WorkBench by Eric Brown - Comments welcome

[Eric Brown]

Workbench Info
Material: Maple & Walnut
Length: 84” (7’) from Twinscrew inside jaw
Width: 27 ½”
Thickness: 2 ¾” with 6” high skirt
Height: Adjustable 28 ½” to 45”
Front Vice: Veritas Tucker Patternmakers
End Vice: Veritas Twinscrew 27 ½”W x 8”H , 11” Opening, 17” Between screws
Special Features
Noden Adjust-a-Bench legs with Vulcan “constant force springs” for counterbalance
(Total of 5 springs @ 25lbs each = 125lbs total counterbalance)
Leveling Screws with jam nuts
Hanging Deadman
Veritas bench holddowns and dogs
Dog Holes: ¾” round on 7 ¾” centers. Located on four rows top, along both skirts and end vice
Build.jpg

Top Down.jpg

Top Up.jpg

Counterbalance.jpg

Bench Tools.jpg

[Jim Becker]

Very nice, Eric!

I've had the Adjust-A-Bench system for a few years now and love it. It really adds an extra dimension to comfortable usability, especially since my bench serves multiple purposes.

[Greg Cole]

Looks great Eric!

[Jason Tuinstra]

Eric, looks like a great bench. I knew Jim had this system as well, but I don't recall ever hearing how easy it is to go from one height to another. What's the process? Just curious how easy it is.

[Doug Shepard]

Outstanding. Having a pretty similar setup, I'm real curious about some of the mods you did to the Noden

Noden Adjust-a-Bench legs with Vulcan “constant force springs” for counterbalance
(Total of 5 springs @ 25lbs each = 125lbs total counterbalance)
Leveling Screws with jam nuts

Could you elaborate on what these are doing that the standard Noden stuff isn't?

[John Schreiber]

Sweeet.

Tell us more about the hanging deadman. I've planned on something like that, but haven't implemented it yet.

[Eric Brown]

The springs are like a spool of metal kind of like a tape measure but heavier. They are on a solid plastic bearing 1 1/2"D x 1 5/8"W with a 5/8" hole. The springs are put on the 5/8" shaft and held in position with set collars.
Drilled two 5/8" holes at each end of the legs for the shafts (fixed plate only). Raised the top completely and drilled two 1/4" holes through both plates about 1" up and 1 3/4" in from corners. Re-drilled the 1/4" hole from the inside of the legs with a 1/2" drill, going through the fixed leg first and the movable leg second just enough so that it becomes a countersink for a flathead screw.

Made some aluminum tab ends for the springs. Assembled all the springs and shafts onto the fixed leg. Put flathead 1/4-20 with nylock nut into movable frame holes. Pulled eack spring individually down and secured with another nylock. Left tabs a little loose so they will self align.

These springs cost about $100 for 9 with shipping (I wanted spares) I put 75lbs on the Tucker end and 50lbs on the twinscew end. The ones under the Tucker were doubled up (don't ask, it was hard to do)

The hanging deadman can be seen in the last picture above the bench dogs. It was originally used as the guide for drilling all the holes in the benchtop which is why the corner at the bottom is clipped.

Cbal parts.jpg

[Eric Brown]

See the website for some good video examples of operation. Realize though that you have to lift the benchtop and it becomes apparent why I put the counterbalance springs on my heavy bench. It's much easier now to lift. Did not change the stability of the top at all. Rock solid.
http://www.adjustabench.com/

Eric

[Jim Becker]

I was unaware of the balancing setup, but it does make sense if you have a very heavy and stout benchtop with "big iron" vices, etc. My benchtop is a lightweight, so it's easy to adjust with just my forearms.

[Jay Jolliffe]

Nice bench. About how much does it weigh? I'm looking for a bench that can be moved easily but rugged enough to work at.

[Eric Brown]

I would have to guess that the top weights about 300lbs and the legs/stretchers about 100lbs. While heavy is good typically, solid is better. Problem I had with the castors was that the bearing play could be felt when planing hard. The castors could be lowered until the legs were resting on the floor, but then you lost some of the leveling ability. I added outboard levelers and noticed I still had a problem due to the thread clearance in the nuts I had welded on. To solve this I added jam nuts to hold the levelers steady. Now my bench is solid. The 2 3/4" top has no flex and because of the 6" skirt, there is no noticable deflexion when pounding with a chisel.

I work in a basement so I needed to be able to take the bench apart for moving.

If I were building the bench again, can't think of anything I would change. Love the adjustable height. I think thats one thing Chris Schwartz would not do, but he likes "traditional" more than modern. Interesting because he will also say how important bench height is. So do some other writers. I made sure to follow most of his advice but when I strayed, I tried not to compromise any of his "holding" rules.

Eric

[Tom Godley]

Eric - how do you like the Vise?


I have been thinking of a possible purchase but without ever using one I am not sure of the investment!


I also have the Adjust-a-Bench and like it a lot.

[Eric Brown]

I considered buying the Emmert clone, but decided it was not made as well as the Tucker and it weighed more. I love how it works and I can position it and the bench height to put the work where it is easiest to work on. However, that said, it is not for everyone.

As for the twinscrew, I put it on the end so clamping a door lengthwise would be possible. (Almost 8')
17" between centers keeps the screws outside the Adjust-a-bench legs. I prefer to work on all sides of my bench and sometimes clamp a board in my end vice as a planing stop. The jaw was made very thick (4") to limit flexing when clamping in the middle. The weight is enought to prevent the jaw dropping that is mentioned in the instructions. Teeter-Todder effect I suppose.

Some people would have put the twinscrew on the front for greater distance between screws, but all I have to do is rotate the Tucker (back jaw is flush with skirt), add the Hanging Deadman (if needed) and use one of the bench holdowns on the skirt to hold boards up to 6' long. Couldn't do that as easy with a twinscrew there.
All that and I can still raise or lower the bench.
I'm real happy with how the system works.

Eric

[Jim Becker]

Eric, I did away with the casters on my Adjust-A-Bench, too. My primary issue was knocking my shins into them, however, and since I rarely move the bench there was no point on keeping them. Rather, I mounted more traditional bench "feet" on mine and couldn't be happier. Since my floor slopes, I have to shim the front up about 3/8" to compensate...yet another reason not to move it. And it's rock solid, which is good with my increasing use of hand planes.

[rick fulton]

Eric.

That is a fantastic bench. Adding the springs to reduce the lift load is a great idea. I was about ready to give up on my Adjust-A-Bench because of the weight of the top.

Where did you buy your spring hardware? Direct from Vulcan Spring? At McMaster-Carr, similar hardware would cost much more, and worse, it would result in a spring of larger diameter, which could be problematic to install in this situation.

I like your caster setup also. Looks very solid, and leaves more unobstructed room under the bench for shelving. Thanks for sharing.