How tall is your workbench?

[Rick Schubert]

I'm thinking of building a workbench or adapting an old one I have. I am wondering about the height. I'll be using it for planing and general work.

I'm 6'3" and much of my height is in my legs-36" inseam on jeans.

How high is your bench and how tall are you? Do you wish it was higher or lower? Is there a general "rule of thumb" to use?

Thanks, Rick

[tod evans]

rick, stand straight with your arms down at your side, bend your hand where your fingers are parallel to the ground. i like a bench to be at the height of the heal of my palm......02 tod

[Von Bickley]

Rick,
I am in the process of building a new shop. In the new shop, all of my benches and tables will be built to match the height of my table saw out-feed table.

[Dave Anderson NH]

Hi Rick
I'm going to proceed based on the assumption that you will be using the bench primarily for hand tool use as opposed to handling electric routers and such. If you are building a bench with four separate legs, and they are not joined at the bottom by sled type feet, you have the option of doing some experimenting. Start with a bench that is at the maximum height you would expect to use and remove one inch at a time until you find the correct height. The down side of this approach is that once cut off, it's hard (but not impossible) to add material back to increase the height. If you try this approach, thoroughly use each height for as many different operations as possible for at least a month before cutting down another inch.

One of the traditional bench height measurements has always been that when standing next to the bench the correct height will have your wrist at the benchtop. If you do a lot of handplaning however, this will be perhaps 1-2 inches too high for long term comfort. In my case, at 5'9" and with a 35-36" sleeve length (no ape jokes folks), my bench is 33" high. I started at 36" 16 years ago and lowered the bench several times as the amount of hand tool work increased. I find that 33" is a good compromise height for me. It's still 1-2" higher than optimal for extensive hand planing, it works almost perfectly for choping joinery, and it is almost a foot too low for carving.

I would guess that a good height for you would be between 35-37".

[Spence DePauw]

I'm 6'5", with normal proportions (I guess, kids don't laugh and point...). I found that 39" was about right for me. I set the tablesaw to that height, and the workbench. It's served me well, for what it's worth.

Spence

[Zahid Naqvi]

Yup! what Dave and Tod said. I used the wrist height principle when I was buliding my bench about 2 yrs ago, and so far haven't felt the need to change the height.

[Bruce Page]

Rick, I’m 6’3” also. I built my bench top height at an unconventional 43”. I’m sure it is too tall for many, but it works for me

[Chris Damm]

I'm 6'4" and one bench is 36" while I raised the other one to about 40". The taller one is more comfortable to work at. The short one becomes a catchall for everything.

[Brian Hale]

I'm 5'6" and I like mine the same height as my tablesaw, 35"

Brian

[Mike Henderson]

For working with planes, I find that a bench in the low to mid 30's works well. But for chisel work or for carving, that's much too low - I get a real kink in my back bending over that much. Sometimes, I get a chair so that I can sit when doing that kind of hand work.

Someday, I'm going to design some kind of strong box with a vise attached that I can put on top of the bench, clamp it in the bench vise, and have a hand work vise that is high enough to be comfortable.

Mike

[Jim Becker]

My workbench is at whatever height I need it to be at a given time within a wide range...I use Geoffrey Noden's Adjust-A-Bench system.

[Dave Anderson NH]

Hi Mike, Putting a carving bench on top of your regular bench and holding it in place with either clamps or using pins in the dog holes will work. Sometime in the last year or two FWW had an article on making a mini-bench of that type. Several members of our Period Furniture Group have made improved and modified versions for use on top of their regular benches and are thrilled with the added versatility. Most of the guys used between 10 inches to a foot as the height of the add on .

[Brian Hale]

My workbench is at whatever height I need it to be at a given time within a wide range...I use Geoffrey Noden's Adjust-A-Bench system.

Jim, you've got to stop doing that............... I'm going BROKE!!

Brian

[Tom Ruflin]

Hi Mike,

I'm 6'1" with long legs (34 to 35 inseam) and I have my hand work bench at 38" high and 2 other assembly etc benches at 36". I used to have the hand work bench at 36" and adding the 2" height really saved my back and allowed me do work alot longer with out fatigue. I did find that at times it is a little difficult to get leverage when doing some work like planing the edge of a wide board with it in the vise.

[Gary Herrmann]

I'm 6'7". Broke a couple vertebrae my freshman year in college in a car accident, so hunching over anything for very long isn't very pleasant. I still do more power tool work than hand tool work (which I hope to change), so when I build my next bench the height may go down some. That said, my bench top is about 47" (going from memory). I set it up before I got into hand tools, so that may tell you something. However, I've hand planed boards on the bench and its been reasonably comfortable.

My planes are all low angle LVs. Block, shoulder and the BU jointer, jack and smoother. Planing oak, mahogany and cherry has not been an issue for me at that height. 30 years of basketball having also taken its toll on my knees, I sometimes think about experimenting with a seated bench - as long as the boards aren't too long, it might work...

Ultimately, I will invest in some sort of height adjustable bench mechanism.