Hi Everyone,
I had a question for the New Fangled Workbench Users out there. I am planning on building one this summer and I wanted to know if you had any problems keeping the top flat? I want to build a bench and I am willing to sacrifice beauty to save some money but I wanted to make sure that it is going to work as well as the old European style benches. Are there any other problems that you have run into with this design? Would you add or take away anything? Does it stay flat? (I know that every bench needs to be flattened periodically but does it stay flat within reason?). Thanks for the info.
Nick
Replies
I finished mine earlier this year and love it. It's staying flat enough for me so far but I am not a flat fanatic. I have other benches and assembly tables I can use that stay flat enough. One thing to consider is if the NFWB is flattened often the MDF running down the center will eventually stand proud and have to be run thru a planner. One problem I had building it was that I think the Sketchup plan and the written plan used different sized diameter pipe clamps. I had a bit of a job getting the height of the stack of long pipes, cross pipes and MDF to fit the height of the well using three quarter inch black pipe. It was a bit of a squeeze. I had never built anything from a Sketchup plan before but I finally got good at using it and it was a lot of fun for me. I love the design and have moved the focus of my work around this bench, even moving the storage of all my hand tools to the its location in my shop. I was even using the unfinished bench to build parts for the bench itself. That said, I am not a professional woodworker, just having fun in my retirement. By the way when I was building it I used FWW's Ask The Experts John White (the designer of the NFWB) and never got an answer.
Good luck, have fun, be safe.
The Ask the Experts feature/service was discontinued a couple of years ago, as I recall. The fact that the section on the forum remained open for posting was a bit confusing. John still drops in occasionally, however, but probably doesn't read that section any more.
It's hard to say how long it took to build. It was spread out over several months broken up by trips to see my granddaughter. It took a few days sorting thru lumber for straight grained sections that looked good enough to rip off. I followed the plans exactly when it came to screwing it all together even though it would have been much faster to glue up the top. Also working alone meant I had to devise methods to hold the quite heavy parts in position while I lag bolted them together. As the bench gets more and more parts added it gets massive. If I remember, having an extra long 1/8 inch drill bit saved some time with pilot holes. Mostly I took my time as I have other benches in my shop and wasn't in any hurry, fitting in work with other chores which seem to multiply with retirement. I had to go to a farm tractor hardware store to find the huge washers for the front vise pipes so I wasted time going from big box store to b b store looking for them. All in all I think it is hard to judge how long a project will take, not knowing skill levels (I don't have many) and shop size (mine is 1000 sq ft) or equipment used.... too many variables... you get the point.
swenson
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