Over the past several weeks I have been slowly working on a new workbench for hand tool woodworking. 
This is a learning project for me and I am learning a lot.  At the heart of things I am finding that I really enjoy hand tool woodworking.

I am also finding out that I am not particularly good at it which doesn’t surprise me much as I have never really dedicated any time to it or learned the proper ways to do things with hand tools.  My saw skills definitely need work as I have never done anything with hand saws but rough carpentry and this is a whole new ball of wax.

 

That said, progress is being made and I was able to dry fit the left and right leg assemblies today.  They are square and the hand cut mortises and tenons are well fit for the most part.  I discovered that i NEED a shoulder plane to really finish these up properly.  That said, the little gaps from my lousy saw skills won’t impact the functionality of this workbench in the slightest. Especially after everything is drawbored, pinned, and glued in place.

As I work my way through this build I will continue to post updates on the overall progress.
 

Looking really good!

 

 

So, what style is it going to be?  I just got Schwarz's workbench book out of the library again.

This looks a lot like the bench I built. Looking forward to more on this. I know you have designed this to the nth degree but if you want to look at mine it is in this blog.'

 

Thanks much for pointing me at that blog @Gerald The bench design I have a pretty decent handle on but there are some great ideas there for the drawers that I am going to use. 

 

@kmealy This one is going to be a left-handed split top Rubou with some modern modifications.

I got to spend some time in the shop today and finished up the Left-Rear leg of the workbench.

Chopped the mortise for the Long Back Rail, Drilled the hole for the knockdown hardware and cut the tenon for the top to sit on.

 

My handsaw skills still suck but are improving and a shoulder plane is capable of fixing a lot of mistakes as long as you leave yourself some  wiggle room.

 

My chisel game is acceptable and also improving.  I have discovered that the secret is SHARP chisels.  Not just yeah that’s sharp, but I looked at it and it cut my eyeballs from across the room sharp.  

 

The same is true of planes.  The curly shavings there are from chamfering the bottoms (end grain) of the leg with my little block plane that is truly sharp.  I need to spend a little more time on the shoulder plane and get it to that point as well.  It will save me a lot of frustration on the next one.

 

The only things left are to drill the draw-bore holes for the side stretchers, sanding, assembly and finishing….for this leg…1 down three to go!!

 

Front Left Leg Ho!!!

 

 

Nice read, I'm sure it's going to be a fantastic workbench.

What brand of shoulder plane did you end up purchasing?

All the best Mate.

What I wanted was a Lie-Nielsen medium shoulder plane. What I got was a Wood River.

It all came down to what I could get and when.  It’s not a bad plane but I did need to address the iron out of the box.

The back was relatively flat which was nice but the cutting side needed to be addressed.  I am not sure if it was by design or defect but the cutting angle was at 27* which is a bit more than expected.  I reground the primary bevel to 25*, sharpened and honed it.

That seemed to take care of the chattering problem it had initially.  

That all sounds simple but it was not.  The Wood River iron is Mn65 and they claim it is hardened to HRC60-64.
I believe it.  It makes the A2 Lie Neilsen irons look easy to sharpen.  I expect it to be a bit more brittle than the LN stuff but all in all the plane is solid and works as expected once sharpened.  Unlike the Lie Nielsens that come ready to go out of the box, expect to spend a little bit of time on this one first.

4 hours ago, StaticLV2 said:

 Unlike the Lie Nielsens that come ready to go out of the box

Beautiful bones, Michael.  Love the massive beam and tendon construction! 

 

RE: LN tools, I'm not sure that lately they are crazy sharp right from Maine. My 3/8" chisel and Violin Maker's Plane were in August 2018, but maybe Covid has crimped the gears of perfection? December 2021 and July 2022 No. 102 and No. 60 1/2 planes were delivered sharp, but not sharp. Even a recent scraper set, $15 previously but now $25, showed signs of fabrication an earlier set did not.

 

These days, sharpening and dressing my tools is a separate bench project. I gear up for it over time, clear the deck, then give honing all of my focus.

Made some decent progress today.
 

The left side assembly is now pretty much completed.  Dry fit has been done and everything goes together nice and square.

I am learning a ton through this process and I am a big fan of the Japanese pull saws. I am gradually getting faster and more confident with hand tool operations and things are starting to gel a little bit.  Another 4000 or so hours of shop time like this and I might actually get to an apprentice level of competence

 

I really prefer the Japanese style saws. They seem to give me more control.

Most excellent progress and work Michael. Enjoy following this project along.

Edited August 1, 20223 yr by Grandpadave52
Grammatical improvement

Beautiful work!!

Following,..I love these style benches. You've got some nice beefy looking stock there and some great looking joinery. Thanks for posting 

Just a bit of an update, managed to get the right leg assembly finished off as well so its time to start on the front and back stretchers to connect the two.

I think you better build that in place. Pretty sure it's not gonna be easy to move once completed!

Already have plans for that.  Have a set of cantilevered casters that are rated for 600lbs which is good because this bench will clock in at about 560 lbs or so.  Since this is going to be a split top there isn’t really any single part that is going to weigh all that much.
The front and rear top slabs will clock in at about 170 / 150 respectively and the whole base will be about 200 but that will break down into 4 pieces that are relatively simple to move.  All that aside, I plan on assembling it where I want it to live in the shop

 

Love the painstaking, methodical, quality approach to your build-a-long Michael. Appreciate the detail you're showing and sharing with this project. THANKS!

I have seen  that some people make the crazy thru tenon plus thru dovetail leg to top joint by merely laminating strips along the edges and on the legs.  Seems like a good way to do it to me.

 

I have seen that as well and aesthetically, I think it looks nice.  That said, I am not opting to do this on my bench because I am planning on installing a tail vise and I cannot for the life of me figure out how to keep it from pulling the 3 laminated sections dovetail, dog hole, and tenon away from the rest of the top over time.  The tail vise can put a lot of stress on those joints and it probably isn’t as big a deal as I am thinking it is but I am opting to run solid laminates.  I suppose in 200 years or so someone can look at both options and let me know which one held up better lol.