I decided to stop posting every time I did something on the bench to get it built but I have been taking photos along the way and will post these over the next week or two now that the bench is complete.
Just the tail vice to finish off and most of the machine work has been done on the components.
I'm dry fitting the dovetails at the moment which is hard work; there is so much friction inside a dovetail on a 70 mm thick component you have to really beat on it to get the joint to close and again to get them apart.
It's a fine balance; take too much off and the joints will be sloppy but leave too much on and you run the risk of them not closing when glue is added into the equation and everything start to swell up.
I'll let you know how I get on...
Measure Twice, Cut Once... Redesign, Measure Again...
The bench frame components were cut to length, excluding the angled rear legs which would be cut to length when the tenons at the top are cut.
I was checking the components before marking out mortices and noticed I'd rotated the angled rear foot cut through 90 degrees... Oops!
This would change the orientation of all the 70 x 90 mm components so that they measure 70 mm viewed from the front of the bench.
This wasn't a problem as the legs were still over-length so I could simply recut the rear feet but I decided that I prefer the idea of having the side frames with components measuring 70 mm at the front.
So it back to the drawing board to redraw the side frames.
I took this opportunity to include a detail a student who started after me will use on his bench which involves notching the bottom of the stretcher tenon so they sit lower over the bottom side rail joint.
I'm using 70 x 150 mm deep bottom side rails and stretchers and chose to notch both the top of the side rail tenon and the bottom of the stretcher tenon to keep both joints as strong as possible.
This whole area wasn't easy to visualize when I was redrawing the joints and I had a few nervous moments cutting these mortices.
One of the good things with the course is that there are students at different stages working alongside you which lets you discuss plans and incorporate ideas you might not have come up with working alone.
The redesign means I've increased the size of the opening between the legs and the underside of the bench top and the top of the stretcher.
Students have used this space to house a set of drawers similar to an auto mechanic's tool chest. I'm not planning a tool chest of this type but by increasing the size of the opening I've kept my options open.
I'll be discussing cutting mortices next...
I was checking the components before marking out mortices and noticed I'd rotated the angled rear foot cut through 90 degrees... Oops!
This would change the orientation of all the 70 x 90 mm components so that they measure 70 mm viewed from the front of the bench.
This wasn't a problem as the legs were still over-length so I could simply recut the rear feet but I decided that I prefer the idea of having the side frames with components measuring 70 mm at the front.
So it back to the drawing board to redraw the side frames.
I took this opportunity to include a detail a student who started after me will use on his bench which involves notching the bottom of the stretcher tenon so they sit lower over the bottom side rail joint.
I'm using 70 x 150 mm deep bottom side rails and stretchers and chose to notch both the top of the side rail tenon and the bottom of the stretcher tenon to keep both joints as strong as possible.
This whole area wasn't easy to visualize when I was redrawing the joints and I had a few nervous moments cutting these mortices.
One of the good things with the course is that there are students at different stages working alongside you which lets you discuss plans and incorporate ideas you might not have come up with working alone.
The redesign means I've increased the size of the opening between the legs and the underside of the bench top and the top of the stretcher.
Students have used this space to house a set of drawers similar to an auto mechanic's tool chest. I'm not planning a tool chest of this type but by increasing the size of the opening I've kept my options open.
I'll be discussing cutting mortices next...
Finishing the tail vice screw
All the frame components have been machined to final dimension and I've made a start on trimming them to length before cutting mortices.
The maple screw I ordered from the US arrived last week, it's beautifully machined and I'm looking forward to working on the tail vice.
I've given the threaded parts several coats of danish oil in accordance with the instructions on the manufacturer's website and will wax them for smooth running prior to final assembly of the tail vice.
The hub and handle have had several coats of wax, I chose a simple wax finish for the exposed parts to keep them as close as possible to unfinished maple - bench tops here are typically left unfinished.
I picked up a nice Record 52 1/2 quick release vice on Ebay a while ago which will be fitted to the bench before making a start on the tail vice but there's a lot of work to be done before that...