Shop Project: Finally flattening my main bench top

[Jim Becker]

I've been meaning to "actually" flatten my main bench top since I made it a number of years ago, but never got around to it. Back at the old shop, the plan was to take it to Bucks County Hardwood and have it run though their big old wide sander as I have done a few times with big table tops, but it never happened. And then we moved three years ago. It was certainly "ok" but I knew there was a dip in one area and knew a few other things needed to be addressed for it to be truly flat. Well...today was the day. And it was surprising just how much I had to take off to take care of everything...about 4mm or so "in general". But it's now quite flat. I still need to remount it on the Noden base, sand it thoroughly, re-run the chamfer for the dog holes, etc., but here are a few pictures of the, um...mess...I made this afternoon over about an hour or so.

Here's the starting point. Rather than taking the vice off, I just pulled out one lateral rail from my flattening table so that there was no interference and that also made sure the vice jaw was brought to the same level. It may or may not need minor tweaking with a hand plane but I'm not worried about it. This is a thick benchtop, and so that I didn't have to take off the sacrificial rail tops that protect it when it's being used as a tracksaw table, I blocked up the TrueTrack side rails about an inch so that the gantry would clear the top of the bench. Hot glue kept the bench in place.

Bench-1.jpg

Because of the necessary "bite" to take care of things in all of this hardwood (purple heart, cherry and oak), I kept the stepover at about 4% (five cranks of the wheel) and rested the router about every ten minutes.

Bench-2.jpg

Here's the evidence of the "dip" I mentioned...

Bench-3.jpg

And at this point, the surface of the benchtop is most certainly flat and ready for some "finesse" work like easing the edges to avoid purple heart splinters and cuts (!), sanding and re-chamfering the grid. That darkish area where the dip used to be is just weirdo cherry...I may address that further depending on what I see while sanding.

Bench-4.jpg


No question what I'll be dealing with tomorrow. LOL

Bench-5.jpg

One more thing crossed off my list of "things that need done in the shop".

[Michael Burnside]

Wow Jim, > 1/8" is quite a bit but it looks great now! LOL, looks like you've got a pile of chips to take care of!

I finally had it with my old workbench that has a slight hump in the middle. On the last project, I said enough is enough. To be fair I built it years and years ago when I was a n00b and while it isn't fancy, it worked well. But this weekend, I designed a new bench and uploaded the CAD BOM to 8020 and parts are ordered. Nothing more important than a good workstation IMHO.

[Lisa Starr]

Looks great, Jim! I new bench top has been on my "Someday" list for at least two years now.... I'm currently rearranging my shop, so it will continue being on the someday list

[George Yetka]

Nice work Jim. Only issue is it currently looks way to clean. Got to hurry up and get some scars on it.

[Jim Becker]

Nice work Jim. Only issue is it currently looks way to clean. Got to hurry up and get some scars on it.

It was pretty nasty for sure from the grey tinted Rubio that happened to drip on it during some recent projects as well as the natural darkening and color changes. It will sparkle for awhile when I'm done with the reconditioning, but in the end...it's a workbench that I slice and dice on.

[Tom M King]

Looks fantastic!

[Jim Becker]

The cleanup went surprisingly easy...I created the "world's largest shop vac" and sucked it all up. The hose wouldn't reach on it's own and I had a spare 5' piece of 4" quick connect duct. Voila! Now to be clear, since I use a Harvey G700 in my shop which does not have pre-separation, this whole area was already cleaned prior to the benchtop flattening so I knew there was no metal on the floor. When I was done with about three minutes of waving that heavy thang around, there was only a very small amount of remainder to be sucked up by the shop vac.

Bench-6.jpg Bench-7.jpg

I moved on to the sanding and finishing stages and will post a final photo when this little flattening and reconditioning exercise is complete.