Monday, October 17, 2011

Workbench Inspiration

We can't help it.  Workbenches turn our heads, and quite a few got my attention at WIA.

Shannon Rogers brought his newly-built bench to his Hand Tool School booth.  Its height was determined by the measurement beneath the elbows of the vertically enhanced Shannon, who found this to be perfect for joinery work.

Chris Wong, of Time Warp Tool Works, added a handy planing attachment to Shannon's bench during the conference.

Across the aisle was Mark Harrell who must have some timberframing expertise on his list of skills given the design and joinery of both of his mammoth, knock-down benches.

Jameel Abraham brought two benches as well.  One was a sawbuck joinery bench that enabled conference-goers to take a spin with his smooth-as-silk Benchcrafted vises.  He told me that my sawbuck table inspired him. Cool.

Kevin Glen Drake brought an as efficient as it was handsome benchtop bench with leather-lined face vise.

Ron Brese's Shaker Workbench which he built with Jameel Abraham is a real beauty. He debuted it at last year's conference. Looks like he was able to remove the drool marks fairly well.

At the Hand Tool Olympics' booth, Mike Siemsen had made some quick and effective workholding devices for the handcut dovetail challenge.

Not at the conference but showcased at a Lie-Nielsen hand tool event at Hearne Hardwoods last weekend was a SAPFM member's portable bench. William Duffield had come up with some clever workholding solutions for the period projects he makes.

12 comments:

Chris Adkins said...

Oh that warm feeling in my heart with workbenches in the air!

I have always been remotely satisfied with my workbench but knew the time would come to build another. Now with all that has came from WIA and the WoodWhisperer Guild building a bench next build, I think it is time for me to jump on the proverbial bandwagon!

Thanks for the pictures Kari, great stuff!

Wilbur Pan said...

The Swiss cheese bench was made by William Duffield. He's one of the guys in my woodworking club, the Central Jersey Woodworkers Association.

Tom Buhl said...

thanks for the tour, Kari

TJIC said...

I love workbench posts; keep them up!

Here's my minor contribution:

I made my bench top (out of softwood :-( ) last fall, and now I've got it up on sawhorses and am building the base.

Picture of mortise and tenon base under construction:

https://twitter.com/#!/tjic/status/125667316116619264/photo/1

Torch02 said...

If only there was video of you using Kevin Glen Drake's bench from last year's event...

RONW said...

Amazing!

RONW said...

Btw, here's my work bench here and here. Ain't they so pretty.

Kari Hultman said...

Chris, workbench-building has reached a fever pitch in the ww community it seems. :o)

Thanks, Wilbur. He's planning to bring his bench to the next SAPFM meeting next month. It's avery clever design.

Tom, you're welcome!

TJIC, your bench is looking great! Those are nice tools that you made, as well.

Steven, indeed. But a video like that simply does not exist. Shame.

RonW, I suspect your workbench will look an awful lot like a house when it's all done. ; )

Shannon said...

I had a great time talking with William at the LN event last week. His bench was inspired by Steve Latta's design (you can see if in the inlay videos by LN)but I like the Swiss cheese effect he added. Also not a planing stop on the saw bench I was just showing someone how to bore a hole. Not a bad idea however!

RONW said...

"RonW, I suspect your workbench will look an awful lot like a house when it's all done. ; )"

At the risk of getting off topic .... before and after.

before and after.

Kari Hultman said...

Ah, gotcha. Thanks for clarifying!

Oliver said...

Work benches are to carpenters what garages are to mechanics - facinating! I don't think I have ever seen a compilation of work benches. I think your post shows that we really need a website dedicated to the appreciation of work benches!