Build a Portable Workbench

[Stick486]

How to Build a Portable Workbench

[roxanne562001]

Nice project

[Bushwhacker]

Yes, it is a very nice project. Thinking back through all the years that I have been fooling around with wood working. I can't think of a time that I may have really needed some thing like this. I have always been able to get by with a few clamps and blocks.
That being said, I am afraid it would eventually join all the other jigs and things that clutter my shelves.

Bushwhacker

[Cherryville Chuck]

Yes, it is a very nice project. Thinking back through all the years that I have been fooling around with wood working. I can't think of a time that I may have really needed some thing like this. I have always been able to get by with a few clamps and blocks.
That being said, I am afraid it would eventually join all the other jigs and things that clutter my shelves.

Bushwhacker

My sentiments too. I started out saving every jig and it didn't take long to see the problem that was creating. Some of them I couldn't either remember what they were for or how to use them. Most of the others I realized I would do differently. So I tore the ones apart I didn't use often and salvaged what I could and burned the rest.

The video does have some good work methods and is thought provoking in other places. To simplify the build I would use threaded rod instead of buying that expensive wood threading kit. You can epoxy a nut in the moving vise jaw and on the handle end use a self locking nut on each side of the frame with washers between. You'd probably only need a 1/2" rod in metal. To fix the handle on the rod, and the nuts too if you want, just drill a small hole through and drive a roll pin in them.

[Nickp]

expensive wood threading kit

Here's another opportunity to add to the burn pile...

BUT...it is a sweet jig...

https://www.woodsmithshop.com/episodes/ ... eading+jig

Watch the video...pretty cool jig for making threads in wood and wood objects (in this case a canister with screw top)...

[tomp]

Kind of a "one-trick" pony, a scaled down end vise really. You can get the same use with a Moxon vise with the rear table having dog holes. But still wind up with a bulky "jig" that you need to find a place to store. I kind of like Paul Sellers set-up where he uses a bar clamp clamped in his bench vise and holds the part he's working on in the clamp - when you're finished, take the clamp out of the vise and hang it on the rack.

Clamping on a workbench

[Stick486]

so many of you class this as a jig to be anchored to the shop...
read the title again - it's a portable workbench...
the key word is portable...

why are y'all slamming/snubbing it???
OH WAIT!!! ...
I get it...
none of you are remote/out of the shop woodworkers...
for some.. this can be the jobsite ticket...

[Herb Stoops]

It is a beautiful project,and would be fun to build,BUT I will take my Workmate for job site projects, or 2 of them together are hard to beat.
these are impressive to say the least and exhibit a persons craftsmanship in making such a tool, but you still have to have bench or saw horse to set them on and would be tough using the tailgate to support it.
Just saying,
Herb

[Stick486]

this just may serve a niche...
how many WW's live in an apartment and only have a small room or closet to work out of???... a tin shed??? back porch???
consider the have nots trying to work w/ what they don't have...

read some of those replies... they speak volumes about the poster's mind set...

[Stick486]

I will take my Workmate for job site projects, or 2 of them together are hard to beat.

now they're north of a hundred bucks, pressed sheet metal and plastic...
the WORX is a buck twenty and all plastic...

[Herb Stoops]

Mine are the old Stanley's, all metal and wood,with only a minimum of any plastic. You say closet,back porch, tin shed, I took it we were talking jobsite. and it would be a challenge for any closet woodworker to make one of these.
Just mentioning,
Herb

[Stick486]

Mine are the old Stanley's, all metal and wood,with only a minimum of any plastic.

THOSE DAYS ARE GONE!!!!

I had the newer generation...
the plastic broke...
the fiber board disintegrated....
the metal rusted......
rivets sheared...
and what could bend, bent...

[Stick486]

we're talking jobsite

yup...
you are in construction mode...
I'm in trim, fit/finish and custom install mode...

[Stick486]

it would be a challenge for any closet woodworker to make one of these.

nope...
do you remember the guy that only had a bathroom for a shop???
or the one that had a basement storage locker in his apartment complex's basement???
they produced some mighty fine work...

this portable bench has it's place...

[Herb Stoops]

It is still kind of clunky and would have to be anchored to something substantial to work with.
If you walked into a bare apartment to trim it out, how would you set it up to plane a door, bevel a windowsill to fit against a window frame, plane the back side of a threshold,you could put your chopsaw on the floor, ohhh my aching knees,use it to hold trim to plane or sand backside to fit bumps in the wall.You need a set of sawhorses and a sheet of plywood or old door to set up like a workbench, then you have something to clamp it down to. You can do all these things easily with a workmate.
To me this is for a hobbist like carver to walk in plunk it on the dining room table after the wife leaves to go shopping and get out the dremel and start carving, then grab it and run for the closet when you hear the car door slam.
Herb

[Herb Stoops]

After thinking about for a few minutes, I wouldn't call this a "Portable work Bench" I would call it a portable vise.
Just saying,
HErb

[Stick486]

how would you set it up

folding table legs...

[Stick486]

I would call it a portable vise.

yup...

[Cherryville Chuck]

It might be the right tool for some jobs but I'm like Herb about the Workmates. I have 4 of them. You can clamp between the the top pieces or use the dogs to hold onto something. The dogs are pretty strong even if they are plastic. I've used them to hold boards for routing and planing as well as using them for sawhorses. Mine all have the thick fiber board for tops but they've been very durable and if I had to I could replace them with ply later.

[CharleyL]

My DIY jigs, and some purchased jigs, all hang from hooks in the beams of my shop ceiling (no sheetrock). Because the ceiling is only 8' I have no trouble moving around under most of them. When I hit my head on one, I move it to a hook above a place where I don't walk. I am usually alone when working in my shop, but when a tall friend comes over they usually have problems. The easiest fix is to tell them to sit down, but I have sometimes taken jigs down that were above the walk areas, until they went home. I'm beginning to run out of ceiling space for them, so will soon need a new creative solution or I too will be burning or scrapping the lesser used jigs. Big jigs like my I-Box and CRB7 jigs each have a specially made tool box to hold them, and they get stacked on shelves between uses.

At one time I had 8 WorkMates. Most were acquired at yard sales and flea markets. I was rebuilding a boat back then, and at one point had all 8 in use. I have given and sold away a few, so at last count I have 3. My #2 son has two of the ones that I gave away in his metalworking shop, and they get used often. One of the ones that I have kept is, I think, one of the original WorkMates. It has many structural parts that are cast aluminum or magnesium. Still much heavier than the newer sheet metal variety. It was given to me by a neighbor. The other to are model 200. One is my original. The other came from a flea market. I never paid more than $20 for any but the original, which was purchased new at about $60, if I remember correctly.

Charley