Bench Update

[Doug Shepard]

Well like everything I start, this took 5 times longer than I estimated to complete but it's finally done (well 99% anyway). First I'd like to thank everybody who helped answer questions I had along the way with this. I'm tempted to list them, but I just know I'd forget and insult somebody, so I'm going to chicken out and say THANKs again - you know who you are.

The construction is pretty much following Sam Blasco's bench on this thread
http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=22081
Things Sam forget to mention though:
1) I make this look easy
2) You're an idiot if you try this without a honkin big vacuum press bag like I have
3) Having a big slider TS sure beats trying to trim that top with a circular saw.
4) I make this look easy

This ended up at 28x78. The thickness was originally meant to be 4". The top is (from the bottom up) 2 horizontal layers of 1/2" ply, 1 layer of 1" vertically laminated ply, 1 horiz. layer of 1/2" ply, then 1-1/2" of vertically laminated ply. The bottom 2 layers and top 2 layers were glued up separately, run through a wide belt sander, then those 2 slabs were glued together. The LH 2/3rds of the top ended up with a crown in the middle so more flattening with a router sled on rails was needed. That and the wide belt sanding made for a final thickness of around 3-5/8".

The vertically laminated layers were done using yellow glue to glue 5-6 layers of ply - the most I could do and be able to cut it on the TS. Then those were cut on the TS to form sub-sections of the 2 vert. layers. After those were all formed, epoxy was used to glue those together while also glueing them down to the horizontal layer(s) beneath.

The hardwood edging, and vise jaws are purpleheart. Not the funnest stuff to work with, but I wanted something darker to contrast with the ply. Of the locally available options in 8/4, the PH ended being one of the better prices. It's glued to the ply core with epoxy. The area around the Tucker vise also has #14-4" screws through the PH as well. It seemed prudent for supporting the 50 Lb vise weight.

The rear rail underneath is a piece of Macacuaba I pulled from my No-Kill Wood Shelter.

Noden Adjust-A-Bench leg hardware underneath which I'm already enjoying. It made for much more comfortable working heights as I completed finessing and finishing the top. The caster set rolls extremely well too. Maybe I'll mount some masts and sails in the dogholes and take the bench for a spin around the neighborhood this summer:D

Bison leather jaw liners for the Twinscrew picked up on eBay around 1/4" thick.

I wanted to be able to keep longer work flush with the bench front which is why the Tucker vise is mounted in that setback. An LV Surface Clamp in the dogholes on the front edge works to hold the opposite end.

Still need to finish up a couple of things but probably wont get to them for a couple of weeks.
-Finish touchup in a couple spots
-Easing the dog hole edges
-Drilling dog holes in the Twinscrew jaw
-A tiny bit more shimming underneath for the UHMW rub strips

874878748587486

[rick fulton]

Wow Doug, it looks great.
Sounds like it is well built also.
Should last you a couple of lifetimes. ;-)
Must weight a few pounds. Any Idea how much?

[Doug Shepard]

Rick
I tried to guesstimate the weight a few months ago based on the vise weights, leg panels weights, purpleheart weight, and ply weight. Seems like 500-600 LBs as best as I can come up with.

[Gary Herrmann]

Wow, Doug - your bench looks great. I may have to read through Sam's original post. That seems like a good idea for a top.

Excellent job.

[Chuck Nickerson]

Noden, Tucker, and Twin screw? Fantastic! When does a cabinet go underneath?

I've got my Noden and Tucker. This weekend I order the Twin screw. In several months I should catch up.

Chuck

[michael osadchuk]

"The construction is pretty much following Sam Blasco's bench on this thread
http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=22081
Things Sam forget to mention though:
1) I make this look easy
2) You're an idiot if you try this without a honkin big vacuum press bag like I have
3) Having a big slider TS sure beats trying to trim that top with a circular saw.
4) I make this look easy

This ended up at 28x78. The thickness was originally meant to be 4". The top is (from the bottom up) 2 horizontal layers of 1/2" ply, 1 layer of 1" vertically laminated ply, 1 horiz. layer of 1/2" ply, then 1-1/2" of vertically laminated ply."


Doug,
.....You're saying that while Sam used 3 horizontal layers of ply and one layer of "vertically oriented plywood laminations", you went one better and used TWO layers of "vertically oriented plywood laminations".......

You wouldn't happen to have a count of the number of separate pieces of wood that went into the benchtop......

from Despair.com, I bestow upon you their achievement award:
"You can do anything you set your mind to when you have vision, determination, and an endless supply of expendable labor"
(I realize that this is probably a good description of the
"time management" orientation of we amateur woodworkers .)

It's a beautiful creation but please consider a more conventional construction for any assembly table you have in mind (smiley)

congratulations (I think)

michael

[Doug Shepard]

...
Doug,
.....You're saying that while Sam used 3 horizontal layers of ply and one layer of "vertically oriented plywood laminations", you went one better and used TWO layers of "vertically oriented plywood laminations".......



Well I dunno - one better or one worse??:eek::D
I briefly considered going completely vertical until I traded an email or 2 with Sam and he reminded me that I'd probably want the horizontal underneath for screwholding. He was the one that mentioned maybe going with alternating layers, but it wasn't until I made up my mind that I also wanted some screws into the core around the Tucker area that cinched it. Those are located to go into that internal vertical layer so that the screws are going into face grain for better holding.
I'm not sure how many pieces, but the 2nd vertical layer was only really extra work from the standpoint of gluing the bigger assembly. When I laminated together the sub-sections for the plies for the verticals I did them with yellow glue around 3" thick, and wide enough to cut a strip off for both the 1" and 1-1/2" layers, then flipped them over on their sides (edge-up). So making the sub-sections wasn't that much additional work.

[Greg Cole]

Doug,
HOLY _ _ _ _!!!
That's beyond my expectations from posts and PM's.
That's amazing, truly.
Definately inspiring to get me going on mine instead of talking about it.

WELL DONE.

Greg

[Doug Shepard]

... When does a cabinet go underneath?
...


Well at least for a little while I need to stop working on stuff FOR the shop and start working on stuff IN the shop. But I really like the cabinet that shows up on the Noden site that's underneath a castered bench. One of these days maybe....

[gary Zimmel]

Doug

That is one sweet looking bench....

Great job!

[Jim Becker]

Wow...that's beautiful.

[John Thompson]

Very.. very nice looking bench, Doug. Something that nice looking takes time as you have done lots of detailing. Looks great though!

I have worn my top slap out over the last 5 years with wear and re-surfacing. So... I went and hand selected some stock today for a new one. I have 2" x 8" x 12' cross-cut down to 6'.. ripped and jointed on both edges to 3". Should be ready for glue up latter in the evening.

With any kind of luck I can switch over the vises on Saturday morning and be rolling on a tall chest by that afternoon. But... it won't get the detail you put into it. But.. for $22 she'll work fine for another 5 years or so. :)

Again.. well done and excellent detail...

Sarge..

[Johnny Kleso]

Thats a awesome bench if I ever seen one..

[Bruce Page]

Wow Doug! That’s a work of art! I wish you didn’t live so far away, I’d love to see it in the flesh. It is obvious that you put a lot of planning, time, and thought into it, not to mention a few $$.
I really like the way you set back the Tucker, I bet you’re going to love that vise.

Well done! http://www.sawmillcreek.org/images/icons/icon14.gif http://www.sawmillcreek.org/images/icons/icon14.gif

[Doug Shepard]

Thanks eveybody.

Michael
This pic shows the stack of lam subsections sitting on top of the horizontal ply pieces. This probably makes more sense than my description of it earlier. Both the 1" and 1-1/2" portion were done from the same glued up lamination. Everything else from this point forward was where the fun and epoxy started.
87538

Here's after doing the bottom 2" portion.This and then the top 2" similar sub-slab were what got hauled to Armstrong Millworks in Highland, MI for a few passes thru their wide belt sander. Both of those lost 1/8" in the process.
87539


Here's one gluing the 2 slabs together. This is probably where at least some of my center crowning problem cropped up. Shoulda used cauls here too, but realistically both of these slabs were so blasted heavy I thought the weight of the top slab alone would take care of things.
87540

[Doug Shepard]

Wow Doug! That’s a work of art! I wish you didn’t live so far away, I’d love to see it in the flesh. ...

Last I heard, New Mexicans can get Green Cards that will allow them into Michigan:D Anytime.:cool:

[Bruce Page]

Last I heard, New Mexicans can get Green Cards that will allow them into Michigan:D Anytime.:cool:
I’ve heard that too…:rolleyes:

I would like to make it out to the cup race at Michigan International Speedway someday.

[Bob Noles]

Doug,

That thing is a work of fine art. You can park it in my living room if you'd like :D

Super job and what an heirloom that will make.

[Doug Shepard]

Here's a few more.
This part was actually kind of fun because I got to preview how cool the Tucker was to use before I had it on the bench. I had it mounted to a dumpster dive piece of butcher block straddled between 2 Workmates. I did this so I could nail down the dimensions to plan out that notched setback area.
87549

So I put the Tucker to use cutting joinery for the hardwood in that corner notch. With the vise rotated it gave me a nice stable edge to hang the router edge guide and laminate trimmer on and cut some spline slots.
8755087551

The slot for the maple splines on the OS corner were done on the short leg while also in the Tucker. The matching slots on the longer benchfront weren't put in until after it was glued to the bench and short leg. I could complete the slot with hand/coping saws & chisels on that piece after it was in place, but had to have it done on the short leg before gluing it to the bench. There's just no way to get tools in there in place. So I glued the short leg, splines, and LH end of the hardwood togethr, then glued/screwed that whole section into the notch. If you look close you can see 2 of the plugs covering the 4" screws that go into the core. The inside corner splines are more purpleheart. The OS corner ones are just some scrap Borg maple.
87552

[Jameel Abraham]

Nice work, Doug. And nice shop. Shag carpeting, fireplace, TV. Some people....:)

Now for a serious question. How do you like the Noden legs when aggresively using say, a jack plane to hog off some wood, or a jointer to flatten a face. Are they rigid? I saw a bench with these recently was not impressed, but it may not have been set up incorrectly, or out of adjustment. I couldnt really check it closely. But it wobbled like a drunken sailor.

[Doug Shepard]

Jameel
I can only judge so far based on the handplane work I did on the top after getting it finished underneath then mounting the legs and flipping it over. I used a number of things on the top for flushing the purpleheart to the ply core. I glued it on proud of the core then also had to level the twinscrew vise jaw as well. I also mentioned the crowning problem on the top. I initially tried going Neander there as well but after suceessfully getting the first 18" flattened out I realized that would take me forever and switched to the router sled/rails. Just had to stop and resharpen way too much planing that edge ply. I think the arsenal during all this was a LV BU Jointer, LN 5-1/2 HAF, LN 4-1/2, LN LA Jack, LV Scrub, LV Scraper Plane, Stanley #80, a couple of Knight planes, LN Block planes,....
So this did get a lot of pushing on it during construction and I never felt any movement out of it at all. What I dont know yet though is whether it will feel the same with the casters engaged but locked. I dont know whether I'll have to adjust the casters up so it's sitting on the legs panels (as it was during my construction phase) for actual use or whether it's stable enough just sitting on the locked casters.

[Doug Shepard]

Couple more of the Re-flattening after discovering my middle crowning problem. Thanks to Alex Shanku for pointing me to this for the How-To
http://www.highlandwoodworking.com/index.asp?PageAction=Custom&ID=58

Here's one with the router sled/rails afterwards. By the time I had made it to the last 12" on the RH end, that ply had pretty much spent the router bit and I was getting quite a bit of burning.
87566

After scraping the snot out of it with the LV Scraper, Stanley #80, card scrapers, etc.
87567

[Doug Shepard]

One right before flipping it over for the last time. The counterbored hole & washer in the lower right is one of 2 holes for a cross-dowel (barrel bolt). There's a hole into the back edge for threading a long bolt into the cross-dowel. Since I've got no other place to put one, this is where a Woodrat mounting board will hang when I'm using it.
87571

The UHMW rub strips for the twin screws. I didnt like the idea of not gluing the shimming between the UHMW and bench bottom. But with it glued in place, there's no way to be able to get the vise flange nuts on/off if need be. My compromise solution was to glue the shimming in place but leave the gap. I still need to cut a short piece of shimming & UHMW that's just wedged in-between and held with screws.
87572

[Jameel Abraham]

Thanks Doug. Let us know in a few months how they are working out.

[Jim Becker]

Jameel, my Noden bench is rock solid. If you saw one wobbling, I have to imagine it was not set up properly, such as having the stretchers properly adjusted.

[Mark Drayton]

Doug, Lovely work. I'm about to refurbish my 12 year old bench and, like you, have both the Tucker and Veritas twin-screw vises to replace my existing hardware. Mine won't look anything like as glamorous as yours - perhaps the next rebuild when I'm retired.

I was also debating whether to notch my solid beech bench top to allow the Tucker rear jaw to come flush with the bench front. I haven't unpacked the vise yet to take any measurements. Can you let me know what dimensions you came up with for the notch on yours using that temporary jig?

Thanks, Mark

[Doug Shepard]

Mark
Here's the answer from LV's CS that I got back when I asked about doing this before buying.

The Tucker Vise can be mounted so that the rear jaw is flush with the front edge, but it will need a recess cut into the front of the bench. The recess will need to be 2-17/32” deep. This is made up of 2-7/16” from the back mounting surface to the rear metal jaw face and 3/32 for the leather liner thickness.The minimum distance needed to the side of the vise in order to allow the vise to rotate is 1.5”. This distance was measured by clamping a board onto the bench to the right of the Tucker vise and rotating the vise to establish the clearance needed. One note of caution, this will create a “pinch point”, therefore, a further allowance should be made to avoid injury to fingers.

I decided to go ahead and do the temp mount just to make sure I hadn't forgot to ask about something that could have scroood me up. I ended up going with about 15" long and in the end I really didn't end up measuring the depth. I jointed a couple pcs of 2x4 around 2 ft long and laminated them together then resawed to a ballpark (but over) thickness then kept sneaking up to the final thickness with the planer. I kept putting that across the front of the temp slab and checking with a straight edge across the rear vise jaw. I did this so that I'd be able to clamp it into the notch and hold a long straight edge down the front of the bench to see if I needed to tweak the face of the notch. It also ended up coming in very handy when I needed to clamp/screw those router sled rails on for that final flattening step.

[Doug Shepard]

Mark
I also forgot to mention that if you go that route, you might want to change the side of vise that the quick release spring attaches unless you're going to use the foot pedal setup (I cant). It's an easy mod and LV's CS said it would work either way. During experimenting with that temp mount I found it rather awkward to get the hinge pin installed. You can do it with the spring off the pin but then you've got pretty limited access to stretch the spring back over the pin in that inside corner. It's do-able but just not as easy as leaving the spring on the pin when you hang the vise and be able to slide it in from the open (LH) end of the bench. But that means needing to change the quick release.

[Doug Shepard]

Geez
Almost forgot. You CAN also leave the spring attached to the pin, leave the quick release as-is, and slide the pin in from the RH IS corner end, but you need around 7" of clearance between the RH end of the mounting plate and the inside corner. That's quite a bit more than just the rotational clearance that's needed. You dont need that much space if you slide the pin in from the left without the spring, but then you've got the tight quarters to work with in getting it back on.

[Monte Milanuk]

So... if I'm following the logic in the original thread, cutting and glueing the plywood in strips gives something similar to the durability of an end-grain butcher-block surface? Otherwise it seems like an awful lot of work compared to just laying 3-4 slabs of ply together and covering them w/ a sacrificial top of tempered hardboard (though it certainly looks nicer).

Yes/no/maybe?

[Mark Drayton]

Thanks Doug. Three replies to one question! Very helpful replies - issues I hadn't considered as I was thinking about mounting the vise slightly further in (to the right) than yours to avoid a leg, retaining a short piece of bench top at its original depth to the left of the vise. That might not be such a good idea, or even possible, to allow the hinge pin to slide in without making an excessive width notch. Food for thought. Maybe adding a 2 17/32" skirt to the front of the existing solid skirtless top would be an easier solution. Bench restoration is scheduled to start next Monday!

Mark

[Doug Shepard]

Yeah Monte - Sam's original thread had a good description of why & how he came up with this. I can confirm though that it's way harder than face grain ply.

[Monte Milanuk]

Interesting... I'm just finishing up my first 'woodworking' bench - Norm's NYW bench and I'm already looking for something else ;) I've been looking at some sort of laminated top, but I didn't want to spend the $$$ on hard maple for a bench top, and have some concerns about the 'hardness' of a top made from fir or pine, even laminated strips there off. I'll have to experiment a bit - I've got a work-cart project coming up that would probably work just fine for a 'test bed'...

One other question... though this might be more for Sam, since he's had his for a few years and presumably put some miles on it in that time - hope he's reading ;)

How does it hold up w/ regards to dog holes and such... no problems w/ holes getting 'loose' or oblonged from use/abuse?

Thanks,

Monte

[Brian Dormer]

Oh darn! I never thought about recessing the vise and bringing the apron behind it like that....

Back to the CAD program - time to make more design changes.

[Gary Muto]

That bench is fantastic. I'd be afraid to scratch or ding it up.

[Lori Kleinberg]

Wow, Doug that is one sweet looking workbench. Use it well.

[Jameel Abraham]

Jameel, my Noden bench is rock solid. If you saw one wobbling, I have to imagine it was not set up properly, such as having the stretchers properly adjusted.

Musta been it! Thanks Jim

[Doug Shepard]

I've been cleaning up the GaShop most of the day. Some of you may recall that the Noden Legs were what was enabling me to even fit a workbench in my limited space. The plan is to raise the bench to max height when it's not in use and existing stuff slid under the bench. Well I start trying to raise the bench way up and it wont go past a certain point. This is with the casters engaged. It ends up just trying to pivot/rotate up on the casters on the opposite side from where you're lifting once you get it so high. So after puzzling for a while I crank the casters up so that all the weight is on the leg panels. Voila - no problem getting the bench to adjust to various heights. Not sure what's causing this and it's not a huge deal. I'll just have to raise it up first after use, then engage the casters to slide into it's spot. But it sure is puzzling.

[Doug Shepard]

Finally got my small punchlist of things completed from when I first posted.

-Finish touchup in a couple spots - Done
-Easing the dog hole edges - Used a 1/8" roundover bit from SMC advice. I was originally thinking of a champfer bit and I'm glad I went with the roundover - it worked great
-Drilling dog holes in the Twinscrew jaw - Done
-A tiny bit more shimming underneath for the UHMW rub strips.
Got that all tweaked and the twinscrew turns very smooth now out until the final 3-4" of extension when it wants to sag more and gets a bit stiffer to crank. I think over time once the screws have cut a bit deeper into the UHMW rub strips it's going to be good for the full length.

I had also been planning on a full width bench stop and threw this one together from leftover purpleheart, oak dowel, and some scrap ebony to wedge the dowel. It's 3/8" x 1-3/4" and hangs over the bench edges about 1/2" so there's something to grip and work it up out of the dog holes.
9077790778

Also decided to put a couple of these in the front edge as well.
9078090779

Seems a bit absurd that the first real project that's going to come off this is a dog house, but it was also meant as an assembly table as well, so....