# Yet another workbench



## JonasB (Jul 8, 2015)

*My belt and suspenders design.*










So I decided I needed to finally build a real woodworking bench for my new workspace. I got all the books by Chris Schwarz, checked all the back issues of woodworking mags and browsed the internet in preparation. Then the first thing I did was break one of Chris Schwarz rules. I decided to design my own rather then duplicate a historical bench. I think I had valid reasons. My workspace is small. I could not fit a long bench. A short bench means planning forces have a bigger impact, so I decided to use canted legs. This also helps with clearance for a face vise. I don't like the way a straight face vise looks on a canted leg, so my vise is also canted. In addition to aesthetics, I felt this would give me a little more clearance underneath for holding long items vertically. I also wanted the bench to be easy to disassemble, so if I ever move, the bench is not stuck in my old workroom with no way to get out. I wanted the component pieces light enough so that one person can manage them.

I started this project about 6 months ago and finally finished it last week. Like others who have embarked on this journey, I have done it in pieces with vacations, long periods of thinking, and testing ideas mixed in with honey todos stretching out the time. I am still surprised that something that looks so simple took so long. Luckily my homemade solutions work well.

One other thing I did during this project that I have not seen discussed by others is to use the freeware Freeplane mind mapping software. I have been using this software for a variety of projects and have found this flexible approach to moving ideas around invaluable. Each new project, I find new ways to apply it. On this project, I initially used it to capture my design thinking, then to build a materials list as the details solidified, and finally I used it to plan and document my activities long and short term. This really helped avoid some mistakes and make the best use of my time. This is especially important when you have significant time gaps in your work. It is also a good place to capture future improvements or additions you think of in the middle of the project. When finished, it provides a good log of what you did and why in case you want to use some aspect of your work on a future project (if you date your entries, you get a interesting time line). I have no connection with this software, but have used it extensively since I found it.

*Design*

To get some dimensions, I decided that the top would be layered plywood with maple edging. The edging, chop and misc bits would use maple from a tree I had chain saw milled from my back yard that had been kicking around the garage for about 15 years. To use the plywood efficiently, my get started dimension would be a quarter sheet of plywood with the edges cleaned up and whatever I could cut from my maple horde for edging. This resulted in a size of 51" x 27". For height, I wanted it slightly shorter then my tablesaw so it could be used as an outfeed table if needed. This turned out to be 35.5" which is also a good working height for me. The legs were splayed at a 15 degree angle (no special reason, just looked good on paper) and their footprint on the floor matched the top dimensions. This eliminated any cantilevered instabilities. Lastly I am too cheap to buy good bench hardware and I like working with metal, so I decided to roll my own face vise hardware. For an end vise, I got a deal on eBay.

My final design for the basic bench consisted of 5 wooden components: two leg assemblies, a lower shelf and a top made up of two sections.

The top consists of two sub-assemblies. The lower top is two 3/4" plywood panels glued together and framed by maple edges. The maple edges form a recess that holds the upper top which is also two 3/4" panels glued together. The upper top is held in place using multiple wood screws at strategic points. The wood screws do not penetrate the upper top more then 3/4" so are no threat to wood working tools. There are a number of benefits for this two part approach:

- It breaks up the weight so that the bench assembliies can be carried by one person.

- Since the top comes off, I can mount the end vise with flat head bolts and still have full access for maintenance if needed.

- If the top gets hacked up, I can use the old top as a guide and make up a new one from half a plywood sheet and effectively have a new bench.

- If I decide I want a solid top, I can replace the plywood top with a 1.5" thick glued up slab of solid wood cut to size and not change anything else.

I decided to make the lower shelf the same length and width as the top. This creates a variety of clamping opportunities since the shelf and the top are on the same plane when any wood is clamped in either vise.

For the face vise I wanted to eliminate having to bend down to put a pin into a parallel guide. I initially decided to try a linear bearing design that locks the vise and clamps the work with racking forces. I bought the hardware, tried it and did not like it. Did not go all the way with installing it, but in testing some prototypes, it looked like the angles could get a little tricky and if you racked too hard, releasing the pressure was not smooth. This is not a definitive analysis of that system. There are a lot of variables and it is quite possible I could have gotten it to work, others have, but I decided I wanted something simpler. I eliminated the cross option because you need to remove a lot of wood to install it and its on the expensive side. I read about and liked the chain mechanism. Seemed simple, easy to implement, and only required a couple of new holes. I decided to keep the linear bearing hardware as a parallel guide and marry it up with the chain system (= belt and suspenders). This turned out to be a good choice. If I ever build another bench, I would use this combination again. The linear bearing was reasonably priced and only required drilling some holes to mount it. Seems a lot simpler then all the cutting and mortising needed for a normal parallel guide with a roller mechanism. There is no place to put a pin, but the chain fixes that. The chop moves smoothly on the linear bearing, the chain clamps well and installation, once I had created the hardware, was fairly straightforward using Forstner bits and a drill press.

My chain system is a hybrid of Tim Muashige's dogleg vise and the Ancora Yacht Service system based on the pictures and info they provide on the web with my linear bearing additions.

The end vise was purchased and only needed mounting on the end of the table. Because of the canted legs, I had plenty of room under the top and could mount it right up against the edge of the table. I did not want metal clamping wood, so I added a wooden front face and recessed the back of the vise into the table edge framing. I was prepared to do a lot of shiming, but lucked out and my routed out recess was right on.

So here is the design I came up with. The end vise was added later, so does not show here.


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## Boatman53 (May 21, 2012)

JonasB said:


> *My belt and suspenders design.*
> 
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> ...


Thanks for mentioning my company, Jonas. I do sell all the part for the chain mechanism. And I'd be glad to answer any questions.
Jim

Nice bench, Jonas


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## htl (Mar 24, 2015)

JonasB said:


> *My belt and suspenders design.*
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Very interesting!!!
Came out really nice and just the right size.


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## Nickdarr (Nov 2, 2012)

JonasB said:


> *My belt and suspenders design.*
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> ...


Very nice. I really like the appearance of the canted leg vice.


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## Dovetale (Jun 8, 2018)

JonasB said:


> *My belt and suspenders design.*
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> 
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> ...


Jonas, thank you for this article. Your bench is a beauty. I am in the process of building a hybrid Moravian style bench. I love the look of the angled vise and use of the linear bearing and rod. I have ordered a 30mm set. Did you weld the end of the chain to the rod? A few close up photos would be greatly appreciated. Are you still satisfied with the clamping performance of your modified leg vise?


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## JonasB (Jul 8, 2015)

JonasB said:


> *My belt and suspenders design.*
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> 
> 
> ...


No welding on either end. Both ends were attached using chain connector links. The bolt on the chop was filed down to chain thickness and drilled so that it fit like a chain link to the connector link. For the end under the table. I first had to hammer the hex head of the screw till it flattened out to the thickness of the chain. I then shaped and drilled it to hold the connector link. The screw is attached to the modified shaft clamp and is used to tighten the chain as needed. I have updated my blog #5 with a picture and minor word changes. Hope this helps. 
I am surprised that the chain mechanism gets very little air time in the various wood working forums and magazines. It works great and is very easy to install. I love my chop and it still holds very well, but I will be honest and say it does not get used as much as I expected. Since I don't have a dead man and rarely work with long pieces, I use the end vise and bench dogs most of the time.


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## JonasB (Jul 8, 2015)

*Wooden Parts 1*

*Leg Assembly*










Two leg assemblies are part of the support system for the bench. I was going to use glued up 2×4s, but found some 12/4 poplar, so sawed that to shape instead. The legs are 2.75" thick and 4" wide, and the top rail is 2.75" square. The legs are angled at about 15 degrees. The 2×4 approach would have simplified cutting the angled slots, but then you have the hassle of cleaning up the glued up legs. The large hunks of wood making up the legs give them a nice solid look and feel.










The rails and legs are joined with a half lap joint and then strengthened with dowels. A bridle joint would probably be a little stronger, but due the angles, harder to cut. I had a router jig set up for making the shelf half laps and the same setup worked for this joint. I cut all the half laps with a pattern routing bit and a template jig to maintain the 15 degree angle. For the front legs I wanted to keep everything as flush as possible. On a couple of joints I needed to shim with some scrap veneer and do a little planning till I got it right on. I used epoxy to glue things together. I am sure wood glue would have been sufficient, but I wanted this joint rock solid and gap filled so decided to use the epoxy. While building this I delayed glue up by using bolts to keep things together until final assembly. This allowed me to break things down and work with more manageable pieces along the way.










For the face vise, I drilled a slightly oversized hole for the acme screw and drilled a larger concentric hole to hold the nut on the back. The screw is attached using a pipe flange which is secured to the back of the leg. The opposite leg has a bracket that supports the pipe that the screw is riding in. The rectangular hole is for the chain to pass through. I could have drilled a 5/8 hole instead, but decided to go rectangular to minimize wood removal and allow a tighter fit. The chain works best if it is anchored close to the screw. I used the drill and chisel method to cut this. The recessed rectangular notch below this hole on the back provides clearance for the sprocket which I mounted close to the surface of the leg. If I kept it a little further away from the leg, it would not be needed.










The linear bearing is also mounted on the leg. To install, clamp the leg on the drill press table and drill a hole for the bearing with a Forstner bit, then drill a concentric hole to hold the flange. This takes about 20 min total to complete. I think making and installing a pinned parallel guide takes a bit longer. On the downside it may require more precision in alignment, so I was prepared to tweak and shim as needed to make sure the bearing and screw are aligned.

The lower shelf is attached to the legs with a half lap joint with two bolts per leg holding it in place. I used 3/8 carriage bolts with torque washers to eliminate any rotation. I ground the rounded head a little flat so that they look a little like elevator bolts. I recessed the bolts into the front of legs and glued in a plug to hide the hardware. The flatter head allowed for a shallower recess hole. Nuts/washers on the back secure things and allow disassembling.

*Shelf*










The shelf consists of a frame and a top. The frame is built using 2.75" square poplar joined at the corners using pinned bridle joints and notched for half lap joints with the legs. The same jig I built for notching the legs is used to rout out the slots for this joint. The inside edges of the poplar frame are rabbeted to hold a ¾ plywood panel top. Some 1.5" poplar boards were added to the bottom for additional support. Clearly I over-engineered this, but they were offcuts, so I put them to use. The small rectangular notch near the left leg is for the chain to pass through. The linear bearing and chain run under the shelf. It would not be needed if the parallel mechanism ran above the shelf.

I was pleasantly surprised how stable and strong just the legs and shelf were even with no bolts keeping them together. The half lap joints lock things down very nicely. While building this table, I bolted the legs to the shelf, put a board on top and had a great temporary bench halfway into the project.


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## canadianchips (Mar 12, 2010)

JonasB said:


> *Wooden Parts 1*
> 
> *Leg Assembly*
> 
> ...


I like the look of tapered legs. Somehow it looks solider than straight legs ? "Perception" 
Nothing I hate more than working on wobbly workbench.


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## kryptonite (Dec 7, 2013)

JonasB said:


> *Wooden Parts 1*
> 
> *Leg Assembly*
> 
> ...


How is that linear bearing working for you? I built a mock up one and its not working well for me.


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## JonasB (Jul 8, 2015)

JonasB said:


> *Wooden Parts 1*
> 
> *Leg Assembly*
> 
> ...


I did not like the way the linear bearing system worked when I prototyped it with some 2×6s. That's why I added the chain mechanism. I really like the way that works in conjunction with the linear bearing. As I explain in this blog, I left the linear bearing a little loose in the chop so I don't get unwanted racking. My handwheel has a 5" diameter bearing surface, so it seems to take care of any side wobble.


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## JonasB (Jul 8, 2015)

*Wooden Parts 2*

*Top Assembly*



















The top consist of two sub-assemblies: The lower half and the upper. The lower half is made up of two plywood sheets glued together, edged with maple and joined using doweled bridle joints. The doubled up plywood is attached to the frame using a basic butt joint strengthened with 3/8" dowels and glued down with epoxy. I used this method because my wood was not wide enough for the desired final dimensions if I rabbeted in the panel. This simple butt joint gave me some additional width and the dowels and epoxy give it plenty of strength.










I used a pocket hole jig in a non traditional way to make dowel alignment simple. The glued up plywood is first drilled in the usual way using a standard pocket hole jig. After assembling the frame, I aligned it with the plywood base and drilled the 3/8 holes deeper into the frame to hold the dowels. After the glue dried, I used a Jsaw to cut them almost fllush then sanded the rest of the way. A trick to using the Jsaw for this is to put some tape on the saw. This raises the saw just enough so there are no saw marks on the surface. I could have used screws here, but I have wanted to try this joint and this was a good opportunity.

The block at the top is for mounting the end vise. The end vise is all metal, so I lowered and recessed it to clamp mostly with wood. The two big holes are to make it easy to pop out the upper half when it needs to be removed.










The upper half is just two 3/4" plywood panels glued together. It fits in the recess of the lower half. Wood screws attach it to the lower assembly and keep it flat. The screws are well below the top surface so that any tools I may use have no chance of being dinged. Screws work better then any wood joints I could think of for this purpose.

The dogholes were drilled with the bench assembled and the top screwed down so there is no jiggle. I used a router with a ¾ up-cut spiral bit to keep the dog holes aligned vertically. The router was held in a jig to make sure it did not move. Since the combined table is 3" thick, I had to finish up with a spur auger bit in an electric drill. I tried some other techniques to drill the dogholes, but they did not work well for me. I had to go back and glue in some dowels to fix some angled holes and re-drill with the router. Also keeping track of your screws is important. I caught one and ruined a router bit.

The top is attached to the legs with six 3/8 lag bolts recessed into the rails. I took extra care to make sure that the front edge was flush with the legs since this would be the clamping surface. Any minor irregularities were kept on the back of the bench. The leg/shelf assembly is reasonably stable by itself, but when the top is securely attached it makes everything rock solid.

*Chop*




























The chop came from my home milled maple stash. It is about 2" thick. I first drilled the rounded corners with a Forstner bit and then cut the straight sections on my bandsaw. A jig saw or Japanese handsaw could have done this but would have taken much longer. The chop is canted the same 15 degrees as the leg. The top hole is for the screw mechanism. The hole for the screw is drilled oversize so wood does not contact the screw. This is designed so that the only contact is with a brass plate mounted to the front of the chop. This plate is drilled and threaded so that it can be mounted using 4 machine screws via recessed holes on the back of the chop. Below that and hidden by the brass plate when assembled is the hole and recess for holding the end of the chain. Finally on the bottom is the hole for the end of the linear bearing rod which only penetrates about 2/3 of the chop from the back. I drilled it exactly 1" but I had to taper it slightly on the side since the clamp was not closing parallel horizontally. There was a 1/16 gap on one side. The taper allowed some rotation of the chop side to side for a tighter clamp. I planned to epoxy in the shaft when it was all properly aligned, but it does not look like that will be necessary. Leaving it loose seems to allow for clamping items that are a little out of parallel and the chain pulls the shaft tightly into the chop when clamped. I will need to use it for awhile to see if any issues show up, but it looks good so far. The other benefit to leaving it loose is that it avoids any alignment issues with the screw.

The top of the chop is left overlong until all the assembly issues are taken care of. To finish up, I cut the top flush to the table, routed a cove around the edges and rounded over the top of the chop for a little extra clearance.

*Wooden components*










Here are the wooden parts with the bench disassembled. They are portable and can be carried by one person, though the lower top is quite heavy and pretty close to my limit.


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## JonasB (Jul 8, 2015)

*Hardware 1*

*Screw assembly*



















The face vise screw mechanism is all DIY. Here are the piece parts. The hand-wheel has been kicking around my basement for 15 years. I remember buying it on Ebay for a project I never completed. It was too nice to throw away, so it waited and waited until now to find a purpose. The acme screw and nut I picked up on Ebay more recently. I cut the screw to length and drilled the hole that holds the hand-wheel setscrew. I found a 5 inch brass plate 1/2 inch thick also on Ebay which seemed ideal for this application. No idea what it was used for originally. I drilled and tapped 4 screw holes so it could be mounted to the chop. The leather washer protects the brass from the steel hand-wheel. For a garter, I put in a 1 inch metal set collar that is held in place with a setscrew. It sits in a recess in the chop behind the plate and pulls the chop back when releasing the clamping forces.




























The nut for the screw is welded to a pipe flange and a 1" black iron pipe is used as a guide to keep the screw from sagging. As a side note, welding galvanized is not a good health idea and stainless needs fancier gear. I am not a great welder, but I picked up a HF flux welder and this is my second project using it. I overdid the weld and then used an angle grinder to get it back down to a reasonable shape and also to round over the hex corners. Welders would laugh, but for the forces involved in wood working it will hold. The biggest challenge was to keep the flange flat as I ground things away. If welding is out, cutting a hex hole for the nut in the leg and screwing down the flange over it would also probably work (maybe some JB weld (no affiliation)?). I cut the sides of the pipe flange off a little with a cut off wheel on the angle grinder to allow closer mounting of the chain mechanism. The nut sits in a recessed hole on the back of the front leg. I made a small wooden plate with a larger hole to accommodate the weld area. This eliminated the need to make a larger recess in the leg. The other end of the pipe is held in place on the back leg using a wooden bracket. I considered a second flange, but decided that cutting and threading the pipe to exact length was too complicated and wood is much cheaper. The bracket also helps to align the screw. There is some play in the flange and locking down the other end stabilizes everything and also can be used to make sure the linear bearing shaft and screw are on the same plane.

*Linear Bearing*



















The linear bearing consists of a few piece parts purchased on Ebay. The shaft and bearing are both one inch. I could not find a cheap 1 inch version of the flanged shaft support block, so I picked up an aluminum 25mm one, loosened it and drilled it out to an inch. I also cut off one of the legs of the flange (no functional reason I thought it looked wrong when used this way). Both the acme screw and the bearing shaft are as long as I could fit between the legs. This gives me a lot of clamping space, but more realistically, I thought it would help keep the chop from sagging by providing some balancing weight at normal working distances and give the pipe something to hold on to.

*Install thinking*

My biggest concern was alignment of the screw and bearing. If out of wack, the bearing starts racking and locks up. This was my original intent in adding the linear bearing. Keeping it parallel should keep things smooth, non racking and non-sagging. Drilling the holes for the linear bearing seemed to have the most potential for problems. I finally decided on the following steps. I did all the drilling before assembly, so I could work with the leg and chop on the drill press. I used carriage bolts to keep the leg in place so I could put it on and take it off as needed. I drilled 1/8" oversized holes in the leg and chop, and 1/16" oversized hole in the brass plate for the screw. I then drilled a precise hole for the linear bearing in the leg and installed the bearing. I centered and mounted the pipe flange with the nut. With the leg installed in the bench, I mounted the hand-wheel assembly on the chop and screwed it into the leg. I made sure the chop was hanging down the same way it would in use. This meant the brass plate on the chop was touching the screw at about the 11 o'clock position due to the 15 degree angle. I then clamped the chop to the leg and used the linear bearing hole in the leg to align the hole for the shaft in the chop. I then drilled a precise 1" hole 2/3 of the way through the chop on the drill press. In spite of this there was a little drag at the brass plate as the chop moved. A little file work on the plate at the touching point eliminated this. I then screwed in the pipe and used the bracket on the opposite leg to make sure that the bearing shaft and screw were equidistant and aligned. Still not sure why but the bearing hole I drilled in the chop was not perfectly square to the chop face and one side of vise closed before the other by about 1/16". I took some wood off of the side of the hole in the chop to get it to line up better. This created a slight side to side taper in the hole. The bottom of the hole did not move and was still at the correct position for the screw to bearing hole distance in the leg. As a last step, I was going to clamp the chop tight and epoxy the shaft in at the correct angle. As mentioned earlier, the chain mechanism eliminated the need for this and leaving it loose with a slight taper appears to work well. Not sure if a pinned parallel guide has the same issues or is inherently a little looser so alignment is not such a big deal.

I was a little surprised by how little info is available on how a face vise works. Which holes should be oversize? How do you keep it from sagging? What are the alignment issues? The conclusions I reached are as follows (but I could also be wrong since this is a sample of one). The screw is held precisely in the leg by the nut only. The hole in the wood should be oversized to eliminate friction. The parallel guide in the leg should only allow perpendicular movement with as little friction as possible. Both the screw and the guide need to be in the same plane. You can't have one swinging left and the other right for example or up vs down. On the chop side, the screw holes are loose (friction again) but the chop rests on the screw at a single point which affects the height and possibly the angle of the chop. The parallel guide should be tight and square to the chop face vertically, but some looseness in side to side movement in conjunction with the looseness at the screw seems to help even out the clamping pressure. I wonder, if you built the chop with a slot at the nut and a hinge at the linear guide, if this would allow you to clamp odd shapes better hmmm.

I am still a little uncertain about the sagging. I have two places that prevent sagging, so they need to be aligned to prevent racking. In other designs, I am not sure if the sagging is eliminated at the screw, the parallel guide, both, or either. One conclusion, regardless of how it works, is to leave the chop long until everything is done and settled down before cutting it flush to your table top.


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## JonasB (Jul 8, 2015)

*Hardware 2 and Wrap Up*

*Parallel guide chain mechanism*










To make the chain mechanism, I used #35 chain and the sprockets are 10T with a 3/8 center. The chain is attached using two chain links. I had to do some metal working to create a few items: the brackets to hold the sprockets and a way of securing the chain at both ends.

I had a 1.5" rectangular steel tube in my scrap collection so I used an angle grinder with a cutoff wheel to make both brackets that hold the sprockets with 3/8 bolts. Big box store angle irons would be my second choice. I used 3 brass washers and a nut on the inside to center the sprocket and an outside nut to lock it in place. For the upper bracket I drilled the bolt holes so that the sprocket is close to the surface of the leg. I thought this would help keep the chain out of the way as it travels down the back of the leg. I may make a cover for it eventually.



















I used a 5/8 bolt I abused on the bench grinder to attach the chain at the chop. It fits in a hole on the chop with a recess that hides behind the screw's brass plate. I cut the bolt to length so it does not stick out of the chop and ground it to shape in about 30 minutes. I ground a centered flat part on the end and drilled a small hole through the flat part so that I could attach a #35 chain link that holds one end of the chain.



















The lower bracket is attached to the leg under the shelf. The bolt holes for this sprocket are further away from the leg surface since the chain needs clearance here. Since the lower sprocket sits between the half lap on the leg and the hole for the linear bearing, there was not a lot of room to secure a bracket, and it would be subject to some serious forces. To address this, I made the bracket longer and cut a hole in it so the linear bearing can pass through. This allowed me to secure it over a wider area for strength.

The other end of the chain is attached to a ¼ hex bolt I modified heavily. I pounded the hex head flat, ground it to shape and chain width on a bench grinder, and then drilled a hole for the connector link. Its a little crude but functional. This bolt attaches to the "flanged shaft support block" on the linear bearing shaft. The tension on the chain can be adjusted using a nut on the bolt.










This shows how the lower part is put together. Clamping force and chop angle are controlled by length of chain, placement of the support bracket and the nut on the bolt holding the chain. I cut the chain as long as I could, then played with the other adjustments until I got a flat angle when the vise is clamped down.

if metal is not your thing, except for the bearing shaft side of things, this is very similar to the Ancora Yacht Service chain system that is available commercially (no affiliation but learned a lot from looking at their website).

*End Vise*










The end vise is a quick release model I picked up on Ebay. I took it apart, cleaned it and painted it. I made a front face from my maple horde. I drilled some blind dog holes and put in a couple of bench dogs. The vise mechanism prevents through holes, so I came up with an alternative. The bench dogs have a small central hole drilled in them and a nut glued in at the bottom of the dog. I ground the head of some Philips machine screws flush to the thread. There is enough material left to allow a screwdriver to grip if there is not a lot of force involved. The screw goes into the central hole and engages the nut on the bottom. Tightening the screw down with a screwdriver pushes up the bench dogs when I want to deploy them. Unscrewing the screw allows the dog to be pushed down out of the way.

*Wrap up - Dimensions*

I designed this table, but did not pay much attention to dimensions. Everything is based on the decision to make the top out of ½ sheet of plywood (two glued up quarter panels) with edging. I used the pieces already constructed to determine the dimensions of the next pieces being built. The main parts of the bench are dimensionally amorphous. The legs and shelf can be any size you want and any relationship to the top is a design decision. I chose to make the shelf and leg footprints the same size as the top. The shelf could be narrower or shorter to give you an overhang. Even the two leg assemblies could be different dimensionally if you need a trapezoidal table for some reason. (i.e. back legs wider then front legs.) Want the legs canting front to back as well? Only the half-laps in the legs for the shelf need to change to the desired angle, (though the chop would be affected and the joint would no longer be flush).

Where to put the screw in relation to your guide and clamp point? A face vise in some ways is the opposite of an Archimedes lever (move the earth, but watch where you step). The forces from the acme screw are partially lost as a ratio of the distance of work to screw divided by work to guide. If the screw is 2/3 up from the guide and the work is clamped at the top of the chop you are loosing 1/3 of the screw force. This says that you should move your guide as far down as possible and make the screw to work height as short as possible. Guide height is usually constrained by how far down you want to bend to put a pin in. The distance from the work piece to screw limits the size of the board you can clamp. A 1" distance would maximize the force but would probably wobble with most boards since the grip area would be miniscule.

After mulling over this theory, I decided to put the parallel guide under the shelf, fairly low down and out of the way and the chain eliminates the need for bending. The canted leg increases the clamping surface that clears the screw for holding long boards vertically. I can clamp with about 2/3 of vise and still stay clear of the screw mechanism. For clamping boards horizontally, you can't avoid the screw so I gave myself about 10" here. I may be over thinking this a little. The screw probably generates around a 1000 lbs of force and tweaking the dimensions will probably not buy you noticeable improvement in clamping forces, but if you can maximize things without a downside, you might as well go for it.

*Final touches*

I added a leather pad to the chop face to further improve the grip.

I finished the whole bench with tung oil and a coating of wax. The main reason is to keep the surface less grimy and to resist glue. I started using the bench while it was still being built and was amazed how quickly sawdust and dirt accumulated on the surface that could not be brushed off. It got in the pores and stayed there. Luckily, I was able to sand most of this off in final finishing. This is not fine furniture, but would prefer it if it looks reasonably nice for as long as possible.

I carved my initials in the chop. Not essential but fun.

I added a green man to a recess I had in the hand-wheel. He is a Celtic god that among other things is responsible for artists and gives them energy for their work. I am not pagan, Celtic or an artist, but have no issues with getting some free energy and skill improvement whatever the source. Again not essential but fun.










In the future I will be adding some type of deadman and would like to find a way to add some wheels for mobility but have not figured out a non-clunky way of doing it yet.

I learned a lot by building this bench and I hope this blog provided some useful info for others contemplating this journey.

That's the story of my bench. Its done and I am ready to use it to build some things.


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## kryptonite (Dec 7, 2013)

JonasB said:


> *Hardware 2 and Wrap Up*
> 
> *Parallel guide chain mechanism*
> 
> ...


Great looking leg vise. I will be attempting to make the same thing this fall.


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## Dovetale (Jun 8, 2018)

JonasB said:


> *Hardware 2 and Wrap Up*
> 
> *Parallel guide chain mechanism*
> 
> ...


I think I have the metal skills to pull this off…. Glad to have the photos and the story of your build. Thank you!


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## JonasB (Jul 8, 2015)

*Mobile base*

So after five years, I finally decided to build a mobile base for my workbench. Prior to this, I have experimented with bases for some of the other equipment in my workroom and always found something I did not like with most of the traditional designs that are out there. This was my justification for coming up with my own over-engineered approach for my beloved workbench.

My goals were fairly basic.

About an inch of lift
Table stands on its own legs when not mobile
Easy lifting
Stable in both stationary and mobile configurations.
KISS
Strong
Minimal mod to bench
Installed without having to move my bench (since I am adding it to a heavy, already in place item)

After letting my brain work on this while sleeping for many years, I finally decided to go with a cam mechanism attached to the bench for the lifting, and an independent dolly base to support the wheels.










*The Dolly*

The dolly base can be anything from a sheet of plywood to welded iron. I decided to go with two plywood platforms for attaching the wheels and two ¾ pipes connecting the two and providing a metal surface for the cam to slide against. The dolly can surround the object to be lifted or be inside of it. I decided for clamping clearance and less tripping issues to have the dolly inside the bench legs. The bench was big enough that this still gave enough separation for the wheels to prevent tipping. To keep the dolly from sliding out of alignment, the plywood platforms have rectangular cutouts at the corners that register on the legs and keep it loosely contained. The wheels are attached with 5/16 bolts and the pipes are drilled and attached to the plywood platforms using ¼ bolts. Here is what I came up with. Ignore the paint aesthetics. Since it is mostly invisible I used up left overs and was concerned with rust presentation more then looks.



















*The Cam Mechanism*

The cam is a rotating ¾ pipe with 2 inch pipe sections attached off center to provide the lift. Hubs are attached to the legs with lag bolts to support the ¾ pipe. This configuration is not optimized to even out the lifting forces, but does make it easy to find the parts and to make it. The 2" pipe gives the desired 1 inch of lift and does not require much strength to operate with my 300 lb table.



















I found the hubs at a big box store, its a 3/4 in Silver Galvanized Steel Structural Pipe Fitting Swivel Socket.I think it's used for fences. I had to shorten one leg to fit my bench.










I cut the pipes to size with a cut off wheel on my angle grinder (No threads needed for this) I did not want anything to stick out from under the bench, so I found a pair of ½ inch drive sockets that fit snugly inside the ¾ inch pipe (watch out for that welded ridge). Every manufacturer makes wrenches somewhat different, so I grabbed a piece of pipe and went to the tool section to find the right fit. In my case the 14mm wrench was just right. I ground away the welded pipe ridge and then pounded the socket into one end of the pipe with the drive side sticking out. Finally I drilled a 5/16 hole through the pipe and wrench (carbide drill, cutting fluid and crossed fingers for the wrench section), put a mild steel pin in and cold pounded the pin until it deformed to keep everything locked in place. I had to file things down since the pin wound up inside the hub.










The ¾ pipe is attached to the 2" pipe segments using 5/16 bolts and one nut on the inside to keep things off center and one nut on the outside to keep everything together. Since the cam rides on the dolly pipe there is enough clearance for the bolt heads. I also added a stop block on the 2" pipes to stop the rotation. The block is adjusted so that the rotation is past the unstable max lift point and is resting in a stable configuration without losing much lift. While nothing is guaranteed, I do not expect the cam to rotate loose when moving the bench around.

*Assembly*

This can get a little tricky. I had to attach and detach things a number of times till I got everything fitted. Sequencing was also an issue, since one step usually blocked some aspect of my next planned step. Luckily I had a reasonable amount of clearance under my bench to work with, so I was able to sort things out without having to lift the bench.

To setup the dolly, I had to assemble one of the wheel platforms to the rest of the dolly while everything was positioned under the table. It would not fit otherwise. The dolly was then used to set the height of the hubs with the cams in the lowered position. I allowed about ¼ inch of clearance for uneven floors and debris under the wheels. You want the dolly loose when the bench is not up on its wheels. I used lag bolts to attach the hubs to the bench. Of course the dolly blocked the holes for the lag bolts, so unassemble, shift, reassemble and repeat. The lag bolts for the hubs was the only change required to the bench.

*Conclusion*

I used a 15 inch ½ inch T-handle to rotate the cam and it did not require a lot of force to raise the bench about ¾ of inch into a stable position for rolling the bench around. DO NOT USE A RATCHETING HANDLE FOR THIS. WHEN LOWERING THE TABLE A RATCHET WILL ALLOW THE BENCH TO CRASH DOWN.


















This approach is fairly flexible. It can be installed under or around an object to be lifted. The cam can be attached to the dolly or the item to be raised. If built under the object to be lifted, this requires clearance for the cams to rotate and to allow room under the assembly for the wheels. The drilling of the axis pipe for the cams requires some care to keep the offsets aligned at both ends. The socket wrench is overkill. Much simpler alternatives can be used. Great care must be taken to avoid interference issues when choosing the locations for the various bolts and brackets. All the metal parts attract each other and want to be placed where they can cause the most problems.

This worked out very well for me. I can now get at the sawdust that has been hiding under my bench with ease and the ability to create more space where needed is sooooo nice.


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## brandongb (Dec 15, 2013)

JonasB said:


> *Mobile base*
> 
> So after five years, I finally decided to build a mobile base for my workbench. Prior to this, I have experimented with bases for some of the other equipment in my workroom and always found something I did not like with most of the traditional designs that are out there. This was my justification for coming up with my own over-engineered approach for my beloved workbench.
> 
> ...


This is really cool. It would never occur to me to use half of what you did as parts for this project; hats off to you, sir!


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