Fold away MS station...stupid idea?

[Rich Imlay]

Hi there,

I am going to make a new work bench for my small garage shop. It will run about 16ft of wall.

I am intending to incorporate a Mitre Saw station -- I have a Makita 1214 12inch sliding compound mitre saw. As the bench is needed to do a range of tasks it will also include a tail vise, face vise and dog holes. I am intending to make the MS fence removable mounting into the rear line of dog holes.

I am now toying with the idea of having the MS fold away. The idea being that the saw would be mounted at an appropriate height that the MS saw table matched the finished bench height and that the platform on which the MS is mounted would be hinged at the rear end (closest to the wall). Behind the saw blade there would be a plywood dust baffle, that would form the bench top when the saw was in the "away" position.

I have looked all through this forum and an Australian one and not found anything like this.

Is this stupid? Have any of you come across an idea like this before? Let me know if you have any ideas, suggestions or examples....

regards,

Rich.

[Rich Engelhardt]

Hello Rich,
LOL!
Great names/great minds/great ideas!

I'm planning to mount 1/2 of my station via a cleat system.

I'd thought about using a hinge arrangement, but the hinged arrangement isn't stable enough to suit me.

Here's my basic plan:
The center of the station will be fixed. The right side will be secured to the wall. The left side will consist of a modified torsion box mounted via a cleat on the wall, and the mating cleat on the back of the torsion box.
I plan to construct the torsion box using shop made I- beams as the centers, and 3/4 ply as the top.

In another thread I spoke about the swing out lumber rack I'm building.
The left side - on cleats is going to sit behind where the rack swings out away from the wall.

Pictures will be coming as soon as I get time to work on it.
Between my job and having to work on two rentals, I'm buring the candle in the middle and at both ends.

[Rich Imlay]

Hi Rich,

Well it's pretty lonely here.....guess I'll implement my idea and if it works I'll post the results....good luck with yours!!!!!

regards,

Rich.

[Jim Becker]

I'm not sure I'm visualizing what you want to do exactly, but it sounds like it might work. I didn't do a fold down arrangement, but for my miter station, the fences are removable and should I choose to do so, I can pull the saw out very easily and replace it with an insert that creates a continuous bench. If you don't use your CMS/SCMS a lot, that could be beneficial from a space consideration as long as you have a place to put the saw when it's not in use. And storing the saw takes up less room than a knock down miter station would where you have both the saw and the stand to deal with.

[Danny Thompson]

Sounds like a great idea, Rich, particularly the doghole/fence setup. I've got a new blank slate of a workshop in my near future, and am very interested in this possibility. Let us know how it turns out.

Jim, have you posted pix of your setup?

[Rob Bodenschatz]

Sounds like it would work. It's similar to the flip-over idea I've seen in some magazine. My only concern is that that I'm sure that saw is pretty heavy. Lifting the saw in position may be awkward unless you have some ideas that I'm not envisioning. The flip-over configuration pivots in the middle so you don't have to bend over as much.

Quick search resulted in this:
http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=17841

Be sure to come back & let us know what you did. I may be interested in copying.

[Nick Amandus]

Rich,

I also have a small garage and was in need of a MS station. But like you, I needed the floor space and decided on a 'fold down' style bench. I drew up the plans a while ago but didn't get to building it. It incorporates a block and tackle counterweight system that would fit in a 2x4 stud wall with folding legs in the front for stability. Again, I didn't get prove the design, but feel free to ask me any questions about it. I realize this may be a little late, but let us know what you end up with.

Nick

[Kevin Groenke]

I've also thought about this but never gotten around to it. Other solutions I've considered are:

a center pivot flip top as somebody mentioned

a gap between base cabinets with cleats to hold the miter saw mounted on a board, the saw could be swapped with another tool mounted on a board (planer, drill press, spindle sander, ?) or a blank board. Some of the tools could use the same fence. (less t-slot to buy if you go that route). The tools would store on cleats mounted below the top in the same cabinet gap. I like the fence/doghole idea.

a lift mechanism so that the saw could be dropped below the benchtop and replaced with a fillerboard.
http://www.rockler.com/product.cfm?page=10751
You could even put a cheap hydraulic or scissors jack under the saw to raise/lower it.