workbench top using different wood species

[Billy Trinh]

I've read from some roubo bench users with douglas fir top that the dog holes are easily damaged using holdfasts due to DF being softwood. Have anyone had experience with laminating DF to hard maple front so dog holes can take more abuse? Any major issues with wood movement, flattening? I'm thinking maybe 4" hard maple front. Or if DF all the way is sufficient for (below) average user?
Thanks!
Billy

[Justin Green]

A few of the well known Shaker benches had softwoods for the parts of the top that didn't contain the dog holes and those benches turned out a lot of quality furniture.

[Federico Mena Quintero]

My bench is red cedar, and the holdfasts haven't really damaged the holes. I guess a super-rough shaft could cause the top fibers of a hole to split if you pulled the holdfast carelessly, but it hasn't been a problem. Those split fibers would disappear with the next flattening of the bench, anyway.

[Andrae Covington]

I haven't had any problems with my dog holes, though I did chamfer them and that might help. The front edge of my workbench top has really taken a beating though, splitting off in splinters and shards as DF loves to do. I originally made about a 1/16" chamfer along the front. Then after that got roughed up, 1/8". Then I considered 1/4", but gave up. If I were to build it again, I think I would use something less splintery as the first board, perhaps maple. Short of that, paying attention to the grain direction might have taken care of the problem. See photo below, the rings are running nearly spot-on 45° next to the chamfer; just asking to delaminate. Happy with the DF bench otherwise.

223762

[Marko Milisavljevic]

I am also about to start DF bench, and decided to laminate top and sides with 1" of hard maple - should cost me $35-70 depending on options, and significantly extend the life of the workbench. Haven't decided if I want to laminate the top with flat sawn boards, rift sawn, or to take a 8/4 board that is flat sawn and slice it sideways into 1x2" strips and use that to laminate the top (making it rift sawn top) - I'm still evaluating price vs effort vs performance. Most likely I'll get lazy and use 4/4 rift sawn at about $6.50/bdft locally. If you wait a few weeks I should hopefully have the result to show.

[Paul Saffold]

I've got one under construction now with df 4x4s and white oak for the dog strip. WO might be splintery too on the front edge/corner, but the dog holes should be ok.

[Jim Koepke]

My bench is currently in the stage of one board being rip sawn per day. My thoughts for the front board is a piece of 8/4 maple. I do not look forward to ripping that, but a 12 inch apron also doesn't suit my fancy.

My other thought is to have a separate row of holes for use with holdfasts. The row of holes on my current bench look fine on the top side. Looking underneath most of the holes have split out from using holdfasts. It might be from driving the holdfasts too hard.

As for mixing woods to use tougher woods in areas that get the rougher treatment, it is probably a good idea.

The movement of wood will mostly be across the grain, not the length.

jtk

[Justin Green]

I just picked up a load of 8/4 maple for my bench. I want a 4" top, and the boards are all 5-8" wide. I thought about ripping all of these by hand, and it will take about 13 8' boards to get the width I want. Plus I need to rip the boards for the legs and stretchers, probably 18-20 boards in all, give or take. I wanted to use all hand tools making this bench, but I'm considering using my table saw for this last operation before I sell it, and do the rest with hand tools. That's if my poor little contractor's table saw can handle ripping that much 8/4 maple. If it survives, I'll sell it, lol. Maybe cutting 8/4 maple that's dry will be easier for it than cutting the wet SYP that it is accustomed to sawing. I'm going for a shaker-styled bench, except the top will all be 4" thick.