Many of my students delight when I make a mistake or a misstep in class. Not because they are cold-blooded wankers, but because they like to know that all woodworkers screw up at times.
So let me say that these workbenches would be totally delightful to my students.
I lost a whole day when building the movable block for the the wagon vise. After cutting all the joinery, tweaking the blocks to a piston fit and creating all the joinery for the screw and garter it came time to make the dog hole.
I chopped it at the wrong angle – 3° slanting away from the other dogs instead of 3° the other way.
I also lost a day experimenting with different ways to affix the benchtop to a table. Fail, fail and fail again I did. Finally I came back to my original notion – angle iron – which worked brilliantly.
And making the little bench chihuahuas was an entire afternoon of stupid ideas accented by blunders, dead ends, two trips to hardware stores and – ultimately – a five-minute operation that created awesome little dogs.
Even though I have years and years of experience, building something new is never a perfectly orchestrated unicorn square dance.
But the benches are done – finished and functional. The story is written. The SketchUp drawing is sketched. The digital photos are processed and off to Popular Woodworking Magazine. I am ready for a beer or 12.
But the Frenchman calls. Zut alors.
— Christopher Schwarz
Looks great! Looks like a fun bench to bring on vacation….
Yes! That would fit nicely in my pop-up.
And my motor home too.
Putain Roubo!
3 degrees the wrong way – I would not cry, I would give up wood work for, mmm, two weeks. Why square? Traditional?
Actually round is traditional….
I made square dogs because the original had square. I prefer round dogs for the ease of installation. But I can swing both ways.
Maybe we are square heads in Scandinavia, because all the workbenches I have seen have had square dogs and dog holes. Even the old workbenches.
That aside. It is a good looking bench you have built.
Brgds
Jonas
No, I think some of them ARE cold- blooded wankers
Guilty.
Sweet chisels. Dave needs to add them to his site…
Yes he does. Besides the firmer chisels themselves, I’m excited he’s working in O1.
Perhaps he’ll offer his paring chisels in O1 as well.
Are those Blue Spruce chisels??
Yup.
Is the front rail held in place with a coach screw/lag bolt?
I started with a lag bolt on my version, but it pulled out when I used the front screws. Could be because I used hem fir rather than maple. To fix that I bored all the way through the bench and replaced it with 1/2 inch threaded rod, a couple of washers and nuts.
The original used a long hex-head bolt. I used a 3/8″ x 4″. It hasn’t moved yet.
Be honest…you made those shavings in your workshop and brought them to your kitchen table for the photo op didn’t you?
. Nice portable tool box too!
Very nice little workmates, ideal for the built-in artist. Roubo must be grinding his teeth of jealousy in his vault. What’s the diameter of the handscrews ?
Only two trips to the hardware store?? You are a pro.
And you didn’t mention bleeding. I figure the job is never properly done unless I’m bleeding on the way to the hardware store.
Hi Chris
I screwed up the same way with square dogs when building my bench. After much gnashing of teeth, I routed out the entire dog strip, made a new one and dropped it in. A Learning Experience – I will not say whether it was a good one or not ….
http://www.inthewoodshop.com/ShopMadeTools/DodgedaBullet.html
Regards from Perth
Derek
I immediately thought of you when I read that. Someday I will join WoodNet, I already read it religiously, as well as this blog….
Me too. I remember reading about your little adventure on WoodNet
I’m the dumb one in the group – what are the wood screws on the long side for?
Those are the vise screws for the face vise.
I knew a craftsman, an English panelbeater, who said he preferred to make three of an item.
- First: figured out the best way to make it
- Second: refined the proceedure
- Third: everything came together.
- Fourth, etc: tended toward boredom
I’ll second that. That’s often how making things works out for me, too.
Sweet!
You’re a brave man woodworking on the dining room table. Hopefully following this blog post wont get you sleeping in the workshop.
I also was wondering about that… specifically what the angle iron did to the finish. Will the “cold-blooded wankers” be delighted again?
It came to mind because I’ve put things down and when I pick them up, the words “Oh crap!” leap from my mouth after I realize what I did.
Wait, you mean if I do some woodwork in the kitchen I get to spend all night in the shop? Dang, why didn’t someone tell me this earlier!
Years ago I was told “Never second guess.”. Looks good Chris. Looking forward to the article..
I don’t want to say I delight in your screw ups, but it does give me a speck of hope to one day work at your level….:)
‘Not because they are cold-blooded wankers, but because they like to know that all woodworkers screw up at times.’ That and, you do a good job following up on the mistakes so it’s nice learning experience.
Hi Chris, define the word wanker for me in American terms, then look up the British meaning,
After that I`m sure they were all warm blooded!
You could go ask the people in Wankers Corner Oregon, just outside of Portland. I never went there, but I knew a lot of their kind when I lived in Portland.
Hi Chris, please define the word wanker in American terms, then look up the British meaning, I bet they were all warm blooded after that!
Ah, yes – innovation. A string of failures punctuated by the occasional (sometimes accidental) success. You need Persistence to be an innovator, or even to do things you’ve not done before.
Looks like you’ve Persisted to good effect. It would be interesting to hear well how the portable bench works in practice.
Chris,
Speaking of screwing up – you made reference a few weeks ago to spending a year or something like that with your former teacher learning ways to cover up “mistakes” in dovetails. I am interested in technicques for fixing problems commonly found in woodworking – gaps in dovetails, poorly fitting mortise and tenon, carcase’s out of square, saw something about how workers at Nakashima Studio cut 3/4 kerfs in underside through a cupped board and secure it flat with a couple cleats to salvage as much wood as possible when flattening, dealing with worm holes and bug holes etc. Is there a book or resource for how to address common woodworking problems?
Thanks.
Josh
You must not have as many engineers reading this blog as you think. No one has mentioned that you are working on the wrong side of a trestle table. You are asking for trouble. Work on the end – in the center. It is the strongest point and can take more downward and side pressures.
Engineers can disagree. Chris’s materials, dimensions and joinery on this table look pretty rock solid. I would agree that on the table end over the leg is the strongest point for vertical loading, but that will only really matter if he decides to, say, rebuild a V8 engine or something in the dining room. I’d think that the table would be most stable for an operation like planing parallel with the long axis of the table. Take a look at the depth of the stretcher and the wedged through tenons in the previous post. Solid.
I’m worried that the holes for the moxon-ish vise look kind of large and that the screws might have enough torque for an inexperienced user to split the front rail apart.
Clearly we need some destructive testing on this point. You can always rebuild the table right?
could this be attached to either a sawbench or Ron Herman’s bench? Or would that put the benchtop too low.
I hate to be the bearer of bad news. But I built a small bench to put on my bench years ago. My dogs were similar to yours. I have had nothing but problems with breaking the tab part off the front. mine were 3/8″ from top to bottom, and jutted out 3/16. I tried all different configurations of putting them together. but the tabs always broke off, I must have made 50 in the last 10 years. And that under light use.
I think the tabs on yours will do the same
I’m fleshing out a new design for a new bench on bench and am making sure the tabs will be 3/4″ tall and 1/8 thick like many of the commercial ones I have seen.
Looks like a joseph maxon piece of work to me
Hi
does this article will be released in the next popular woodworking issu ?
Alex (from Paris)
Yes. I believe it will be in the June 2013 issue.
thanks for reply,
how do you fix workbench on the table ?
Nice bench. Speaking of blunders, the only serious injury here in +30 years was boring dog holes in my 2″ maple bench top twenty-five years ago. The vintage D-handle drill caught my hand and twisted it around, pulling a middle finger (how appropriate) out of joint. Trashed the drill, nursed my hand for weeks and cursed my stoopidness.. but the bench turned out well.