SoDo Hall Bench

A neighbor of mine salvaged a bunch of fir tongue and groove 4×6s from an old rail servicing station in Seattle’s SoDo neighborhood. This timber was originally used to frame in skylights as sodium lamps weren’t available back then. They were headed to the dump and took a fortuitous detour into my shop. Thanks Neighbor!

My family needed a place to put shoes on before heading out so the first step was to clean up the lumber. After testing for lead in the paint, and removing some rather large spikes used to hold them together, (see image with standard 3.5” framing nail next to a spike I pulled out) I used a hand chisel to remove the rest of the paint and tar. I selected out the best boards and with some help from my father-in-law we ran them through the thickness planer.

Naturally as the tongue and groove was already in place just some water and a carefully applied amount of Gorilla Glue was my choice to hold the top together. The one thing I learned from this step is that I need MORE CLAMPS!! I probably had the minimum amount to make this happen, but it’s still holding together after a lot of abuse.

The conundrum of bench legs was solved by serendipity really. I did not want 3 pieces to make up each leg because to me it would look a bit boring. I figured I would just stick two pieces of the same lumber together and recess them a bit, however that would have made the bench a bit unstable. I received this lumber in November of 2006 and did not complete this project until November 2007. The majority of time was spent trying to come up with a clever solution which was staring me in the face the entire time. I guess I was just to distracted to notice it.

For some reason I looked at the lumber rack and saw some left over pieces of ½” birch plywood I had used on a built-in shelving project. This was my “Ah HA!” moment. I thought shave off the tongues and glue the birch into the grooves already provided. This also made for a nice contrast of color between the aged fir and the light birch.

To attach the legs I simply made a huge mortise and tenon joint. I carved out a router guide in the shape of one of the legs and plunged into the underside of the bench top. Some more gorilla glue, clamps, and presto the bench legs were attached.

I used the router to round out the edges in an attempt to spare the toddlers in the house from any trips to the ER, and finished the project with several coats of a clear acrylic to preserve the rich tone Mother Nature had already created.

Now we have a very solid place to sit/stand/and jump from. It has been put to the test by my children time and again. Now I just need to figure out what to do with the other pieces, but rest assured they are not going to the dump.