I have come across something I didn't think existed. A bench!

Rumour has it that I might have a couple of those somewhere in the garage. Maybe I should try this " spend some time tidying up in my workshop " idea – though it is rather a strange concept. Should I be brave enough to try this "tidying up", what do I do with all the "stuff" ?

Nigel B.

Be very careful. There are many blurry photographs of alleged work benches that you see snapped by people in your situation. Usually taken on the fly, through piles of junk, as they catch an unexpected glimpse of the alleged work bench. But careful follow up research by qualified shedologists has failed to find conclusive proof that such a thing exists in reality.

Many of them are simply large sheets of plywood laid flat on top of a pile of junk at some point in the past by someone who then went on to build up a further pile of junk on the top of the plywood. When the top pile is removed, the piece of revealed junk plywood can often be mistaken by the amateur for a workbench.

Giveaway signs usually include the pile of solid junk underneath the flat, alleged benchtop-like flat surface and sometimes a second sheet of junk plywood laid flat on top of an initial layer of junk about halfway between the top flat surface and the garage floor, giving the impression of a storage shelf. Often this faux shelf is covered with half used tins of paint so old it has turned solid in a bid to approximate benchness.

The presence of a vice attached to one end of the top flat surface is not regarded as proof of benchness. Over the years many merry pranksters have attached vices to pieces of scrap plywood, old doors laid flat and the like in order to fool unsuspecting bench-seekers.

One way to test what you have for true benchness is to take a small, round, very expensive and totally irreplaceable component from any rare mechanical device and place it in the centre of the flat surface you have uncovered. If the part rolls immediately toward the wall behind the flat surface then disappears down the gap, never to be seen again, it's a bench.

I know I had a bench in the shed once because a tiny bit of it is still there. I think a time lord is slowly dragging it into the past as I have hazy visions of long abandoned projects disappearing into the distance where the end should be.

Dek

One thing's for sure… model-engineering is the hobby least likely to be taken up by a Feng-Shui Consultant.

Could be a challenge to them though…

'

'" Yes, I understand the lathe should be aligned NNE by SSW with the headstock at that end… but its 7 feet long, the shed's barely six wide and I've to stand on this side to use it… '"

'

Hopper – the part that vanishes never to be seen again, will be. Only, long after you've made a replacement, when looking for some other small part that's rolled off the bench or that which passeth for such; and has become invisible in its turn.

It's long been my intention to have a bench, but something I have not got round to in this new house (well three years is a short time to do anything really).

The absence of a bench can be limiting, there is nowhere to leave part built projects while a start another project.

Every horizontal surface is pressed into use instead of using a bench, milling tables, lathe trays, shaper vices, all become storage spaces for varies items over time.

Similarly I lose floor area when pressing it into service as a temporary tool box. Most of my tools have permanent homes but find themselves relegated to the floor until I need them again.

The upside is that my flexibility and core strength is maintained as I dance my way between various islands of floor space in the shop, gracefully navigating the table of tooling. Until that is I am halted by finding a long lost item with a shin or hip.

If I had room for a beach I know it would soon be engulfed in the same kind of mess the rest of the shop enjoys, so I soldier on without one.

Maybe I will use this quiet time to clear away some of the stuff to its rightful place, then spend the recovery period looking for it.

Mick