CT's Most Excellent Workbench Adventure

[Rocketir]

The bench looks wonderful and thank you for inviting us to enjoy your "adventure" with you. Now everytime you use that bench you will be doubly proud of what you have accomplished. One for the current project and one for the bench that it was make on. Heck I suppose you can even add the fact that you made some of your own tools.

[biocmp]

CT, got a question.

How did you decide to join the main part of your workbench surface (the two large pieces edge jointed) to the rest of your apron?

I'm not even sure if that is the right terminology, but i hope you can understand the question.

[Crooked Tail]

The apron is glued on to the edge of the main slab. Both the apron and the main slab have a tongue on each end, which fits into the end caps. There are also three battens under the main slab which are to keep the slab from cupping, and also attach to the front apron. On pages 9 and 10 there are pictures of the underside of the bench that show the battens.

I felt like the front apron (with the dog holes) needed to be attached more securely, because that is where I will planing boards and probably doing the most work, thus it will receive the most stress.

So, the main slab is joined to the aprons in three ways: (1) with glue at the edges, (2) with the T&G at the endcaps, and (3) with battens underneath.

Hope this helps. If I had the money, I would have bought more maple and built the whole top out of laminated pieces. Then I wouldn't have had this issue. But, I guess only time will tell whether it really is an issue or not.

[bombe']

Crooked Tail,

It might be wise to spend the time now getting your benchtop to final flatness. Before starting on the end vise. This will give you a flat reference surface to check the end vise for parallel (very important). Where did the vise hardware come from?

The bench is looking super. Great thread!

-Bombe'

[Crooked Tail]

That makes sense, bombe', to do the flattening now. Time to get my new #7 into action!

The vise hardware came from Lee Valley. The front vise is the Large Quick-Release Front Vise and the tailvise is the Tail Vise Assembly, which has a bracket and all of that.

[Crooked Tail]

OK, the workbench is approaching flat. Flat enough that I decided to take a break and work on the frontvise instead for a bit. I just needed to make the front jaw. The jaw is really mostly aesthetic. I could have just mounted a big hunk of wood on there. But here goes:

A large piece of purpleheart for the core, and I glued a 4/4 piece of maple to the inside. The maple will be the part that contacts the bench.



Next I decided to start cutting the thumbnail profiles, because I figured it would be easier to do the PH before I put the top and bottom pieces on.



I used rasps and a spokeshave, but it still is going to need a lot of cleaning up:



I guess you can't see it very well, but here I'm gluing on the bottom piece of maple. So the PH will be sandwiched between the maple pieces.



Wash, rinse, repeat for the top:




Used the rasps and the spokeshaves again to finish the profile. You can see that it still needs a lot of cleanup, especially up at the top, where I can't reach with the shave.



Now, finally, it's ready to be mounted on the bench. Drill the holes...





Quit when you're tired!

[Cian]

Ohhhhh man!

I can feel that hurt all the way here.




I put one of these up in my shop:




Duuuuuuude.

I'm really sorry to see that. Ouch.


She does look nice though.

[msweig]

D'oh!

At least it looks like the hole would be covered up when the vise is actually in place.

mark

[David - Central Ohio]

CT, it looks great. Very impressive. And as for the vise jaw mis-step, everyone here has had at least one of those moments. On more than one occasion I've called myself names that I probably shouldn't write in a family forum.

[mpphoto]

Ouch, ouch, ouch.... ouch!
I'm a big believer in the power of the hole as a decorative element

Looks great though-
Michael