Question about a "3 piece torsion box"

[Kevin Smira]

All,

I'm in the need of freeing up space in the garage in order to keep the wife happy. I currently have my planer (13" lunchbox) and sander on a flipcart (fixthisbuildthat style). However, I find that the short tables of my planer to be lacking and wanted to make a permanent "planer sled" that slides into the planer and is level, thus giving my much more real estate. However, that doesn't work with my flipcart...surely you know what I'm taking about. That said, since I'm limited on space, I was thinking of making an assembly/layout table that is 24x48 on the top. I had planed on making it a "3 piece" top in that the middle section would be able to rotate around when I needed to use the planer and sander (would put the planer sled on the wall until I needed it). If I was to just make the 24x48 work surface, I would make it torsion box style. Now, I'm thinking I'd make it in 3 pieces. Anyone ever done this or thinks it's a bad idea?

Thanks,
Keivn

[Rich Engelhardt]

I'll be interested in any replies - or better yet pictures - to this since I'm thinking of doing similar with my planer (DW734)

[Jim Becker]

I think the singular issue with a "3 piece torsion box surface" is that you have to work hard to get the major benefit of a torsion box to begin with...a perfectly flat, contiguous work surface. Now if the typical size of your projects will not be effected by the potential of the overall surface not being "perfect", no big deal. And as long as it's reasonably close, it's not going to matter much for wood projects, given they will all move slightly anyway from seasonal effects.