Bench Top Surface Material

[Patrick Laflamme]

I recently bought a house and now that the basement is mine, I am setting up as proper a shop as I can. The biggest thing I am looking at right now is a workbench. The one in the basement when we purchased the house is only a workbench in the academic sense that it is a flat(ish) surface supported above the ground.(I.E. an old and abused hollow core door balanced on top of old poor quality mdf kitchen cabinets fastened together only by gravity.)

Needless to say this needs to be replaced. I originally wanted to build a laminated maple top 36" x 72" 3 or 4 inches thick. After checking prices I've decided this is never going to happen - at least not for several years. So I'm left with wondering if I were to build the same top out of common 2 x 10 Douglas Fir would that be strong enough? I had planned on putting one single screw vise to the far end of the front side and two single screw vises side by side at one of the ends with 3/4" dog holes through the top. I would be using the 2 x 10's so that I could rip and dimension 1 1/2" x 4" x 72" boards from the straight grain at the edges of the boards.

[Jamie Buxton]

Welcome to the Creek.

Benches are often discussed here. Use the Search function to find zillions of threads about them.

An issue with construction lumber like Doug Fir is that it is likely not dry. It is often sold completely green. This means that if you make anything with it, the wood will shrink across the grain as it dries out. It make also cup and/or twist. Some folks do choose to make benches from it, but they use a design which will tolerate the shrinkage, and they plan to reflatten it as it moves. Other people use wood which is dry, which gets them out of the worst of the shrinkage, but which has a higher material cost.