Workbench 2.0

[william nelson colorado]

The bench is moving right along. It looks great so far! Man, those are big dovetails

[Brian Holcombe]

Thanks Chris,

those dovetails are awesome!

[Chris Griggs]

Thanks William and Brian. I've never cut DT that big before. The 2" thick tail board and corresponding 2" deep pins definitely make things harder, since any amount off you are is amplified by 3x-4x as much as it would be in typical dovetails. It took a couple of test fitting and trimmings to get them too seat fully, and I eventually realized a slightly out of square tail (which was cut right on the line so I guess was a marking error) was wedging and holding things up....once I realized the issue my float saved the day and everything came together easily. I love my float!

[Brian Holcombe]

I cut some large dovetails for my bench as well (10/4) and found the same thing, you have to be pretty spot on with the squareness. I found I have to do an incredible amount of paring for the fit.

I know many just cut to the line and seat it with a mallet, but I always test fit, and test fitting is especially helpful for extra large dovetails.

[Bobby O'Neal]

Bobby, Never really thought of my jointer as "impish" before. I'll have to think on that a while...

PI

I should have clarified…the routers are the imps. A jointer is a tool many neanders would covet, I think. Both rotary, but only one is a touch evil.

[Robert McNaull]

Chris, any new progress?

[David Weaver]

I heard there is!!

[Robert McNaull]

Thanks David, now I'm more curious, I'll follow that with the normal pictures or it didn't happen.

[Chris Griggs]

Yep. Didn't do any work on it last weekend because I had to work-work on Sat and Sun...I also have to work-work next weekend, but Paul and I got some good shop work in today. The tail vise is done so we mounted it and got to try it out for the first time...its awesome...totally worth the effort. In addition to clamping things between dogs those jaws can hold a piece ever which way like nothing I've ever seen...it works so well that actually started thinking that don't even need a front vise. After about 5 minutes of using it I am thoroughly convinced that a "traditional" tail vise is vastly superior than any other type of end vise (to me anyway..as always YMMV)

Anyway, as far as what we got done today...we got the legs and stretchers dimensioned and got the legs mortised into the top. We are pretty much almost done, and one more weekend day in the shop and it'll be fully constructed...this doesn't include the storage of course, but in two weeks when I make it out to Pauls shop again, I fully expect that the bench itself will get fully assembled and be ready to bring home. Pretty exciting.

We didn't take many pics today as we both had schedules to keep, but I did snap a couple.

This tail vise installed and opened to full capacity.

IMG_20140301_112522_185.jpg

Paul wasting out the mortise in the underside of the top for the legs...he wasted out with a router and I did the fitting will chisels.
IMG_20140301_131933_828.jpg

The top and the legs getting taken apart at the end of the day.

IMG_20140301_152736_472.jpg

[Robert McNaull]

That's a nice bench Chris, puts mine to shame for sure. Thanks for posting!

[Brian Holcombe]

This is coming along nicely! I have a similar tail vise on mine, it's the vise I use on my bench most of the time that I'm using the bench.

[Chris Griggs]

This is coming along nicely! I have a similar tail vise on mine, it's the vise I use on my bench most of the time that I'm using the bench.

Thanks guys. It such a great style of vise. I can't believe they're not more popular (well, in mainstream WW media). I can't think of any recent "build x workbench" article, in any publication that used one. I'm still going to put my face vise on mine (just as you put a shoulder vise on yours), but honestly with a good tail vise of this type that has a good max opening I don't think I would miss a face vise if I didn't have one. It'll be interesting for me to see what I end up using more for joinery and other things I would typically do in a face vise...the tail vise or the QR vise.

I can't wait to get this bench into my shop.

[Brian Holcombe]

I use my shoulder vise for jointing edges and cutting dovetails mostly, works fabulously for those things.

Are you sticking with the typical draw bored mortise and tenons for the leg joinery?

[Chris Griggs]

Yeah, I think my face vise will be primarily used for edge jointing mostly...I wonder if I'll end up using the face or the tail more for DTs and tenons though.

The short stretchers will be drawbored into the legs, the long stretchers will be have threaded rod running through them, into stub tenons and out the side of the leg secured tightened/drawn in with nuts. That's how I did my first bench and it makes for a super solid joint that is easily knocked down.

The tenons in the tops of the legs won't be secured to the top...the weight of the top will keep the tenons in the mortises....again, so it can be knocked down.

I need to be able to knock it down to get it into my basement, and I want to be able knock it down if I ever need to move it again

[Steve Voigt]

Chris, the tail vise looks awesome! Love the dovetails!
Question: are you using the LV hardware that currently costs $74.50? Apologies if you already covered this--I couldn't find it.