Workbench design II � Conclusions

Removable front vise (Mike)

Dirk Vogel


>Hi Mike, you once stated :

"I'm picturing a vise that can be locked to the benchtop at the position you need. I wouldn't even make it part of the bench, just a specialized clamp that I'd pull out when I needed to. Robert Wearing has a couple of simple ones in "Making Woodwork Aids & Devices", but you could get a little fancier if you wanted to."

I didn't get your idea. Like I said some day ago, I only found very complicated ways to have a removable front vise. Would it bother you to send a little sketch or something that illustrates what you were speaking about ?

Thanks and greetings,

Dirk.

Tucker vise (Thom)

Dirk Vogel


>Hi Thom,

right now, I have other news for you and for other readers who my be interested in our discussion :-) Guess what : yesterday I made an important decision, thanks to your efforts. I spoke with the one guy in Germany known to me that had a Tucker vise available, asking him if he could make me an interesting offer. And you know what � he did ! So I'm buying that vise right now, for a price that's certainly not modest, but at least not absurd (- 25% !) So we can close the discussion about front vises � nearly. :-)

What I would like to know about the tucker is : what distance is there between the two dogholes that could make of a Tucker vise also a tail vise, lining up two rows of dogholes in the bench top ?

And my second question : on many photos you can see a Tucker vise installed like on the photo below. In your opinion, would it be possible to do it the way I tried to show using your drawings, i. e. one of his jaws flush-mounted with the benchtop edge ?

Many greetings,

Dirk

Tail vise and apron (Thom)

Dirk Vogel


>I'm studying for now the important question of the tail vise, where unsuspected problems arose. I'm speaking of the tracking problem, of course. :-) First, I finally found out why I thought that kind of vise possible the way I designed it : Sam Allen shows in his "Making Workbenches" book (p. 25) a photo accompagnied by the sentence "A wooden single-screw face vise can be mounted on the end of the bench to serve as a tail vise". Ok, his is a normal front vise (not an L-formed one), and he simply uses it with both dogholes simultaneously. I concluded overhastily that a single-doghole use may be possible, too.

Re-reading carefully what you said about (classic) tail vises here and there, however, I got the impression that :

1. Only tail vises with metal hardware (like a gliding rack) should be built in I-form.

2. Purely wooden tail vises need an L-form to be i line without racking.

Now, my personal problem with the L-form, as I already stated, was the short piece of the L, as it's "only" needed for tracking issues. But now I think I found a way to "accept" the L in my aestethic construction principles : this way one doesn't see it when the vise is closed. What do you think ? Do I weaken too much my apron with this ? Figure A shows my benchtop from the top, figure B from the upside. Figures C and D mean to show the tailvise construction idea. Unfortunately, I designed the vise with the top upside down, that is a mistake. But one can understand the general idea, I hope.

Thom, another question : I think I understood your idea how to fix an apron araound the benchtop without problems of wood expansion (using metal bolts). Do you think in my project (figures A and B) there may be a wood-only solution now that the apron form has been simplyfied ?

Benchtop width (Thom)

Dirk Vogel


>Thom, as you know, I found out the ideal twin-screwes vise I want to have for dovetailing large shelves had 39". Now, you told me that even if my bench is free-standing, you would prefer a narrow bench. I tried among other things to imagine the twin vise as tailvise, so that the bench would have 39" of width, too. Could you tell me please why do you think that this is no good idea ? I think proportions would not be very handsome, but I can't see other reasons in thit moment ...

Congrads on the vise

HC Sakman @ Victoria, BC


>You will not be disappointed at the least! it's an awesome chunk of metal for a workbench.

On the other hand, I strongly disagree with removable top business. I think it'd be a degrading factor within the frame of your thoughts, effort and skill that are going into building one.

I suggest you go with traditional top and in case you have a messy job of some sort, throw a sheet of ply or mdf on top.

Remind you, this is not a lab table or even a kitchen table. Let the work done on it over the years show!

Chico...

Not Thom, but a response

Bill Houghton, Sebastopol, CA


>Hard to reach past 24" on a bench. If it's out in the middle of the room, this may not be as much of an issue, but I suspect that the "back" of the bench would then turn into storage space over time.

Re: Benchtop

Edward J


>Although I am not a woodworker by any means, I recently completed my dream workbench. After informing myself (and subsequently confusing myself)with as many books a possible, I decided on a 6'-er with maple tops salvaged from baker's dough tables. I had examined the Tucker vise at the local LV and was impressed with it's versitility and ran away from it's CDN$700+ price.... However, I'm not a patternmaker and can not justify the price for what I need it for. I decided on a Record-type 101/2" quick release vise, and mounted the inside jaw behind the maple edge of my top. The maple edge is a 1 x 6, and the top is just shy of 1/1/2"thick, so I have an overhang of almost 3 inches. This maple edge doubles as my "boardjack", I clamp a piece of lumber in the vise and secure the tail end of the project to the maple 1x6 edge with a clamp.

After reading every topic on tail vises, I decided to ignore them. After much soul-searching I decided to perforate my maple top with a series of 3/4"holes on a 6" grid, turned my own dogs from oak and made my "accesories" with the turned oak dowel spaced 6" apart. They include a strip that spans across the width of my table (24"+ a 6"tooltray) and another strip wedge shaped with a matching opposite wedge. To secure a 5" board face up on the bench, I would set it against the flat strip(which is anchored to the table by the dowels set into the 3/4"holes), set in the wedge piece in the nearest set of holes, and tap in the opposite wedge, thus clamping the board securely. The system works well, and it was only after using it for a few months I recieved for my b-day a pair of LV Veritas "Wonderdogs": a clamp that fits into a 3/4"hole. I prefer the wedge system because it takes far less time than threading the Wonderdog clamps securely. I bought and converted a "Vice-grip"type tool commonly used for drill presses to accept the 3/4"hole systems as well. I also turned a socket for the 3/4"holes that accepts the stem of a spring-loaded table lamp, allowing me to place the lamp securly where ever I like on the table.

I had alot of fun with the research, conception, design, and execution of the bench. The only regrets I have was routing a shallow 3/4" groove across the table to accept a stick-on 6'steel measuring tape (think it's made by Starret). %^&!-ing tape sticky backing keeps on fatiguing and bubbling. Replaced it twice now, and the sticky backing still fatigues and bubbles up....

Also not Thom...

David Barnett - SW Florida


>My bench is 21" deep without a tool tray, and if I didn't need the extra top weight to offset a bit of my own and the stability of a broader base, I could've gone 17" or maybe even 14". Considering how much of me precedes the rest, 21" is about all I can reach across, these days. Michael Fortune's bench in Landis' book, from which mine draws inspiration, has a fairly narrow top.

39" is a twin bed in the USA.

Vladimir with his 2 cents.

Vlad


>Hi Dirk,

I recently completed a 2nd bench with 2x6 lumber for the base and a oak top (from a tree I felled when I moved into my new house). I'll have to post pics sometime soon. I wanted to get rid of the oak lumber and yet have a nice thick robust looking base.

My 2nd bench is 36" tall, 9' long and 30" deep. I prefer the biggest bench I could make. I wanted to go longer but my logs were cut to 8 1/2 feet. Personally I like the big benches because I not only dimension lumber on the bench, I use it to assemble my projects as well. Both my benches (I think my original should be in the archives from the Badger Pond days) are 30" deep. On my second bench I would have gone as far as 34" deep but ran out of wood. As for vises, I have an emmert clone. I too couldn't justify the $700 price tag for a Tucker, although it's a beauty. My tail/end vise will oncorporate a small tool storage system. For this my vise needs to be fairly deep and luckily my old Wilton will do the job. A twin screw would have been ideal I suppose.

I'm not sure a twin screw will be ideal for a bench that is 39" deep. I don't think I would go beyond 30". I think you should call LV customer support and ask them or perhaps Rob will chime in.

Good luck.

Best

Vlad

Re: Removable front vise (Mike)

Michael Recchione


>I don't have any software that will let me make a drawing on the computer and turn it into a jpeg - maybe I can sketch an idea on paper and scan it in. I don't want to scan the page from the Wearing book because of potential copyright issues. But the book is in print and readily available - the applicable drawings are on pages 13 and 14 (called "long board holding device").

Wearing's solutions aren't all-wood, and I know that's a requirement for you. They're also not high on the beauty scale. But with a little imagination you could easily come up with an all-wood and more esthetic solution.

Re: Removable front vise (Mike)

Thom D


>I think the Tucker is removable with one pin. You are left with half the hinge thing. I have never removed it.

Re: Tucker vise (Thom)

Thom D


>"Hi Thom,

right now, I have other news for you and for other readers who my be interested in our discussion :-) Guess what : yesterday I made an important decision, thanks to your efforts. I spoke with the one guy in Germany known to me that had a Tucker vise available, asking him if he could make me an interesting offer. And you know what � he did ! So I'm buying that vise right now, for a price that's certainly not modest, but at least not absurd (- 25% !) So we can close the discussion about front vises � nearly. :-)"

Great news Dirk, I hope you enjoy it as much as I do. I will look forward to a critical appraisal when you get used to it!

"What I would like to know about the tucker is : what distance is there between the two dogholes that could make of a Tucker vise also a tail vise, lining up two rows of dogholes in the bench top ? "

I make it 7.75 inches on center, and the dogs seem to be the standard LV round dog as far as diameter is concerned.

"And my second question : on many photos you can see a Tucker vise installed like on the photo below. In your opinion, would it be possible to do it the way I tried to show using your drawings, i. e. one of his jaws flush-mounted with the benchtop edge ?"

I think it is possible to do that, I don't know for sure, there are a lot of really detailed instructions on instalation. You would have to make the recess either a little oversize, or curved, so that the vise could rotate.

I have attached a picture of mine, and the main point I wanted to make was that the picture shows how I found it when I went into the shop. It's in the useful vertical position. If I had a big cut in the top, it would look pretty awful and might be a risk to knocking my knuckles I like the clean mounting here, but you could try something different, just be sure it doesn't interfere with the load transfer to the top since you would be notching out the dog area if the bench.

The gray casting in the picture, the part that holds the handle is a real knuckle eater, so be a little careful.

You will notice the shame that the back half of my top is not even visible!

Cheers,

Thom

Re: Tail vise and apron (Thom)

Thom D


>Re-reading carefully what you said about (classic) tail vises here and there, however, I got the impression that :

"1. Only tail vises with metal hardware (like a gliding rack) should be built in I-form."

As far as I know, and assuming you want the multiple dog holes.

"2. Purely wooden tail vises need an L-form to be i line without racking."

I would put it this way: They need the L form to control the racking that occurs from putting a screw to one side of the dogs. Also it really isn't wood or not wood. It whether you put the screw, wood or otherwise, where the dog holes go, or off to one side. Screw material doesn't mater.

But a further option is the metal hardware option, where metal guide plates are used and a metal screw. In this approach you can make the sliding box bigger, hide the screw off side fromt eh dogs and use metal plates to track it. You could possibly do something like this with wood, but I wouldn't personally bother. When I built my Frid ench I built the L, then I considered converting it with standard metal hardwar. They LV introduced their bolt on version where the whole thing could be just hung like a face vise. What I think it had going for it was that it was quick release, and that is worth it if you can find some harware that supports it (is the new LN hardware quick releasee). Overall the metal designs never really worked for me, and I stuck with the wood. The fortune bench In the Landis book and several others use the metal hardware.

"Now, my personal problem with the L-form, as I already stated, was the short piece of the L, as it's "only" needed for tracking issues. But now I think I found a way to "accept" the L in my aestethic construction principles : this way one doesn't see it when the vise is closed. What do you think ? Do I weaken too much my apron with this ? Figure A shows my benchtop from the top, figure B from the upside. Figures C and D mean to show the tailvise construction idea. Unfortunately, I designed the vise with the top upside down, that is a mistake. But one can understand the general idea, I hope."

You have some Escher stuff happening in "D" where the top is recessed at the back and flush at the front!

I think the concept would work, but I don't think it will work as drawn. One needs the full 3 inch width, or nearly so, for the endcap, so that it is strong enough to take the screw. So for the moment, your outline looks about 3 inches, and you have cut half of it away so that nothing is really left strong enough. I have to say I like the L, it is one nice piece of framing in the whole bench. Oh well.

"Thom, another question : I think I understood your idea how to fix an apron araound the benchtop without problems of wood expansion (using metal bolts). Do you think in my project (figures A and B) there may be a wood-only solution now that the apron form has been simplyfied ?"

Yes, there could be. It seems to me yo have five issues, any one of them isn't a biggie, but all Five are tough:

1) Continuous apron around the whole board, and installed to deal with expamsion.

2) No endgrain showing (is that correct?)

3) 2x wide top

4) both sides fully functional and solid, therefore unlike the tool tray type there isn't any area to push the expansion too that you aren't using.

5) Lack of desire to use un-natural means like invisible epoxy sealing, or metal tricky hardware.

I could probably come up with something, but I need to know if those 5 points are all in play.

Re: Tail vise and apron (Thom)

Thom D


>Probably the simplest way of dealing with it naturally would be a tool tray down the middle. You solve two problems at once. people have been warning you that you can't reach across such a large bench, well now you have a place to put stuff in the middle where it comes to hand from either side. If you keep it there then it is out of the way when you flop a wide board on your benchtop. Though you would cover the tray. The other problem the tool tray solves is that it provides your "out" for expansion.

If done properly it creates some architectural interest in a bench that otherwise will look pretty flat and huge in the middle. The top is with a tray, and the bottom is without. These are 96 x 32 with three in. borders and the tool tray is 6 inches wide. Oh, I notice you narrowed it?

People point out that trays collect dust. well everything does, the dog holes the strectchers and vises. Hand work creates a lot of waste material. If you like the tray idea I wouldn't worry about the dust you are going to be doing a lot of cleaning and the tray will not be the worst part.

It doesn't have to be a tray, but if you were in any way leaning in that direction at some point, it's an option.

Re: Tail vise and apron (Thom)

Thom D


>Here is a simpler option for the tail vise though in this case it is metal hardware. Make it like the Fortune one, but make the box out of the same wood as in your bench so that it follows your prefered outline, and mount the box flush to the top.

Tray and double vise shown for interest.

Re: Benchtop width (Thom)

Thom D


>For stuff like dovetails I prefer to be at the side since it is easier to put tools to hand. Let's say you fill the end vise with a wide board, do you have to walk around every time you want to get a tool? most of the time you can just reach over the top. But other times you have a tall board...

It is stronger to mount your jaw to side grain that is integral with the top. Rather than to an endcap, though both work. Since you want to use wood your endcap needs some other means of being really strongly attached, I'm sure it is possible but it is more complication.

A double end screw does not make a great tail vise because there is a gap. It works well enough with the Veritas vise because it is designed for it, though there are some little bits that seem to shear off now and again.

Where is the advantage? I wouldn't double my bench width in order to allow me to attach a vise on the end that probably prefers to be on the side.

On the other hand if you have some real need for a wide bench that is totally different. We all work at various scales, and the bench should support that. I know what I like, everyone could have different ideas. I just attacked the width because it seemed part of the initial overbuilding agenda, but if you need it, go for it. Keep in mind as one piece it will weight about 430 pounds plus the weight of the vises. With my bench the beams are a little heavy but everything comes apart if I have to move it.

Need for width ?

Dirk Vogel


>"If you have some real need for a wide bench that is totally different. We all work at various scales, and the bench should support that."

Dear Thom, the problem is I can't forsee this precisely what I'm putting myself into here. :-) I doubt I'll have to, or want to, build anything that exceeds a width of 32". For me, even tables should stay within this limit. If one day I'm going to build something really big, I'll articulate it in smaller (= narrower) pieces. Even the bed I was told to build has to be decomposable, and I think this is a good approach for nearly every kind of big and wooden furniture. And shelves this large (near 30") can't be treated (e. g. plained) but in two passes (treating one half, turning the shelf around and treating the other half) anyway, can they ?

That's why my original bench projects turned around a 32" width. After all the modificatioins they suffered, I'm less sure about everything, bench width included ;-) What I don't know is : does it really give many advantages if what you're working on can be fully placed on your bench, or doesn't it matter if a certain percentage of your piece of wood is protuding the bench edge ? For exemple, can I plain a 32" shelf on a 24" bench ?

Woodwork AIDS & Devices

Dirk Vogel


>Hi Michel, I discovered the Wearing book is available also in Germany. I'm going to buy it, then I'll let you know. Besides, my all-wood-solution has already been corrupted seriously by the presence of the Tucker vise, and who knows what kind of compromise I'll have to endure before getting the final version of my benchbuilding project ... ;-)

Re: Tail vise and apron (Thom)

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX


>At Homestead Heritage I watched another student build such a bench. Also, the student benches all had tool trays down the middle. It was a very handy feature to use. They had special inserts for the tray which extended the front-to-back dog holes by spanning the tray, also pretty cool.

Pam

Apron width and fixation (long)

Dirk Vogel


>Hi Thom, I'll respond to your tail vise comments in another chapter of this thread ("Bench vise distribution"). Right now, let's see the apron story :

A) The apron width of 3 1/2" was the result of my original dogholes (1" x 1") being surrounded by what seemed to me a reasonable quantity of wood (1 1/4"), guaranteeing their steadyness, but permitting also to have the holes near to the edges of the bench and jaws of vises, permitting to handle little pieces of wood to be clamped by dogs. So if you put 1 1/4" of wood on both sides on 1" dogholes (they were square because I thought them to be used in length and width by front and tail vises), you get 3 1/2" of width.

That was also the reason for the 3 1/2" thickness of the top, the 7" apron height (2 x 3 1/2"), the 31,5" bench width (9 x 3 1/2") and the 94.5" bench length (27 x 3 1/2). I spoke about 32" x 96" because I'm measuring in cm, so 9 cm (the base of my calculations) is nearer to 3 9/16" than to 3 1/2", so when multiplicated with 9 or 27, those 9 cm correspond to something that's nearer to 32" or 96".

B) But � now it comes ! � I would like to have a tail vise larger than 3 1/2", because of the clamping space between vise end and apron. That creates problems. I could double up its width, of course, but then I should have an apron of the same size, and 7" seem exaggerated to me for an apron that I want to build around my bench. Other solutions would make the tailvise meet two types of wood or break the rectangle form of the apron (you know that already from earlier drawings of mine).

And those are not the only problems. I was proud of, or better, very content with, my dogholes being at the center of the apron width. With a wider apron, I can either stay with the same distance between hole and edge, what gives holes that aren't centered anymore, or stay with centered dogholes in relation to the apron, but giving up short distances between dogholes I thought useful for small workpieces.

C) And if you're asking me "Why do you need an apron ?" my answer is that especially wooden front vises with their need of wooden guides require at least 7" of height if you're interested in some free clamping space above or next to the 2" screw, and I want the vise jaws to flush at the edges of my bench. And since a 7" thick benchtop seemed a little overdone even to me, the apron is the only way I see.

So apron width is bound to these exigencies : doghole placement, relation to tail vise, needed space of front vise, aestethics. And now I'm going to use a Tucker vise ! Its propotions may change apron height, maybe even the use of square dogholes, and with 3/4" round dogholes one could modify the apron width ... Like you see, nothing is fixed yet. Also if I decided not to add a shop built wooden front vise (because of the tucker vise's presence), 7" of height would not be required any more ...

Now, to the criteria you wanted to know :

1) Continuous apron around the whole board, and installed to deal with expansion.

�> Yes, and I'm even getting used to the tool tray idea you and others insisted on for so much time ;-)

2) No endgrain showing (is that correct?)

�> Only in the measure of big dovetails, maybe finger joints, if it's possible

3) 2x wider than the top

�> The relation between bench thickness and apron thickness is no must, look what I said about the reasons that conduced me to this. Another relation fine to me would be the golden section relation(1 : 1.6162), but I thought relations based on integer multiples were easier to calculate.

4) both sides fully functional and solid, therefore unlike the tool tray type there isn't any area to push the expansion too that you aren't using.

�> Yes. Well, if you can manage without a tool tray, let's see ! If it's not possible, I've got to consider this tool tray *sigh*

5) Lack of desire to use un-natural means like invisible epoxy sealing, or metal tricky hardware.

�> Precisely !

Now I'm curious :-)

Cheers, Dirk

Re: Vlad's clone

Denny


>Vlad,

How do you like the Emmert clone? Are you aware of any limitations or weaknesses compared to the Emmert?

Thanks,

Denny

Another source you may already have

Michael Recchione


>I was actually going to build one like this but never got around to it - because my bench has an apron of sorts, it's just too easy to use a handscrew to hold the right side of the work when I'm doing dovetails. Landis calls this one a "dovetailing vise" in The Workbench Book, on page 134 of the paperback American edition. It's in the section titled "Specialty Vises" in the chapter on Shop-Built Vises. I would extend the faces more on the outside of the screws, particularly on the left side, so you could use it to hold really wide stuff between it and the regular face vise.

This is cooler than the ones in the Wearing book, and I'm sure you already have this.

If you mount the Tucker vise as recommended instead of making it flush to the rest of the bench, whatever mechanism you use to clamp this to the bench won't get in the way (make the back jaw of this extend down over the face of the bench, and make it thick enough so that it is even with the back jaw of the Tucker vise).

Good luck,

Mike

Re: Apron width and fixation (long)

Thom D


>"1) Continuous apron around the whole board, and installed to deal with expansion.

�> Yes, and I'm even getting used to the tool tray idea you and others insisted on for so much time ;-)"

My current bench doesn't have a tray, it would possibly work well with your needs but there are other ways to deal with wood expansion. A tray is simplest if you happen to want one.

"3) 2x wider than the top

�> The relation between bench thickness and apron thickness is no must, look what I said about the reasons that conduced me to this. Another relation fine to me would be the golden section relation(1 : 1.6162), but I thought relations based on integer multiples were easier to calculate."

It's not so much a mater of a particular proportion, it's just that the wider you make it the more wood expansion you have to plan for, at some point it becomes a meaningful increment that will lead to visible cracks, spaces, whatever.

The golden section is a critical design element but it is often not something one can aesthetically appply to a whole. So, for instance, I am 73+ inches tall and 22 inches across the shoulders. If those are normal human proportions they don't conform to the Golden rule, but theoretically dozens of related body proportions do.

A bench that was 96 by 59.4 would not be all that compeling even if it is the GR. Now this is amusing: I chose 22 inches to start this example, because I like that width in a bench. Son of a gun the double GM is 73 inches! I'm darn near perfect!

4) both sides fully functional and solid, therefore unlike the tool tray type there isn't any area to push the expansion too that you aren't using.

�> Yes. Well, if you can manage without a tool tray, let's see ! If it's not possible, I've got to consider this tool tray *sigh*

How about a rubber traction strip down the middle!

5) Lack of desire to use un-natural means like invisible epoxy sealing, or metal tricky hardware.

�> Precisely !

Now I'm curious :-)

You can laminate the top and because the apron needs glueing on too, as do the dog hole strips, you can bond everything with epoxy which limits moisture uptake. Your central beams need to be planed also So that rather than be solid 3xlumber only the top cm is exposed to the the weather the rest is really all boxed in epoxy. Someone looking at the bench would never know the difference by it would respond like super plywood.

Re: Vlad's clone

Thom D


>Mine arrived with broken parts, so I'm guessing the castings are a little marginal.

I saw a real Emmert for 350 Canadian and didn't buy it!!