Woodworking 101 Day 5

Back to the workbench build this morning. I unclamped the top and moved it back into the workshop where it fit nicely atop the sawhorses. I scraped off the globs of glue that had oozed out of the joints and then squared off the ends and sanded the joints until they were pretty close to even.

Along the way I also removed one quarter of the finger nail from my right middle finger. That's one quarter as in draw a cross using two lines, one that goes across the nail half way back from the end and another that runs the length of the finger. Now remove one of the two pieces out toward the end of the finger. I thought for sure it would hurt a hell of a lot more than it has so far. And it should have bled a whole lot more too.

Anyway, that happened early and I was able to work through the inconvenience.

I got out the router and a mortising bit to produce a tenon on each end of the top. The tenon measures 1/2 inch in thickness and protrudes 3/4 of an inch. It took a little thought to set it up and I erred on my math as to where I should put the guide but luckily the error produced a tenon that protruded only 1/2 inch so after I realized the mistake, I just moved the guide back and proceeded right along. The Tenon is also down the side 1/2 inch from the top so I made several passes to remove the waste wood. trying to do it all in one go (1/2 inch x 3/4 inch) would have been a bear of a job.

Tenon on one end of the bench top.

Once the tenon was formed, it was time to make the mortise in each of the side rails. To do that I used a small tabletop router table and a 1/2 inch mortising bit. This groove is 1/2 inch from the top, 1/2 inch wide and 3/4 of an inch deep. Again, I made several passes to remove all the wood.

Mortise in one of the end rails.

The small router table made the mortise a snap.

Now that I have the two ends ready to be installed, I'll be working on the back and inner rails. These four rails will attach directly to the bench top. After they go on, it will be time to start working on the holes for the dogs for the vice, and the one vice that will run the length of the table. The second vice will be mounted on the front of the table. As I do not yet have the vice parts in hand (I placed an order with Lee Valley today), I'll probably just mount the bench top to the legs and make room for it somewhere amidst this pile:

The wood that is stacked here is left over from the construction of our log home. Most of it is tongue and grove pine boards from 8 to 12 feet in length and between 6 and 8 inches in width. Cut a V-notch in the center and this material could be used as the car panel surround for the shelf area beneath the bench. I'm also toying with the idea of using this for some of the walls of the workshop. There are three sections where the framing is still exposed (the back of the bathroom, the wall shared with the utility room, and the stairs) where this would close things in pretty nicely. There are also a few tongue and groove planks that were used in the second story floor (1 1/2 inch thick and 6 inches wide) and I would have considered them for the bench top except the best boards have already gone to make the doors to the utility room and the workshop.

I've no idea what to do with the bike frame--or the three mis-matched tire rims--that Rick was so kind as to leave behind. At least I can make use of the fully functional bike that is out in the garage--when the snow melts and the mud dries up.

No, I won't be out of things to do while I wait for the vise components to arrive.