I have made many workbenches in my lifetime and I'm about to embark on making another. My workbenches have been anything from plywood tops, solid slab doors that where re purposed, to just construction grade 2 x 4's. Cost of materials has often been a factor in what the bench was made from. I have made them big and small and every size in between. Some benches for the garage, some for metal working, and many for wood working. I dont think there is any one perfect bench, and everyone's needs are different. For now I'll give my thoughts on a wood working work bench and what I want in my next bench, which I'll be starting on soon. Some things that need to be considered..........bench height? And this will vary for everyone. In my early days I always made them too tall, through trial and error I've finally found the height that is right for me, I'm 5'9". So my bench height wouldn't be good for a person that's 6 foot or more, and probably would be too tall for
@Tony. Bench size? I once had a bench that was 9 or 10 foot long, it was way to big, I still have it but I have cut it in half and use one half in my wood shop and one half in my metal shop. The half in my metal shop is too tall and I need to shorten the legs. For me I find that about 5 to 6 foot length is enough room since I often use my tablesaw outfield tables as a supplemental work surface (place to pile stuff). For a wood worker the bench needs to be rock stable and have mass! My next bench will have a much thicker laminated hardwood top, Ash because I have a bunch of it. I've gone back and forth with this but I think I want my next bench to have a tool tray in the middle with ramps on both ends of the tray for easy clean out of sawdust and wood chips. It should also have massive legs for low weight and stability, I haven't quite worked out the final details of this in my head yet, but I'm almost there.
Work holding?........and this too will be different for everyone and often times dictated by budget, good vises can be expensive. I have my favorite ways of holding things, a good wood workers vice with replaceable wood jaws suits me just fine. Bench dog holes, hold fast for those holes, and the ability to clamp things to the edge of the bench are important to me and how I work. Finish?........For me over the years i have found that a waterbased poly for floors works well topped with wax, its durable and easily repaired or refreshed and allows glue drips to be wiped off easy.
For me a workbench is utilitarian and I'm hard on a bench and usually beat the crap out of them which cause me to occasionally sand the tops down to refresh them. I have seen some beautiful work benches,
@Mike1950 bench comes to mind, it's absolutely beautiful! But I would be way to hard on a bench like his and would abuse such a beautiful bench. No drawers for my bench because I have a whole wall of cabinets and drawers and I put my shop air cleaner below the bench, works great when I'm sanding and I dont hit my head on it. So these are my thoughts on a bench and what I'll be building next, it will be similar to
@Sprung bench but with a few things different to suit my methods of work. Of all the tools in your shop I think over the years I have learned that it should require the most thought and effort to build correctly because that is where most of you time will be spent. I have made many mistakes building benches to learn this from trial and error.
