My First Blog - My First Workbench #1: My First Workbench

In the early years(more than 35 years ago) of toying with a hammer, nails, a saw and a pieces of wood, I found it very excruciating and a lot of times very very painful as well to nail two pieces of wood together with some semblance of alignment. It was very difficult to saw straight if not impossible and again most of the time it was also very painful. Those were the times I wished I had another pair of hands.

My father saw me struggle with what I was doing. He just watched and went about his ways. He was the kind who’d let you discover and find it out for yourself. But I was not making any progress and maybe to prevent me from hurting myself any further….He said “Son whatever it is you are doing to that piece of wood will probably take a lot less effort, will probably be more accurate, will probably be done faster and most probably be a lot less painful too if you keep the workpiece immobile”.

Fast forward to Lumberjocks.Drooooooooooooool!Those workbenches are magnificent. Fine furniture to build fine furniture. Perfect combination. Gotta have one. But there is one hitch. My conscience told me “manila boy you’re a mere mortal. You can’t afford any of those pretty benches! Cost is a formidable constraint for me. So is the size of lumber that will fit in my car as well as the size of my shop.

No plans. Built on the fly. Hand-cut box joints. Doubled up plywood top on rabbets. Mortise and tenon joinery on the legs. Tenoned stretchers pocket screwed to mortises on the legs.

Materials (cost me about P3,000, US$75):

2 pcs – 2” X 4” X 8’ Tanguile S4S for the legs
1 pc – 2” X 4” X10’ Tanguile S4S for the legs
2 pcs – 2” X 5” X 8’ Tanguile S4S for the top
1 pc – 3/4” 4’ X 8’ Marine Plywood

Tools:

Handsaw
Coping saw
Hammer
Chisels – 1 1/2”, 7/8”, 1/2”, 1/4”
Planes – Stanley # 3, Stanley Block
Router – 1/2” X 2” straight bit
Drill Press – 1/2” bit
Jig Saw
Portable power planer

I hope you will all stay tuned.

-- "Real jocks do it on a bench"