Workbench VII - Installing the Saw

Finally!  I managed to get the circular saw bolted to the plate.  I cut two slots - one at 90deg and one at 45deg.

Table saw of death - highest point

Changing the depth is pretty easy

Underneath - switch on with a zip tie

When I put it in, I realised that the cord pushes into one of the metal cross beams on the base.  I might get away with it, but it makes putting it in tricky and I think it might cause wear on the cord, so I'll probably borrow an angle grinder and cut a piece out for it to fit.

Cord obstruction

Next, I need to work out a fence solution.  :)

Workbench VI - The Insert

Today I bought a pattern bit so that I could do the insert for the saw.  It scared me half to death cutting in to my lovely bench top!

I checked the level of the bench again this morning and somehow it has developed a bow.  I'm not sure what has caused it, but there is definitely now a slight sag in the middle.  I'm not too concerned, even after all the routing I did to get it flat, but it did make inserting the plate a little more difficult.

I got a piece of 12mm mdf and cut a square.  I was originally going to do a rectangle, just a little larger than the saw, but I thought that it might be a good idea to make it square so that I could change the direction of the saw if I need to.

Cutting a square is harder than I thought though, but I got close enough in the end and then got set up to cut the hollow.

It took some serious tweaking to get the depth right, and cutting out the square with the jigsaw was painful!  There are some pretty crazy rough edges, but I'm happy enough for now.

Routing done ...

... then the cut

The plate is a little wonky and it doesn't fit in in every direction, but I'm done for now.  I feel exhausted.  Another day, I'll get back in there with a sander and see if I can make it a little better.

Workbench V - Last bit of flattening

And this is how it looks now!

I think gluing those end pieces on worked ok.  I did end up adding some pocket screws underneath, which I did by hand and they ended up being a bit of a mess.  (Pockethole jigs are really expensive!)  But they did the job and are hidden anyway, so who cares?

Also, when I routed the two end pieces to match, I didn't extend the side sleds out far enough, so even though I tried to adjust, the weight of the router kind of pulled the skid down a bit and now the very end of the bench slopes down.

I'm not too worried at this stage.  I suppose I could take off the last end piece, add a new one and relevel the whole thing.  But I'm not a carpenter and I suspect that it really isn't going to matter that much to me.

And if I find that I can't live with it after a while, I can always come back and fix it later.  We'll see.

Next will be making the table/circular saw insert.  I need to get a pattern bit for my router to do that and I'm both excited and terrified at the idea of cutting into my beautiful top!

Workbench IV - Flattening finished ... almost

Today is the last day of my holiday and I'm finishing off the flattening process.  It's looking pretty good, I reckon!

I'm definitely not going to be able to stand those router ridges though, so filling and sanding next.

BUT...I made a huge mess of one end.  When I got to the halfway point, I decided to lift up the skid and start in from the other end.  But obviously something happened to the bit in the process.  I think it started coming loose, but I didn't notice that either.  

So when I started at the other end, it was way too deep, but without a reference point, I couldn't tell.  And then, at about the third pass, the whole bit came loose and made a huge gouge in the surface.  Way, WAY too deep to fix.  

omg

How didn't I see this?!

I don't know how I didn't notice, but I think I imagined that this end was a lot higher than it actually was.

So there's is no way I can fix or live with that!  So I cut off the whole end which then made my whole "too short" issue even worse.  I had two short pieces left over though from the laminating, so I'm trying to see how gluing those onto the end will work.

I want to believe that the glue will be strong enough to hold them, but if I decide to eventually put a tail vice on, it will need to be really sturdy, so I'm contemplating adding some pocket screws underneath.

Workbench III - Flattening

Today was router day!  I've been struggling with the temptation to buy a router for a couple of months now, but I promised myself I wouldn't buy any more new tools until I absolutely need them.

And I knew today that I couldn't go forward without a router.  J said that he would be able to borrow one from someone at work next week, but I wouldn't get that for another week or so and I really wanted to keep the ball rolling.

So this morning, I went off to Bunnings to buy the AEG 1350E plunge router.  Morley had sold out and I discovered that it's actually a promotional item and they won't get any more stock.  It's rrp is actually $225, but Bunnings were selling them for $99.

The sales guy checked around for me, and the only place that still had stock was Malaga - 1 left!  So feeling it was meant to be, I went screaming up to Malaga and got it.  Yay!

I also picked up some cheap melamine & plywood to make the sled for the flattening process.

First, I tried to get the bench base as level as possible on the ground, then I screwed the top down.

Then I cut the melamine into two pieces and attached them to the sides.  This was a tricky process and I probably could have done with another pair of hands, but seeing as there weren't any, I partially nailed holes into the boards and then, with the level balancing along the top edge, made little adjustments and then hammered them into place.  Once I'd done the other side too, levelled with each other, I went around and added screws too, to make sure there was no movement with the sled moving across the top.

It was an interesting exercise because up until this point, I would have said the surface was fairly level already.  But, hooley dooley, it was nowhere near!

Once I'd put the sled together...

The sled showing router gap

.. and got the router onto it, I realised that I'd made the rails too high because I couldn't get the bit to reach the lowest point, which seems to be this corner...

So I took a bit off the high point at the opposite corner ...

The sled on the rails

... and then took off the side rails and did it all again, much lower this time.  That did the trick and now I've started flattening in earnest!

I'm finding that I can do 10 passes at a time.  It's a pretty big bit (1" straight Diablo) and I don't want the motor to get too hot.  Plus, holding the trigger down means I have to grip it really hard and after 10 passes, I need to un-cramp.

Rails down and starting in earnest

The fallout...

... is immense!

It's leaving behind these little ridges, which some people seem to think you just leave to give the surface a bit of texture to hold your work.  But I don't think I'd be able to stand it!  Once the router passes are done, I think I'll go back with a sander and smooth it off.

But one step at a time.  The lesson I'm learning from this project is patience.  Every time I pick up a tool, I want to race to the ending somehow, but I'm trying to slow it all down and just focus on one thing then another.  No cutting corners.  There's no deadline.

Workbench II - Laminating

Yesterday was cutting and laminating day.  It went ok.

I started out with some grand ideas of cutting down the length of each piece with a view to giving them all nice straight edges to laminate together.  But after attempting one piece, I gave up.  It was way too hard trying to get a nice straight rip with the circular saw so near the edge.

So I just went ahead with laminating using heaps of pva glue.

There were some seriously large gaps between the pieces, because of bowing and cupping, though.   Not to mention all the knots.

I considered just using a filler to fill all the gaps, but some of them were so bowed that the only bit that were glues were just the little bits at the ends.  So I put some masking tape underneath some of the worst ones and started filling them with Tarzan's Grip.  

I love this stuff - it glues really well, but also swells up to a kind of foam as it hardens.  It took a few goes, but eventually I got it start coming out of the top seams.

I wasn't too concerned about any mess because it will all come out when I flatten the top.

I also trimmed off the ends with the circular saw, but I made a bit of a boo and cut off too much at one end.  I would have preferred more overhand at the ends, but it just means that I'll definitely have to put on an end cap at some point.  :)

Workbench I - The Beginning

This all began with my wanting to get ducks.  I already have 5 chickens, but I thought, hey, why not 2 ducks as well?

But then of course, that means I’m going to need a new coop, that can house both chickens and ducks.  My poor chickens have needed an upgrade for a while, so this is a good reason to do it.

And that means, of course, I’m going to need a lot of pallets.  And to get all those pallets ready for building, well, that means I’m going to need a proper work area.  And a proper area needs a workbench.  And thus, I’ve arrived.

I already have a base made of really heavy metal, so really all I need is the top.  The base was my Dad’s and had some old mdf top on it which was all swollen and crumbling, and I figured that if I’m going to get a new one, I might as well do it right.

So I started investigating and eventually came across roubo bench designs, like a proper carpenter’s bench with built-in vices and whatnot, and that got me properly excited.  It’s not going to be a proper roubo, but inspired by one.

This was the impetus I needed to get sorting out my back patio.  Most of it was piled high with boxes and baskets that Mum left behind and it took me about 2 days to get through half of it.  But that was enough to make room for the bench base.

After much sketching and changing and thinking, I finally trotted off to Bunnings and bought 6 lengths of structural pine - 90 x 45mm x 2.4m.  For some reason, Bunnings keep this particular size on a mezzanine floor down the back of the trade section, which means each piece has to be carried down stairs to load on your trolley.  Luckily, when I went, 2 nice blokes were there buying timber too, so they helped me pass it all down, over the edge of the balcony, and down onto my trolley.

I managed to fold down the back seat of my Outback as well as put the passenger seat right back, and that way, I fit it all in.  Woot!  I picked up some pva glue, clamps and a very cool long sash clamp thing.  I really wanted a 90mm t-bar slash clamp, which was on the Bunnings website, but after visiting 3 different stores and nobody having them, I gave up and bought this one instead.  I actually really like it.

So here it all is:

The wood is all in really poor shape.  I know it’s only structural grade pine, but I had the feeling that lots of people had already been through and picked out all the best bits.  So even though I went through every piece, what I ended up with is still pretty twisted, bowed and knotty.  Oh well.  I keep telling myself, it’s only a workbench and not fine furniture.