Tampilkan postingan dengan label benchtop. Tampilkan semua postingan
Tampilkan postingan dengan label benchtop. Tampilkan semua postingan
Selasa, 29 Maret 2016
New Yankee Workshop Workbench update cutting the plywood benchtop
I set up the 4x8 sheet on my 2 sawhorses with 2x4s running the length for support. I also set up a straight edge to run my cordless saw along. This end will be cut off here and then cut into two matching pieces to make the bottom shelf.
I also set up two scrap pieces of 2x4 to support the wood when I cross cut it.
I checked the far corner and it is pretty square so I clamped a 1x3 down to use to cut the piece for the tray bottom. I gave it a couple of extra inches and will cut it down to size on the table saw. This will make sure that the side cut with the 1x3 ends up being square.
My table saw came with a 28 tooth blade. I bought a 40 tooth blade a couple of weeks back and I am finally getting a chance to try it out.
Here is the tray bottom and shelf top cut to size.
The 2 pieces for the benchtop have been cut to size.
I cut the hardboard to width using the same settings that I used on the plywood.
I didnt want to have to deal with the leftovers of a full sheet of hardboard so I bought 2 smaller pieces that fit in my car. I bought 2 because they were not long enough to cover the length of the benchtop.
All cut to size.
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I cut the hardboard so that the seem would be located where I need to cut the top out for the moving dog block.
Heres the first dry fit.
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Rabu, 23 Maret 2016
Dads Benchtop Bench Part I
A few weeks ago, I wrote of how cool some Benchtop Benches are. After contemplating buying the Sjoberg Smart Vise for him, I instead opted to build a Jeff Miller style Benchtop Bench for my Dad for Fathers day.
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| Jeff Millers Benchtop Bench from FineWoodworking.com |
As might be expected of me, I began by milling the legs out of Timerstrand. One of the nice things about Timberstrand is that they come almost perfectly flat. They’re also easy to mill. A few passes over the jointer and through the planer left them ready for joinery.
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| Timberstrand mills just fine. |
Rather than use the traditional tenons that Miller used on his original, I used Dominos (no suprise to a regular reader. I glued the tops and bottoms to the legs. It was my intention to bolt the front and back stretchers as Miller did, using unglued Dominos rather than his staunch tenons. I say it was intention, because as with many good intentions, this fell to the choiceside once I had the Domino and glue in hand. The stretchers are not permanently glued to the legs.
Miller centered his stretchers on his legs, resulting in their being set back slightly from the face of the legs. As it was easier, I simply jointed my stretchers flush with the face of the legs.
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| The leg assemblies. |
I glued the leg assembly in two (2) steps. First I glued the top and bottoms to the legs. Then I glued the leg assemblies to the stretchers. As soon as they were glued up, I put the whole thing on my table saw as a flat reference surface. There was some twist to bench base, so while the glue was still wet I added an extra clamp diagonally across them to try to pull the twist out.
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| The stretchers glues in and the diagonal clamp to minimize racking. |
Once the leg assembly was in clamps, I began on the top and vise.
The top is made of the finger jointed mystery wood panels you can get from the home centers. I laminated four of the panels together (3/4” each to make a 3” slab) about a year ago as an experimental benchtop. The whole thing was about 6’ long and had an awful twist to it.
To make the benchtop bench top, I cut a 24” length off the end of the home center panel experiment. With a few passes through the planer, this smaller length flattened out quickly and ended up just under 3” thick.
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| The benchtop on the legs. |
Rabu, 16 Maret 2016
Dads Benchtop Bench Part III
With the vise nuts installed and the bench milled to accept the vise, it was time to work on the outer jaw.
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| The benchtop, ready for the vise. |
Miller’s original features a 45° bevel on the top, outside face of the outer vise jaw. I’ve seen the bevel before on many Moxon Vises. It provides clearance to hold a saw and chisel at an angle. To cut my bevel, I eyed about how big I thought it should be, set my table saw to 45° and cut achoice.
Unfortunately, Once I put the vise jaw in place, I quickly realized that the big bevel I’d cut did not leave enough flat surface on the top for a bench dog hole. Rather than have the awkward hole which would have resulted, I flipped the front vise jaw around, and cut a much smaller bevel on the new top edge. This left the big bevel on the bottom, which I’ve grown to like the look of.
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| If Id left the big bevel on the top, I wouldnt have been able to drill (route) for dog. |
To attach the vise I took the back jaw of the vise and set it upside down on my table saw. I also set the bench top upside down on my table saw. I used the saw as a reference surface to ensure that they were aligned, and then I clamped them together with parallel clamps. To fasten them, I simply used screws. I pre-drilled the holes and staggered the pattern to prevent splitting.
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| Fastening the rear vise jaw. |
I installed the legs in a similar manner. I held them in place with parallel clamps and then screwed them to the top. Since the legs were slightly out of square, I was sure they were clamped extra tight to the top before I screwed them on.
Once I took the clamps off and flipped the bench over, I found that that screwing the legs to the perfectly flat 3” thick top was all it took to pull them into alignment. The feet sit perfectly flat on my tablesaw.
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| Assembling the legs to the top. |
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| The milled vise jaws. |
With the vise jaws milled, I then set out to drill the vise screw holes and make the mortises to countersink the vise screw nuts. I used Miller’s side to side spacing to determine the screw location, making sure that they were clear of the legs before committing (I had made the width of my legs slightly wider than Miller’s. The screws are simply centered, top to bottom.
With the vise screw locations marked on one (1) of the jaws, I set them on top of each other on my drill press. I used an 1/8” bit to drill through the entire upper jaw and about half the lower jaw (I ran out of bit length). These 1/8” holes served as center guides for the larger bits I would use to make clearance for the vise screw (about 5/8”) and the vise screw nut (about 1-1/4”).
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| Drilling the pilot holes for the vise screws. |
After checking that the vise screws fit in their holes, I set the vise screw nuts in their holes. I traced around their flanges and pulled them out.
Then I used my DeWalt DWP611 with an 1/8” upcut spiral bit to route out for the screw flanges. To set the depth, I set the router on my bench and brought the bit down to the bench. Then I loosened the depth guide and slid the flange between the top and the turret. I then tightened the stop and pulled the flange out. By lowering the router until the stop hit the turret, I had set the depth exactly as deep as the flange.
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| Plenty of clearance. |
I then simply routed free hand. To ensure that the flanges fit, I made sure to go outside the lines which were drawn tight.
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| Too proud. |
When I installed the vise screw nuts, I found that they fit perfectly within the routed out areas. I also found that they stuck out proud of the inside face of the vise jaw. I had to remove them and cut off the excess with a grinder in order to fit them properly.
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| Being shamed into fitting. |
With the vise nuts installed, I assembled the vise by inserting the vise screws through the front jaw into the rear jaw and snugging them up. Then I laid the vise in place, letting the screw threads rest on the underside of the benchtop. I marked the screw locations with a pencil and took out the DWP611 again.
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| I actually routed the nut clearance first. |
I used the router freehand to remove a clearance hole for the screw threads and I relieved a small amount on the edge to give just a little extra clearance for the back of the vise nuts.
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| Ready to receive the screw. |
With the benchtop milled to accept the vise, I went back to complete the front jaw.
Read More..
Rabu, 09 Maret 2016
The MWA Gets By With A Little Help From Our Friends At Woodtalk Show
Wood Talk did the Modern Woodworkers Association a big favor by helping to promote the MWA teams for the Fine Woodworking Live Build Off.
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| Yep, these guys want the online community to rock. |
I trust that if youre following the +Modern Woodworkers Association you already know who the Wood Talk guys are. If not, be sure to check them out. Youll be glad you did.
In their most recent episode, #141 - Quality Control Is Boring!, Marc mentioned our build off.
Like us, they want to demonstrate how thriving the online woodworking community is. Were looking to show everyone by assembling a number of four (4) person teams for the Fine Woodworking Live Build Off. Our goal is to not only have online woodworkers win, but to have them play a major role in the build off so that everyone in attendance at Fine Woodworking Live learns of the community and the fun we have.
If youll be at Fine Woodworking Live on Friday Night, August 9th, please joing us for the build off. You can sign up below. Youll make some furniture, meet some friends and have some fun.
Rabu, 02 Maret 2016
On Benchtop Benches
Benchtop Benches provide woodworkers with small, portable benches that have almost as much clamping versatility as a full sized bench while still fitting in a suitcase.
I first noticed the Sjoberg Smart Vise due to its prominent placement in the Rockler catalogue I recently received. The Smart Vise caught my eye because it solves an issue Ive had before and I know many woodworkers have had: How to clamp and work pieces without a proper, formal bench?
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| This image of the Sjoberg Smart Vise is from Rocklers site. |
The Smart Vise is a 14.5” x 14.5” benchtop with a wood jawed vise along one side. There are dog holes in the vise and bench. It even comes with four (4) small bench dogs.
What makes the Smart Vise so interesting is the lip which runs around the sides. By clamping the lip onto any work surface, you mount the Smart Vise and get a small, extremely portable bench to work on.
This notion of a small, clamp-on bench has recently been popularized by Chris Schwarz and his “Milkman’s Workbench”. The Milkman’s Workbench is a small (about 30” x 7”) wooden bench. As is true of the Sjoberg Smart Vise, the Milkman’s Workbench is meant to be portable and simply clamped to a table for use. The original Chris saw accomplished this with fancy wooden clamps built into the bench. In the version Chris built, he used much simpler angle iron and F-style clamps.
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| Mark Hochsteins Milkmans Workbench. (image from gunpowederwoodworks.com) |
Though not designed to be quite as portable as the Smart Vise or Milkman’s Workbench, Jeff Miller’s Benchtop Bench is also in this class of bench - in that it can be put on about any table and used as a bench.
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| Jeff Millers Benchtop Bench from finewoodworking.com |
The difference is that unlike the Smart Vise or Milkman’s Workbench - which are essentially portable benches designed to be transported and used when a standard formal bench isn’t available - Miller’s Benchtop Bench is designed to be used on, and in conjunction with, a formal bench. It’s made to raise the workpiece to a more comfortable height for certain operations, similar to a Moxon Vise. Though the stub legs which give it the added height also make it a bit bulkier than the others, I think it would still work as a portable bench too.
Among these benchtop Benches, I think the biggest deciding factor is “Do you want to build or buy?” If you want to build, you’ll then need to figure out if you want the unique clamping ability of the Milkman’s Workbench or the height and bench surface of Miller’s Benchtop Bench. If you want to buy, then you just need to figure out where to get the Sjoberg Smart Vise (Woodcraft and Amazon seem to be the cheapest).
All three (3) of these benchtop benches provide working bench functionality for anyone without a formal bench or who needs to woodwork on the road. Though I won’t be putting one (1) on my to-do list ahead of the formal bench I still need to build, I think there versatility means one (1) of them will be in my future.If the Milkman’s Workbench has caught your eye, be sure to check out Mark Hochstein’s blog posts about building one himself.
Read More..
Kamis, 18 Februari 2016
Power In The Shop Only 5 Years Late
Long time readers may remember some of these photos.
It was in the summer of 2008 that I ripped out the sheet rock, insulation and electric from my shop. Though I had every intention of replacing them all quickly, it was not to be. For years I suffered through a shop that had no insulation and almost no electric. My only shop outlet was a single 15 amp outlet on a circuit shared with the shop lights and the hall in the house.
As the removal of the insulation and electric was part of the first phase of my siding project, their replacement languished as the siding project devolved into a multi-year odyssey. It was my friend, +Aaron Marshall, who finally brought me back to the insulation and electric.
Woodworking in America 2011 occurred during the early days of the Wood Whisperer Guild Split-Top Roubo project. Aaron and I were excited about it and talking about workbenches. I explained to Aaron my intention to build a Roubo/21st Century Workbench hybrid from LVL’s and Timberstrand. Though the great hardware available from the WIA vendors was tempting, Aaron convinced me to make even that from LVL and make my own leg vise.
I left WIA excited about my bench and proceeded to begin work on it right achoice. I had finished the leg vise design by the time the temperature dipped - that’s when I knew the bench had to wait and I began rebuilding the wall.
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| My absolute favorite drill for roughing in electrical work. |
Though the rough in of the electric was the first phase, most of the electrical work had to wait until the walls were insulated and sheathed. The insulating work began just after Christmas 2011 and by April of 2012, I was able to begin sheathing the walls. Finally, by April of 2013, the insulation and sheathing work were done and I was able to begin wiring outlets.
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| Ready for sheathing. |
I completed the wiring of the 110V outlets on July 10, 2013. After thinking I was done, finding one I forgot, installing it and then connecting a ground that I’d failed to connect, all of the outlets were live and wired properly. I was even able to use the power detector I made in 7th grade technology to test the outlets.
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| Theres Power! |
Next time I’m in the shop I won’t be swapping plugs to switch tools or blindly feeling for the circuit breaker when the table saw or planer trips the fuse and the lights go out. I now have 3 dedicated 20V circuits with 16 double gang boxes and one single gang box to choose from.
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| So many nice outlets . . . |
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| Gluing up the corner boards |
As with any T1-11 sided building, the Treehouse needs corner boards to seal the nasty gaps where the T1-11 panels meet.
I began fabricating the corner boards by ripping 3/4" off of half the 1x6s I had. After assembly, the corner boards should be the same width on both faces. I hate it when lazy carpenters fail to rip one side, resulting in a corner board which is the width of a board on one side and the width + thickness of a board on the other.
After ripping, I glued up the corner boards with no fasteners. I did this so that when I was cutting them to fit, there would be no chance of hitting and exposing a screw or nail.
Once the glue was dry, I primed the inside and outside of the corner boards. They are made of simple, box store pine, so rot could be an issue. If Id waited until they had been installed, any water which did get behind them could easily rot into the bare wood. The primer doesnt make the rot proof, but it will help. I also primed the cut edges, prior to installation.
I dry fit each corner board and used relative dimensioning to mark them to exact length. A quick trip to the miter saw later, they were ready to install.
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| The first corner board is installed. |
I put a double bead of M-1 sealant behind each side of the corner board, slid them into place and fastened them with screws. Before the final coloring, Ill apply another bead of M-1 to the exterior joint where the corner boards meet the T1-11.
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