New Workbench - Part 2 - Beginning to Build the Top

I ended up buying some 2x12x8 Southern Yellow Pine on sale for the top. For now this is a better alternative to using some of the reclaimed oak I've brought home recently. I'll save that for future furniture projects down the road a bit. Final dimensions of the top will be 6'x2'x2.5". I know for some the thicknes may not be thick enough but for me it's a balance between budget and the type of work I do.

The 2x12's were ripped to 2 1/2 inch widths, marked for grain direction and surface planed to make them all the same thickness. Sorry, no jointer as of yet, not a perfect solution I know but I have to make due with what I have. Each of the 2 1/2 inch strips are then glued up in sets of 4 to make 4 large individual sections. Those individual section will then be jointed with my No. 8 Stanley and then surface planed to uniform thickness. Then they will be glued in to one large piece that will eventually be flattened with the jointer plane once they are attached to the legs.

The photos are from the a glue up of one individual section and one section that has already been glued and jointed.

New Workbench - Part 1

Time for a new workbench. For some reason I woke up one morning and that is the thought that popped in to my head and I just went with it. Could be something to do with the fact that my current, scrapped together, workbench has finally overstayed it's welcome in my shop. Could also have something to do with the fact that I recently finished reading Christopher Schwarz's book Workbenches: From Design And Theory To Construction And Use. Good book by the way. I've also had a new vise sitting around for about a year that I was planning to put on a new workbench - retrofitting the old one to fit the vise was not really an option. Sort of like putting new wine in old wineskins.

Initially I thought I would use all reclaimed materials but I opted to use some Southern Yellow Pine that was on sale at a local home center for the top. I'm still using reclaimed lumber for the base which includes the legs and the stretchers.

The photos are some of the 2x4's that I pulled from a small barn/shed late last fall. They were pretty rough but a few passed throught the planer did wonders.

Reclaimed 2x4's before removing the nails and planning. One important thing to note here is that I use a Lumber Wizard III to check for any remaining metal or nail fragments that may have been missed when pulling nails.

Legs beginning to take shape. Here they are cut to size and aligned so the grain is going the same direction for further planning.

Leg blanks getting glued up in one shot.