Workbench book rant...

[john brenton]

I have the workbench book by Lon Schleining, and I always wondered why everyone referred to the Landis book, but never to the Schleining book. Well, I just recently bought the Landis book and now I know why: ITS THE SAME BOOK just with an older Frank Klauz and an older Mike Dunbar.

I see no improvement in the Scheining book over the Landis, and Landis's book goes into far greater detail on the history of the benches and their uses. His section on the Ruobo is fantastic.

Funny that a lot of things in the FWW blogs from certain contributors sounds as if it's new information that they've researched in a dank underground Gothic library. "When I was thumbing through the pages of ancient history I found..." but if you open Landis's book it's stated right there....VERBATIM....especially when talking about the Ruobo. Verbatim.

I guess I have to make a point now. If you're making a bench get them both, because (a) workbenches are cool to look at, and (b) it's almost a "two heads better than one". There may be one perspective that ones shares that the other misses, but for the most part you'd find the Landis book is superior and the Schleining superfluous.

[Trey Palmer]

Thanks John, good info. I have the Landis book but not Schleining. I haven't bought either Schwarz book but I thumbed through his first one skimming at some length and have read most everything he's written online.

I also really love The Toolbox Book by Jim Tolpin.

[Jim Neeley]

Background: At the recommendation of a member here I recently added Schleining and Schwarz books to the Landis book I've had for several years. I'm reading the Schwarz book now but have only looked at the pictures in Schleining so far.

I really like the Landis book although Schwarz adds a great deal in his function-by-function discussion and his personal ranking of solutions. For example, he'll might take the topic of surface plaining, small boards, and discuss the advantages / disadvantages of using a holdfast, end vise w/dogs, twin-screw w/dogs, Veritas wonderdog and Veritas hold-down.

He walks through many such operations in this manner, helping you to think through which compromises are best for you. I can already see I'll be reading this book several times.

Tolpin's Toolbox book is a great inspiration... even though I'm nowhere near the skill level to implement what I see that I think I'd like to make.

Jim

[Trey Palmer]

Jim,

I see Landis's book as more of a survey. Schwarz's is more of an instructional book with specific recommendations. I did read through his lists of best methods for different tasks, which all made much sense to me. I've read so many of his blog posts that I felt like I had already absorbed much of the information in his book. Clearly the right thing to do is to buy his book, but so far I haven't overcome my selective cheapness.

Speaking of Tolpin's book, and your signature -- I bought a traditional dovetailed pine tool chest last year, built by someone else, with an unfitted and unfinished interior. I want to refinish the outside and fit out the interior as a sort of ongoing project, perhaps rebuilding tills and such as my skills progress. For now, my goal is to limit my woodworking hand tools to what I can fit in the chest.

The interior dimensions are about 30x15x20, counting the lid's interior height, so it's somewhat smaller than the ca. 1800 Seaton and Phyfe chests. But I don't anticipate having a large molding plane collection any time soon, so I think it's big enough to fit everything I really need if the interior is well-designed. With a little under 15" from front to back inside, it almost mandates the Tony Konovaloff style side to side tills, which make more sense to me anyway. It is just long enough to accommodate 26" handsaws, quite possibly by design.

The idea didn't appeal to me at first, mainly due to the bending over. But I can keep it raised, and the more I realize the limitations of my tiny space, the more sense it makes!

[john brenton]

What the Landis and Schlening books don't dedicate enough time to is to me what should be the most obvious. It's easy for me to say, having never written a book, but it would've made perfect sense to establish a comprehensive list of woodworking tasks, show how each task is performed on the bench, and grade each bench based on each of those tasks; pointing out where each one excels.

It sounds like Chris Shwartz's book does that. I'll have to check it out.

[Erik France]

I picked up the Landis book and Schwarz's 'Workbenches: From Design And Theory To Construction And Use' when I was designing my bench. I liked Schwarz's book better. To be honest, I really didn't read the Landis book entirely though. I liked Schwarz's take on the histories and uses of the workbench.

Schwarz also has a second bench book out called 'The Workbench Design Book' Link. I haven't seen it myself yet.

[John Sanford]

IIRC correctly, there are 5 workbench books out there.

Landis, Schleining, Schwarz, Schwarz and Sam Allen. I have all except for Schleining's. The Landis book is the most inspirational in the true sense. The photography is superb, and of the 4 I have, it's the one that would lurk on the coffee table. The two Schwarz books are the best, because they really focus on what you do with a bench, and how the different elements of the bench contribute to it's fulfilling it's role.

Sam Allen's book may be the most basic, but I think it's also worthwhile. In fact, I build my current bench from the first edition of the book. I have since modified it based on lessons learned and rethink inspired by The Schwarz.

[Jessica Pierce-LaRose]

As an aside; I have Schwarz's second book, but not the first - is it worth having both?

[David Keller NC]

As an aside; I have Schwarz's second book, but not the first - is it worth having both?

Definitely - Schwarz's first book has all sorts of analysis on the advatages/disadvantages of different vises, features of workbenches, and workbench accesories. IMO, while the Taunton book (Landis) is a nice coffee table book, there's not a lot of useful info in it about workbench configuration and why one would choose some of those workbench designs.

[Jerome Hanby]

I bought all of the workbench books (well almost, evidently the Schwarz has more than one). They are definitely not all created equal, but if nothing else, just having the pictures form each one is a help.

I wish one of them had a real, down to the parts list and cutting diagrams, plan for the Nyquist tail vise...

[john brenton]

And something I just noticed is that the bench featured on the cover of landis's book is actually the bench I think I want to make...and that's the one that has no details. It's not like it's a total mystery, but it's just ironic.

[Russell Sansom]

I have to agree with David. I don't find much useful information in the Landis book. I found the Swartz #1 very helpful, inspired, and full of spirit. Though nobody mentions that it's the same info presented twice and is very thin.

[Frank Drew]

When I built my bench years ago, there wasn't a wealth of information available, anywhere, on different styles of benches; heck, there wasn't even an Internet to look for information!

But there was FineWoodWorking magazine, and I used their plans for the Tage Frid bench when I made my own, slightly modified (no tool trough, slightly thicker front board in front of the dog holes.) I'm sure other styles of benches are fine but I never found anything about mine that I didn't like.

My brother gave me a copy of the Schleining a couple of years ago, and I've enjoyed looking at the different benches. Bench porn. There's no way I'm going to build another bench, so Chris Schwartz' books wouldn't be of that much interest to me, perhaps, but I'd probably enjoy looking through Scott Landis' book. For the pictures; more bench porn.

[john brenton]

Exactly...bench porn. That's good. If it wasn't for those books I would have built my bench a year ago. But its all good. I've been limiting myself to just one side, but I have the space to do vise configurations on both sides of the bench. I might just do that.

[Tom Vanzant]

My wife and I visited the Hancock village several years ago. The wookbench on the cover of the Landis book is the bench at Hancock. I compared pictures that I took with the Landis cover picture and guess what? ... it was slightly different in the drawer area at the end nearest the end vise. Not knowing when the cover photo was taken, it could have been because of a repair and/or rebuild of the drawers. Anyone have an explanation?