# Work Surface Options?



## clin (Sep 3, 2015)

I'm getting a workshop together. I'm trying to decide what type of work surface to use over some base cabinets.

I'll be doing some hobby stuff, like building RC model airplanes. So along one wall, I'm going to have 10 to 12 ft of built-in cabinets with an area to sit at (open like a desk). Near one end will be a utility sink. There will be other actual workbenches. So this area will be for doing fine work like framing a model airplane wing.

Note: While any and all of this could be done at a heavy workbench, completely different tools are involved, so it make sense to have two different areas.

So the question, especially to those that might have a similar setup, what do you recommend for the worktop (essentially a counter top).

I was originally thinking just laminate top, thinking it would be so much less expensive, that I'd replace it every 5 years or so as it gets beat up. Turns out it isn't as cheap as I thought. Mostly because I need to get it custom made. Off the shelf tops like the BORGs carry, I don't want. I want a solid color, no marbled patterns. A patterned background just makes it harder to find small parts etc. And I would prefer a square edge.

I'm thinking about maple tops. I can get maple butcher block tops for about the same price as a custom laminate. Though it's not quite a equal comparison. Custom laminate includes install. Price really isn't the issue and a maple top will last forever. But I'm worried about the sink and possible water damage.

Any input would be appreciated.


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## Iguana (Jun 22, 2011)

Clin,

There are many kitchen countertops that are made out of wood. Unless you are planning on pouring water on the top and letting it sit there, the maple will hold up just fine. I'll recommend a wipe-on polyurethane as a finish - cheap, easy and fairly tough. Also somewhat water resistant.

I'm a bit jealous. I just finished installing a.bunch of cabinets in my shop and had to settle for custom laminate tops. Maple tops were my preferred choice but at least twice as much money.


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## DrTebi (Jun 16, 2009)

I agree with Mark,

wood really isn't that sensitive to water unless you leave standing water for a long time and/or bake it in the sun.

Even if the maple top should become a bit damaged from water or anything else, you can simply sand it down, refinish, and have a brand new looking top again. Can't do that with laminate.


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## OSU55 (Dec 14, 2012)

You don't say what size you need, or what makes your need "custom". Home Depot shows a plane white countertop here. Another option is a white laminate sheet you apply to the substrate of your choice. Laminate "wood look" countertops are available. Another would be a sheet of hardboard like this or screwed to substrate. I have a heavy duty workbench with this on top. I apply ob poly to it and wipe it off. I've changed it a couple of times in the 25 yrs I've had it. There's a white hardboard panel if the dark color is a problem. Lot's of fairly cheap options available.


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## JBrow (Nov 18, 2015)

clin,

Unless you go with stone, the sink will have to be properly installed and maintained. Particle board substrate of a laminate top will deteriorate rather quickly once water gets to it. Maple would take longer to deteriorate.

10 to 12 feet of counter top may require a seam, which I would think you would want to avoid. I do not know if your laminate quote includes a seam or is seamless. Maple would have to be custom built to avoid a seam. The maple tops I have seen in catalogs are too short for your application without seams. If you went short with maple and butt seamed the pieces, I suspect the seams would open over time - not much, but a little and perhaps enough to lose a small part.

Color is another consideration. Assuming dark parts, a white laminate top could be installed. Maple, on the other hand is not uniform in color. While the wood is mostly white, it will have some darker veining. Water based polyurethane will largely preserve the light natural color of maple, while oil based polyurethane and most other finishes will yellow the maple. No matter what varnish is applied, the maple will darken somewhat over time.

Both maple and laminate are durable. However, a razor knife snapping through a part and impacting the countertop will damage both materials. However, a cut in the laminate, in my experience, will be far less noticeable by touch or by eye than maple. Laminate will also endure drops and other impacts better than maple, which will get dinged up over time. However, the only fix for damaged laminate is to replace the laminate. On the other hand, maple can be refinished several times over its life when it becomes damaged; but that is quite a job.

There are woods much harder than maple, and hence more durable that maple. Hardness of woods can be compared using Janka Hardness, the larger the number the harder the material. When you get away from US domestic hardwoods, prices go up and materials can be hard to find. You can find the properties of various woods at

http://www.wood-database.com/lumber-identification/hardwoods/bloodwood/

One alternative you may not have considered is bamboo. Bamboo is available in countertops. Bamboo can be quite hard, superior to maple and many exotic hardwoods. It is attractive and available in a light color. If you want to explore a bamboo countertop, Google searching "Bamboo Countertops" will get you started.


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## clin (Sep 3, 2015)

Thanks for the input.

FYI, laminate is available up to 12 ft without a seam. The reason I don't want to use an off-the-shelf BORG counter top is I don't want a pattern, and while they do have a solid white, I don't want a surface that will reflect that much light back up and create glare. As I mentioned before, I also want a straight front edge rather than the common rolled edges seen on the BORG tops, and in most kitchens.

I was a bit surprised at the relatively high cost of a custom top. Now this is installed pricing but it was $50/ft. Believe it or not it is $14/ft more to have the straight edge versus rolled. Now, this was one quote from the main counter top outfit in town. I have no doubt there are somewhat less expensive sources.

Originally I had planned on a maple top, but then saw some for about $900 and thought maybe I could get a laminate for about 1/3rd the price. After seeing that the laminate was about 2X what I thought and looking at more maple options, the price difference isn't as big as I thought. I've found some 12 ft maple tops for under $700.

I'm not real price sensitive on this, but what at first looked like maybe I could get 3 laminate tops for the cost of 1 maple, I thought I'd go laminate and just replace it when it gets too beat up. But while laminate would still be cheaper, the difference isn't that great and I'm leaning towards maple or more generally wood.

As far as water problems, it was also my thought that unless I leave standing water on it, that won't be a problem. Also, the sink is not something I'll necessarily use daily and not likely to get heavy use. Mostly occasionally cleaning a paint brush, that type of thing.


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## JayT (May 6, 2012)

Why not build your own laminate counter top? Use a good substrate (sanded plywood, particle board or even MDF), pick out a solid color laminate you like and use contact cement to glue it down. Trim with a router. It'll take some time, but is pretty simple to do and you'd get exactly what you want, including the square edge.


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## Cooler (Feb 3, 2016)

I would use 3/4" ply with a top surface of tempered hardboard held in place with carpet tape. When it gets bruised or damaged it lifts off with a paint scraper and you replace it. The tempered hardboard is much harder than the regular stuff and it will last a long time. It is not very decorative however.

From Wiki:

Tempered hardboard is hardboard that has been coated with a thin film of linseed oil and then baked; this gives it more water resistance, impact resistance, hardness, rigidity and tensile strength. An earlier tempering process involved immersing the board in linseed oil or tung oil until it was 5 to 6 percent saturated, and heating to 170 °C (340 °F).[8] Tempered hardboard is used in construction siding.


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## clin (Sep 3, 2015)

> Why not build your own laminate counter top? Use a good substrate (sanded plywood, particle board or even MDF), pick out a solid color laminate you like and use contact cement to glue it down. Trim with a router. It ll take some time, but is pretty simple to do and you d get exactly what you want, including the square edge.
> 
> - JayT


That is certainly an option, but I've got many dozens if not hundreds of hours into building out this shop already. Figured I don't need to fight every battle. I.E., building my own shop cabinets because nothing off the shelf is what I want, and custom cabinets are more than I want to spend. Plus, making cabinets is kind of fun.

But, I've not made up my mind yet, so anything is still possible.



> I would use 3/4" ply with a top surface of tempered hardboard held in place with carpet tape. When it gets bruised or damaged it lifts off with a paint scraper and you replace it. The tempered hardboard is much harder than the regular stuff and it will last a long time. It is not very decorative however.
> 
> From Wiki:
> 
> ...


I think tempered hardboard is what I know simply as "hardboard". For example, I see that all the products on the Home Depot web site, that are hardboard, are called tempered hardboard. It's been my experience that it doesn't hold up well at all to water. Now, maybe there is some difference here I don't appreciate.

I realize there are versions used for siding (just used some on a shed), but these come primed and must be painted.

I have used hardboard for workbench tops many times before. But given the sink I'll have, I don't it's a good fit in this case. But I'll see if I can find out more about tempered hardboard, to see if it really is something different than what I'm thinking.


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## bigblockyeti (Sep 9, 2013)

At my old house along the back wall of the garage I had a 2' x 16' workbench attached to the wall and the top was 3/4 BC plywood covered with 1/4" tempered masonite. It had to be replaced every two years, but it's cheap, relatively tough and could be changed out very quickly as it was just stapled down. The bench was used literally for everything from automotive work to woodworking. While mine did get wet on occasion it wasn't exposed to the kind of water that could be present around a sink, overall it worked out very well for me.


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## Kristian_S (Dec 7, 2015)

Concrete is also another interesting option and surprisingly cheap. I've done a cast in place top for a coffee table with good results. I'll soon be doing my kitchen (~20ft of countertop) and it'll end up costing me less than $1000 including a few pieces of equipment (wet grinder, diamond polishing pads, concrete mixer) and molds which wouldn't be necessary in your case. I'm sure you could do it for $200-300 depending on the type of finish you want.


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## Redoak49 (Dec 15, 2012)

My countertops are 3/4" plywood with 1/4" cardboard or MDF over it. I finished the mdf with a thinned coat of shellac and then a couple more coats. After is was dry, I gave it a good coat of wax. It has wormwood.

You can repair spots if needed or if too bad replace the mdf.


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## Cooler (Feb 3, 2016)

> At my old house along the back wall of the garage I had a 2 x 16 workbench attached to the wall and the top was 3/4 BC plywood covered with 1/4" tempered masonite. It had to be replaced every two years, but it s cheap, relatively tough and could be changed out very quickly as it was just stapled down. The bench was used literally for everything from automotive work to woodworking. While mine did get wet on occasion it wasn t exposed to the kind of water that could be present around a sink, overall it worked out very well for me.
> 
> - bigblockyeti


Home Depot and Lowes only carry tempered in 1/8" (or maybe 3/16" thick); the 1/4" thick stuff is regular hardboard. The same goes for the peg board. The tempered stuff is quite notably tougher. I put it down with carpet tape. Mostly it just held in place by gravity. But it does not move around and it seems fine. I guess you could put in a couple of countersunk screws if it were a problem. It would not be good around a sink however unless you sealed it and that kind of defeats the purpose of using the stuff. It is cheap and easily replaced.


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## Planeman40 (Nov 3, 2010)

> I would use 3/4" ply with a top surface of tempered hardboard held in place with carpet tape. When it gets bruised or damaged it lifts off with a paint scraper and you replace it. The tempered hardboard is much harder than the regular stuff and it will last a long time. It is not very decorative however.


I have been building model planes for well over 50 years and have a very complete metal and wood working shop. I agree with the above recommendation. All of my counter tops are made of strand board substrate (flooring) with *tempered* hardboard tops and edged with a nice hardwood strip. Like was said, use tempered. This is a hardboard that is infused with oil and made under high pressure. It is very hard, strong, and water resistant. It is often found coated one side with a white Melamine finish that is made to be used as a bathroom wall covering in place of tile. The white is nice to build model planes on, however you will never be sticking any pins in it. Too hard!!! For that use a building board, all balsa building boards are the best. Guillows used to carry them, I guess they still do. Tack the hardboard down at the edges with small brads. Like was said, if you ever want to replace it, just pry it up and flip it over. If you don't use the white Melamine side, three coats of varnish on the dull brown side makes a nice finish.

Planeman


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## Hammerthumb (Dec 28, 2012)

If the sink is at one end of the counter, you could tile around that end of the top. Then use a replaceable hardboard as suggested for the working area.


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## BonPacific (Jan 22, 2016)

I have to add another vote for Plywood with a Tempered Hardboard top. Water shouldn't be a problem from teh top of the tempered board, and plywood or worse is used in just about every counter top these days. Caulked seams and exterior paint will resist water very well, and it's dead-easy to renew later on. Plus you can get exactly the color you want, for a fraction of what laminate would cost.


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## clin (Sep 3, 2015)

Lots of good ideas. I appreciate the suggestions. I do suspect the tempered hardboard is a bit different than what I'm thinking of. Certainly that over plywood or other substrate would be very inexpensive. Might make sense to just try that. If it doesn't work well in the long run, I could always go with laminate (DIY or not). Or get the maple top.

I'd certainly seal the hardboard and maybe extra coats near the sink. And sure, always have to caulk around the sink and any other crevices. As mentioned laminates are typically done on particle board, and you have to keep the water out of that.

Unless you can get that hardboard in 12 ft lengths (unlikely I would think), I'd have to have a seam, which I was hoping to avoid. So I need to think about that.



> For that use a building board, all balsa building boards are the best. Guillows used to carry them, I guess they still do.
> 
> Planeman


I would certainly use a building board no matter what. At first I was concerned with building a very flat work surface so I could throw down a building board (sheet of acoustic tile). But then decided, trying to may a really flat work surface over base cabinets would be hard. It would be difficult to support it well and I'd lose the space needed to for a large torsion box.

I've since decided I'll build a small torsion box I can lay on top of any work surface to build on. Much simpler to build a small flat torsion box than a large one.


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## 000 (Dec 9, 2015)

You can make your own top for about 150 bucks (or less) using laminate and plywood.
45.00 for a 4×8 x 3/4 ply (shop birch) 
cut in half for the 2 pc top. use scrap for a build up on the front and/or backsplash.
75.00 for a 4×12 x sheet of laminate. You should be able to buy 3×12's ?
25.00 for a gallon of contact cement.
I wouldn't worry about water around the sink unless your slobbish.
Laminate should last 20 years or more easily unless your beating the hell out of it. 
If your worried about it, go for the 15 sheet of Masonite to put on top as a replaceable sheet.
Wouldn't take more than a couple of hours, taking your time.


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## MadMark (Jun 3, 2014)

Use a used firedoor for a cheap, solid, top.

M


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## rwe2156 (May 7, 2014)

Laminate or hardboard with laminate on top around the sink.


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## Cooler (Feb 3, 2016)

I don't think I would do much more than apply a few coats of poly to the tempered hardboard in the area of the sink. Coat both sides and the edges of the cutout. About 12 inches around the perimeter of the sink would be fine.

Tempered hardboard is already pretty water resistant as it has been saturated with oil and backed under pressure.


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## clin (Sep 3, 2015)

I'm actually leaning back towards a maple butcher block (or other, thick wood top). Not sure if I mentioned this earlier, but part of this will be unsupported in the middle (maybe up to 4 ft) so I can sit at this like a desk. I want to have some shallow drawers (like a desk drawer). It makes it hard to support the top well along the front edge and have a shallow drawer.

If I used a thick wood top, it will be plenty strong enough to support itself.

Still nothing set and I appreciate the ideas.


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## wormil (Nov 19, 2011)

Laminate is hard to beat for a work surface. Impervious to most all petroleum solvents, heat resistant, glues don't permentaly stick, and you can clean it fairly fast with a 6" putty knife. Plus it's smooth and easy to keep clean.


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## kimballd (Jul 27, 2013)

Reico Kitchens here on the central east coast carries Ballywood butcher clock tops in a number of species. Maple and oak being the least expensive. The last time I bought some, maybe 2 years ago, they were $325 for a 1.5" x 25" x 12'. These come with what looks like a poly finish on them. My local hardwood dealer gets me cherry BB for $450 for 1.125" x 25" x 12' for $460. These are unfinished. Have finished them with bees wax for use in kitchens and hold fine for that use. Ikea has red beech BB tops for $135 for 1.5" x 25" x 8'. That is the longest that Ikea sells them. These are unfinished but I've put them in tight budget kitchens, with an oil finish. I used silicone caulk at the butt joints and machined them tight. Haven't had problems with these.(Same with the cherry tops). Also, Lumber Liquidators can get maple tops. Think I paid $400 for a 12' maple BB top last spring when I couldn't wait for the lead time from Reico.
Just a few ideas, but I've got a small scrap of oak BB I use on a small work area in my shop. It's been there for years with an oil finish. It takes serious abuse and minimal maintenance. You could always sand it down if you stained it too badly.

Kimball


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## Cooler (Feb 3, 2016)

I have the Ikea butcher block in my kitchen. If I were doing a work bench I would buy it from Sears. Much cheaper.

http://www.sears.com/craftsman-6'-butcher-block-work-surface/p-00914961000P

Scroll down and you will see the table top options including fully kitted tables with legs and drawer options.


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## oldnovice (Mar 7, 2009)

I use 1/4" tempered hardboard, a.k.a. Maonite, and when it get worn, I just replace it!

Or, how about PaperStone counter top.
It is similar the other man made materials but it is paper in a binder therefore it called the "green counter top"!
I have used it and I really like it.


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## clin (Sep 3, 2015)

Just a followup.

I built and laminated a standard countertop. It was probably a good $200-$250 in materials. 4×12 sheet of laminate was the single largest expense at about $140. Plus I also bought some new tooling. Nothing too expensive. Laminate trim bit for router, J-roller and a few other small things.

Given the amount of work, the one (and only) quote I got for $600 doesn't seem out of line. While I know it is on the high end, it's wasn't crazy.

Anyway, top came out fine. Over-filed the corners a bit on the backsplash (first piece I laminated). But the main top came out perfect.

It was a bit tricky due to being a bit over 11 ft long. I had to build and laminate it in place. Aside from sliding it around as needed, the only major movement was when I had to flip it over after adding the doublers around the edges and mid-points. Needed some help getting it flipped over. But was able to do everything with it right on top of the cabinets.

FYI, in my case I chose to cut the laminate with my circular saw with it laying face down on some rigid foam insulating boards. Same way I carve up sheet goods. A 12 ft length was just too much to try to use the table saw.

Also, I found the solid carbide trim bit (vs ball bearing flush trim bit) worked best. Found the tip online about using shortening (Crisco) to lube the edge laminate while trimming the top. This worked better than I could have imagined. Smoother than using the bit with the ball bearing.

Thanks again for all the ideas earlier. I still have actual workbenches to build and will be looking at options for those surfaces sometime soon.


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## Finn (May 26, 2010)

I have pre-painted Masonite (Solid white) as my bench top for wood working. Works well to find small parts if set on it. When I built model RC airplanes I used a hollow interior door as a bench. I got it at Lowes for $10 (Damaged one side) Laid a ceiling tile on it that served well for pinning acft. constructs to. Flat and light to move is needed.


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## knotscott (Feb 27, 2009)

I added tempered hardboard to my workbench as an easy and affordable renewable surface a couple of years ago. It's worked out great, and haven't needed to replace it yet.


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