first serious workbench....thoughts?

[Chris Hachet]

Thinking that I am going to build my first serious workbench. I am thinking smaller, perhaps 48 to 54 inches in length, and am thinking European Sweedish style for the bench.

Thinking laminated beec for the top, ank thinking of the Veritas style tail vise for a tail vise, and the Lie Nieilson bench screw for the front vise.

Probably thinking poplar or soft maple for the base...although Ihave also considered Hard Maple.

Any input would be appreciated.

Thanks!

Chris

[Charlie Stanford]

Thinking that I am going to build my first serious workbench. I am thinking smaller, perhaps 48 to 54 inches in length, and am thinking European Sweedish style for the bench.

Thinking laminated beec for the top, ank thinking of the Veritas style tail vise for a tail vise, and the Lie Nieilson bench screw for the front vise.

Probably thinking poplar or soft maple for the base...although Ihave also considered Hard Maple.

Any input would be appreciated.

Thanks!

Chris

Nothing beats a Scandinavian style bench for furnituremaking. Fine Woodworking has an old article by Tage Frid with measured drawings. I would build it as shown, vises and all. It's the vises that make these things the great benches they are.

[Jim Koepke]

Thinking that I am going to build my first serious workbench. I am thinking smaller, perhaps 48 to 54 inches in length, and am thinking European Sweedish style for the bench.

Chris,

Welcome to the Creek, even if you have been posting for a few weeks. Where do you call home? You may live near another member who is willing to let you give their bench a test drive.

My current bench is 60 inches in length and often seems to be a bit short for my projects. If you have a smaller space or mostly make smaller projects your projected length may be perfect.

I am not a fan of the European Swedish style front vise. For me it sticks out too far. My current vise sticks out only a couple of inches and still, my hip sometimes has a run in with it. Of course our different styles is what makes for a world of wondrous variety.

For me it is the ability to remove my front vise quickly that, even with its many limitations, still has me thinking of going this way on my next bench. Often my stock is longer than my bench. For planing the edges the vise can be removed and hold fasts will hold the piece to the front of the bench.

Sometimes a bench hook or shooting board is held in my front vise. A shoulder vise would put me further away from the work. Surely for some wood working there is an advantage to a shoulder vise. For me, my vise is as likely to hold a shovel or garden tool that needs sharpening as it is to hold wood being worked. There is even a metal vise in my shop that is mounted on a stand that is held in my wood working vise for the times some metal needs to be worked.

One of my thinking points on my next bench is, "the most versatility with the least compromise."

For instance, wagon vises are neat, compact and could even be called sexy. How ever they would not allow me to do some of the operations now done at the tail end of my bench like planing short pieces or using my tail vise to hold pieces while I am cutting dovetails. Of course their are ways around this, but those seem like compromise to me. Everything a wagon vise can do, my current simple tail vise can do. A wagon vise can not do some of the things my current tail vise can and then would be in the way for some of the operations I can do with the tail vise removed.

Of course there is a disadvantage with my current vises, they rack terribly. Some folks would not accept that. For me it is something easy to overcome.

Have fun and please post some images of your work.

jtk

[Jim Matthews]

Do you have a bench, now?

What features do you like?
What features would you like to remove?

If you mainly work with power tools, Josh Finn's torsion box workbench is really clever.

I use a front leg vise and sliding deadman.
The base of my bench is a cabinet with drawers. The most used tools are immediately handy.

Have a look at Zahid Naqvi's latest effort.
It was built with a couple of key ideas in mind -

Resistance to racking, working by hand, holding larger boards to the front of the bench.

If you haven't read Jim Tolpin or Chris Schwarz treatises on the subject, they're worth considering.

The only advice I would offer someone building a bench for hand tool use is to keep the height around your belt line.
Much higher, and it's difficult to bring force to bear on the workpiece.

Too much lower than your belt line and things can be difficult to see, tools harder to keep on the straight and narrow.

[Jared McMahon]

Unless you have a pretty darn good idea what sorts of woodworking you'll be doing, I wouldn't sweat the details of your first bench too much. Scandinavian/Klausz is fine, Roubo is fine, etc. You also can't go too far wrong with vises and hardware from any of the main vendors (Lee Valley, Lie-Nielsen, Benchcrafted).

If a Scandinavian bench puts a twinkle in your eye, definitely check out any articles and videos you can find about/by Frank Klausz, he gets a ton of mileage out of his.

[John Sanford]

Unless you are committed to an "authentic" Scandi bench, I wouldn't focus on using beech. Go for whatever closed grain, strong, stout light colored hardwood you can get a good price on. In the US and Canada, especially east of the Mississippi, that usually means Hard or Soft Maple. The Scandinavians use beech because it's the best mix of value and performance for them, not because it's "the best bench wood."

[Charlie Stanford]

The genuine article:

http://www.workbenches.se/en/index.php

[Frederick Skelly]

I took a lower cost approach using dimensional lumber and still built a REALLY NICE copy of one of those high end benches a few years back. Heres what I did, in case someones interested.

I carefully selected clean, straight 2x4s and laminated them face to face for the top. The top is 3" thick, a couple feet deep and about 6 feet long. I added a tool tray.

While I was on a business trip, I went to a woodworking store and studied how the bases on those high end benches are built. Then I bought 4 straight, nice 4x4 fence posts and used them for legs. I used 2x4's to connect two legs together top and bottom. That left me with 2 "leg units", one for each end of the bench. Then I bought 2x6's for stringers, grooved both edges on each and ran all-thread down the grooves to connect the leg units together.

This sounds rube goldberg-ish, but its an attractive and absolutely rock solid bench. I love this thing. And I have only a couple hundred in it, plus the vise.

Fred

[Chris Hachet]

Nothing beats a Scandinavian style bench for furnituremaking. Fine Woodworking has an old article by Tage Frid with measured drawings. I would build it as shown, vises and all. It's the vises that make these things the great benches they are.

Thanks for the link, I am looking at/for plans right now, so that will be a huge help!

[Chris Hachet]

I have a rather plain jane bench now that was built with fir 4 by 4 s for legs, and the rest of the lumber is strait grained 2 by 4 material that came from the shipping pallet of a 15 ton TRANE rooftop unit that I set on the roof of a local seafood restaurant.

I am about eighty percent hand tool...I still use a table saw, a band saw, a hollow chisel Morticer, and a drill press.

Mostly concerned about vise configuration...

[Chris Hachet]

I can get fantastic beech for about two bucks a board foot....not married to the idea of it...but hard maple around here runs about five...all else being equal....

[Chris Hachet]

Thanks for posting this, my current bench is made of simple two by and four by stock...nice to know that I am not stoned for liking my current bench...

[John Sanford]

I can get fantastic beech for about two bucks a board foot....not married to the idea of it...but hard maple around here runs about five...all else being equal....

Sounds like somebody is going to have a beech bench! Congrats.

[Stanley Covington]

I used a leg vice on the last workbench I made (I have made three over the years) because shipping prices made buying a commercial vice impractical. While I had my doubts, after completing it I found I like the leg vise more than any other type of vise I have used, including my LV twin screw vise. I have a wagon vise on one of my earlier benches, but seldom use it. In any case, I highly recommend leg vises.

I am not fond of softwood vises. I recommend maple as the softest US wood to use. White Oak is OK. Red Oak is not worth considering. I have used beech, but think maple is better. Remember, the Europeans like beech not because it is the ideal wood, but because it is grown in huge commercial plantations producing cheap, consistent, and certified environmentally-friendly commodity wood. But that is not the case in the US, so I recommend you choose the wood that meets your price point and performance criteria instead.

If you have the budget and the patience and skill to work them, the very dense tropical hardwoods like Ipe or keruing are fantastic for the weight, stability, and durability they provide.

Stan