly different than before. But all is good now.

I did spend some time this afternoon cleaning up and truing the legs. So now I have 4 identical legs which are actually square and true, so I must be getting better at this woodwork lark...

I also planned and thicknessed the stretchers for the base. Unfortunately the 3" thick ash for the long stretcher had a horrible distortion around a branch mark. So once I cleaned them up, one of them was down to just over 2". I shall put that one at the back and keep the 3" thick one for the front where it will need to act as a support for the deadman and the shelf, whereas the back one only needs to support the shelf.

I did decided to stop and have a think before starting to cut mortices in the legs. I need to double check the plans to see just how the front stretcher needs to he shaped to act as both shelf and deadman support. I would hate to try to figure that out after I have put it all together.

I also got an email on Thursday saying that my vises were going to be posted "by the end of the week" which i presume means that they will get taken to the post office today and hopefully means that I should have them by the end of the week. Then I can get the benchtop finished.


----------



## Jacob (23 May 2015)

frugal":149nb7i1 said:


> .....
> I was going to use M&T joinery throughout, but also drawbore the joints for added strength.......


The point of draw boring isn't to add strength it's to pull together pieces which are difficult to cramp, which won't be a prob in your case as everything is rectangular, so I wouldn't bother if I were you. Just as likely to weaken the joint - if the pin gets bent or the sides of the tenon hole get knocked out of shape, but it's the glue and wedges which do it.


----------



## frugal (2 Jun 2015)

Not much work over the past week due to one thing and another. The builders are turning up tomorrow to start ripping conifer fence out and putting a dry stone wall in, so we spent the whole of last weekend getting the garden ready and removing raised beds where the new shed is going to go.

On the brighter side, the vises turned up yesterday. 2-3 weeks for delivery turned into 12, but they certainly seem to be worth the wait. Although they were expensive, they are still a lot cheaper than importing Benchcraft vises which seem to be the only equivalent.







My daughter's first words when she saw the wooden vise screw and nut was: "Are you sure that's not Thor's hammer?!?"

My wife's comment was: "they are beautifully finished for something that will be hidden inside the bench."

The screw is about 3" wide and about 2' long. The nut itself is 3"x3.5"x8". I no longer feel that I have over engineered the legs at 6"x6" 






The garter is glass smooth. I may at some point in the future replace the handle and end caps with an ash handle and cherry end caps, but for the moment I am looking to get the top finished as soon as possible.






The wagon vise is a thing of beauty. It has nearly 18" of travel and the table slides along the rails very smoothly. Again, at some point after this is all finished I may well replace the walnut handle with a cherry one to match the rest of the bench.

Now that I have seen the vise in the flesh, I have decided that I will indeed 2 planks in front of the dog holes as the handle is slightly offset to the right (the front as it will be on my bench). This will put the dog holes a little further back from the front of the bench than I would like. This will put them about 120mm from the front of the bench to the centre of the dog hole. Having a quick play with a plane and holding a work piece down with a clamp at this point, it seems to be ok.


----------



## wcndave (5 Jun 2015)

I have the exact same wagon vice installed on right hand side and it's 4cm to the dog hole strip. If you wanted for example to work on chamfering some ten cm panel frames, you need to be closer to the edge. Would you like some pictures of my install?


----------



## TheWizardofOdds (20 Jul 2016)

I've really enjoyed this WiP, did you finish the bench? I'd love to see the end result.


----------

