bench

as part of my art making preparedness plan (or AMPP if you like to abbreviate things) i decided i needed a small and at least somewhat mobile workbench that was still robust enough to take a beating so i wouldn't need to consider building a new one for a long time. and as part of my router table plan (that's the RTP) i cut a spot for a router table insert. here are some pictures:

here are all the legs stacked in the ultimate clamp-up machine at the shop (that's my dad's buisness shop, not the garage). it originally had iron handles that you spun to tighten each clamp, but those have been replaced by those little wing jobs that are tightened with a pneumatic motor. usually i try to avoid using the bigger tools at the shop as i don't want to be in the way of the real work and i don't want to get too dependent on tools that i will never have in a smaller shop setting. but this is the right tool for the job and they weren't using it at the moment.

i also glued up the top in the big ol' clamper. because it is just wider than even the largest tools at the shop, i flattened the surface by hand. i could definitely see where a larger #7 or #8 jointer plane would have worked better, but my #5 did a respectable job. all i had to do was completely and evenly remove all those pencil marks...

and then the surface would be flat. of course, the closer you get to flat, the more material you have to remove to get it flatter. this picture is from about half way through the planing step. because it is a workbench, i stopped well before i got to "dead flat" and even left a lot of tear-out made by the plane. i finished with the belt sander in an attempt to remove some of that tear out and got a surface that i find acceptable.

then i routed out a recess for the router insert (that blue metal thing).

and used some screws to level it out.

after the top was finished, i built the apron out of poplar and attached the legs. then i spent about a week living with it, deciding how i wanted to take care of the racking issues (i.e. wobbly-leggedness). i decided to go with a strong plywood toolbox screwed on to rails installed 6 inches below the apron, along with lower foot rails on the short dimension. now i have a pretty tough table that can be packed up flat. too bad it still weighs a ton.