One of the things that every garage/shop/workspace needs is a good workbench. What you are doing determines how you should build it. I've never built a wooden work bench before, but I've used a lot of them, for sure. Building a large workbench out of metal is pretty darn expensive, so wood provides a decent balance between durability and cost. The new garage I am getting settled into is in dire need of a workbench. Since the cost of materials is certainly a concern, I decided to get things draw out with SketchUp:
Things to note:
-I designed the front of the bench to be able to clamp things to it. Having a clamping lip is a HUGE benefit when you want to hold things without using your hands.
-The dimensions are 2'x8'. This will allow two sections of the bench to be made from one 4'x8' sheet of plywood for the top, one 2x6 for the support rails, and a few (I haven't counted yet) 2x4s. As it is now, with a 3/4" thick sheet of plywood on top, the height of the table is 38", which I think is a pretty comfortable height for me, since I am 5'10" tall.
-It has already been pointed out that while this design has pretty darn good compressive strength, the torsional rigidity is not so great. That is intentional. The next step of this project is to design four cabinets to fit under the bench, and these will be firmly attached to the bench to provide more stability. I intentionally designed the frame of the bench separate from the cabinets in order to make the whole system a lot easier to move around.
That's about it. I am sure the design will change a bit before we actually buy the materials.
I am really starting to like using SketchUp. It's not exactly what I could call intuitive, but, it works.
Things to note:
-I designed the front of the bench to be able to clamp things to it. Having a clamping lip is a HUGE benefit when you want to hold things without using your hands.
-The dimensions are 2'x8'. This will allow two sections of the bench to be made from one 4'x8' sheet of plywood for the top, one 2x6 for the support rails, and a few (I haven't counted yet) 2x4s. As it is now, with a 3/4" thick sheet of plywood on top, the height of the table is 38", which I think is a pretty comfortable height for me, since I am 5'10" tall.
-It has already been pointed out that while this design has pretty darn good compressive strength, the torsional rigidity is not so great. That is intentional. The next step of this project is to design four cabinets to fit under the bench, and these will be firmly attached to the bench to provide more stability. I intentionally designed the frame of the bench separate from the cabinets in order to make the whole system a lot easier to move around.
That's about it. I am sure the design will change a bit before we actually buy the materials.
I am really starting to like using SketchUp. It's not exactly what I could call intuitive, but, it works.
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