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Drawers and Top

Workbench continued….

Under the hand tool drawer I like to keep all the various chemicals I use when building models. I had this arrangement in the last bench and it seemed to work very well. I am going to add two drawers here.

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The drawers are simple boxes, plywood bottom and sides made of finger jointed birch door casing material. Lots of clamps makes the difference between a nice square drawer and a frustrating job. Prior to driving in any screws the pieces are glued, clamped and pre-drilled, this ensures a tight joint.

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Nice and square and should be the right size to hold what I need.

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The drawer fronts are glued and screwed in place from behind. Full extension drawer slides are installed.

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A bit of trim is added to the sides of the drawers to dress up the edges a bit. Drawer pulls still need to be added and the drawers will be complete.

Laminating the top

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I have used several materials over the years for tops of workbenches with varying degrees of satisfaction. Vinyl flooring, vinyl tiles, painted plywood, painted MDF, plastic laminate, hardwood and softwood. Geez, I’ve built a lot of benches over the years….

This time I am using 1/4″ tempered Masonite. Mainly because I like the colour, a nice chocolate brown that will match the trim in the room nicely, plus it is very hard and should wear well. I will varnish the top when completed.

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The top is glued in place with latex contact cement. Contact cement is applied to both surfaces and let to completely dry, about 40 minutes.

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One thing about contact cement is that when the two surfaces touch each other, it is stuck, permanently. There is no second chance. A trick to help get the laminate in place is to lay a bunch of sticks on the top and lay the laminate onto the sticks. This allows the laminate to be moved precisely into position.

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Once in position the sticks are pulled out one by one slowly lowering the laminate onto the top. The surfaces are pressed together and the bond is complete.

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This process is repeated for the other half of the bench.

About the Author:

I'm your host, Tim Warris, a product developer in Port Dover, Ontario. Since March of 2007 I have been documenting the construction of the former CNJ Bronx Terminal in HO scale. For my day job, I design track building tools for Fast Tracks, a small company I own and operate. Fast Tracks makes it fast and easy to hand lay your own trackwork. Stop by our website to learn more!

Posted by: Tim | 11-24-2007 | 12:11 AM
Posted in: Latest Posts | Work Bench

4 Comments »

  1. Tim,

    I’m very impressed. Your workbench it’s definately the more accurately built I’ve ever seen. Looks like lots of great work can be done in such a neat environment.

    Denny

    Comment by Denny Turani — November 24, 2007 @ 5:51 am
  2. is this project being sponsered by Labatts?

    Comment by rob wilton — November 24, 2007 @ 10:50 am
  3. Denny,

    Thanks for the feedback. Its been fun to build and should provide a nice environment to work in, but I am at heart a slob and will have it sufficiently messed up in no time…

    -Tim

    Comment by Tim — November 26, 2007 @ 2:46 pm
  4. “is this project being sponsered by Labatts?”

    It should be….

    Comment by Tim — November 26, 2007 @ 2:46 pm

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