workbench for a cooperative house

Go to a salvage yard, or to a Habitat for Humanity store and see if you can find a cheap solid core wooden exterior door. These are usually anywhere from 1 1/4 inches to 1 3/4 inches thick and are cheap if bought used. Sometimes you can get them for free if you luck up on a house or building that is being torn down. Once you have the door you can either put it on sawhorses (instant easy to take apart workbench) or find a couple of cheap base cabinets at the same salvage yard to make a more permanent workbench. If you are looking for inexpensive vices go to Harbor Freight. If you do find a solid core door you can glue a piece of hardboard or thin mdf on top of it to make it studier.

-- Those that say it can't be done should not interrupt those who are doing it.

thanks for the quick reply… i was thinking about the solid core door for the top but i’m hoping to get a little more ambitious [read custom] with the ‘frame’ (although cabinets do seem quite versatile…hmm)

thanks so much great ideas

-- george

I second the Habitat for Humanity stores, if you want cheapness. They often will have (at the ones near me) decorative legs at these places. May be brand new, may be “gently” used. Either way, it’s a good bargain for a good cause.

You mention that you already have 2×4 and 4×4’s available, so there you go for legs on the cheap.

-- Respect your shop tools and they will respect you - Ric

Glue the two by fours to each other to get your self a sturdy 4x or use the 4Xs and start with these as the legs, a solid core door as suggested above for the work surface and you are off to the races.

-- ...it's rennovation time!!!

I thought that the bench I built (from FWW’s Getting Started in Woodworking) was a nice compromise between not getting in over your head and still having a nice handcrafted appeal. I built it with a circular saw, drill, miter saw, and router.

Also, you’re probably going to want to consider what to do with the dust you produce. Dust and electronics don’t mix, and I imagine that it’s not very nice for sewing either. There’s lots of advice to be had on the forums here, but even something as simple as a homemade air filter (box fan + furnace filter) and some cheap shower curtains to block off your space would help a lot.

Good luck!

-- Steve -- University Heights, Ohio

With storage always a problem, especially in a small shop, look for old base cabinets that have come out of a kitchen remodel job. A cabinet maker might even let you remove the old cabinets for free – saving him the task of having to do this.

Then put a 3/4” plywood top on the cabinets. I like to have a 2” overhang in front so that I can clamp things to the table.

-- "Heaven is North of the Bridge"

thanks to all

that fww video especially was pretty great it pulled together a bunch of things that i’ve seen or read into one place. i might go for something like that but experiment with making the joints mortise and tenon (that might be a bit much we’ll see…)

again thanks so much to all can’t wait to share my first thing…

oh and also i think i’m definitely gonna head over to the local dig and save to hunt down some cabinets (or maybe someone here knows or is a cabinet maker in madison, wi looking to get rid of some from a remodel :-)

-- george

look into the madison area woodworker’s guild. i was a member of it before i moved back out west; good people in that group, and they might be able to help out.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/madwoodworkers/

regards, jm

-- Jarrod, Taos, NM http://jzmurphree.wordpress.com/