What do you think of Paul Sellers workbench?

[Corneel]

As far as I know, mr. Schwarz also promotes to use the cheapest wood you can get. So I don't see why he would be oposed to the Paul Sellers bench build. CS is a fan of the Roubo shape. PS is a fan of the English shape. Well, both are very nice benches, easy to build with carefully selected construction grade lumber. I don't see any disagreement between the two "camps".

[John Dykes]

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All quite different from his postings on Stanley and other "poor man" tools.

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Derek, as one of YOUR admirers - and that of Paul Sellers (admission to having his book/DVD courses, and paid subscriber to his online site) - I think the point is, that Paul is trying to lower the (perhaps perceived) bar of entry to woodworking. I don't think any of Paul's "distance" students are being taught that Veritas is the Devil.

If you notice Mike's context that you quoted:

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I think he is thinking along the lines of "how can I make the craft more affordable to my students?" Therefore, he opts for construction lumber and $20. vintage planes instead of hardwoods and LV quality planes; at least for the mass of his students.

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You dropped the "therefore" and everything past the semicolon....

When I started woodworking, I bought a Unisaw because I thought I needed it. I think Paul is trying to show people that people can start paring with a Marples - they don't need to buy Blue Spruce - or even Kiyohisa slicks..... A lot can be done with $20 in wood and an old Stanley.

[Window Guy]

I believe that is basically what Paul's intent is, to introduce wood working to people of all age's but is specifically trying to encourage younger people ( Men and Women ) to learn how to work wood.

He is proving a point you don't need to go out and buy a $300 + plane when a $25 - $40 properly tuned plane will do the job. Also using common wood found in the big Box stores verse's expensive hardwoods to build something.

If you follow Paul's blog www.paulsellers.com he had an interview with Chris Atkins when he was up in Atlanta a couple weeks ago and talks about these things.

Also his bench is an English style jointer's bench which again shows you don't need a $1000 worth of vise's etc. to make some fantastic piece's. He built his last 2 bench's which he ended up giving away to people 25 years old or younger and could be taken apart so he could travel with the recent Woodworking Shows. Normally his bench is not built knocked down, he also shows a couple different configurations he use's on that bench. Two slab's instead of one etc, sometimes he will add an end vice that type of thing.

I am building the single slab one and will have holes for hold fasts and may include a crochet at some point if I feel it is necessary with the Record or similar vise.

Paul's is trying to encourage the use of hand tool's especially for the younger kids to learn wood working the way he was brought up which is slowly fading away with the power tool surge. After all I am not going to turn an 8 or 9 year kid loose with a table saw or router table to start.

My Hat is off to him, and we still have Chris and Roy who like hand tools as well.

Steve

[adamcherubini]

I believe Sellers bench is a variation of the one depicted in Peter Nicholson's book from early 19th c. I have one, the guys in Colonial Williamsburg use them, and a couple others have built fairly faithful copies of them including Bob R.

To my knowledge, these benches have always been associated with joineries and not cabinetshops. They are often depicted (in 2 paintings I'm thinking of from Jay Gaynor's book) as simply built from construction lumber, possibly nailed or bolted together and VERY long.

The front apron, the benches' most distinguishing feature, is riddled with holes in Nicholson. The tops interestingly are not. The front apron can be used effectively for edge work by placing holdfasts or dowels in holes. The apron both provides stiffness to the top but also shear stiffness, preventing the bench from racking horizontally under planing loads.

My bench is constructed a little different from Nicholsons (or anyone else's for that matter). It was designed to be disassembled and easily transported. While disassembly may not have been part of the originals' design intent, transportation or construction on site certainly was.

My bench consists of three basic parts, each weighing about 30 lbs: the top is 2 2x12 x8's glued together edgewise. The front and backs are single 2x12's with 4x4 legs attached to them with deck screws (from the back). The 4x4's were rebated to allow the front face of the apron to sit flush with the legs. This is an important functional characteristic, as there are holes in the legs used to support items being edge worked (yesterday I replacing hollow core doors with new solid 6 panel doors, and held the doors on those lower pegs to plane their edges). At the top of the side pieces runs a 1x1" steel angle, screwed to the sides permanently, and with holes corresponding to threaded inserts in the top.

The top is connected to the sides thru a series of 8 or so 1/4" bolts running down each side. The legs are tied together at the bottom front back via a stretcher (hardest part to build) M&T into the legs, then secured with bed bolts.

In use, then bench doesn't have that rock solid feel of a solid maple. But it is light and stiff and an excellent platform for planing, in my opinion, the chief function of a work bench, but I recognize this isn't true of everyone. If you need to pound something, and I rarely do, there are places on a Nicholson bench, over the legs for example, that are more than adequate.

The big advantages are:
Low weight (each of my three components weighs about 30lbs and is easily portable by one man.- Keep in mind this is an 8' long bench.).
Low cost- my bench was less than $100 of Borg lumber
Quick build. Only trick is that lower stretcher. I have a twin screw vise- that's a little tricky to build yourself, but a snap if you can source the screws and nuts.

In my shop, for my work, the attribute I like most about this bench is it's length. I prefer it because it's longer than my other (german) bench. I don't miss the tail vise or hardwood top. The german bench is prettier tho.

The finish on my nicholson bench is homemade walnut hull dye (just to add an aged look and get rid of the new construction lumber look of it), followed by a light coat of linseed oil, and then rubbed weekly with sweat, plane shavings, dirt, and saw dust, and sometimes a drop of blood (meaning use!).

[mdhills]

If your questing for the holy grail of benches, keep on questing...

It seems to be a reasonable workbench design to allow you to turn your focus to making things. (Chris has some similar designs in his books, and he talks freely about the tradeoffs with them)

What do you feel are the limitations of your current bench? And what are you going to be doing with it? (My impression is that Paul's bench is a bit less of a milling bench, and a bit more of a joinery bench)

Paul addresses some of the workholding questions in this blog entry. E.g.,


You might also like this podcast, where Bob Rozaieski discusses the tradeoffs in his bench design in this podcast:
Design: http://logancabinetshoppe.com/blog/2010/04/episode-20/
Evaluation: http://logancabinetshoppe.com/blog/2011/05/episode-34/


As others have mentioned, there are many ways of holding work beyond dogs and tail vise:


Incidentally, which book are you using? CS's first workbench book has a Roubo and a Nicholson:



Matt

[DallasStarter]

If you read his blog, you'll see that be often refers to the craftsman he worked under 40-50 years ago as the basis for nearly all if of his methods for approaching woodworking. He cites the perfection and speed of the output, their no-frills approach, and the fact that this was how they made their living as the basis for his belief that their ways are self-evidently the best and anything else is basically the byproduct of the hucksters in the industry fooling people into believing that there was a better way and that they might need something else. If you find this summary close-minded and arrogant, please remember it isn't my philosophy. If you find it a misrepresentation, I'd suggest you might be too busy chugging the PS kool-aid to notice the aggressiveness with which he dismisses alternative views and ways of working.

I don't doubt that his bench can be very functional if you use the workarounds he uses. Certainly building one would be very instructive in developing had skills, but then this is true of any bench build. For myself I would say this: Dismiss the work and research of Schwarz at your own peril.

Reed

[adamcherubini]

DallasStarter said:

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If you find this summary close-minded and arrogant, please remember it isn't my philosophy. If you find it a misrepresentation, I'd suggest you might be too busy chugging the PS kool-aid to notice the aggressiveness with which he dismisses alternative views and ways of working.

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Paul's attitude is part of a centuries old traditional that kept wooden smoothers coffin shaped and hand saw nibs long after people forgot why those things were needed. You can call it close minded if you wish. I can understand why our (USA) modern, all points of view are equally valid and everybody gets a trophy society would rail against these traditionalist and sometimes dismissive voices.

I recall asking Frank Klauz why he sawed a half tail at the bottom of a drawer side, think there was some strategy to housing the drawer bottom groove perhaps. He looked at me in the eye they way he does and says "because that's they way you do it". You can be offended by that. I was delighted to hear the voice of an 18th craft apprentice.

[Handplanesandmore]

+1

Paul Sellers is actually not much different from other hand-tool teachers in that they teach what they know and what they believe in. Different schools offer something different and there's no right or wrong. When I teach hand-tool classes, I share methods and techniques that come from both camps (if you know what I mean). Anyone who thinks there is only one way of using hand tools or building a workbench is missing a lot. Paul Sellers, Chris Schwarz, Roy Underhill, Rob Cosman, and the countless authors of hand-tool blogs all are helpful in generating interest and knowledge to people interested in building things with their hands. I wouldn't dismiss them, simply because they advocate or favor one approach over another.

[DallasStarter]

"because that's they way you do it" is a great response and emblematic of the difference between Sellers and Klaus. Klaus packages his approaches in matter of fact charm. Sellers might give you a diatribe about why anybody who teaches it a different way is a hack (implied). And I don't for a minute subscribe to this nonsense about every viewpoint being equally valid or even valid at all. But that doesn't change the fact that not ALL the non-Sellers viewpoints and methods are invalid. Some have merit, but are dismissed or derided by him just the same. On the subject of benches, it may in fact be that all Schwarz' thoughts amount to little more than a bunch of trendiness and no substance and that the 100s, maybe thousands of benches he's influenced in the last 10 years were all misguided in finding value in his thoughts. I can only speak for myself on saying that I find this not to be so. Having worked on my bench for hours upon days since I built it in 2008, I can say I find the ideas wholly worthy of consideration next to those Sellers promotes. I read his blog hoping to learn from him and sometimes I do. But when I don't, it seems usually to be because he's railing against unseen evils who have polluted the world of woodworking with incorrect and meritless information. Only problem is, having found some if that very information to be quite useful, I'm left wondering why he can't just stick to talking up the advantages of his own approaches and let the reader make their own decisions about what has merit.

Reed

[Tony Z]

I've been a woodworker since the mid 70's. Started off as a carpenter's apprentice, and after serving a 4 year apprenticeship, I became a journeyman. I left the trade in 1989 to start a manufacturing plant and I've been there ever since. Since that time, I've approached woodworking as a serious hobby.

In those years, I've seen many woodworking guru's come and many fade away. I've seen as many fads come and go. What I enjoy about Paul Sellers is his ability to cut through the crap and show you how a tradesman gets the job done. These are the guys out on a job that can't wait the week for the newest LN plane or Bad Axe saw to arrive. You mentioned Swartz: I think his thinking is beginning to evolve in the same manner with the publication of his book on woodworking "anarchy".