My first and my dads present bench are almost as you described but mine had birch hardwood flooring and dads was oak. Dads has held up pretty well over the years but his bench is not used to do much more than hold junk 34″ off the floor. Mine on the other hand was used hard. I have put the bench through the war and back and when I scrapped it a lot of the hard wood had started to lift off its base. In short I would do so again if the bench was not going to be used for any amount of hard work. But if it is going to do a days work then I would definitely make a different top.
Scott C. Frankland
Newfoundland Wood Worker
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Hi Rick
Where did you get some flat hickory flooring? I’ve installed thousands of feet hickory and not one piece was even close to being flat enough to make a workbench out of. LOL
Now to your? I thank hickory flooring would make a grate workbench top. It is on par with maple for being stable and hardness. You can’t glue it together thou, it will bow up because of the flooring mill. So do it like flooring. I would glue and clamp to the ply then clamp it together kind of at the same time so it doesn’t bow. I might even use two layers of ply. No nails! Can’t have nails in a work bench!!! Then if you can have it drum sanded (that flat hickory).
Jeff in so cal
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