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It's finally done. I've been working on this bench for months now. It took a long time because it really does perform many different functions in the shop.

It's:

A Workbench (duh)
A downdraft table
An air filter
An outfeed table
A finishing table (due to the roll of paper on the end :)
Storage for saw blades, biscuits, etc.
It has a vise for clamping as well as dog holes and Kreg clamps (the blue things in the corners)
It provides electricity to the table saw, the router table, and anything else I care to plug in to it.

I looked at a lot of benches and took all the best ideas I saw and made one bench that does it all. It's very heavy, but it has two wheels so you can lift up one end and roll it (slowly).

You can see in the second picture that there is a squirrel-cage fan in the bottom that sucks air through the downdraft holes. The air is filtered by the two filters you see in the middle (the sloping shelves are off in this photo). One filter catches the large stuff, the other is a more expensive filter that can clean up the air down to a couple of microns. The table actually acts like an air filter when it's running.

It's just made out of birch ply pocket screwed together, but the top is 1 3/4" maple and the drawer fronts are maple. The whole thing is coated with wipe-on polyurethane.

Gallery

Comments

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1,011 Posts
SWWEEEEETTTT!!! What an awesome idea…. very creative. Great post!
 

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134 Posts
Great Idea, Beautiful Work!
 

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332 Posts
Very very nice, I love it. You have a lot of fun with this table! Thanks for the post.
 

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1,487 Posts
Great looking unit. You did a beautiful job on it. Thanks for posting.

god Bless
tom
 

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79 Posts
If theres a record for most dog holes, you win!

That looks like a tremendously useful piece of shop equipment.
 

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Favorited for closer study…
 

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Very very nice combi workbench indeed.
A kind of workbench where you can maximize space usage.
The multiple drawers sitting at the corner of the shop is great too. Post some pics when you have time.

Thanks fro the post.
 

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205 Posts
Nice!
 

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430 Posts
Nice work. That should prove to be very useful.
 

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1,243 Posts
Great Job. That thing is REALLY nice!
I bet you get a LOT of use out of that!
 

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What a great looking bench. I just finished a router table and next on my list was a mobil bench. I think I'll be doing some copying. Do you have plans or did you "wing it" as you went? I think this deserves a full how-to writeup.

Cheers
Mike
 

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4,967 Posts
Wow … this project would answer a lot of needs in my shop.

Your design looks to be well executed, and gives me some ideas to work with. Thanks!
 

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415 Posts
Great looking bench. I want one too.
 

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1,043 Posts
Excellent! Very good project and very well thought out! You should blog this for the others so they can build their own.
 

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Great concept for a bench and an excellent execution. Definitely a favourite.
 

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That is really great. It looks like a lot of thought went into the design.
 

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I think we could all use one of these! Very impressive top. Thanks for sharing this with us. I second the blog suggestion.
 

· In Loving Memory
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3,537 Posts
I take inspiration for this as I need a nice workbench (been too long without a nice one) and I need a downdraft table never had one so thanks for the post.Alistair
 

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89 Posts
That's slicker than deer guts on a door knob!

I was about to put a top on the bench I am working on but now I am going to consider some of your innovations.

Rufus
 

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Can I come over and play? (I'm jealous!!!)
 
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