Building Workbenches - Live Q & A (8 December 2023)

two one and go you are live hi folks Welcome to our Friday Night Live Frick's busy tomorrow night so we had to bump this one up tonight's topic is workbenches answer your questions best I can some have already come in did we get a bunch uh we got a few yeah right so I'll I will do the introductions as we get a little bit deeper into it so you go ahead and throw one at me right now if you want sure this one comes from Jeff in Woodbury Connecticut hi Jeff he says I know bench height varies by the person but when building a new bench should I go with the height that works okay for both PL planing and dovetailing or go with the best height for planing and go with the Mox and vice style for dovetailing well Jeff the first question I'd ask you is how old are you and if you have any underlying conditions like a bad back or bad legs if you're uh in your 40s and you're physically fit uh what would I do I would probably go with a higher bench so mine is 36 and 38 of an inch I'm 5' 7 and 5'8 with these shoes on I think so this is relatively high but it's really nice cuz it's a it's a really good sawing height and I would probably choose sawing over hand planing when it comes to uh how I design my bench so when I'm sawing at this height my arm and the saw are pretty much level which is ideal so you got a couple of options you can always actually we are about to start selling these in fact I think uh they'll go be released next week you can build a bench that's lower which makes it easier for hand planing because you're leaning you're over top of it and then you can use a moxen vise which simply clamps onto your bench like that and elevates what is that 4 in brings your work up an additional 4 in so so I could have dropped this bench down 4 in and used this and probably would have made it a little bit easier to hand plan but I get used to it so it's not a big deal so those are your options as far as where you know I've heard it I've heard what other people have said about uh where where it should hit your hand but I don't know if I believe that I think it's too uh I think it's there's too many factors involved to really come out and say uh what height is right for anybody what's really nice is if you get a chance to work on somebody else's bench or another bench and you get to play around with the height you can adjust it so the one that we the bench that we designed you can add blocks underneath and raise it up when I originally built this I had two I had feet that were hinged so that you could raise it up four or five inches just by flipping the feet underneath but I never did I never used it so I took it off so read me the question again so I can make sure I answered that oh oh build a bench for dovetails or hand plan hand planing so let me throw one more caveat in here so if you're if you're strong upper body build it's going to be easier to plane at a higher level if you're uh slight build you're going to want you're going to want your plane your bench at a lower level for for planing and I would think that would be the most that would be the deciding factor your physique go with that next frck uh okay this got Chris here tonight we got Mo here tonight we got Ken here tonight Jake's behind the camera eating and Frick is over there I assume Luther's on uh no no no awful quiet I'm not sure and somebody who's going to who's going to do the head count for the Vets you Ken so if you are a wounded vet that has been to our program as one of our scholarship vets any one of our 26 classes and you're on there tonight we'd love to acknowledge you give you a shout out so Ken will if you just put at Ken Ken and tell us your name and what CL what year what class you were in in the in the comment section then Ken will watch for it and collect them and we'll stop and give you a shout out next question Frick please next one comes from Todd in leale Ontario hi Todd he says my benchtop finally needs resurfacing and I've seen several how-to videos online for doing it with a router sled and two straight edges uh clamped to each side for the sled to move along this seems much easier and more accurate than trying to hand plane the entire surface do you have any experience with this uh I've always just done mine with a hand plane so a hand plan and winding sticks you could do it I mean I've seen I've seen exactly what you're talking about and maybe I'll even try that for the next one this bench needs to be this needs bench needs to be done if I put a straight edge across this section oh it's not that bad I thought it was worse I thought One Direction yeah it may be just scuffed up I thought we had an area in this bench Jake that was really really that's not it I thought there was let me just check and see what we can get in there what's this shim right here you know it's not had is six th oh so that's better than six th in fact it probably feels like it's at least 10 so it needs to be done but you know what I mean I don't ever sand it so even if I did use a router sled on it I'd still have to come in and hand plan it and if it's not that bad I would just hand plane the whole thing so I don't know depends on where your skill is if you've done enough hand planing that you can handle it it's a big job and you're going to want a long plane I'm I'm going to use a number eight when I do it it's um it's tiring because you're having to reach but it's doable i' I've surfaced I've surfaced I don't remember how many benches a lot of them so you're good at hand planing just do the hand plane if you want to try the sled I haven't done it before but I think it looks as long as you're not taking too much be uh you know very very light passes you shouldn't have to worry about tarot but I was thinking more of causing whatever you're using to hold the router to flex if you're taking too heavy of a cut try it next frck hi Mike well I wouldn't what for Micah which is plastic laminate because it's just way too slippery and there's no time that I want my bench to be slippery uh you could do it on on an assembly bench just to keep the glue off of it but I don't even think they still made that stuff that was back in My Father's Day I um I say a wood top is traditional and it's good and I like it but if you've you've seen this bench that we do and this one was made out of water resistant MDF and U I would say that the number one criteria there's several the number one criteria for your bench is that it needs to be flat because it's your reference everything you're building is Le resting on this so the flatter this is the better chance that what your building is going to come out right you want it to be stable um you don't want it to flex on you you pound it you want it to be nice and solid so it needs to be heavy and this this stuff works ideal ideally in fact I when we when we end up building this I said uh if I had have done that one first I might never have built the other one hello I guess he wanted in what was the question for M oh for Micah yeah the only the only the downside to a wood bench toop is that you're going to have to resurface it the upside to this is you don't have to resurface it's going to stay the same now we also do this we make we we make one with uh Baltic Birch so three sheets of 1in Baltic Birch and same thing it'll be nice and stable but this is yeah this is ideal next frck I'm gonna I'm gonna tell you a little bit about this bench once we go through some questions whoa close to home sorry my is from yeah uh this is from Anthony sorry my mic was on mute Anthony from Bridgewater says have you built an adjust an adjustable height workbench working on a scissor lift mechanism between the legs and top but not sure if it's worth the work your thoughts I'm sorry I was watching this table saw say that again please Frick um have you ever built an adjustable height workbench working on a scissor lift mechanism between the legs and top but not sure if it's worth the work your thoughts um I've never built one but I worked on one I was doing a wood show over in uh in England one time and they had one there but it leaked it was hydraulic lift so we would raise it up and then an hour or two later it would have sunk down we have to raise it up again yeah an awful lot of work well I told you that when I first built this bench there were two feet two additional feet and they were hinged on the outside so if you wanted to raise the bench up 4 in you just had to lift one end up and because it was a piano hinge it would just fall underneath and then you go to the other side and lift it up and it would fall underneath did we ever do it did we ever yeah when you're bu yeah I I I'm I know for 10 years afterwards I wouldn't have used it three times so you get used to the height and yeah now I might I I might look at that a little bit differently if I was 75 70 but right now I I I don't I've never I I don't can't recall ever coming in saying oh shoot I wish this was two inches lower or three inches taller but just Happ yeah it's not as noticeable you wake up one morning but if you got a back issues or leg issues or age issues everybody gets those or later as moose said you may want to consider it but you know what it's a lot of it's a lot of expense and a lot of frigging around I would think for something that you're probably not going to use a whole lot to each his own on that one next frck this one comes from Chris and Savannah Georgia hey Chris I keep looking at this stand and the camera's over here I am getting ready to build a workbench and have some eight sl4 white oak that is 7 inch wide I am thinking that's called Eight quarter okay well 8 quarter didn't make sense to me but anyway I am thinking about just pling it flat and gluing three 7inch pieces together for the top but never see anyone use wide boards like this is there a reason for this should I rip it into smaller pieces and glue it up so the top is Edge grain so my very first bench that is now Jake's desk was made up of a wide plank that was uh 2 and a/4 in thick and and it was Notorious for going out of flat and I had to resurface that multiple times over the course of I built it in 1989 and I didn't replace it until [Music] 2012 so yeah it was notor it would it wouldn't stay flat this one I took 104 Lumber and I cut it into three three in 3in pieces and I glue it edge to edge to Ed face to face to face so I am working on as you would say Edge grain so um I've had this now for 10 years compared to the other one and I haven't had to resurface it needs to be resurfaced but I've gotten 10 years out of it so I would probably say yes RIP it into pieces and glue it face to face that would make more sense I think you're going to I I think you'd have a more stable product but I'd also make sure that your moisture contents right so make sure that that material is in equilibrium with where you're going to have it meaning in your shop so and and I'll just throw another little thing too when you start ripping that big thick stuff like that up don't expect it to stay it'll twist and if you need 10 pieces to build the core of your bench you better make sure you process 14 and then let them sit for a while and a while means a couple of months and then get rid of the ones that really twisted bad because they're not done twisting good question by the way next frck they get you between bites y uh Fred Robbins in yamill Oregon hey Fred we yamill I know where yamill is yep what is the m what is the manufacturer of the water resistant MDF and where is it available okay Ken name a few you don't have that one on you give him the microphone so he can say I don't know I'll have to check well wait there's more than one right yeah I'm pretty sure that everybody that makes MDF makes that variety as well and I'm going to just check with these guys did I not read somewhere that it was three times stronger than regular MDF some somebody somebody told me that I don't think it was a little bird I remember whoever I talked to about it that it was substantially stronger than regular MDF I know it was Mel um the color not always different we've well we've had two different brands had that color and right so I actually like this because you can't tell the other one from regular MDF so there's at least two different brands out there and I think as I mentioned everybody that makes MDF makes the water resistant and now that we've used it for what a year is there any difference between that and regular MDF you meaning up yeah just using it as a product you would not be able to tell if okay so I don't know why they don't switch all MDF to this stuff because there's no downside is there any downside Jake more expensive much I thought it was back down to the normal price or well regular so the water resistant you you need to talk into your mic you and I are having this conversation the water resistant is still more expensive than the regular Yeah by give me a guess 20% well I would pay to I would pay the 20% to to not have what happened so all this all of our stuff in here is MDF so the baseboard over there that leaked and the water ran down the wall onto the baseboard which is completely ruined now because it was regular MDF had that been this stuff it would have dried out and You' never known there was anything wrong Jake and I did a video it does it does still swell yeah Jake and I did a video well so so would would how long ago we do the video two months three three months maybe four months we took two different brands of water resistant MDF and regular MDF we soaked it in water for a day or two and then let it dry out for a long time maybe a couple three weeks and one brand went right back to normal the other brand 90% back to normal 90% And the regular MDF was just full of it was just destroyed you wouldn't be able to use it so we'll we'll try to find you we will try to find you the brand can you do that while we're here Ken find the brand can you find the brand the brands that we know okay we'll give that to you and it's available in in uh what sizes have we bought it in only 4 by sheet well no thickness oh inch and 1 in and 3/4 inch do you know if it's available in half inch or yeah I believe it is yeah so I'm pretty sure you can get it in the range that you can get in regular MDF next next one comes from T Tim Beach he Tim who is retired US Air Force thank you sir Cedar Park Texas he says I recently purchased your Baltic Birch bench and I love it yay I'm new to using hand tools over power tools hold on a second do you remember send the bench to him yeah we had to modify it oh he's the guy that did the did the did the uh rap with Walnut or something yeah he says my question is a picture which would be better uh Vice for a face Vice the moxen vice or a scherg vice which would be better for a well the Mox and vice really can only be used for the one thing which is dovetailing or joinery because it's sitting up here whereas the schirg vice if you put a Shir Vice over there it's much more functional Vice the Mox and vice has the advantage of being able to uh clamp to some place when are we going to have those ready for sell Kim they're ready now are they like possibly next week they'll go up so you're going to be able to buy from a if you don't want to make your own one like this it's all ready to go you just clamp it on so you put a clamp on either side to hold it in place now the big advantage of this is that you can open this up put your board down in here and now you've got clamping pressure over the entire WID of the board and it's only limited by the space in between your rods if you come over and use the sherg and you you could modify this if you wanted if you had a bigger bench but the nice thing about it is the sherg the cherg tends not to Rack but if you tighten it too much you will force it to you can always if you had to is put a spacer in here that's the same width but that's well held and that board is 8 in [Music] wide 8 in wide and I'm grabbing 5 and 3/4 in so that I wouldn't consider that to be an issue so what would I do if I I would have I'd have both we you when we originally designed this we had a face Vice on here but the the face Vice added the cost of an extra Vie which was substantial and we realized well if you're only using this for dovetailing you can dub tail down here and use it for a tail Vie but it would be nice to have the second vise there so I would go with an extra moxin and I would go with the extra sherg up here but you also have to cut into your stretchers in order to allow for that to go up up in because it goes all the way back to about here but I wouldn't hesitate to get a Mox and vice too just for the occasion when you need it but you're going to get more use out of the showbird mounted on the face next uh John root in green buyer Arkansas John in in Arkansas yeah hi John he says a wheelchair is in my near future probably within a year what changes would you make to your design to accommodate this I definitely won't be able to have an enice I recall seeing a bench the bench Brigade built and delivered I have not been able to get my hands on the design well we can certainly help you with that because I know he would the fell the retired architect that designed it would be more than willing to share it with you um I'm going to suggest that that's going to be something that you're going to have to uh you are going to have to wait until you're in your chair to realiz to find figure out what you're able to do um I can throw some ideas at you I would probably have it so it was a U-shaped meaning I could move my chair into here and I could actually brace myself against if you can imagine cutting into the into the bench like that so you could get in here and you could have your back against this part of the bench when you're planing to give yourself some support but really you're going to have to determine what your limitations are but if you if you contact who I don't know who built it h no no who's which one of us is going to contact get them the plans the the bench that they built for uh um well you have to contact Jack oh that's good you get a hold of Jack lane lane at how can you reach Jack um I think it's on the PHP uh website microphone Jack's uh he can contact him through the the PHP website where he's in the chat here tonight if he wants to contact him in there hey Jack if you're in there and you can help out would you communicate with this fellow and see if you can get what's the name of the fellow that that built that bench I hate forgetting those names because he built several benches he built the bench for Josh Bon and he built the bench for Austin Reese who was the uh wounded EOD up in up in Montana so I'm going to leave it to you guys to connect on the on the chat I'm sure Jack will do it if he's on there next Rick next one's from Michael Evans in pal Tennessee and Michael would a moxin style Vice being acceptable o alternative to a tail Vie no no uh your tail Vie is designed to hold your piece that you're planting so if I'm planing this piece of Walnut I've got a bench dog in here and I've got a bench dog in here and that has to be sitting below or at or below this surface to squeeze this and place and hold it your moxen viice is sitting up on top so function of a tail VI that's the primary function of a tail Vie and that would not have moxin visce wouldn't help you that way next frck uh Todd Linus in the chat hi Todd can you mount the Mox and vice Hardware into the side of the bench basically turning it into a face Vice yeah I don't see why not certainly you could just like we did right here frck Jake can you can you show them this yeah we put this on here just because you remember the name of the guy whose idea this was I hate not giving credit so some one of somebody I apologize for forgetting his name had this idea he needed a bench he needed a vice he didn't have a bench his taable stop was the heaviest piece of equipment that he had so he built it on the end and uh this is just really cool just a great idea we've never used it but we leave it on here anyway just as a conversation piece but yes you could do that you could do that right into the side of your bench if I did that I would probably make it so that actually you know what you could do that you wouldn't even have to have the inside jaw you would just use that so you'd have to bore into here so I would I would bore into this if you're using MDF and then bore hole up from the bottom not all the way through obviously so you could capture a nut on the inside so you can lock that in place you do it the same way as we did this if you just imagine if you imagine that this is the edge of your bench instead of it being a piece of maple so you've got a hole in case you don't know Ken I know I don't need to get in case you don't know we sell a moxin kit that we've modified Willie the Wonderman takes them and adds this knob on there which which is what a convenience when it comes to using it Jake's idea was to add these Springs and we have these uh brass bushings oil oil impregnated brass bushings the Springs are really nice because it doesn't require a third hand to pull this back oh David Baron's idea okay you you had the brass bushing that was Luther that was Luther did you do anything Luther forgot the live was tonight that says a whole lot so you would you would bore a hole this diameter right into your the side of your MDF bench down in here probably 3 inches in you would bore another hole a larger diameter hole up into so that you could access the back end of this to put a nut on just like we have in here can you see up in there so in order to get out this you'd have to have another hole coming up through but that's doable and then uh you have another nut on the outside here now what we did to to uh we have a larger diameter hole that will capture that nut so it allows you to bring your jaws up tight so yes you could do that it's a good idea probably an option we could even just start offering what yeah yeah that's right too although it doesn't pull the same way it's not on a track so I think Chris was making reference to that question we had a few minutes ago about could you use a moxin vise for your tail Vie so this doesn't really stay put like uh it doesn't move uniformly like a uh a uh sherg visce does you have to operate both of these when you're trying to hold something else over there so might I still say it's not the ideal tail Vie but that was a really good idea to mount it on here you going do all right there Jake yeah right there next frck next one comes from Mark in the chat he's from London Mark in London says hi Rob I love your Channel please how stable would a laminated Oak workbench top be how stable would a laminated Oak worktop be well I'm I'm I'm I'm assuming that you're meaning they're going to be lamin laminated face to face so of course the first thing you're going to ask is is the Oak dry and uh dry is only a um an approximate description because it has to be in equilibrium with the environment and the more you control your environment the better your luck is going to be so old homes England where homes breathe um a high pressure system comes in and everything dries out a low pressure system comes in and everything absorbs moisture and that's where you get those really wild fluctuations today it's pretty easy to control the uh inside environment so that there's a very small change when the weather changes inside so as long as your wood has reached equilibrium with the surrounding atmosphere meaning if I were to take that piece of wood if I wanted the absolute best way of determining how stable it is Jake you took that scale away I took one I had that scale here you took it the nice one yes no it's sitting over there oh right so I would weigh this you and they're not that expensive are they 20 bucks $20 for that scale maybe oh that's even better soon as Jake comes over here I'm going to show you what to do take a sample piece of the wood that you're going to use and in the shop where it's going to be parked you're going to take a piece of a piece of that Oak and you're going to weigh it thank you and this scale wh weighs quite uh accurately you put it on there and you record the weight and tomorrow you record the weight and you do it every day for a month as long as it's changing when it starts to gain a little lose a little gain a little lose a little then you've reached equilibrium and that point you can you're you can bet your bottom dollar that you uh aren't going to have an issue and other than that as far as Oak goes I don't think I don't think I don't think you're going to have much of a difference among the species of popular domestic woods so yeah go ahead and do it next Rick this one comes from Ivan in the chat hi Ivan he saysi love your bench in fact looking to build one just like it which I I wish they would tell me which bench they're talking about probably the one behind you yeah um except maybe a bit longer one question I have is how come you don't have any drawers or cabinets and you just have open space underneath well is he on right now or is this this yeah no this is in the chat okay so let me uh let me introduce you to both I don't over here because uh I have everything I need right here so there's lots of doors and drawers um I often will clamp to this so I didn't want anything in the way I want to be able to come in there and clamp from up the top of the whatever it is I'm clamping to the underside of the bench if you don't have the luxury of having the room or the wherewithal to build a nice tool cabinet that someday we get finished then you can do this so we just shot a YouTube today that'll go up sometime in the next week on building this door drawer configuration so this bench looks like this bench over here see all open underneath except for a little spot for your bench hook or shooting board so we decided to fill it so if you look real closely there is a carcass made out of um 3/4 jig 5/8 58 five Baltic Birch so I'm going to just go with the outside so here's the frame it goes across the top down the side across the bottom and up here then there's a divider here and here so splits it into three equal spaced uh openings and then we have dividers horizontal dividers one two three of them that go all the way front to back and that's what the drawers run on the middle section has doors now we wanted it so we could access it from both sides so you can come over here and you can do the same thing you can open up that drawer you can open up this door now what I did is I put a magnet right there really powerful magnet close to the surface but definitely not out Beyond and I put another magnet right in the middle down in there so when you close your drawer the magnets and make sure when you put it in you don't get opposite uh two Norths or two South Poles but it holds it in place I haven't put the magnet in this one yet that's why it's still in fact I haven't fit the drawer either so this is this is a nice addition to the bench if you're looking for space to store stuff so the reason why I don't have it on this one is because I didn't need it the reason why I headed on this one is because it look like a fun thing to do will I actually use them probably not I'll find stuff in there a year from now say well that's where that went place for everything and everything in its place and I don't know where it is so this has eight drawers and two doors um everything is made out of Pine and Douglas fur the only thing different about doing this is when you typically build a drawer your back is your template and you get your template to fit the opening perfectly you can change it if you have to if you make a mistake but when we did this one we didn't have that luxury because we have essentially two drawer fronts and no drawer back but it was fun to do in fact all of that is uh on uh in our we did we built this in the online Workshop next frck I'm watching the time just because we have a we have a very special guest coming on tonight at 8:00 and at the top of the hour which be 7 Eastern and it's a very uh you'll you'll enjoy it very good cause next uh this is from I like sitting here Kyle Rogers he Kyle says hi Rob Kyle from Australia thanks for your call the other day how should I attach a hard hardwood Edge band on the Cosman workbench that accounts for movement I don't have access to torrified Timber well uh the Top's only 3 in and I'll go back to what I said if you control you know what's the cost to go out and buy a a dehumidifier or uh an air conditioning unit a little portable air conditioning unit doesn't it's not that very not that expensive but so that it doesn't wreak havoc on what you're building I would do it the the closer you can control or the tighter you can control the humidity in your shop a lot of the stuff becomes a non-issue at least for wids of only 3 in um we did that one is that out there in the shop the one that we banded do we still have it yeah oh we yeah too we Ed the TFI so it doesn't move I I don't think I really don't think you'd have a problem and if you want to be safe I would glue just the top I would glue the top inch did we put a spline in that how do we how did we hold that in place I don't think we did you could put a spline maybe a half an inch down from the top all the way around or just glue the top inch so that any movement and then dry fit the rest any movement is going to drop down it's not going to drop come up you don't want it coming up because then it's going to be in your way when you're planing but as long as it's secure just on the top and allowed to go down if it wants to expand a little bit but I really don't think you're going to have that much of an issue on 3in wide piece if it's dry next frck uh next one comes from Robert Proctor hey Bob he says uh guys I can't get Baltic Birch can you can I get a suggestion for a different material to replace it y there's a company in Oregon that makes Apple ply which I don't know how expensive it is but it's the same thing it's made out of the same all the layers of the same species of wood so it's a higher quality you just want to stay away from the St stuff you buy at The Big Box store that they I swear they use a weed on the inside and then they give you a veneer of the hardwood on the outside that is so thin they have to color the bottom substrate so it doesn't Telegraph through so I the very first one we built we used what do we use what plywood just I think it was just fur plywood good one side and it just looks crappy it's full of voids and it just not very nice so try Apple ply if you can't get Baltic Birch and I don't have any other suggestion for you than that but Baltic Birch we I me we went for a year or two when it was almost impossible to get but can no problem with Supply now Ken says no problem so you might have to just look around a little bit try going to cabinet shops and they'll they most likely would sell you some and if somebody's going to have it they're going to have it because if you're going to use plywood building Furniture it's the only thing to use I think next brick uh excuse me next one comes from uh Peter Perry he Peter he's in the chat he says hey thinking about making a bench with a shoulder Vie I've seen benches with the grain in the same direction do you have any thoughts on this kind of construction so you're talking about a shoulder Vice like I have I assume okay okay now that say that again please it uh thinking about making a bench with a shoulder Vie I've seen benches with the grain in the same direction do you have any thoughts on this kind of construction he says I meant the shoulder Vie is also in the same direction h well if you uh built your shoulder Vie so my grain from here is all running this way the arm is running this way the grain right here is running this way when you when you clamp down on this and people do it even though they don't need to you don't need a ton of pressure you just need enough to hold it so that it doesn't vibrate or move when you're working on it but you can apply quite a bit of Leverage here and you can force this joint apart I have a bolt that goes all the way through to about here to help hold that in place if the grain was running this way you're all you're going to deal with more expansion um if it's going to split it would be easier to split well the big issue the big issue that arm if that arm oh no sorry never mind it would be going the right way I think the the primary reason they did it is just to control expansion between here and here I built this bench so that everything everything from here to here doesn't move this is all dry fit from here over this is there's three splines in there this this bolt is sitting in a larger diameter hole and it allows the entire bench to move this way or to come this way and if you've never seen seen this this is pretty cool so I have first bench I had you just had to make a tool tray the ramps in your tool tray couldn't go all the way to one side to the other because that would impede the expansion so this Gap right here from season to season is different so what I did I cut a groove on the end of this piece of mahogany down in here put it slipped in a little piece took some that's why I don't have any Springs in any of my pens drilled holes and put in some um Springs out of ballpoint pens so that this is always under tension it's always maintaining the Gap but at sometimes you'll see a little more of it and sometimes you see a little bit less but it always keeps it nice nice and tight that's in my uh that's in the online Workshop in detail but I think I would stay with the grain running this way for stability purpose purposes next Frick uh next one comes from Dave McKibbon in Minnesota hey Dave if one does not have a vacuum system to glue large sheets of MDF tabletop are calls the best option or is there a better option uh read that for me again please if you don't have a vacuum system to glue large sheets of MDF our Call's the best option or is there a better option well uh in our video we show you how Luther came up with this idea and it involved using large diameter washers and screws because um it it you can imagine how many clamps it would take so we took this all into account when I design I took this into account when I designed this so if you're I envisioned somebody that's new to this trying to build a bench with minimal tools so how are they going to put this together and how are they going to get this top flat so the way we build the base it's pretty easy to build the assemble the base and have your stretchers flush at the top of the leg on all four corners now you can also check that with winding sticks this is going to be this is going to take a minute to explain but so you take your winding sticks thank you Jesse and if you can imagine the Top's not on I would set one winding stick on the top end of the base and the other one on the top end of this base and I would sight down those winding sticks and I would determine whether or not the top edges of the base are parallel and if you don't know what winding sticks are you have these little white inlays on this side so as you sight down the top Edge edge of this and compared to top edge of this if you see more white on one side than the other then you know there's wind or twist that has to be dealt with now as long as your stretcher the piece that runs horizonally is flush where it meets the upright here and there and there and there and if you still have wind or twist well all you have to do is just wedge whatever side is low and get it sitting right then what you're going to do is you're going to take your first piece of your first piece of MDF which is going to be your top and you're going to lay it down face down on your uh on your frame on your base and you're going to have the same amount hanging over both ends so that you have most of this covered and then you're going to spread your glue and your you're you're going to put the second piece on and you're going to use these washers with screws every 3 in now what I neglected to say is we went in and we pre-drilled into the second piece not the premium piece that's on the bottom that will eventually be the top but you're going to pre-drill you glue it all up and then you come in with your screw gun and a friend and the Big Wide washer so that it won't sink down into the MDF and you carefully use those screws to pull to apply your pressure to bring those two together once the glue's dry you take those screws out and you clean the top off clean that off and then you do the same thing with your third piece which is going to ultimately be your bottom now you will see the holes but it's going to be in the underside so who cares and then you screw that down take the screws out when it's dry and Bob's your uncle or for your father and everything is good if you don't want to do that then you have to have quite a few calls and quite a few clamps clamps are probably one of the biggest expenses in the shop when you actually I don't ever want to know how much I have sitting over there because I know it's a fortune and what you see on that clamp rack is mirrored on the other side takes a long time to accumulate and when you buy clamps if you buy junk clamps you will curse them every time you use them you have to buy good clamps they'll fail the bad ones will fail when you least can afford to have them fail so the clamping system with the screws is the best way of doing that how did we do it originally with big calls calls and clamps yeah like like uh right yeah in order to get pressure in the middle and you got your Call's running here you have to put a little bit of a radius actually the easiest way was just to leave just put a little strip of wood down the middle so that and when you clamp it here and clamp it there before the Call Comes tight to this it's squeezing that little piece of strip of wood in the middle applying pressure in the middle that's easier than trying to calculate how much of a radius do you need to have on your call in order for it to apply sufficient pressure in the middle and pull down tight and apply pressure to the outside edges complicated answer a good one good question next frck oh here stop just one second FR who anyone to say hi to oh let's have them so we oh it's hard on my memory now some of these people don't say if their vets or not that they if they're in the PHP class and I don't know some of some of the names I don't know help me um Michael delvo Michael is vet August 22 Kevin burus I know he is a vet who's Kevin who's Kevin oh Kevin the Creator I got so Kevin's I got Kevin to make me up a new plock and Jake tells me that's a Seinfeld thing so we were having a meeting this morning and Jeff said uh remember second place means you're the first loser so I got Kevin to put that he's going to do that on a platform on a big slab of uh of slate it's going to say remember second place means you're the first loser he stole that from Jerry yeah Sid boron's on Sid bordon seems to me I signed a paycheck with his name on it you do how he said well actually yeah kind of a paycheck yeah well the one up re Sid works with Chris uh Eric St Phil s got 32 years 32 years Canadian Army Engineers next Eric St Phillips did you hear April August 22 Tim Pierce September 22 Tim Ralph Sutton August 22 big Ralph Ralph Omar who was just here in October Omar oh we gotta hold on a second we have to show off Omar I was just bragging about Omar the other day so Omar was an AM Miracle Omar is a uh Navy Marine EOD sorry Omar those are fighting words aren't they no they're pretty much the same Omar was a a marine EOD stands for explosive ordinance disposal so these guys would be the ones that would diffuse bombs and he told me he said first they would plant one IED and then we'd get good at finding them so then they would plant a second one to try to take out the First Responders and then they would started planting a third one and they would often hide the batter the power source cuz that wouldn't get picked up well the third one got Omar took off his leg from the knee down stripped all the meat off of this leg so he has a special brace to keep his foot from dropping uh this hand to the he had the wand you know the wand I guess they call it and when it blew up it took all of this took that finger off and a big chunk of his palm so he's got some graphs in there to hold that together was that the hand that had the fingertips all blown off too I don't think so no I don't and then on this side the blast took all the meat off of his wrist off his forearm and his elbow they made him a new elbow and they took some muscle from his back correct me if I'm wrong Omar and they uh they repaired what they could there but these two fingers were dead they they were there but they didn't move so imagine learning to cut Dove Tails like that well there's his dub tail I kept going down to help him and he' said no no no I want to try I can do it I can do it and uh when he when he he assembled that and pled it up I was I was wow so he was nice he came to me last he goes Rob if you'd like you can have that so I proudly display that Omar okay next um where Omar Cory Miller October 23 Cory just got his dog just got his service dog it's a uh is it I think it's a collie I might be wrong but look like Setter anyway he's happy uh Brent Nelson September 23 Brent I can't take too much time but there's Brent slowest slowest dovetailer anywhere he said the West no anywhere but it was incredible when it f when he finally got it together and played it up I couldn't believe my eyes absolutely remarkable so Brent you you ret you retain the title of slowest and the best that's a feather in your cap maybe even two Danny Bell he's on Danny Bell saw a picture the other day of a shinook dropping troops off on the side of a hill so they had one end of it was parked the other head was hovering out over there and I thought well there's Danny bill you had to send him that picture he's probably done that Danny Danny was uh 160th nightstalkers flew shinook helicopters also used to spin on the ground and do uh break dancing he's got a natural he's got a bald spot that isn't really natural right up here on the top where he wore the hair he doesn't grow any here in that one little spot I'm telling all your secrets down John say hello to the family girls John Brown JB JB JB's up in frederickton JB was on another one of our Canadian vets um and got his bench built by the Kodiak Woodworkers club and I hope there scratches on it Kevin SME oh Kev I haven't talked to Kevin a long time Kev that's kev's flag right there and uh Kevin's a great guy took that that flag flew in a lot of places so we chose that one when we when we built a flag case for it I'm going to show it to you just in case you haven't seen it so a lot of people had ask well how can you dovetail a flag case because you only have one 90° Corner these ones or whatever angle they were so too steep to cut a dovetail in so what we decided to do we did dovil up there by the way this is out of Ash so then we'd put a long a long miter down here and then I took my dub tail saw and I made slots cuts through took some ebony veneer put it in there glued it in place and then Fluss it off so at least it gives you the outline of a dovetail and a boy Kev okay Mark Smith is on h mark I just got a I just got a I just read a PHP application from friend of Mark's and Mark Mark built our Mark worked here for how long Jake Mark Mark's another Canadian is Mark retired now he is he just retired Mark just retired Al mcneel's on anyway Mark built Mark built a lot of the infrastructure for us Al mcneel yeah and Kyle stay in the tank Kyle's on Kyle yeah oh yeah so Al Al is the owner of this 105 mm discardable Sabo anti- armor piercing round first one he ever fired and Kyle is our uh Kyle is our is our main man in New Finland Kyle comes over and helps with PHP a lot now who wants to who's best introduced this are we going to have them ince say JB can JB's on yeah anybody else can no that's it no okay so I was contacted uh a month or so ago by a fellow who is doing a really nice thing for a really nice guy and the individual we're talking about I'm going to let them introduce him but he too is a uh combat wounded vet and uh he's run into a very tough situation fellow toolmaker makes s so let's just are you ready uh y almost okay where's that microphone so I I really want you to pay attention to this there's an opportunity for you to help but there's also an opportunity for you to win a really nice tool cabinet full of tools that have been donated we'll hear the whole story you tell me when you're going to turn over so I can come over there yeah come on over okay FR where do you want this camera then where are you switching it's it's fine all right Cory are you there I'm here gentl thanks for having me out hi Cory which uh which microphone is this Jake where you top was it uh input okay just give me a mic check there Corey yep can you hear me now perfect great go ahead give have some of oh no yeah I'm going to give him the floor go ahead Cory tell us the story yeah sounds good just want to thank you guys so much for having us on and uh kind of letting us tell the story about our friend who's going through a pretty tough time right now um so many you know so many things in my life I can attribute to my buddy Eric florp um Eric is a a retired Marine um he was a sergeant in the third lad Battalion uh spent some time at the embassy in Qatar and then also uh did a tour in Afghanistan um Eric had a rough time you know in the service they came under attack multiple times um you know he grew up in a small town in northern Michigan where uh there wasn't too much to do except for you know have small town fun and um you know he decided to enter the military uh after you know just trying out a few different jobs in northern Michigan and it wasn't fulfilling him so he uh kind of wanted to do something different and the Marines um are where he found kind of a home and a um just a great group of brothers and sisters that he you know still keeps in touch with to this day um so Eric uh here about a year and a half ago um started having a pretty bad headache and um for a few weeks you know it just got too bad he could not open his eyes um thought it was Lyme disease and went into the doctor couple days later after testing uh found kind of the worst thing possible um and a a large brain tumor and it was grade for grade four Glo blastoma you know that that day that that they will live on in our in our um Minds forever just couldn't believe it still can't believe it um you know in talking with the doctors it's um likely that it was burn pits in Afghanistan um that were the cause of it and uh the the Outreach and everything that we've had from the VA from um you know our congressman is a a veteran as well has been you know very great wish we weren't having to go through it but the support has been um amazing so just want to all the Vets on thank you so much for your service we really appreciate it um so where uh you know Eric Flor comes into the uh tool making world world is um they were station at Pendleton over in California and he you know wanted to get his hands busy so here about 10 11 years ago um his wife Temple uh requested that a bookshelf be made and request that Eric make it so Eric got to got to work making a bookshelf um didn't really have many tools um and knew that he needed a handsaw uh Eric could not believe the price of some premium hand saws that were out there um and there are and there's some beautiful saws but at that point uh he he went with something um that he found in a thrift shop and what he did is he took that saw apart rebuilt it and made it very useful in doing that he found a love for making saws um so that was his first saw that he kind of redid and I'm sure by now he's made over a thousand saws um Eric started by refurbishing a few saws and then he started by making the handle and then he started by um making his own screws making his own back folding his back um flattening his own steel cutting his own teeth Eric did 100% of the um Machining for all of his saws um his saws were in Woodcraft his saws were in Garrett Wade um he was you know making you know over 50 saws a week in his shop back here in northern Michigan um you know I'd always go out to his shop stop by see what was going on so things such as if his daughter Ella was out there I think she's 11 now you know they were testing the durability of a Barbie or another toy against a you know 50 ton press or seeing how it would Faire in the CNC machine um so Eric immediately fell in love with Machining his daughter was there every step of the way with them and you know his Instagram there's still a lot of really sweet videos of them doing projects together out there um you know his Marine Ingenuity and problem solving and just his um overall uh just desire to keep going keep making things better um allowed him to not only make a saw but figure out creative ways to a saw 100% in his shop and sell it for roughly $100 that was his goal was a $100 saw that that uh was just as good as you know a $300 Handa or dovet tail saw and he he definitely succeeded in that um so yeah Eric Eric uh they're living in Traver City um he's the the cancer is definitely taking its to you know we're at about a year and a half and um Eric just entered in home hospice care as of uh you know a few a few weeks ago so really tough to see um his sense of humor is is there for sure he keeps you know just the other day I was over there and I'm I'm a wood turner and he keeps telling me that I need to go CNC on my lathe so he's still giving me grief for that um just to get more production work in but you know love the guy um love what folks have done to put together this tool chest that uh Charles is going to get on and talk about um that the community behind you know that he was in and The Woodworking and the Saw making Community um you know in the in the veteran Community is absolutely humbling and you I feel very fine speaking on behalf of their family this is all incredibly appreciated you bringing him on you have they seen these pictures no they're going to uh when the next the next gu comes [Music] on anything to say to him no I'd have to let him go y Oh Oh you mean he can okay I yeah I'd have to let you go uh Cory to get um Charles yeah absolutely hey really appreciate it fellas thank you Cory yes absolutely thank you [Music] guys so this is the builder of the tool cabinet and he'll F tell you what's in there and how you can how you can get it see if we can get [Music] him second to make sure there he is there you go just one second here all right you're on all right uh Hey guys my name is Charles uh thanks for having me on um uh just wanted to show you what we're doing here uh to raise some money for Eric and his family um I built a traditional Dutch tool chest right here um and it holds every tool that you would really need for hand tool woodworking um it uh holds the planes chisels saws three back saws um everything folds up and you can store your tools very nice and two shelves down here for extra tools um and uh every single tool that you see here uh was actually donated from people in the community um I mean we're we're talking thousands of dollars worth of tools uh two years ago I made another tool chest for a charity auction and we ended up raising quite a bit of money and Eric uh this was before he got sick he actually donated a saw um to that tool chest no questions asked I never met him before never talked to him I just sent a message he just responded with what's your email or you know what's your address let me send it to you no questions asked and and um just really wanted to return the favor but uh we have an incredible tool set everything from from sharpening to every saw that you would need your bench planes some specialty um jary planes as well and uh We've we've got a huge list of people here that that uh sent tools um it's all right I'd like to give some shout outs but uh Michael Kayla Charlie McKenzie Bob Ian Robert coffee Eric Benson uh Tom Trevor Andrew Austin white Troy James Wright from wood by Wright has been amazing during this whole process um he has let us use a site um to list up this posting and I sent uh I sent Rob Cosman uh a link if he could post that in the chat or you know wherever we're going to do is tickets are only $5 uh you can buy as many as you want we're giving a price break um you know if if if you buy 25 tickets it uh it's it's it's $100 and the winner will be sent this chest um free of charge and we just really hope to kind of carry on uh Eric's Legacy thank you wonderful how heavy is it uh it's it is uh it's it's fairly heavy but uh you know obviously there's a lot of tools but some of the advantages uh it's all made out of Pine and so that that really cuts down on the weight and these these chests they're they're traditional uh really popular 17th 18th century so these were made for travel so you can easily throw this in the back seat of your car go to a woodworking class so they're they're very uh uh travel friendly and and all the proceeds are going yeah one 100% uh every single tool on here uh you know the list of people that I mentioned um they all sent that on their own dimes um I I'm going to cover the the shipping fee and uh 100% of the money is is going to go to Eric and his family awesome wonderful cause well uh thank you thank you it's great to see people stepping up and helping these these uh soldiers that have literally put it on the line for us and now they're having to pay the price so uh with what we do with the Purple Heart Project I know exactly how you feel and I know why you do it sobody else will catch that uh even even money aside you know obviously we want to we want to send a lot of money to uh Eric and his family but uh money aside you know Eric has inspired so many people to get into Saw making and um we just really hope that this chest not only raises a lot of money but really helps kind of carry on his name for for a long time you know these these chests they're made to last a long time every tool in here whoever wins this if you take care of it I mean you know you can get hundreds of years out of this and we we just really want to carry on Eric's Legacy I'm just going to have freck scan the questions to see if there's anybody that's want has a question having a having a problem getting to the cart for the raffle Bob Proctor I posted the link it's on uh would by wrs website can you check and see if it works yeah Jake can you go in there and read and see if there's any other questions that need to be answered or just make sure that when you're adding a ticket you have to select if you want to add one ticket or 22 or 25 and uh yeah it seems to be working for me okay any other questions on there pertaining to this no no okay no they're just listening all right well Let's uh let's hope that it's hugely successful is the season yeah we uh I I post James posted up that uh uh that listing when I left work at 5:00 and by the time I got home uh it it was already up to $1,300 and and just a quick 20 minute span so we're going to be selling uh raffle entries between now and um Christmas Eve we're going to announce the winner on Christmas Eve on James Wright's uh live stream and then uh whoever is the winner will uh get in contact with you and uh we'll send you this tool chest we'll be watching thank you for what you're doing thank you for having us on I I really appreciate it happy to help all right you have a good evening you too thank you buy your tickets folks wonderful cause and in case you're wondering why there's no cman saws in there by the time they got to me the chest was full so all they asked us to do was if we would promote it and of course we be willing to promote it and we'll uh we'll make a donation as well very fitting next question can you pull it all back together yep um Dean rampy in Oregon he Dean know Dean well I have a sherg elite 2000 workbench yeah both the face Vice and N Vice both double bar with the screw in the center have a racking problem any idea how to fix this yeah if you look underneath so the scherg uh Elite Series has a the same type of Vice only bigger what you don't have one device oh well it's not the same but I think I it's it's the same idea I think it's the same idea yeah Jake Jake Dean Jake will uh Jake will bring it in I'll show you exactly what it means so in the meantime let's go on another question we'll come back to this soon as he gets back next for Dro from Santa barbar California can I can I D how's his first name Drago d r a g o Drago from where Santa Barbara Cali Santa Barbara I've been there can I build the top of my workbench with a 2x4 construction Lumber that and then laminate 3/4 hard maple on the top surface he can he or did he he's asking can I can I build the top of my workbench with a 2x4 construction Lumber and then laminate 3/4 hard maple on the top surface uh I assume you're doing that to save money so you're going to laminate well this all comes back to the same thing we talked about and that is the stability of the wood based on its moisture content so your construction Lumber is not going to be typically is not going to be as dry as your as your uh hardwood because I assume you're buying your hardwood from a hardwood dealer so if you can get them to be the same and for thickness you're going to use the 2x4 which wouldn't be a problem Square it all up I would do the same thing I would do with the hardwood cut multiple cut more cut 30% more pieces than you need let them dry on their own then Mill them I would let them I would let them sit for another week or two to see if they move take the best ones do a final Milling on them so nice and square flat glue them together and then glue your top onto it so yeah I don't think that would be a problem at all just want to make sure and the the the checking with a scale is always your best bet in terms of determining when it is actually you know you can buy the electronic moisture meters but how do you know that that is the moisture content it should be in the environment that it's in you do the weight thing and wait for it to start to fluctuate then you know you hit it okay so Dean here's what your Vie looks like underneath this is a side that gets bolted to the underside of the bench so there are two um I think it's a phenolic resin strips right here so you've got the frame you've got the strip and then you've got the tubes that make up the actual Vice right the phenolic strips allow this to run nice and smooth over here you have a phenolic strip a steel bar and if you look down there you can see a screw there and actually it's a bolt there and a bolt here and then over here you have the two bolts and there's a there is a a nut here and a nut here that's the when you use the lock so you loosen this up you tighten up that bolt and that bolt so that it removes any racking but you still want to be able to move it so you don't want it too tight but you want it tight enough there's no racking left and then once you get it where you want it hold that bolt securely with an open end wrench while you tighten this one the second nut against the nut that's hold it in place and that will lock it and hold it and that's how you adjust your visce to get rid of any racking and of course the other thing is don't overtighten this will not this won't rack unless you try to force it and if you try to force it you'll get it to pull a little bit because think about it you're putting all your pressure on this one side um you're going to cause that thing to move a little bit but you'd be surprised at how little it actually racks that's a pretty easy uh pretty easy adjustment next frck who died Mickey Jack is did you say Jack Lane is did he get that situation taken care of the guy that was looking for the plans for the wheelchair bench Jack if you if you can hear me there was a fellow earlier on that was looking he's going to be expects to be in a wheelchair within the year and he wanted to know about modifying a bench to fit and um the chap in Alberta that built the bench for Austin I'm sure he would be willing to share his plans so I asked him if he would contact you so the chap was looking for it Jack's on you two connect and uh everybody will be happy next frck uh someone in the chat named Lynx Lynx yeah says not sure it's been asked but how do you determine the proper height for your sharpening station oh sharpening station well that's a good question then no it wasn't asked um so first of all the thinking behind it is if you try sharpening assume this is my Stone If you're trying to sharpen at what I would call bench height so you're working on this and you realize you can't stay in one spot you're going to wear your stone out so to this circular motion you have to introduce this motion right so that while you're doing your little circles you're moving along the stone the problem is it's very difficult to do those two motions at the same time without rocking back and forth and turning that into a radius which you don't want to do but if you take your stone and you move it to a lower level what that allows you to do is two things number one it moves um it takes the movement away from your wrist which is right here and it allows you to move it all the way up to your shoulder well the farther away you can get from that Pivot Point the easier it is to maintain that angle up here your pivot Point's right here and you're trying to do this very difficult to maintain that angle to not do this but over here I'm able to lock my wrist lock my elbow and pivot from up here and people can successfully do it with very minimal training the other Advantage is instead of moving introducing a second motion like this while you're doing these little circles you can simply stay in this one position but just Ro uh hinge on your ankles forward and back allowing you to cover the entire surface of the stone without introducing a second motion to this okay what's the height by the way when you're thinking about this it's very uncomfortable so the faster your Stones cut the better that's why we said sell fast cutting stones for that reason uh here's here's my height there's my knee all swollen on the side because of torn meniscus ignore that so I'm I'm uh there's my my kneecap is right there so what 4 five inches above my kneecap if you consider that that's the height I'm working on that's what works for me but it may not work for you so what we do when we make this on the uh on the benches out there in in the shop for the vetss is uh can you see it on this one oh so we make it we make it adjustable so we've got a block it's like that oh like this yeah so there's a there's a block of wood on the inside it's got a bolt going all the way through and you can loosen the nut you can raise it up or lower it and lock it where you want it and that way you're not committed to anything and you can actually find what you want but those are the two criteria move your pivot point as far away as possible and be able to rock over the stone so that you don't end up uh you don't end up rounding your blade moving like this as you're trying to introduce this motion and this motion We're Men we do one thing at a time next prick please Merry Christmas everyone by the way it is a season to be jolly have hi girls Javier expence rope well no but you could twisting it um you can make you can make your own the idea that Luther had with the screws and the washers for clamping the bench toop is better than calls and clamps because you can put them you can put as many as you want on there and the big heavy heavy washer will spread the pressure area out greater so you know you can go every three inches and you're going to get as good a clamping as we get with that big fancy press that Chris built vacuum press so no I haven't used rope I suppose you could also put a piece of plastic on it and use sandbags too there a lot of things you could do next frck my mic was muted apparently there it was Danny Bell's girls that said hello Ellie and Mila yeah you oh you didn't you didn't hear you didn't they didn't they didn't hear me say whose girls you just said hi girls oh the Bell girls the Bell twins uh Jeff wants to know where you get the drain pan for the sharpening Jeff schab Jeff who schnap schnap we have them and they'll go live they'll why are they not up on yet we did the video a month ago they'll be on the site this week we have them in inventory it's a shop in product Andrew Smith says are there any drawbacks in using hickory for a bench oh it's just it's a it's not a fun wood to plane um yeah the and the other problem is that any open Porsche wood like Hickory and the Oaks Ash um not really Walnut because it's dark anyway but any wood like that is going to get really dirty as dirt and grime get down into the pores if you look at an oak floor that's not new and you'll know how black it gets because you get dirt down into those pores and you can't get it off um whereas Maple Cherry Birch very close pores wood that doesn't happen so it'll look really grungy in no time and that's almost impossible to avoid next frck and I said hickor is a pain to plane uh Joe OIC and Seattle Hey Joe he says the n pieces on work brides are usually made from material that is 12 quter or greater would you demonstrate how to cut a dovetail in 124 material please oh yeah so what he's talking about is this big shoulder so you've got to have you have to have the depth of cut that's 3 and a/4 in this one's only two and a/4 so you're going to use something other than any of my saws I I think if I did them one time I I used this as far as I could and I could I'm about 516 in away from the bottom and then I went in did I use a Handa after that because the curve is the curve is different it wouldn't matter but let's try something let's try the new super duper Cosman ripsaw and see how it works if we can get a nice clean curve um what are we going to use what do we got thick I got a piece of I got a piece of uh Maple here I don't have anything as thick as you're going to use but if it'll work on this it'll work on anything what you a do oh I'm just going to do one cut so the secret and it seems to be a secret to getting a nice straight cut is using a saw that has minimal set and most don't they've got such wide set that you end up with a really wide curve and the saw just wobbles to and fro makes a mess so we've we've cut oh I see what you mean so if we were going to try to cut a dovetail that's supposed to be a slanted T why it's not you know what we might have to do a video of duv tailing with that so the only thing critical is you need a straight cut so if you eyeball that cut that's that's nice and straight cross the end so my huh that might be out more than an eighth over six though oh well I didn't have a line crying out loud give me a break I didn't know that would fit it's 40,000 yeah unacceptable straighten it out try that first one I think that first one was your better cut anyway bang on should have quit when I was ahead so our saw Chris is the one that uh that does all of the engraving on our saws our saw has just three th set per side that means if you were to measure how far that tooth is bent to the right beyond the side of the plate it would measure 3,000 of an inch less than 3/4 the thickness 3/4 the thickness of a piece of writing paper which means when you when you get your curve going there's there's not a lot of slop so the sides of the curve touch the sides of the blade and they keep it going in that direction so it doesn't wander one way or the other now that's also has to do with sharpening but more importantly is the set so how do you cut big dovetails like that I just showed you and you can purchase the saws at RC woodworking robcosman.com so there you go no limits cut them as big as you need next frck uh Kyle Rogers from Gold Coast Australia hey Kyle he says I'm I'm about to build the Cosman workbench and was looking to install an edge band around the bench with hardwood I don't have access to torfi Timber what's your recommendations on installing a hardwood Edge band so the stop so the top stays flush with the seasonal changes isn't that the one we answered in the very beginning I don't know that was a question that we answer I don't know if it was it was almost verbatim yeah well I'll I'll I'll say it again so uh you're attaching a 3in I said 4 in it's only three which would make it even better you're put you're wanting to put a piece of 3in hardwood on the edge of the bench top and this stuff is not going to change from 3 in and the 3-in piece of hardwood may change slightly I don't think you have anything to worry about over 3 in but if you want to be careful because the last thing you would want is to have that band expand and creep up above the surface you want that to be flush so what I would do I assume you're going to dovetail the corners yes so I would only glue the top one inch go all the way around glue the top one inch the dovetail will hold the rest of it in place I don't think you're going to have a problem and now if it expands all the expansion is going to go south it's not going to step stop it's not going to jump up above and end up with a ridge right there that's the easiest way to do it now I just thought about that and that might make it a n if you've got it flush top and bottom that's that's not going to need to be that's not going to need to be held any other way other than just that top inch and you could even go top inch and a half and you'd be safe I don't think you need to worry about it all in three inches particularly if you're in a climate controlled shop and that's why it's worth going and buying a dehumidifier or something to control your humidity next question frck uh Shane from Cambridge Ontario hey Shane says I'm a member of the online Workshop building the claw style workbench with Rob's amazing shoulder and wagon Vice Hardware I'm about to cut the bench dog holes in the dog strip with the traditional upside down l-shape using a router and template rather than the straight dog holes Rob Cuts with the D stack on the table saw we love to hear Rob's thoughts on this approach okay so I have to hear the question the first time to understand what we're talking about now I need you to read it again sorry well read the main piece he says I'm about to cut the bench dog hole in the dog strip with the traditional upside down lsh shape using a router and a template rather than the straight dog holes Rob Cuts with the DAT stock on the table saw what are your thoughts on this approach so an upside down l so other words other words the bench stock is going to be wider at the top than it is at the bottom so the first question I have is okay why is it done that way and I assume it's done that way so that it won't drop all the way through well as far as I'm concerned that's an awful lot of work for for what benefit right you're not going to see that so we did this and if you watched that you you would have seen this this is another reason why I don't have any Springs in any of my pens so I took a piece of lumber and I cut I cut a slot to here I think I used a table stop but you could use a straight bit and then I went in with a a bit that's called uh what's that bit that looks it's shape of a te you use it for you you know what I mean here I I can grab it right here you use it for cutting a little uh slot on the back of a picture or anything you're going to hang on the wall I'll dig it out huh well I don't know but that sounds right because it's shape of a t where is it is that what it is yeah here it is right here right so there's the bit now the reason I I preut because when you're cutting this you've got a lot of material waste you're trying to get rid of so by cutting a slot with a straight bit first that just gives you a little less material to hog away so you go in and you cut that t- slot just like that then I took a piece of hardwood this is a piece of Binga now this is where it get a little bit complicated and I cut the I cut the Binga can you hone in on that to be a t-shaped only smaller so that I can do this I cut I drilled two holes one here and one there that went down to about oh probably that deep where my thumbs are and I took the Springs out of a couple of pens and I put the springs in the holes and then on the underside of this movable piece I drilled the same diameter hole up into this piece just a 16th of an inch or so just away for the spring to register and then I started to push this in now I can't remember what I did how did I do it so the first one wouldn't catch I must thought of oh I think that's what happened yeah so I I only put the first spring in I left the second spring out I started to slide this in until that little hole cut underneath here was past where the spring is because when you eventually get to one spot the two Springs are going to jump up into that those two little indents those two little holes and they're going to lock this in place but what it allows for it allows for tension so when you put your bench dog in there no matter where it sits it stays put which I think is a lot better solution than going through the work that you want to do unless there's a reason to make that ups that inverted L that is a benefit I don't I don't and I don't I don't know what it would be I'd love to hear if there is one other words do something like that and make it so much easier next frck I'm meta questions most you other questions um Mike from Sterling Cumbria UK in the chat hi Mike he says I don't have an air stapler but I do have an air 18ga brad nailer will the ranked small head Brads be enough to hold the ply frame sections together when gluing up uh so what Mike's asking about is when we do the when we do the base for the Cosman workbench it's we take a we take a sheet of Baltic Birch and we cut it into 3 and 78 inch strips whole bunch of them 3 and 78 because you're going to get your maximum yield actually it might have gone three and 15 16 I don't know but you have to be under four or else you wouldn't get enough on the last strip to have a 4inch piece and then we cut these into pieces into into various lengths and we had it all planned out in the video so that you get best yield so for example this one was actually done backwards this first piece no this is done right this first piece goes from right here to right there then there's a piece that goes horizontally across here and then this piece goes horizontally across there the next piece there's a short piece that goes from here to there then there's a piece that goes from here to here and then from here out the next piece in on this one goes all the way down and all the way up the next piece on here is a short piece between here and here the same thing for the next section there's four sections and the last section is a repeat of this one what it produces is a mortise or a hole in this piece created by the building blocks and it creates a Tenon on this piece that goes from here down and from here up so instead of having to go in and cut a mortise and Tenon you actually building it well that would require a lot of clamps so instead of clamping it what I used was a/ quinch crown staple gun so that means uh I sometimes we use terminology that not everybody's familiar with oh do I have any here to show you yep no that's that's a pin nailer this one might be though yeah so a quarter inch Crown refers to the width of the staple or the crown right and there's a brad nailer that he's asking about so when you drive this in you have these two legs and by the way this is a this is a heat set glue that's what that yellow is not only does it hold these together which makes it easier to load but under the friction and the heat generated by the friction of that driving into the wood that heat sets and it not only is it acting like a nail but it's actually a glued nail somewhat the same with these you can't see it but there's a heat set glue on there with this one you have this leg of the staple and that leg of the staple holding the material between it so the holding power is so much greater you use this and all you have is a little bit of wood that's underneath the head of that Brad which is not a lot now uh a nail gun only works see this on construction sites all the time a nail gun only works if the two pieces are held firmly together then you drive the nail and it holds it like that if there's a gap in here the nail is the staple unlike a hammer driven nail handheld Hammer that will drive the two pieces together but if you've got a gap under here and you drive that staple in you're still going to have a gap so it didn't do you any good so when I when we do this we glue it and then actually what I do is I push down like this and I push with enough pressure I start to see a little bit of glue and then bang hit it and then I come along here I get a little bit of squeeze out and then hit it same thing all the way along there that way you're pulling the two pieces of wood together or the two pieces of plywood together before the staple then goes in and holds them can you do the same thing with the Brad you you can but you can see how the holding power is so much better with the staple um maybe use extra extra Brads and you'd be fine but you know I I don't know what it's like he's in the UK right we can we can buy well at least we used to be able to buy a staple gun like this for $100 100 and a bit and they come in really handy so that's a 100 Canadian next Rick uh Lonnie or wait no are we giving away prizes tonight uh no I didn't post the draw Link and Luther's not here to tell us the donations oh this is a freebie hang on a second H well Ken Ken has the donations for yeah do you yeah but I don't think but we haven't broken the threshold oh we haven't we haven't shared the link we can we're at 1189 right now that's one that's one I haven't started the draw put it into next week there we go add it okay we'll add it we'll add it we'll do a big draw our next our next live is on 23rd of December so it'll be a big Christmas draw we need money oh we need money um let me just tell you about this real quick uh expenses just keep going up as everybody is well where so if you can um we could sure use it because the cost of doing this airfare just keeps going through the roof and uh it's expensive Venture so we are now a 501c3 which is registered charity in United States and we're applying for the same status in Canada which will take effect Ken sometime next year yeah mid year we hope mid year we hope it's a it's a complicated process so we'll be able to issue tax receipts for Canadians as well as Americans um can I release a number it's about 52,000 a class about 52 it costs 52,000 us per class we do six classes a year do the math on that one that was last year's numbers so um RC woodworking is picking up the tab but we'd love to share the blessings so if you uh if you want to uh reward some of these combat wounded vets um you know we would love to uh love to accept your donation and on this program we give back a nice $300 value average price $300 prize for every th000 we raise so that's probably more generous than we should be but based on the fact that we're trying to rage money to run the PHP next Rick I got I got one from Cliff McAn he said said you made the MDF workbench drop 60 by 20 why not 23 or 24 wide oh good question Cliff from where the chat the chat so Cliff I had the same question because when I started uh digging out information on workbenches I couldn't understand why these workbenches were always so narrow well once you start to use it you'll realize you cannot plane over here very effectively you certainly can't playe over there so the bulk of what you're going to do is going to be done from here to here so having this extra wide bench other than accumulating more junk really doesn't benefit you at all when it comes to a workbench if you're having an assembly table that's a different story but if you're build if you're making a bench to take the place of a traditional workbench my core section is what 18 I it's 17 17 in and you know what I've had this I I mean my last one was the same and I have never I have never said to myself shoot I wish this thing was another 14 Ines wider so it's never been an issue at all ever so I I see people they make these great big wide benches I think man they haven't they haven't been using it or else they wouldn't have done that now you you're using yeah when you buy a sheet of MDF you always get an extra inch in length and width so you certainly have the capacity I would never use the actual outside I always like to cut that away a little bit um and we don't do anything with the extra piece do we the extra the extra strip no but the way I laid it out is you take your 4 by8 sheet of uh of MDF and um we cut a 20-in strip like that and then we cut another 20in strip like that this is waist and then you come in and you cut your 60 and your 60 and there's enough left over this is your top this is your bottom and these two pieces buted together create your middle section and when everything's all glued together it's almost like one homogeneous piece anyway so no worries but that's how you get your top out of one piece you could e you could easily um make this a little bit wider because you've got there as well uh and you you can even go a little bit longer because we use six we right now we're doing we're doing 60 so this is 60 and this is 30 we've got 97 so we've got an extra we have an extra 7 in we could have we if we went 64 64 would leave us 33 that would still give us enough yeah do the math on it you could you could make it longer I don't know why we stuck with 60 inch I guess we just built around that and easier to ship that's my answer next FR all right last one this one's from Adam in the chat M it's only 10 to yeah we're done who all of us Adam in the chat says sorry if this is a repeat question how does the MDF hold up with the lateral pressure being applied to the dogs is it a lifetime bench like hardwood would be well that's a good question I think I'll take 12 minutes to answer that if I was to go and find any one of these now I I remind me to say something about hold Fest you could go out I don't well we just replaced some of the bench tops but we didn't replace them because the dog weren't out we replaced them because they've been shipped back and forth to Ontario and they got Corners knocked off from uh handling and handlers and the shipping company but we've never worn out a dog hole and what I do with mine is I use cyan acrylate in the first inch or so just soak Li uh thin cyan acate in there and that'll stiffen that real up well but even without that it's never never ever been an issue but again you're not you're not you're not using that to make apple cider and squeezing apples you're just holding a piece so that it doesn't move people stand on those handles and say no you don't have to do that moderate moderation in all things now a hold fast is a device that looks like a big modified seven and you would put your hold fast down in the hole and has a the the modified end of the seven would sit on here and as you drive it down here it leverages itself in there and it holds that piece firmly I don't know what that's going to do to your dog holes I don't use them but I would think you could get away with it but never had an issue with the bench dogs damaging the uh the bench tops we've got bench stops out there that have been how many years seven the first benches we made were built what year did we make that 2016 2016 when we when we made a whole bunch of yeah well no that was 17 and we made a whole bunch we still have those some of those so no it's it's really durable it's durable and if you get the waterproof stuff then it's almost I wouldn't say it's indestructible but what's durable I mean if you got 10 years out of $150 sheet of mbf yeah you could probably you could you could glue another section on top of it if if you did if you needed to but you're right it's pretty inexpensive all right I got one more oh good uh this is from Randy in the chat he says when building the composite top to a Cosman workbench how do you ensure the first and subsequent sheets slal project are flat that's a good question frck Ken do you have any more vets to say hello to no okay so how do you make sure the first and second ones are flat so if you're doing it per our video then I mentioned this earlier you've got to go in you build your base first it's not hard to make sure that the stretchers those are the top pieces that run horizontally the stretchers are flush with the top of the uprights and assuming that your uprights are the same meaning they're the same width and the same height you assemble it you make sure that all the top corners are flush and then you put your winding sticks across this end and across that end like we we showed you you have to imagine IM the Top's not on here so I would set this winding stick on the top of that stretcher and I would put this winding stick on top of this stretcher and then I would sight down there and make sure the two top edges are parallel if they're not if I need to wedge one corner a little bit I will and and you can get really accurate you could get within a couple of th by sighting and using your winding sticks believe it or not it's actually quite easy once you've got that set then you're going to set your first piece of MDF on there and you're going to center it so you've got a little bit of overhang there and you got a little bit overhang there but not as much as what you'll eventually have when you attach your Vie so this whole thing would be moved down a little bit so you've got pretty good coverage I suppose if you wanted to you could even go in there and figure out a way to add another piece onto here and onto there another extension of that horizontal piece so that you had support out there as well and again it would be flushed with the top and then that's as uh that's as good as you're going to get in terms of holding that first piece nice and flat and that's why one of the reasons why I encourage people to use the 1-in MDF it's going to tend to be flatter than the 3/4 inch MDF thanks frck another one frck did one more come in how do donations do Ken they didn't move my speech didn't work Anthony antonucci says Rob can you recommend any good plans for building a portable workbench thank you this is a portable workbench so Willie our 82-year-old retired fabricator takes these bench casters Jake do you want to tell them about the new things we just got no okay fine not in the mood you don't like it no I don't know yet that's why I don't want to talk to well you already you mounted them yeah I don't know yet you don't know yet Willie takes the casters takes them apart welds on an extra steel plate to stiffen them up because that's the problem we found and then paints them up so they look like new and now they'll hold the weight and they're really easy to operate in fact it's even easier we did a video on this too where we tied used a piece of hardwood to tie the two together so instead of having to use this one or manipulate four you only have to manipulate two so you just step on that piece of hardwood that ties those two tabs together and you can either disengage or engage and then you can move it to wherever you need when you get it where you want it you drop them out way to go so if that's what you're talking about portability that's the best that's the best answer for that we ship this B and and if you take that bench over there that doesn't have the cabinets in it Ken what's the dimension we ship we make these and sell them as well cuz a lot of people don't have the capacity to make it when that's all boxed up what's the dimension2 so we we we sell them in a box in a in a plywood box Kevin makes them 67 67 is the length by 25 so the Box ends up being 67 in Long by 25 in wide well with our cleats it's 10 without cleats just the Box seven by seven inches tall and that that whole thing goes in there it's nice and Compact and and the assembly time when you buy it new is 10 minutes 10 minutes you can put it together certainly you can take it apart in 10 minutes it's really really simple um but it's sturdy and this could be your one and only bench Troy would like to comment that you could be a leg model Troy yeah Troy Troy Clark I'm will be tun what's Troy Clark doing on there be L mou so Troy's our goalie I know we're not very fussy he also works for uh oh I can't even say who he works for that's top secret hi Troy Troy's our goalie best goalie we have only that's over 50 that's on here tonight yeah yeah wow Troy I'm impressed you spent two hours on here dude you need to get a hobby are we done Frick uh yeah any more questions let's cut her huh let's cut it for now all right it's nine o'clock nine o'clock our time 8:00 third time so we'll see you again our last one before Christmas will be on the 23rd we'll have we'll make it a special night was Santa Claus on tonight did anybody notice I didn't see him Santa M CLA maybe we'll have them on and uh we give away lots of prizes so we'll actually give away a couple of Christmas prizes are we going to do that thing Jake that we talked about the giveaway not my realm anymore who's is it social media oh who's the social media expert Frei what oh stay tuned so if you're not on our newsletter get on our newsletter we're going to start giving we're going to give away some prizes just just to be nice from uh sometime for the 10 what's that song how many days of Christmas 14 days Christmas it's 12 Days 12 Days of Christmas no wait no on the yeah it's only 12 that's for the birds in the tree the birds in the bees or the birds in the tree just birds in the tree so we're going to give away one we're going to give away a nice little prize we'll draw the names from our newsletter guess what you need to do no not doing that sorry I messed it up no what are we doing social media so that so that people know who won and and the people that won can be identified not just a a name and Emil oh so we're going to do it through Instagram and Facebook yes okay so follow us on Instagram and Facebook and you might win a prize or you might not or you might or you might not but we'll try to give you some good content Frick's going to get really busy we'll film a bunch of Instagrams this week you watch our watch our YouTube channel we try to give you good education on there so you learn what to do with these there's sales all this month flash sales they only last for 24 hours we had just tell them a quick not what was the last cx1 are on right now right now kx1 are on how much off 25 $25 off a cx1 and that's good for until noon tomorrow uh this on the weekend we had on the weekend it's Friday oh yeah okay what did we do this week we did Mark Eng gauges one 24hour period how much off on those 20 bucks 20 on a cosmed mark and gug cosed Mark and gauge it's 25% off did we do that with the saws too dtail saws dovetail saws were 20% 20% off dovetail saws you missed that one or maybe you didn't anyway so we're going to have more of those for the month of December so get on our newsletter that's where we advertise have a wonderful uh December we'll see you here just before Christmas thank you for uh participating really appreciate your help if you know any combat wounded veterans send them our way robcosman.com you go on there and apply to uh accepted into our uh program first class starts in April we do six every year it's a six- day class for the Vets we take care of all their expenses every vet takes home five in Canadian in American dollars $4,000 worth of Premium tools and thanks to Jack Lane and uh Jim merti up in monton and all the volunteers that we have around the world oh I got to say a shout out to uh David Hicks David hick so David Hicks was a Vietnam vet in our class last summer he actually is an American but he lives intario he's very ill he's had uh cancer surgery and uh please remember him in your prayers David thinking of you brother um was great to have him here and a thank big thanks to his friend that notified us about this I don't know whether he wants to be named or not but he knows who he is all right you guys have a wonderful month we'll see you in a couple [Music] weeks [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music]

Channel: RobCosman.com

Views: 12,771

Keywords: Rob Cosman Live, best table saw, table saw, table saw reviews 2021, best table saws reviews, top table saws, best table saw 2021, best table saws, table saws reviews, best table saw 2020, table saw review, table saw blades, table saw accessories

Id: HCMo7a1NNVs

Length: 122min 40sec (7360 seconds)

Published: Sat Dec 09 2023